My Feelings on the St. Valentines Day DLC & Update
Posted: Sat Feb 16, 2013 4:24 am
Okay, so I just gave the latest Ace of Spades Steam update a go, and I also purchased the DLC (which I initially felt was bad because I was giving money to Jagex). Anyway, to start I thought I'd go through the changes to the base game.
Jagex has added two new maps (well I don't think either of them are new, Jagex chose not to release them earlier), Ancient Egypt and Neon Tokyo. Ancient Egypt is actually in my opinion a pretty enjoyable map, it seems a little larger than other maps, I think this feeling can be attributed to the fact that it is fairly full of scenery. In the TDM matches I played, both teams seemed to stick to sniping from the blue base across to where the green team had set up on a large rock wall. I'd say that this is actually a very enjoyable map compared to the other ones in the game.
Neon Tokyo on the other hand is simply two towers with a sort of suspension bridge structure, that rather than running between them sort of sits like a weird barrier/wall separating them at right angles. I only played demolition on this map, but once again both teams were sort of sticking to the scout class and sniping, I'm not sure how this map would go with other game-modes but I believe that it will only be enjoyable on heavily team based games where you defend your tower.
I also noticed that some of the classic servers supported 32 players, I believe this is up from 24 in the previous updates of the game.
Now onto the St. Valentines Day DLC. The DLC was AUD3.99 which I believe is the same price in US dollars, reasonably cheap, but irregardless, I'm more than certain that a combination of Buffet_of_Lies and Influx collaborating on the maps, hompey and TGM scripting the game-mode, and SIMOX creating the weapons would have pulled this off at no cost, and in a much quicker development period than what Jagex managed. The maps are well made, and quite large, and Chicago is particularly enjoyable, it has many high rises (not quite as high as the towers in Capitol) that actually look quite good. You don't have any choice of weapons simply starting with a pistol and a tommy gun. The models for the weapons and characters acually look good, the tommy gun in your hand feels quite solid compared to the other guns in the game, you actually feel a little like a gangster as you walk up the Chicago streets hip firing at your targets. In terms of accuracy and damage, the guns do high damage, unlike in the base game, it's down to who has the quickest trigger finger. Compared to the 0.75 smg, the cone of fire seems to be much more accurate, however, your bullets with in that cone of fire aren't very accurate from the first bullet fire. To explain, say you aim at a long range target in 0.75 your first bullet has a good chance of hitting your target while the follow up shots don't, in contrast this SMG has an average chance of all your bullets hitting their target: your first one has the same chance as any other.
The game-modes, particularly VIP are fairly enjoyable, and it is quite cool that even if your VIP is the first to die you can still win the match. I'd actually say that this update is far better to play than the base game, and I'd recommend you play it if you have the money lying around. That said though, it still pisses me off that my $4 does contribute to people like Sniped's income...
Jagex has added two new maps (well I don't think either of them are new, Jagex chose not to release them earlier), Ancient Egypt and Neon Tokyo. Ancient Egypt is actually in my opinion a pretty enjoyable map, it seems a little larger than other maps, I think this feeling can be attributed to the fact that it is fairly full of scenery. In the TDM matches I played, both teams seemed to stick to sniping from the blue base across to where the green team had set up on a large rock wall. I'd say that this is actually a very enjoyable map compared to the other ones in the game.
Neon Tokyo on the other hand is simply two towers with a sort of suspension bridge structure, that rather than running between them sort of sits like a weird barrier/wall separating them at right angles. I only played demolition on this map, but once again both teams were sort of sticking to the scout class and sniping, I'm not sure how this map would go with other game-modes but I believe that it will only be enjoyable on heavily team based games where you defend your tower.
I also noticed that some of the classic servers supported 32 players, I believe this is up from 24 in the previous updates of the game.
Now onto the St. Valentines Day DLC. The DLC was AUD3.99 which I believe is the same price in US dollars, reasonably cheap, but irregardless, I'm more than certain that a combination of Buffet_of_Lies and Influx collaborating on the maps, hompey and TGM scripting the game-mode, and SIMOX creating the weapons would have pulled this off at no cost, and in a much quicker development period than what Jagex managed. The maps are well made, and quite large, and Chicago is particularly enjoyable, it has many high rises (not quite as high as the towers in Capitol) that actually look quite good. You don't have any choice of weapons simply starting with a pistol and a tommy gun. The models for the weapons and characters acually look good, the tommy gun in your hand feels quite solid compared to the other guns in the game, you actually feel a little like a gangster as you walk up the Chicago streets hip firing at your targets. In terms of accuracy and damage, the guns do high damage, unlike in the base game, it's down to who has the quickest trigger finger. Compared to the 0.75 smg, the cone of fire seems to be much more accurate, however, your bullets with in that cone of fire aren't very accurate from the first bullet fire. To explain, say you aim at a long range target in 0.75 your first bullet has a good chance of hitting your target while the follow up shots don't, in contrast this SMG has an average chance of all your bullets hitting their target: your first one has the same chance as any other.
The game-modes, particularly VIP are fairly enjoyable, and it is quite cool that even if your VIP is the first to die you can still win the match. I'd actually say that this update is far better to play than the base game, and I'd recommend you play it if you have the money lying around. That said though, it still pisses me off that my $4 does contribute to people like Sniped's income...