The beta test of Nixon’s new root shooter First Defendant has been over. Is it because of the expectation of the first root shooter game in Korea? First Dependent announced a smooth start by recording 36,768 concurrent users on the first day of the beta test.
Beta tests were able to experience most of the games, including basic battles, producing and fostering inheritance, and raids. Thanks to this, it was enough to grasp the charm and unfortunate of the game that First Dependent pursued. How was the overall evaluation of this beta test that could be experienced not only in Korea but also abroad? I would like to summarize the reviews based on domestic and foreign communities and media evaluation.
First Dependent
At the time of its first release, many people remembered the Destiny Guardians of Bulgaria. The SF worldview was adopted in the same genre and the setting of preventing the invasion of alien forces was certainly similar. In addition to this setting, the developer mentioned that it is being developed by referring to the Destiny Guardians, so it was natural to speculate that the overall gameplay would be similar to the game.
However, First Dependent, which he actually did, was more likely to be the first Warframe of Digital Extreme Company than Destiny Guardians. More precisely, the frame that makes up the game is Destiny Guardians, but it is Warframe to fill it up.
However, the characters of the character by creating and fostering the character of the successor and collecting various weapons and runes. In other words, the method of strengthening numbers felt closer to the way of fostering authentic MMORPGs rather than a general root shooter. Since Nixon has been developing MMORPG since the past, I think it would have been this structure by adding shooting action to the most familiar way.
First Defendant’s attractive point, which you can see through this beta test, can be summarized by using the grappling hook, the fun of fostering various successors, and collecting and strengthening runes to create your own build and raise specifications. The core is a build design that combines the successor and runes.
In the game, there are five runes that affect the weapon type and a successor rune that enhances the inheritance specifications. Runes have a variety of effects, such as simply increasing attack power, shortening of gunshots, reducing headshot range, and assisting elemental attacks, and combining the position and runes of the successor can further increase the effect of the skill.
For example, Bernie, who has been the most popular in the beta test, moves at a high speed and plays an electric attribute attack. In order to assist this play style, there is a low reload time and a close-up attack power, and it is a focus on the damage to the electrical properties, the damage to the scope of the scope, the reduction of reload time, the automatic reload during the movement, and the damage to non-aiming. If you use a rune such as, you can operate the character in the direction of bunny’s fast movement and electrical properties.
After the official launch, more successors and runes will appear, making it possible to build a variety of builds. In addition, due to the nature of build construction and fostering games, new runes can produce different synergy with past characters, and may have more than update numbers.
However, the building, which was presented in the beta test, was so simple that it would not come to mind what kind of virtuous cycle will be achieved in the future. The rune effect mentioned earlier could be seen as a basic specification if it was a root shooter. To be precise, it was based on runes that influenced the characters of the character. You can think of it as a way to play a stronger effect on what you could do, not to add runes to play.
It is certainly a great growth of the successor to become stronger. The pleasure gained by catching the boss that was struggling is also one of the fun elements that can be obtained from these training games.
However, in terms of the game of making your own build, the way of fostering only the figures can lead to the uniformity of the build. The skills and play styles are different for each inheritance, so if you eventually lead to the play of damage with damage, it is likely that only the successor who can focus on the damage in the shortest time as much as possible will be loved.
Therefore, if you want to prevent this trend in the future, it is likely that many runes that can be effective in conjunction with the ability of the successor, not the strengthening rune-based rune, which were introduced in the beta test, should be given.
Evaluation of domestic and overseas gamers
The evaluation of domestic gamers toward First Defendant was quite unfavorable. Since the root shooter genre is not popular, it is important to keep in mind that there may be many gamers who are new to it. Among the gamers who had previously enjoyed the root shooter, Hole was divided, among which Warframe users generally responded positively. This is interpreted as being used to the way of creating a successor and strengthening with runes.
Most of the positive evaluations were stylish battles using graphics and grappling hooks, and interceptors fighting with a giant boss. The graphics still had a lack of optimization, so there was a lot of regret, but there were many evaluations that they were able to watch the latest game-like graphics.
The action using the grappling hook was also good because it could use the map in three dimensions. In particular, it could be used as a part of the battle, not just a mobile machine, such as attacking the enemy, attacking the boss’s weaknesses, or destroying the weaknesses of the boss.
Unlike other root shooter genres, intercepts were well received in terms of rapidly targeting the boss by actively using the specifications of the fostered characters. The appearance of the giant and the patterns were quite diverse, and it was fun because there was a difference in how to target the weaknesses.
The design between the successor was to some extent. Some said that they had no personality in the appearance of the K-game style too much, but most of them mentioned that the taste was good thanks to its beautiful appearance and design. As a result, the decorating elements of the successor customization and skin were often expected.
On the other hand, the unfortunate thing was the monotony of weapons and builds, a flat blow, UI and convenience, and level design. What was unfortunate in the build was mentioned earlier, and the monotony of the weapons was one of the gamers’ sympathy. Each weapon felt that the features were not clear, and there were times when they could not find a reason to use various weapons.
A flat blow is also one of the things that adds to the monotony of the weapon. There was an opinion that even the shots that had to show the most powerful shots showed a sad blow, and the power of a particular weapon, such as a rocket launcher, was also found.
The UI and convenience are also one of the most frequent regrets. Considering the beta test, the design configuration was slightly old, and it was inconvenient because it was not provided properly in terms of convenience such as bag size, item cleanup, batch disassembly, and runner strengthening. The item rooting was also narrow, so it stopped, so it seemed to interfere with the flow of battle.
Finally, I could find a regret from the level design. It feels too repeated when the route to grow characters such as map and monster design, story configuration, and party system. In particular, there was an opinion that the party system was sometimes meaningless as it did not proceed with the same mission.
On the other hand, unlike Korea, where the root shooter is not known much, many root shooters such as Destiny Guardians, War frames, and Division have been established. In other words, First Defendant must take out the stones that are embedded in order to succeed abroad.
Overseas gamers also knew this, because most of the evaluations were compared with the existing root shooter games mentioned earlier. The advantages and disadvantages were not much different compared to domestic gamers, but there were more regrets about the most important shooters in the root shooter.
Destiny Guardians, which occupy the most pies, are characterized by the combat itself solving the puzzles, rather than simply shooting the enemy with a gun. In particular, raids provide fun that different from RPG’s raid as these puzzle elements are diversified. Simple shooting structures such as First Defendant can be quite monotonous in the overseas user’s point of view.
Compared to Warframe, it is much faster, so there is a lot of difference in combat methods except for the development structure at the current level. Eventually, it was designed in a structure similar to the existing root shooter game, but it was often found that the depth of content, development method, and story of First Defendant was often found.
However, it is too early to compare the game that has just finished the beta test and the game that has accumulated the know-how of the root shooter genre for a long time, such as Destiny. Most of the route shooters released so far have received a bad evaluation at the beginning of the launch, and when you think that the update has been made to some extent, the current evaluation can be reversed at any time.
Therefore, First Defendant’s work is relatively clear. It is to actively accept the feedback obtained through this test and to be attracted as a root shooter game until the official launch. Fortunately, domestic gamers look at First Dependent. Most of the gamers sent a message of support over Nixon Games, which challenges the new genre, and there were many evaluations that the gameplay itself was fun even though it was unfortunate.
Earlier, Nixon Games is a beta test species