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What can 'Factions II' do to become a multiplayer juggernaut?

cormack12

Gold Member
Can't find the longer video, so just threw a few screenshots in and the 11 second one below. If anyone has a link chuck it in and I'll add to OP.

How do you think Factions II (if it's real) can make a punch in the battle royale/multiplayer canopy? When it first came out there was a lot of risk and reward gameplay which wasn't too prevalent, but I think we've seen a bit of a resurgence in the 'down and out' category.

We have the obvious candidates like Rainbow Six: Siege, then you have the explosion of battle royales like Apex, Fortnite, Warzone, PUBG. They all have their own strengths and specific target audiences and create their own dynamic gameplay in different ways.

ND have always made decent multiplayer modes. They've never been as awful as Tomb Raider (2013), but I feel they've been targeted at the existing players rather than trying to make a complete multiplayer game that pulls people to the IP because of it. And they've always hung off the single player. By the time factions releases most people will have moved on from the spark which was the TLOU II campaign mode.

There's a lot of competition out there, what can factions do better or unique to differentiate it and become one of the long service style multiplayer games of this gen?

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Kupfer

Member
I'd love to see hardcore, like real hardcore gameplay. We have all these colorful fun shooters out there, players sprinting, sliding and jumping around, I want grounded, slow paced and planned gameplay.
No perks, no special abilities, no listening mode.
Let every shot count, even a .380 can be deadly.
 
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drezz

Member
How would they do the drop ship?
Have you run in a cinematic run through the sewers; in a straight line or zig zaging, with a fading darkenss chasing them with clicking noises? Having the playable charachters running for their lives and panicing expression with no weapons in their hands.
Maybe have a map overlay while all that is happening where you can do a small "pop up" choosing of exit?
At least have 3 person squads, personally I'd hope for 4 pr squad.
Have a sidestory where you are gathering stuff for your camp that you build from scratch and have to maintain to not go under, new people coming to assist in some way or another, shop up keep or supply maintainense. Maybe even have a option to do trade with other players?
You send out your crew to do missions and supply your camp to not have it go under.
 
If it was linked back to the whole settlement camp and had people going out on missions and everyone was at different camps and there was fighting and bandit factions ect it would work really well but I don’t really trust the naughty dog of today to actually execute it as it’s pretty clear the brains left

sucker punch did an awesome job of their mp for ghosts
 

Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
I have no idea of what will make it successful -- other than having a simultaneous day one release on PS5, PS4, and PC.

But apart from that, I'm very excited to see what they actually do in terms of gameplay, modes, and mechanics. I wish they allow us to live in that world, as we do in GTA Online and Red Dead Redemption 2. Only having an option to match with other players in a lobby and fight it out isn't going to be enough.

Let us scavenge resources outside of a multiplayer match, build our town, build our community, bring in other people and NPCs, fortify our settlement, craft new weapons and resources, build a stable, get horses, raid other settlements, clear out zombie hordes who may have come too close to our town.

If we meet someone in the online world randomly, we can choose to befriend them or track them stealthily to see where their settlement is. Then we should be able to plan a raid and loot their settlement.

It would be very ambitious, yes, but it could be fantastic, very lived-in, and immersive experience.
 

chilichote

Member
I found the gathering of resources to get ahead pretty annoying. Maybe you should evaluate the whole team in one round and not just yourself, so that you also use the strengths and weaknesses of the players tactically.
 

ZywyPL

Banned
Nothing, it just won't gonna happen. For a decent MP you need first and foremost a very simple, responsive gameplay and precise controls, and TLoU2 simply doesn't have it. All that planning, setting up the fight, contextual takedowns/executions etc. work well vs a scripted AI in a linear game, but not against other human beings, who want to be just running and gunning all over the map when they go online, it's been proven over and over already in the past decades, and this will never change. The core gunplay/shooting mechanics is what will single-handedly kill the game, UC4 was a much more suited game to become something really big MP-wise, hell, UC2 already was back in 2009, but the truth is, ND simply doesn't have what it takes to make a good, long lasting MP title, they always screw something up, and even if somehow they don't, with no scripts and cut-scenes around in MP you're left with nothing but the core gameplay that was made with SP cinematic experience in mind, which like I said, doesn't work in the online world.

Unless Factions isn't a F2P or PS+ exclusive I don't see it holding on for more than a quarter-half a year, if I was Sony I wouldn't even release the game this year to begin with since there will as always be a new CoD, BF hype is through the roof, and Halo is F2P, those are the games people will be playing this year, those are the games that will be huge, because they are made with MP in mind from the ground up, it's better to leave Factions for Q2 2022 or something like that which is when people will be looking for something fresh again.

Bottom line is, I think if Sony wants to have any meaningful MP title that will last for years, it has to be a MP-only game, focused solely on the gameplay, with a dedicated team who will support the game for longer than just one, maybe two DLCs, simply put, they would have to go all-in.
 
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Yoboman

Member
Something fresh is always the key

If its just multiplayer maps or your standard BR with TLOU2 gameplay it will find its audience but its not going to take off big time, I'm hoping they are going for something new which is why its a separate package

Totally out of the box thinking but why not an open world sandbox ala RDR2 / GTA Online and other persistent world online games. Rip the hordes from Days Gone. TLOU2 quality mechanics. Throw in some coop and story elements
 

lh032

I cry about Xbox and hate PlayStation.
I dont play multiplayer much, perhaps bigger world like rust without base building, with progression systems ?
 

Aion002

Member
I want a pve mode. Scavenging resources for your community, fending off threat's and exploring in coop would be incredible, maybe even adding some raid stages like Ghost of Tsushima.
 

ZehDon

Member
If they release a stand-alone round-based competitive multiplayer with TLOU's slow paced and imprecise gameplay at AUD$125.00, it'll struggle to find any meaningful audience, frankly. If they have an open PVP game mode - BR or Survival mode - they have a chance of capturing a small but dedicated audience. If they launch it as a "Factions Remake" and have it in a package with the TLOU remake and a remaster of TLOUII, then they stand a decent chance of building a decent little community. If they go the full F2P route, they could build a good community, but the gameplay will hold it back.

But "becoming a multiplayer juggernaut"? A stand-alone, slow paced, imprecise, third person shooter, with the divisive TLOUII brand attached to it, launching on one platform? You need to re-calibrate your performance expectations, because if they pull the trigger on that standalone retail multiplayer title, they'll be doing miraculously well to crack even four million sales, let alone spit towards the 100 Million active monthly players Call of Duty Warzone brings in.
 
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ZywyPL

Banned
let alone spit towards the 100 Million active monthly players Call of Duty Warzone brings in.

Well we have to consider what a "juggernaut" actually means nowadays, because we do have a couple of titles with tens-hundreds of millions player base. So what's a threshold of calling a game a juggernaut? Grounded for example was reported to have 5MLN playerbase last year, but I'd personally call such result as just "successful" nowadays, SoT on the other hand was confirmed yesterday to have 20M userbase, now that's big, especially for a 3yo title.
 

Bartski

Gold Member
Not gonna happen and I couldn't care less, I'm sure it will be insanely good and the only multiplayer game on the horizon I know I'll be in on day one.

I hope it's visceral, grounded, slower, and just different and that they successfully keep the tone of the franchise.

And no Joel vs Ellie vs Abby deathmatch bullshit, please. I personally hate the idea of characters from the story being there. Just "anonymous" but made your own, customized faction members against each other.

My biggest hope is a horde mode and co-op "missions" against the infected, something akin to GoT:Legends survival.
 

Shmunter

Member
Hell knows. But let’s hope they know the answer.

I’d be down for a BR in lushly dense environments. Maybe mixed with raid style gameplay, resource scavenging & territory control. Some kind of persistence.
 

skit_data

Member
I think it’s simply too violent if they keep the original aesthetic. I love gore and I played all kinds of meatgrinding games growing up. Soldier of Fortune, Unreal Tournament etc. but in this day an age of spun sugar cuteness of fortnite or laserblasting=no blood, everyone dressed up as no name soldiers I think it will be hard to translate the close up slit throat-blood gargling aesthetic of TLOU2 into a big, wide appeal multiplayer blockbuster.

I would play it though, but I don’t think parents would allow their younger kids to play it since Fortnite came into full effect.
 
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For starters, if they could avoid making everyone in the game painful to look at, it would benefit them. Other than that Free to Play, with unlockable cosmetics.

For a BR Mode
Everyone could simply wake up in a random bed in a large town owned by an even larger faction that hunger games their asses. Maybe they got there by being chloroformed.
 
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KRYPT83

Member
It's need a hub like the tower in destiny. Pvpve and pvp modes. They could drop you into a section of the campaign and build clicker/npc engagements to get your blue's. Horde like wave modes man I have tons of ideas
 

Con-Z-epT

Live from NeoGAF, it's Friday Night!
I hope they stay far away from the mainstream appeal of modern multiplayer games and bring something new an innovation to the table.

I also hope that TLOU2 sold enough to warrant a riskful attempt to multiplayer for them.
Let these people be creative and somewhat outside of the box!
Free to play sounds good but i gladly pay full price again if Naughty Dog excels here.

As already mentioned a horde mode or co-op would suit the game and i would like to see it.
However if they innovate into new frontiers then i'm all for that.

Overall i hope that it will be more critically acclaimed than commercial successful.
 

Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
I hope they stay far away from the mainstream appeal of modern multiplayer games and bring something new an innovation to the table.

I also hope that TLOU2 sold enough to warrant a riskful attempt to multiplayer for them.
Let these people be creative and somewhat outside of the box!
Free to play sounds good but i gladly pay full price again if Naughty Dog excels here.

As already mentioned a horde mode or co-op would suit the game and i would like to see it.
However if they innovate into new frontiers then i'm all for that.

Overall i hope that it will be more critically acclaimed than commercial successful.
I think TLOU 2 has sold around 10 million copies, which I'd say is excellent result for any single-platform exclusive game.

I also hope this gives Naughty Dog the freedom and resources to go very big in their first big multiplayer attempt and wow us as they have been doing with their fantastic single-player games.
 

ZywyPL

Banned
2P at the very least. Not sure of the survival chance for any multiplayer game in this day and age with so much top tier MP now f2p.

They already have 50M PS+ subscribers, so why release it for free when you can somewhat cover the dev costs, and possibly lure even more people into the service ? That's actually the only reason I could see paid online on consoles being justified, MP/co-op games that are exclusive to the services, I think both the publishers and consumers would be happy with that kind of model, it would benefit everyone.
 

Shmunter

Member
They already have 50M PS+ subscribers, so why release it for free when you can somewhat cover the dev costs, and possibly lure even more people into the service ? That's actually the only reason I could see paid online on consoles being justified, MP/co-op games that are exclusive to the services, I think both the publishers and consumers would be happy with that kind of model, it would benefit everyone.
I appreciate the conflict. F2P would need to do the typical monetisation crap to earn it’s keep.

It would at the very least need to be perpetually available to ps+ like with the ps+ collection, not just for a month like with Destruction LameStars.
 

ZywyPL

Banned
I appreciate the conflict. F2P would need to do the typical monetisation crap to earn it’s keep.

It would at the very least need to be perpetually available to ps+ like with the ps+ collection, not just for a month like with Destruction LameStars.

Precisely, having a guaranteed monthly income would mean the games don't have to rely so heavily on MTX like typical F2P games do (which often leads to P2W).
 

Thirty7ven

Banned
Either make it F2P or launch it as a PS+ game. If they can translate the single player action into mp, it has a chance at becoming something pretty big. But it's crowded the MP space, very crowded, so there's no guarantees really. PC version is needed.
 
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Con-Z-epT

Live from NeoGAF, it's Friday Night!
I think TLOU 2 has sold around 10 million copies, which I'd say is excellent result for any single-platform exclusive game.

I also hope this gives Naughty Dog the freedom and resources to go very big in their first big multiplayer attempt and wow us as they have been doing with their fantastic single-player games.
Although their games seem to be controversial for some i think they earned their right to do whatever they want after all the good games they delivered.
Let's hope Sony acknowledges this and gives them money and freedom. The last thing we need is more uniformity throughout the industry.
 
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Bartski

Gold Member
I'd honestly be worried to hear they are making it to chasee after that Fortnight/Aphex/Warzone crowd "appeal to a wide multiplayer gamer audience". Also, like many posters pointed out it's a dark and very brutal game.
What makes a "multiplayer juggernaut" nowadays is children player base, that's just incompatible.
 

sainraja

Member
I enjoyed my little time with Factions on TLOU: P1, but other people were so good at it and I was into Starhawk. Can't remember what other games I was playing but do wish I spent more time playing Factions now. I am not sure if ND should try to compete in the multi-player front. Single player story/character driven games are the type of games I like from them.
 
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