The Cycle: Frontier preview - A great introduction to high-stakes shooters
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The second Closed Beta for The Cycle: Frontier is currently underway and I've been jumping in, looting, shooting, completing tasks, stocking up my storage with valuable loot and weapons. After 10 hours of playtime, I see the appeal of high-stakes PvPvE online shooters like it, and I feel this game is a great introduction to the concept.
Escape from Tarkov, Hunt: Showdown – these games fall under the same vein as what some call a high-stakes shooter, where players need to play carefully as their death will mean losing everything they have on their character. The Cycle: Frontier is the next PvPvE shooter to provide a similar experience but with a free-to-play model attached to it, and I'm having a blast with it so far.
The goal can be whatever you want when you jump into Fortuna III, the planet players go to scavenge whatever they find and hopefully extract with their limbs and loot intact. The game has three factions that give you tasks to do when you head out, and doing them rewards you with in-game money, and progression that leads to you having access to better gear. These tasks may seem simple on paper, but they can be difficult to complete with real players roaming in the same space as you.
These real players serve as the perfect monkey wrench, the main ingredient in turning mundane tasks like collecting minerals into a memorable experience. Players mostly shoot on sight here, and that’s only expected because who doesn’t want another player's gear and loot? This makes every run unpredictable and unique that I don't know what to expect each time I head out.
Fortuna III is a world that is lush and colorful. You’ll encounter abandoned stations, caves, and swaps filled with loot. The creatures that inhabit the land can be vicious but easy to deal with. The only problem is, dealing with them results in noise, which in turn could entice a player to go in your direction.
In games like The Cycle: Frontier, you make decisions on the fly. Make plays to outsmart other players but also plan ahead to secure a good extraction. Either solo, duo, or with a group of three, the gameplay loop just fuels you with adrenaline 80% of the time, and that’s a good sign in my book if I'm feeling this way during the closed beta. The shooting so far feels solid but the real winner is the audio as it works well to inform players of what’s around them.
In one instance, I spent 20 minutes slowly creeping in this one area, wondering if I did hear a player sprint a few minutes earlier. For the longest time I thought it was just in my head. I couldn’t find anybody and the creatures nearby weren’t alarmed. But I decided to hold an angle just in case. Truth enough, I then see a silhouette of a player slowly entering my line of sight. I took the shot and he dropped. He/she didn’t see it coming.
In a game like this, it’s either you never see someone, go into firefights with other players out in the open, or have these intimate cat and mouse-like moments I just mentioned above, which only happened because I briefly heard another player run.
What about it being free-to-play though?
So the biggest question right now is how developer Yager will implement the usual business practices you’d expect from a free-to-play title. I noticed a battle pass of some sort that was disabled during the closed beta, and there are two in-game currencies that was available. There are upgrades that you can unlock for your account (like increasing your storage space) in exchange for resources and money, and these upgrades complete in real-time, something I'm not fond of as you’re forced to wait… or spend in-game currency to speed up the process. Yuck.
Can I use my hard-earned real money to get in-game currency to buy gear? That’s a no, at least in the closed beta. This is my fear as this game can easily lean towards the pay-to-win territory since gear is an important factor in Cycle’s gameplay.
The Cycle: Frontier has a fun dynamic that after numerous sessions in this game I’ve come to realize that I want to experience more high-stake shooters like it. This shooter won’t be for everybody, but this game is definitely a good entry point to those unfamiliar with its concept and want a challenging experience. I just hope that this game doesn’t get dragged down into the mud by aggressive monetization on release as this is one game brimming with potential.
