At least in my perception the initial reactions to Marathon are overwhelmingly bad and for Arc Raiders overwhelmingly good Im genuinely interested in what key differences these two extractor shooters bear to spark such a delta since I like to talk about game design specifics.
So what do you think in specific, like what is that much better in arc raiders to compete with established blockbusters like tarkov?
Marathon is "just another extraction shooter" is what I heard as a sentiment. So this is going off the assumption that both games do nothing new as in "been there done that"
My imperssions of Marathon:
- I see how "graphical realism" art style is a complete flop - personally as a trained media designer (elements on the map i.e. having that printer test stamp - very cliche)
- gun models and characters feel like they are not worthy of that universe
- the running shield animations dont help that either haha
- personally dislike hero shooter elements
- UI design aesthetic is very intern-level and execution often questionable (visual weighting off, uninteresting/overloaded pictograms) -> but: the implementation of the one in-game at least seems to have high level execution weirdly enough.
-> but: Gunplay seems fresh? Like no game has done that responsive recoil feedback before, no?
-> but: sound design seems very good too?
Arc Raiders has some really strong points I see:
- The audio design is top (not a sound designer so cant tell you specifics).
- The UI in the A to A- department, only adding responsive UI elements and other fancy tech could add as a final optional highlight.
- Presentation and staging of the world elements seems abolutely like a blockbuster movie. Huge structures and generally a feel like youre in that post apocalyptic rebel world.
-> but: The long term combat appeal of arc is questionable, progression and long term motivation unclear.
That seems a little lacking for such negative rating, sure addicted gamers tend to be very emotional about these things but idk - even more laid back people seem to agree with these evaluations - in sum these points above are smaller likes or dislikes, but in its essence and gameplay both games do nothing much different - dont they?
Is it because the dev studio's reputations mainly? Also marathon having such a rich backbone, feels like its disrespected by the studio. Tell me my what specifics you like and dislike in these titles - did you feel different about the games?
I haven't played Marathon, but I did get into the ARC test. This will mostly be some ramblings...
I'm still waiting to play ARC with some friends. I only did some solo stuff.
I'm coming from this as a big Hunt Showdown player (1,200+ hours) and someone that's played a bit of Forever Winter (~20). I still like Hunt better; I think it's the only extraction shooter that didn't take a ton of influence from Tarkov.
I wasn't crazy about the marathon art style, but I'm not ready to pass judgement on it until I've been in the world.
ARC's art style I found beautiful but also perhaps too sparse. There were so many wide open spaces ... I just don't see that being a good thing for an extraction shooter. The world felt vast and empty ... I prefer Hunt's more cluttered and dense design.
ARC does seem to have a lot of potential in like how it's designed its AI, Hunt's is very primitive in a lot of ways and kind of secondary. I think the AI is going to be a bigger deal in ARC.
Third person also feels worse to me than first person. I hope they add a first person mode to ARC, but I kind of doubt they will.
I definitely agree that ARC felt like it was being set up to tell a story and felt very cinematic at times.
The UI also felt like the best extraction shooter UI I've ever encountered.
I'm concerned about the long term health of ARC. The progression system seems like it will certainly lead to established players dominating newer players. The lack of a primary objective that's shared by all the teams on the map ... I'm not sure how I feel about that. On the one hand, it may lead to a more relaxed experience, on the other hand, it doesn't curate players towards each other like Hunt does; it seems looting and crafting are the primary motivators instead.
The fights that I did get into, they lacked the complex environment and buildings in Hunt so I didn't find them nearly as engaging, they were much more straight forward gunfights than leveraging the map to use it to my advantage. I think that aspect will ultimately hurt the game as it makes it feel like a bit of a generic shooter.
Overall ARC felt very middle of the road from what I've played of it so far. I had a similar feeling about The Finals. Embark seems like a talented studio and I wish them the best as they go up against Bungie and Crytek.
As another big Hunt fan this made me laugh. The bar is pretty low over in Hunt land unfortunately.