APB is by no means a game to avoid, it is a game to take into consideration before buying however. After playing for over 100 hours on both criminal and enforcer characters, heres what I took away from the game.
Customisation is key, this is what the developers have clearly spent all of their time working on. You are expected to spend a large percentage of your time getting your character truly unique, which during the beta felt odd due to the inevitable wipe. It did not however stop me experimenting and getting to a stage where I felt comfortable enough using the tools, they are designed with enough fidelity to allow your creations to come to life, with the right amount of work.
Of course not everyone will want to spend hours playing with the tools to get a good look, gang clothing is avaliable from the vendors to provide a quick and easy alternative look, albeit not unique.
The mission structure works well for the type of game, there is a feeling of progression and working your way up the ranks through reputation gives a steady flow of income and rewards. It does however get to feel like the same endless fetch quest after the first two or three 'pledges'. This is broken up by the occasional cat and mouse mission that may be thrown to the enforcers, allowing them to chase after a criminal who has been witnessed committing a crime. This is fine for the enforcer, who can choose to take the mission or ignore it. However criminals are never safe, usually when first entering an area someone will instantly be dispatched against you, so leaving your character in an action district is a strict no-no. There were many times I simply went to get a drink only to come back and find I'd been killed.
The community is at the head of this game, if you can find a good group of players to level your pledges with, the game becomes a lot more fun. Group play will offer more reputation and cash, as well as generally more challenging or interesting missions. Instead of a 3 stage mission involving nothing but graffiti, it may change into a protect the VIP which becomes a PvP frenzy.
This does however bring one huge problem, if you fall behind in APB, you notice it fast. Even in beta there were rank 230+ players who had essentially broken the game, with guns and upgrades that allowed them to dominate over everyone else as the matchmaking was based on 'threat level', something temporary that rises or lowers depending on mission success.
The final point that needs to be made is about the simply horrible combat, for a game that has been in development for so long it feels clunky as all hell. With no headshots, all shots are valued the same. Being killed by someone spamming your foot with an N-Tec (the games AK-47) is never a good feeling and simply leads to frustration, even moreso when you're killed as you run behind a wall because your laggy hitbox is still behing shot.
The game is worth trying if you are willing to invest the time into character creation and are a community player who will look for a gang who you find it easy to play/socialise with. If you want to play a well designed online shooter, avoid this game, there are far better options avaliable to you without monthly fees in many cases. Also anyone purchasing this game should...no...MUST have a powerful PC. This game eats through your ram and cpu, it will also demand a huge amount of bandwith due to its constant pulling and sending of information thanks to the huge amount of customisation.
Hope this opinion has helped some of you out there, questions welcome about any aspect of the game, thanks for reading my novel.
APB Reloaded
Game » consists of 8 releases. Released Jun 29, 2010
Better known as the free-to-play "APB: Reloaded", APB is a MMO third-person shooter by the developers of Crackdown. Players choose between the hard-boiled law enforcers or the feared criminals as they try to stop the opposing faction's objectives.
An honest opinion, from playing the game beta to test world
I'd love to read your opinion, but since the game has a subscription and im not gonna buy it anyway, i wont read that wall of text sorry
"I'd love to read your opinion, but since the game has a subscription and im not gonna buy it anyway, i wont read that wall of text sorry "
Hardly a wall of text. Well written, spaced out, paragraphs.
I read it. Seems like the major element for me, gameplay, is lacking in the game. Though I am a BIG BIG fan of customising stuff.
Customization sounds cool, but that should almost never be the major focus of the developers, in my opinion. It should be more of a feature. Games like forza would still work without the paint customization but this game sounds like it puts too much into it.
" I wouldn't call the gunplay awful. It's decent enough, it's easy to aim. Though I'd argue the guns could use a bit of rebalancing "Agreed with you there, its easy enough to aim. For a game thats been so long in development and is marketed as an fps however, I'm sure you can relate that the 'game' seems to be lacking. There have been worse shooters put out, looking at things such as Global Agenda, but this is by no means a good system currently, it needs more adding to be a compelling game.
" @Pinworm45 said:I completely agree. I'm just saying, of all the problems it has, I don't think the gunplay specifically is the worst one, which is why I find it weird that people keep calling it as such" I wouldn't call the gunplay awful. It's decent enough, it's easy to aim. Though I'd argue the guns could use a bit of rebalancing "Agreed with you there, its easy enough to aim. For a game thats been so long in development and is marketed as an fps however, I'm sure you can relate that the 'game' seems to be lacking. There have been worse shooters put out, looking at things such as Global Agenda, but this is by no means a good system currently, it needs more adding to be a compelling game. "
" @Pinworm45 said:I think the shooting aspect is accessible enough for people who aren't good at FPS like modern warfare to hold their own." I wouldn't call the gunplay awful. It's decent enough, it's easy to aim. Though I'd argue the guns could use a bit of rebalancing "Agreed with you there, its easy enough to aim. For a game thats been so long in development and is marketed as an fps however, I'm sure you can relate that the 'game' seems to be lacking. There have been worse shooters put out, looking at things such as Global Agenda, but this is by no means a good system currently, it needs more adding to be a compelling game. "
" @MysteriousFawx said:I'm interested as to what you think the worst problem is, as you stated it does have a few. I'll take a guess that its either to do with weapon/upgrade balance or their current payment 'plan'." @Pinworm45 said:I completely agree. I'm just saying, of all the problems it has, I don't think the gunplay specifically is the worst one, which is why I find it weird that people keep calling it as such "" I wouldn't call the gunplay awful. It's decent enough, it's easy to aim. Though I'd argue the guns could use a bit of rebalancing "Agreed with you there, its easy enough to aim. For a game thats been so long in development and is marketed as an fps however, I'm sure you can relate that the 'game' seems to be lacking. There have been worse shooters put out, looking at things such as Global Agenda, but this is by no means a good system currently, it needs more adding to be a compelling game. "
"I'd love to read your opinion, but since the game has a subscription and im not gonna buy it anyway, i wont read that wall of text sorry "
Kindly do some research as well ..... there is no subscription if you dont want one. I personaly think this is hands down the best way to go about pricing any MMO, as jeff said around the starwars release if your paying x amount a month you feel obligated to play or your getting ripped off
APB is allowing you to play the game hardcore style through a sub or more casual through game time. I like the game but i cant see my self using the 60 hours ive got in game time from just paying 26 pounds for the game dissapearing any time soon.
to summerise.....no sub if you dont want and best way for casual ppl to get into an MMO is the pay as you go pricing
" @Pinworm45 said:Neither, IMO the worst problem APB has is a severe lack of content." @MysteriousFawx said:I'm interested as to what you think the worst problem is, as you stated it does have a few. I'll take a guess that its either to do with weapon/upgrade balance or their current payment 'plan'. "" @Pinworm45 said:I completely agree. I'm just saying, of all the problems it has, I don't think the gunplay specifically is the worst one, which is why I find it weird that people keep calling it as such "" I wouldn't call the gunplay awful. It's decent enough, it's easy to aim. Though I'd argue the guns could use a bit of rebalancing "Agreed with you there, its easy enough to aim. For a game thats been so long in development and is marketed as an fps however, I'm sure you can relate that the 'game' seems to be lacking. There have been worse shooters put out, looking at things such as Global Agenda, but this is by no means a good system currently, it needs more adding to be a compelling game. "
Seriously, 2 extremely small maps that both look very similar with missions that get repetitive fast. Generic FPS games that throw in multilayer for no reason have more land area than APB, and for an MMO that's just absurd. I know they're adding more districts, but right now it's pretty bad.
Here is the problem at hand though:
Say headshots did do more damage than body shots? The way the guns currently are, people would be popping off headshots and everyone would be dieing instantly. The guns are just too accurate right now, especially the N-tec.
" Here is the problem at hand though: Say headshots did do more damage than body shots? The way the guns currently are, people would be popping off headshots and everyone would be dieing instantly. The guns are just too accurate right now, especially the N-tec. "Yeah, there's a lot of balancing to be had. I think one hit box is fine. It's seems to me that the better weapon w/ upgrades you have the better you are, and not your skill. That is a real problem in my eyes. That means the other person will beat you 95% of the time if he has better stuff. At least with games like Counter-Strike, it takes real skill and practice to get good.
" @CowMuffins said:Exactly. And, I can see why they're in there because it wants some "mmo elements". But its a problem because of the leveling system and how the matchmaking works. You could be level 10 and a level 17 guy could be matched with you. Obviously the level 17 guy is going to have more upgrades." Here is the problem at hand though: Say headshots did do more damage than body shots? The way the guns currently are, people would be popping off headshots and everyone would be dieing instantly. The guns are just too accurate right now, especially the N-tec. "Yeah, there's a lot of balancing to be had. I think one hit box is fine. It's seems to me that the better weapon w/ upgrades you have the better you are, and not your skill. That is a real problem in my eyes. That means the other person will beat you 95% of the time if he has better stuff. At least with games like Counter-Strike, it takes real skill and practice to get good. "
The game is broken. It honestly is broken. I wanted to love this game, and had fun in the KttC. But when you get to the real game, you find out that just past 10 hours the game becomes a boring clusterfuck of overpowered weapons and mediocre missions.
I only enjoy the customization. Unfortunately, you have to level up to unlock more clothing and accessories.
" I only enjoy the customization. Unfortunately, you have to level up to unlock more clothing and accessories. "Thats the one thing I found amazingly strange, I can understand needing to level to unlock faction specific clothing with their designs and style. But the need to grind to unlock even something as simple as shapes in the logo editor or a hoodie, just seemed way overkill when all people want to do is get in the world and make the perfect look for their character.
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