Evolve

[Fly_Guy16]

Played as the monster and instantly froze when I spawned. Frozen for like 1 min and came back to the winning screen. good game. 10/10

[cairdazar]

Just a FYI if you have XCOM on steam you are in the alpha no action needed, just check your library.

[Wi1D_K4rD]

Just a FYI if you have XCOM on steam you are in the alpha no action needed, just check your library.

Sweet! Thanks for the heads up! I definitely wouldn't have noticed it otherwise.

[bitesizebeef]

So, after playing on both Xbox one and PC, I feel the game is much better on the xbox. The game runs smoother, has less connection problems. I also get the feeling that it is a fun niche game, one that will have large amounts of people coming for a few games here and there, but never staying as a top played game. They have a few really good concepts with the hunter squad, sniper doesn't do a ton of damage but it applied a debuff to the monster so other members do more damage ect.. However even with these fun and interesting concepts I feel like the hunters overall are lackluster.

[SeraphiM0352]

Just a FYI if you have XCOM on steam you are in the alpha no action needed, just check your library.

goddamit!

well the good news is i now have a bunch of extra keys if anyone needs one

[matsif]

day 2:

negatives first, matchmaking and load times are still atrocious and I experienced my first crash this morning. Game is still fairly stable and 1 crash in a bunch of hours for an alpha is acceptable for me. They've patched matchmaking twice now and it still will swap from taking forever to bugging out and starting the game with only 4 people, thus forcing someone in the party to be the monster, leading to a couple interesting rounds with gwyn as the monster. I also got randomly DC'd from the middle of a round and could not rejoin despite the game only having a bot in the character I got booted from.

fought my first kraken today (2nd monster, the one in the first video of the thread in the top post), and it is ridiculously OP. Can easily one shot people at the 2nd evolution with its lightning strike and the banshee mine things it tosses are extremely annoying. Not to mention it flies and can't really be taken down. I have yet to beat it.

I also played a bunch more medic and support:
For medic:
-Val is still terrible despite the tranq rifle being more effective against the kraken than against the goliath, but Lazarus is awesome. His revive tool saving people from losing health permanently from normal revives is a huge plus, not to mention he's just more effective at reviving than anyone else. Oh, and he can revive dead teammates within 45 seconds instead of just downed teammates. Definitely better than Val at everything except the tranq rifle (which he doesn't have). I do find myself being focused a hell of a lot more often as Laz than any other character I've played though because that revive tool is such a game changer.

-For support:
-Starting with Hank, the orbital strike hits like a freight train when you get it to land, but it's tough to get it to land. However working with a good trapper playing Griffin you can get him held in a spot long enough to take the full damage, and it really does hit the monster hard. Otherwise you run around with your laser gun, use your shield gun (basically a medigun that prevents damage rather than heals it) on the guy being focused, and team cloak when you need to.
-Then on to Bucket. Bucket is a robot who can take his head off to be a UAV. And it's easily the best tracking ability in the game. Fly around, hold your crosshair over the monster and tag him, wait for team to trap him then get in there and start spamming your sentry guns and laser guided missiles. Hank's shield is probably his best ability, but as far as consistent damage output bucket definitely does more once you get your sentry guns up.

I haven't played monster or trapper yet, and honestly I'm not sure if I will. I just have no interest in playing either of them. Now that I have Laz medic is a hell of a lot more enjoyable and support is equally as enjoyable as assault to me.

Looking forward to the last day tomorrow, game is tons of fun. I also have 2 more codes if anyone else who didn't get a freebee from anywhere else is interested.

[matsif]

At a completely random chance, I booted into a bot kraken today. Have never played a monster before. Won the round in 6 minutes against a fairly organized team at second evolution.

Considering that, it's ridiculously OP. Assault can't put out damage when you fly, Maggie's harpoon mines don't have the range most of the time, the only thing that is anywhere near effective is Val's tranq rifle, and even then it's not enough when you can just jump up and spam range attacks where the hunters can't effectively do damage to you.

Hasn't really made me want to play Goliath at all either all things considered. Kraken definitely needs toned down.

[matsif]

So the alpha ends tonight, and I won't have any more chance to play, so here's a final review:

The Good:
-gameplay is superbly fun, especially with a full hunter party of friends
-overall balance seems pretty good (minus a few outliers)
-game runs better than BF4 did in any iteration, and this is in alpha
-the environments are interesting

The Bad:
-matchmaking is terrible, please give a lobby join like Payday
-load times are atrocious, waiting for the next game to start easily lasts as long (or longer in some cases) as a game in general
-The outliers in balance (Kraken monster mainly) can ruin an otherwise extremely enjoyable experience

The Ugly:
-While I really enjoy the game and will certainly purchase it, I have to question the amount of content. 3 hunters per class, 4 monsters seems good, but only 4 maps at release and only 1 announced game mode is really limited considering the AAA title cost. I hope there are more game modes than just hunt to make up for the lack of other content and many more maps to come in the future. For those of you who might want to get it but question the amount of content and don't want the preorder bonuses (2nd hunters are unlocked through an amazon preorder, I think gamestop gets an extra monster), wait for a sale.

[King6moh]

Appreciate the feedback Matsif. Would've loved to play some of it this weekend but damn midterms.

Considering this is still Alpha, I hope they address the points you made before the next "test release". Definitely looks like a fun and different kind of game.

[matsif]

in other news, alpha test got extended to Tuesday because they got their crap together for PS4 (which they had delayed due to a firmware update)

[YouSawNothing]

Monsters do the darndest things

phpBB [video]

[CekiHappy]

That video's amazing. 10/10 game of the year

[matsif]

this weekend starting at 9 AM PST (Noon EST, 5 PM GMT) Friday through Monday at 8 PM PST (11 PM EST, 4 AM GMT Tuesday) is PC closed beta. If you played in the big alpha, then you will get an invite code, be sure to check odd places in your email as I almost deleted mine. It's available for preinstall on steam, and no I don't have any extra codes. PC beta is only the hunt mode from the alpha, but we're getting all 12 maps instead of just 3 this time.

-PC requirements

[fUNh1t]

Here is a code.
G2R0I-RTEKN-0YF3Y

[SeraphiM0352]

Also if you have bought left 4 dead or Bioshock infinite you should already have access to the technical test this weekend. I have a spare code if someone wants one.