If you ask me about my favorite video games, 90% of the time I’ll say they’re those focused on story, action and adventure, for example: God of War (2018). Although it may seem unbelievable when you take a look at the list of games that have stolen the most hours from me in my life: The Division, The Division 2 and Destiny 2. They number in the thousands.
Looter shooters have a way of making me lose my mind to unsuspected degrees, especially when they are in third person. The three mentioned are the ones that have stolen the most hours from me, but they are far from the only ones: BorderlandsOutriders and Anthem. By extension, I fall into games with similar characteristics like Remnant 2 or Helldivers 2. And that was years ago when it was the champion of the first person when it came to shooting.
Yesterday, July 2, 2024, it was officially launched The First DescendantI played for a few hours and came to a pretty clear conclusion: it’s light years away from being a GOTY, but it’s a strong candidate to steal hundreds of hours from me… at least a hundred. Just enough to squeeze it out and return to The Division 2 y Destiny 2.
- Clarification: This is not a review or first impressions in the strictest sense. I’m just another player telling how his experience was during the first few hours of play. I still have a lot to learn and aspects to look into in depth, such as the monetization system.
The First Descendant: Much room for improvement, but absurdly addictive
If you like looter shooters and you are attracted to the setting of Warframe, then let me tell you first of all that you should not close yourself off to The First DescendantIt’s free, available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and PC, and features crossplay. I’ll tell you what I thought: if you don’t end up liking it, the only thing you’re going to lose is time.
On the other hand, performance on PS5 is very average. While it’s not unplayable, the framerate suffers greatly in areas where many enemies and several players gather. I’ve spoken to several acquaintances and the situation is similar on Xbox Series X/S, while on PC it works like a charm in most cases where I’ve received feedback. Now that I’ve clarified the more technical aspects, I’ll tell you about my experience and some of my thoughts.
I admit that the setting of The First Descendant I didn’t like it at first. Many players compare it to Warframebut personally it reminded me of a cross between Godfall y Anthem with some Outriders touches in its story. It also meets the stereotype I was expecting: burly or stylized bodies with large armor and mesh, respectively. I don’t say this as a criticism, but as an observation of its style.
The beginning has quite a few minutes of cinematics, so I had time to process and internalize its setting and style. I admit that I grew to like it after a while, but I’m still not thrilled with it. I prefer things closer to our reality like Metro and The Division in this sense. It does look very nice though.
The story is three quarters of the same. Humanity fights against another race until it is on the verge of extinction, they receive a power and from there the chosen ones are born, one of them is us. The objective is to exploit our power and defeat the threat that has been making us bite the dust for years. As I said, nothing that I haven’t seen in Outridersfor example. Let’s say I’m interested enough to pay attention to the subtitles.
If the story and setting are nothing special, why do I say that The First Descendant Is it going to steal hundreds of hours from me? The answer to that question is its gameplay. It drives me absolutely crazy. Not because it’s particularly good, but because it offers exactly what I like: third-person shooting with a fairly varied selection of weapons (with their own ammunition), character classes and abilities, tiers and colors, modifiers and equipment, armor customization, and lots of on-screen numbers.
The only mystery of The First Descendant is learning to navigate its chaotic menus, because the rest of the sections are nothing we haven’t seen in other video games: different areas/worlds, each with its own enemies, dungeons and raids, secondary and world activities both solo and cooperative, challenges and obviously huge bosses. Moving around the world is similar to Destiny 2bridging the gaps between the two.
If it weren’t for the framerate drops, my first experience on The First Descendant It would have been a 10/10 in terms of fun. It is the main reason that has driven me to write a positive article, even though I know that the launch has been mediocre, that there are some things that could be improved and others that are simply bad.
So, do I recommend trying? The First Descendant? Absolutely. If you like looter shooters and you don’t mind everything in this post, then you should definitely give it a try. Remember though: it’s far from being a GOTY, but it has the potential to give you many hours of gameplay.
At iGamesNews | Not even my absent-mindedness has managed to deprive me of the epic battle against the Witness in Destiny 2: The Final Form. Goodbye, my friend
At iGamesNews | Anthem’s magnificent flight: Bioware couldn’t avoid crashing, but managed to make its halberds fly like no one else
