Gray Zone Warfare

[canes21]

Game just released in Early Access yesterday.



It's a PvEvP game that is essentially a Ghost Recon, ARMA, and Tarkov hybrid.

It's a persistent open world extraction-type shooter with a large 42 square kilometer map that can have up to 48 players on it at one time.

There are 3 player factions that you choose to join when creating your player. Players in your faction are friendly, though friendly fire does exist and will be punished over time. The other 2 factions are enemies and that is where the PvP comes from.

Across the map are also various AI enemies and that is where the PvE comes from. There are lightly geared guerilla fighters as well as fighters that have found military equipment and are not afraid to use it.

The gun customization is similar to Tarkov where you can change any part on any gun that you want allowing some creative builds and big amounts of player creativity. Unlike Tarkov, whenever you load into a server, you are in there for good. You do not extract and go back to a main menu. Instead, each faction has a Base Camp and this is where players are safe and are able to access their stashes as well as vendors to buy/sell good and accept quests.

Since the map is so large, not all travel is done by foot. Around the map are various LZ's that players can discover. Once discovered, players are able to call in a helicopter that will take them to the LZ of their choosing and then the players explore the map killing enemies and completing quests. Once you are ready to return to base because you've completed a quest, are out of ammo, are hurt and need to heal up, etc., the player calls in a helicopter to the nearest LZ and takes it back to the Base Camp where they can regroup before heading back out on their next adventure.

You never leave the server, so the player stays engaged at all times unlike in Tarkov where each raid is a separate instance and you're in loading screens and menus longer than you're actually in each map playing.

I've been having a blast with it so far. I didn't know if I'd like it when watching streamers play the game, but after playing it I can definitely see myself playing this along with Tarkov for a very long time. It is definitely a game I personally think is significantly more enjoyable to play than it is to watch.

Having a persistent world that I only have to load into once is very nice. Having 48 players on the map leads to some fun interactions from helping out players from your own faction that you are near to stumbling across an enemy faction squad and engaging in a long firefight with them. The game is a blast and I cannot wait to see how it progresses over time.

[franch1se]

been watching this game and will probably pick it up at some point. I'm just way too into other games right now and i've heard so much negative about its performance issues.

[canes21]

Performance seems to be the biggest issue with the game at the moment. They did release a hotfix that increased performance for nearly all players. Fortunately, I just had a new PC built within the last couple of months, so I am able to play at 1440p and average around 110fps consistently, but I know my buddy with a 2080ti is not having the same experience.

Hopefully they can get it ironed out some more but it does come with the territory with early access games. Optimization is typically one of the final tasks before a game goes full release, so it will be interesting to see how much time they spend on optimizing the game more while it is still in alpha.

I already over 15 hours in the game. I am legitimately having more fun with it than I ever anticipated. I just finished up the starting quests which means the next time I go out questing I will be hitting some different points of interest that will have a higher chance of having other factions there. I am excited to see more of the map and get into some fights with other players. I've only come across 3 other enemy players so far in my starting town, and have killed all 3, but I know once I go out into the rest of the map I will start seeing more enemies and in larger numbers.

I am also excited to see the higher tier enemy AI because they've increased the skill of the AI it seems and even the starting town AI is now pretty tough at times.

[franch1se]

how is it for solos? I have no one who has this game and I'm tired of playing EFT as a solo lol. I get destroyed.

[Picci]

I'm still awaiting that vr tactical shooter encompassing that world!

That is all

[canes21]

Quote: Originally Posted by franch1se

how is it for solos? I have no one who has this game and I'm tired of playing EFT as a solo lol. I get destroyed.

Half my playtime has been solo and I've had fun. I haven't ventured out of the starting town yet, so that may play a role, but so far I've ran into so many other people from my faction that you never feel truly alone in a good way, and it's led to some informal squad play where we've moved through the town together to get our quests down. That definitely helps with solo play.

It is an overall far less punishing game than Tarkov and I think that is true for solo play as well.

[canes21]

As I expected, once getting out of the starting town and hitting other POI's around the map, the PvP ramped up. It was a ton of fun. I lost count how many players we ran into last night, but it was pretty regular.

At one point, near and old soviet bunker my buddy and I ran into a 3-man squad from our own faction and the 5 of us went from the bunker to a nearby military base killing other players and AI on our way there. Turned into about a 1 hour siege on the military base where we made out with some quality gear. It was a blast hooking up with randoms like that, using voip to plan out some tactics, and just fight real players and very skilled and geared AI.

I also tried out the PvE mode before calling it a night last night and it was very relaxing just chilling and running into players and knowing all 48 of us were on the same side fighting the AI at that point. While I won't play the PvE mode too often, it's nice that it is an option and that progress is shared between the 2 modes, so those that prefer to mostly play vs AI have the option to do that without hindering their performance on PvP servers. Great choice by the devs to set it up like that.

[franch1se]

just bought it, played 1 run in PVE mode, met a couple people in raid who helped me do the med check mission. I'm having fun and so far didn't see too many performance issues. Definitely looking for people to run with.