PlanetSide: At A Glance: Introduction to Planetside

Stradden

Our At A Glance articles are meant to give readers an overview of the early portion of an MMORPG, new or old. Today, UK based MMORPG.com writer Donna Desborough sends us this quick look at the FPS-style Planetside.

For a long time first person shooters have been running live servers on the internet. From back in the mists of time when Quake World was new and exciting, online play has enthralled people. It was only a matter of time before someone thought to create a persistent world for FPS players to battle in.

I've been playing FPS games online for a long time, so I jumped at the chance to give Planetside a try. I thought that an MMOFPS would be simple to just jump in to play. I was wrong. There are complexities to the game that I hadn't considered would exist. The struggle for power over planets and areas is in constant flux and the factions can be confusing at times. All in all, a bit more to it than just join a side and kill the bad guys.

Read it all here.

ShotgunJoe

Planetside was a very fun game. Im surprised to see an editorial on it considering it is showing its age, but the concept was a good one.

Someday I hope some CEO in a gaming company gets a clue and realizes that a game like BF2142 or SW Battlefront would make for a extremely fun and popular mmo and be a very good change from the fantasy genre. Imagine Planetside with everything Star Wars related instead, that game would rock!

You keep having mmo companies spit out these hybrid wanna-be fps type games like SWG or Tabula Rasa, but I never understand why they just dont commit to making an true fps mmo.

 

greenstumps

Used to love this game back in 2003 but they ruined it with many things like removing the glow from the vanu force blade and the core combat expansion and then BFR's and "the bending" which was a total cheesy stupid idea. By that time everyone quit and the big battles just don't exist like they used to anymore so no point playing with sooo few people.

They needed to change the bases so they looked different instead of fighting over the same old same old boring generic layout.

jdong

Originally posted by greenstumps


Used to love this game back in 2003 but they ruined it with many things like removing the glow from the vanu force blade and the core combat expansion and then BFR's and "the bending" which was a total cheesy stupid idea. By that time everyone quit and the big battles just don't exist like they used to anymore so no point playing with sooo few people.
They needed to change the bases so they looked different instead of fighting over the same old same old boring generic layout.

rofl "the bending" i can't agree with this guy anymore..

i really wish they would make a second one.

TimbukTurnip

They havent got rid of BFR or Core Combat

and they are making new maps

they have some ready that are just going though some final tests on the Test Server

as well as a bunch of new weapons and vehicles since you left

Erazor01

Originally posted by greenstumps


Used to love this game back in 2003 but they ruined it with many things like removing the glow from the vanu force blade and the core combat expansion and then BFR's and "the bending" which was a total cheesy stupid idea. By that time everyone quit and the big battles just don't exist like they used to anymore so no point playing with sooo few people.
They needed to change the bases so they looked different instead of fighting over the same old same old boring generic layout.

So given that you and everyone else quit, how come Planetside is still going strong?  Oh yes, that's because you haven't played it in years, and haven't a clue what it's like now.  Have to admit though, losing that glow from the force blade totally destroyed the game... Not!

Planetside is still great fun, but don't take my or anyone else's word for it - give it a try.

mindmeld

A tip for new player try to grow friends ingame so you can join up in squads platoons etc and on top of that use ts then it will be a blast .

if its a game that you truly need voicecom this is the game for it.

 

 

dcsn

Planetside is one of the most fun MMO in the market nowadays.



Even after few years of its launch, the game has plenty of fun in it.



If you bring 2 or 3 friends, the fun is even greater!



You can drive tanks and air crafts and take your friends to be you gunner.



A person at battle rank 1 can be effective in the field of battle as one person who is battle rank 25.



This is one of the most important point in this game because a battle rank 1 player can be a greater gunner at the tanks guns and kill a lot of other players.



I love planetside and i have an active acc.





http://www.calil.net/

Desirsar

The thing I've hated most about Planetside's changes since launch is that it used to put 40-60 FPS in most places on a P4 2GHz and FX5200 (dipping to 20 in heavy fighting) just after launch.  Every time they made "optimizations" to the engine, they made it faster for the top 5% of computers and slower for everyone else.  (And those high end machines are running faster enough as it is - why would you not optimize for the machine a notch below the average?  That's the whole point of Valve's continuous hardware surverys.)

I've never really had too much to complain about for gameplay.  BFRs were never a problem for me, even when they were new and very overused, but I like giant robot anime anyway.  They need to make up their mind about with aircraft are supposed to be anti-infantry and anti-vehicular, and make them properly weak against the other - paper thin armor would also be a start, "exciting air battles" be damned, they can learn to dodge.  If you don't mind the idea that you won't be going outside on foot unless you can count on your squad or empire mates to be running anti-air, the game is okay to try out.

My biggest complaint is the size of the playerbase - each empire really only has one good fight at any given time.  Because of the small playerbase, it's mostly "hardcore" guys, and the most active outfits are far too structured and littered with current and former military, and they have an unhealthy attachment to a military organization that they bring to the game with them.  (To be fair, it's extremely effective when the enemies you're coming up against are not similarly trained.  It just stops being fun real quick, which makes you want to unsubscribe, and drive those player numbers right back down.)

JimLad

MMO PvP at its finest, just dont be in the wrong place at the wrong time and you'll have a ball.

It's also very balanced despite what those who left years ago might say.

Age is this games only problem, release an upgraded sequel and problem solved.

Ravanos

the picture is perfect because thats pretty much all you will see in the game ... aircraft. Oh and if you arent in an aircraft (to the "vets") you are an unskilled moron who wants to "footzerg" (basically infantry).

then when you get inside the base you will be fighting these same "vets", who think hiding behind a wall in third person view, being able to see you perfectly when you can't see them is "skillful". And of course these vets who strafe while tapping the crouch button to induce warping and exploit the Client side hit detection and will call that part of thier skill as well.

oh and don't complain about any of these things because you will just be told you're a moron and need to "lern2play" or of course the usual "go back to playing RPGs".

And with the populations the way they are now, you would get better fights in any free FPS (CoD4, TF2). As a former beta tester and LONG time player I wouldn't suggest planetside to my worse enemy.

Kryogenic

I like alot of the concepts in Planetside, but there's one thing that I just can't handle in a FPS: unrefined controls.

The game plays horrible for a FPS. It's just not smooth enough for me.

Besides that all of you hardcore Planetside vets would absolutely love Warhawk for the PS3. The controls are smooth and fluid, the dogfights in the aircraft are a thing of beauty, tanks, jeeps with mounted guns, ground combat with tons of weapons., and the devs are really on top of booting and reseting stats of the people that cheat or boost.

Awhile back I was hoping that Huxley would be an update and improved MMOFPS fix, but it's been so long that I've pretty much lost the steam that fueled my excitement.

Phos

Planetside is awesome. I quit a few months ago because of the low population in-game.

I remember in my last days in-game there were times when I was the only person in the whole galaxy online. Or I was the only person on my team and I couldn't cap any other bases because there was one person on the other team and we just took turns killing each other until we got bored and logged off.

Don't get me wrong. Planetside was the funnest MMO since UO in my opinion. If there was still a high population, I'd play it everyday. It's one of the only MMOs that I had fun in even when I was getting my butt kicked.

- Phos

Gunstra

I played PlanetSide for 5-6 months, loved the game, actually still do, but it's way too repetitive to pay $12.95 a month to play. Would play it again if it was free with an item mall.

BaronJuJu

The longest battle I ever had on an MMO was on Planetside. A four hour battle for control of a bridge between the NC (us) and the TR. It was the early days of PS when there were no Mechs, no expansions or new technology. There where hundreds of players on both sides but by hour 4 we finally were able to establish a foot hold on the other side of the bridge and start our advance to their base.

God, that was so much fun.

Interitus

I played Planetside for years. One of my funniest MMO memories is from doing an ant run on a base we were capturing. I nailed out the airfraft at the wrong time, landed on an upper floor, managed to drive over the railing, flipped the ANT but still made it to the silo in time.

 

 

Originally posted by Ravanos


the picture is perfect because thats pretty much all you will see in the game ... aircraft. Oh and if you arent in an aircraft (to the "vets") you are an unskilled moron who wants to "footzerg" (basically infantry).

Well seeing as you owould be a vet also, I am, played since Beta 3.  I guess this applies to me and you. The only problem is I never said anything you claim vets say. Do some? Yes, but name me a game where you don't find people bad mouthing others.

As for the planes, I would have agreed with you, but I went over to my brothers house of Christmas. He still plays, to my surprise planes aren't a dominating force anymore. The day of plane only squadrons is gone.  I'd say about 90% of the people playing were ground based, probably more. And the planes I did see, most were bombers.

 

Oversoul87

I have played Planetside since launch, went to the first convention in florida, and have been an avid fan since its birth. Its my number one all time favorite game. To the person who didn't like The Bending event, BAH! lol. I still have screenshots on burned cds of me and other people getting smashed by falling rocks. I thought it was so cool :P I do have regrets about the BFR thing. They never turned out like how we talked about them when we wre throwing out ideas for them at the convention with Devs. I think a few too many of us were over doing the drinking of Bawls which were provided free by the case. I still have the  drawing one of the designers did for me on a napkin of the stealth aircraft transport lol.

raykor

I've been playing PlanetSide, on and off, for 4+ years.   It is without doubt the most fun I have had in any online game.  But I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.  There are plenty of games as old or older than PS which are still being developed; sadly, this is not one of them.  SOE has all but abandoned it. 

Sure, you could log on and find a little fun here and there but overall the game is in a sorrowful state.  I recently signed up for a month (out of sheer boredom) and uninstalled after 3 days.  Considering this is my favorite game of all time, that says it all.

xSSx

I'm surprised to see a article on PlanetSide. I haven't seen one on any site for quite sometime.

This is by far the best game I have played in my life.

I started playing back in October of 2004 and just recently cancelled my sub due to many reasons. The biggest being the group I played with had parted ways with the game. I'm still playing with many of the people I met in the game over 3 years ago too. The way in which you can meet people in MMOs is unparraled compared to what other games offer.

All the concepts in the game where perfect. SOE just didn't apply them correctly in the long run with what they introduced (BFRs). I'm really hoping that there will be a PS2 one day or a game similar in design .

TCoops

I would agree that this is the most fun MMO i've ever played. I've pretty much been an MMO tourist, playing every beta/trial and even purchasing a wide number of commercial MMO's. But ive never had as much raw fun as I did when playing Planetside. ww2 online came close, back when it was populated, but Planetside takes the cake.

Ive always had an average PC and broadband. Never had problems with clentside or server lag. Its usually always been decent, apart from those times where you get spikes. I've never felt there was a gross inbalance in the game. Every weapon or vehicle has a counter. You just have to be observant, patient, and clever. Dont just run right up to the enemy blasting away until you (inevitably) die. You have to use tactics AND skill, not just click the attack button and let random dice rolls determine who wins.

The only time i felt balance was totally borked was when BFR's were new. But now the balance has been tweaked and they usually end up just burned out husks on the battlefield.. infact, i have taken out several using clever infantry tactics. I even disabled one using nothing but a pistol. Kept running under its feet attacking its shield gen. Then the pilot got real angry and decided to jump out and kill me with his rifle. Lets just say I dropped him with some good placed autopistol bursts. Then hacked the BFR for myself ; ) Thats the thing about planetside. If you are clever enough, you can have a ball of a time and pull off some amazing victories.

Ive been in massive battles (lately too, mid 2007) that rage on for hours. The most classic epic battles that ive ever had, that get your blood pumping and really suck you in, were in planetside. These battles arent as common these days. But dont be fooled, there IS still a server population playing in PS. US east and west are still good. In off peak times you can find persistent battles maybe 20 vs 20. On peak time, and weekends, it can grow to epic proportions.

A big downside to planetside is that it can get repetetive and there is little else to do if you get tired of capturing the same forts over and over. If an MMO could combine the action of planetside, with some more social elements common to mainstream MMO's (such as economy, customization, character progression, crafting, cities ect) it really would be awesome. I really am tired of mainstream MMO's "combat" systems, which take no real strategy or skill. More like click and watch, no involvement. Planetside is always a hoot to fall back on when I am bored.

Definitely my all time favourite game. Played since '03/'04 and still reactivate subsciption every so often. No other game has held my interest so long. Usual MMO's burn out and become dull after a few months of slaying orcs (lets face it, they are all about that). But I just keep getting back to planetside, the roots of real gaming, to remind me what it SHOULD be about. Fun, and the contest between players.

willgar

Great game in its day with some trully great moments ...."2 full gals hot dropping on a cc roof" superb. But like many people, it got repetetive after a few years and faded away. If you have never played it - give it a try but populations are low now so the glory days of PS have past....

 

Battlefield + PLanetside - now there is an idea

boognish75

Maybe I will try this game, is there a trial for this?

willgar

there was a 15 day free trial and a buddy programme (invite a friend to try free for xx days) but i am not sure if it still running. Have a look at the main website

greenstumps

I used to love it back in the day yeah and was sooo addicted I got kicked outta college cause I played Planetside all day and never went to my class. Just it doesn't play like it used to in 2003 and with all these new FPS games Planetside feels sooo dated now anyways and I have more fun with TF2. PRoblems I have now when I tried it again late last year was that the battles are sooo small you'd have to wait for peak time for a battle to start and even then it isn't very big.

I remember in 2003 after launch a battle in forseral (think it's spelt like that) a battle that went on between two bases for that weekend and sooo many people it just never stopped and was sooo amazing! I got my mates to play it and just remember the foot zergs going on between bases and it's hard to explain but if you played back then and played now then you'd understand.

I also remember defending Amerish all the time and that place was foot zerg central and it was the first ever battle I had there when I logged in for the first time at launch and the ammount of people was crazy. Just sooo amazing back then it was my fave online FPS and nothing came close to it.

Just after core combat though all my mates quit cause the expansion sucked and the population went down abit and just remember being really disappointed. The caverns not only look horrible but they add more surface area to Planetside and it was tooo big anyways so that just spreads everyone out even further. What they needed to do was to put cities on the main planet and remove a few of the uneeded islands to bring everyone closer toether then start to work on making bases different.

I also don't like the idea of veteran vehicles and weapons because it stops making the game about skill but starting to give a edge to newer players, they already had mor eimplants they don't need a weapons edge. Also all the content they seemed to add is just a rehash of the same stuff we got but with different weapons and it felt very cheap and easy way to add stuff in. The art in Planetside I dunno became quickly really generic and boring and just like a kid designed it or something and that contributes to the dated feel of it for me.



They ruined it totally with BFR's and The bending though and thats when people started to leave, the new map they designed too was just horrible. Just everything about Planetside after that felt cheap and they were going the wrong direction with it. CR obital strikes I reckon they should have removed because now everyone has them and it's just spam all the time and really ruins battles + they have nothing to do with commanding.

To this day the only updates I liked were the ones just after launch with the Skyguard and Lib.

The bending bug where you could access the enemies sanc;

 

Vanu Force blade glow glory;

 

I think this is Lasher 2.0 I could be wrong but i'm sure the only pic i kept was of 2.0;

Bobalue

i recently resubscribed to planetside cus i just cant get away from this game it is so damn good if you like shooting games and you like mmos this game is def worth trying if i knew of any free trials i would give you guys a link but i dont know

lorechaser

I love Planetside.  I was lucky, and fell in with a very dedicated outfit within two weeks.  Voicechat is *absolutely* required to have fun.  Otherwise you're just running, dying, running, dying.  With voicechat and a squad, it's hellaciously fun.  I still have an active sub, and love it.

I'm always amused when people complain about BFRs.  BFRs are the best thing *ever* to happen, because they make it so much easier to take bases.  Because you just park your BFR outside the base, and watch as the entire enemy force panics, runs around, and spends the next 30 minutes reacting.  Meanwhile, everyone else goes around taking bases....