Among the upcoming releases of Nexon Games, the one that is receiving the most attention is probably the third-person root shooter ‘First Descendant’. Some of the domestic games are a very unfamiliar genre, and it is also thanks to the excellent quality of previously released videos. In particular, domestic as well as overseas gamers are showing positive reactions to the video and are not hiding their expectations.
Game Mecca tested this game, which can be said to be the ambitious work of Nexon Games, first. The first impression I could feel from a short play was that the foundation was very solid. This means that the basics of a root shooter are already well established. Of course, as it is in the testing stage, there are still many places that need to be touched if we go into details such as hitting sensation, level design, and boss pattern, but we were recognized that the game development was proceeding very smoothly.
Root shooting that combines science fiction and fantasy
As mentioned above, First Descendant is a third-person root shooter genre game. The atmosphere of the game is a combination of science fiction and fantasy, and while using highly developed magic and science as skills, modern conventional weapons such as rifles, launchers, and shotguns also appear. As the center of the story and the heir destined to save the world, players must defend the Continent of Ingris against invaders.
All missions in the game are multiplayer. All missions on the field are supported from individual progress to party play, but in raids, 4 players work together to attack. In particular, boss raids are prepared with various enemies and difficulty levels, and like MMORPGs, patterns are analyzed and weaknesses are attacked.
There are also various characters that appear. Each character has four skills appropriate to their class: throwing grenades, using freeze magic, and forming barriers. In particular, one of the four skills is an ultimate concept, so its power is very strong, but it has a long cooldown. As a weapon, you can equip 3 guns and various auxiliary attack methods among various weapons such as an assault rifle, a beam rifle, a missile launcher, a shotgun, and a hand cannon.
Basic perfection that has already surpassed Anthem
First Descendant has all the basics of third-person root shooter genres such as Warframe and Anthem. In the field, enemies appearing in swarms are beaten one by one with guns, and items dropped by the captured enemies are used to supply bullets and stamina. Guns have ranks, and their abilities change accordingly. As in any shooting game, enemies can hit a vital point to inflict a critical hit. Not joking, all of these parts worked very smoothly even for the first test. It may be a funny analogy, but Anthem ran more smoothly than when it was officially released.
A unique feature of this game can be found in the grappling hook. Many route shooter games allow you to fly or enhance your jumping power with a jetpack to create a fast-paced and three-dimensional battle scene. This game employs a grappling hook. If you use it properly, you can climb high places or dodge powerful attacks from enemies.
For reference, this grappling hook works on the same principle as the Overwatch Widowmaker’s hook, so it requires aiming, and when used on a straight wall, it uses inertia to allow it to stay in the air for a long time. It can even be used twice in a row, which greatly helps the player’s maneuvering. Except for the double jump in the game, it is the only way to dodge the enemy’s melee attack, so it needs to be used strategically. However, like Halo Infinite, it is impossible to draw or attack enemies using a hook.
High difficulty multiplayer is also attractive
The boss fight also gave the impression that the frame was very well established. In the game, you can enjoy a total of 5 boss raids, and you can meet three bosses of different difficulty among them. Each boss had a very different attack method. Debaucher gets a shield from the spore when it receives more than a certain amount of damage and enters an invincible state, so it was important to enter the shield and explode the spore quickly.
Basically, when conducting party play, communication with allies was very important. In order to activate the rigidity of the boss, it is necessary to properly focus the destructible part, and it is necessary to break through aggro and save the allies when the team members are lying down. In particular, it is very important to rescue allies through communication, as you can see the mission failure message as it is when the death count is accumulated 3 times like Monster Hunter. Voice chat was also essential in order to properly distribute the falling stamina supply by catching miscellaneous mobs that appear in the middle.
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Even if it wasn’t a boss fight, active communication was essential for team play. This is because there were a lot of elements to link attacks in the game. For example, if I throw a grenade that unites multiple enemies into one, another user throws a powerful splash attack or another crowd control. There are runes that deal additional damage to enemies caught in ice or poison, so linking with allies who attack elemental was a shortcut to clear the mission easily.
Thanks to the overlap of these various elements, the battle proceeded with a lot of excitement, and the speed was excellent as well. He demanded both very three-dimensional movements and quick aim, such as aiming at the enemy without taking a moment to glance, escaping with a grappling hook to avoid a big attack, and reacting to changes in the enemy’s pattern visually. However, the enemy’s headshot judgment is fairly generous, and the supply is also reduced quite a bit, so it’s difficult to clear it, but it doesn’t happen easily.
There are still many areas that need to be refined.
What was lacking was found in the details rather than the structure of the game. Variety and sound, boss strategy, and unnatural movements. Considering it is a test stage, it is acceptable to some extent, but since the completion of other parts is so high, it was a particularly conspicuous disadvantage. In particular, the feeling of hitting the shotgun was very disappointing because the sound did not come out properly.
On the other hand, the often unreasonable part of playing the game stood out. When you reach the target point after inserting the grappling hook, it jumps high even if you don’t want to, but during this time you are attacked by the enemy defenselessly. This also caused inconvenience to the game because it was the same when driving to the ground to dodge left and right. It seems to have made super jumping easier by mixing grappling hooks and jumps, but it was just an inconvenience. In addition, when playing solo, there are so many enemies that it is difficult to handle alone, and the mission fails because time passes without dying, or when the tank hero expands the barrier, the boss’s attack becomes useless with one shot, etc. seemed
I can expect a little more
Although First Descendant is still in the development stage, it has perfectly implemented the basics of the root shooting genre. In addition, it has its own personality in visual aspects and boss raids. If you pay a little more attention to every corner of the game and forge it well, you will probably be able to achieve the level of perfection that many fans expected.
