Remedy Entertainment’s latest Alan Wake spinoff, FBC: Firebreak, hasn’t engaged players as much as hoped, but a new update aims to fix that. FBC: Firebreak launched for consoles and PC (via Steam and EGS) on July 17, but despite its ties to the successful Alan Wake universe, which has also seen another profitable release with Control, it has received criticism from players regarding playability challenges from the get-go.
The 3-player co-op launched with a mostly negative rating on Steam, from an unimpressive 250 review count, where players commented on not really enjoying the game and its unfocused, difficult challenges and while numerous media outlets have given somehwat positive reviews it’s obvious that the gaming community has yet to feel engaged with it. Since Patch 1.2 has rolled out the review count has risen to over 1,200, a still lackluster number, but has at least pushed its rating to Mixed status. Remedy acknowledged in its patch notes that it is working on making changes to the game in order to make it more enjoyable.
Per Patch 1.2 notes:
“The game’s first hours do not provide a great experience due to a combination of things.
Some of this is down to a lack of onboarding (more about that in a bit), explaining the game’s systems, how to take advantage of the tools at your disposal, and a lack of clarity as to what to do in the Jobs and how to do the work effectively.
In addition, the power fantasy isn’t great in the first hours of the game as starting (tier 1) weapons feel weak, and unlocking higher-tier weapons requires a bit too much grinding.
We can see from the data and are seeing feedback that players who stick around and unlock more powerful tier 3 weapons and Perks, playing on higher Threat levels and Full three zone Job runs, are having a better time.”
From UI improvements to better explaining the game’s mechanics, and making access to various jobs easier for story progression, along with accelerated gear unlocks, the developers are working to improve the experience in playing the game. Here’s a list of changes made via the latest patch.
- You are no longer required to play the first two Clearance Levels of each Job.
- New players start their experience with a full three-zone Hot Fix Job run (Clearance Level 3).
- Completing the full Job unlocks the next full Job, and so on.
- Completing a full Job also unlocks the Corruption option for that Job.
- Lost Assets and Research Samples are now clearly visually highlighted, making it harder to miss them
- Rebalancing the cost of all unlockables
- We have split the Operational Requisitions into two:
- All cosmetics (sprays, armor sets) are placed in a new Requisitions page called “Expressions”.
- Operational Requisitions is renamed to “Essentials” and as the name implies, contains weapons, gear, and equipment.
- Making essentials like Altered Augments, Improvised Devices, and powerful weapons easier to access.
- The end result of these changes is that you can unlock and buy gear significantly faster than before. No more needing to unlock gloves just to get to a better revolver.
Remedy has said more changes are inbound as it continues to exam community feedback and identify more courses of action. FBC:Firebreak also features full ray tracing and DLSS 4 with multi frame generation.
Discussion (9 replies)
Join Discussion →Wait... did this come out last July? Huh...
I missed it too, but I'd just have pointed and laughed at it even if I knew about it. The only thing dumber than making an MP only game is making one from a single player IP.
I mean the concept works. Supernatural outbreak due to empowered item. Send team to recover and subdue item. Its interesting and could be fun to play.
These high concept pitches are better reserved for single player games.
If you look at the most popular multiplayer games, most of them have very little to no story behind them. It is a waste of effort trying to make up some elaborate backstory which will inevitably just get in the way of gameplay. MP games need no lore reasons for their gameplay loop, it just needs to be fun with minimum downtime.
I disagree. But that's fine I get it. I'd love to see tje marketing for. "Team shooter game" where you get.to "shoot people's blocks on other teams!" Make sure to buy now so "you can get the exclusive colored shooter blocks!" Its cool because instead of marketing or story all of their resources went to "the best shooting shooter of shooting."
What is the backstory of Unreal Tournament, Quake3, Quakeworld, PUBG, Fortnite, Overwatch, Marvel's Rivals? Do they even have one beyond some codex entry hidden somewhere? I can't think of a single successful multiplayer game where the story has a significant role, not even in co-op titles.
Oddly enough I don't play any of those. Maybe that's why I find it funny.
That depends on how you define success, and whether one limits their view to a handful of cherry picked titles to support their argument. Arguably, World of Warcraft is/was hugely successful for many years and I'm told story plays a role (I've never played WoW and never will). Lord of the Rings Online (since 2007) is still running and you don't have to think very hard about the underlying story there. The Harry Potter MMO seemed to do well (again, not one I've played) and also one that you don't have to look far for its storied origins.
You don't have to play them to know these are some of the most popular multiplayer shooters ever. I didn't play any of the modern ones either.
The only fair and objective way to define success is financial success or popularity for F2P games. Everything else would be subjective. I'm not cherry picking anything, I'm just listing examples off the top of my head.
My statement was about shooters, since this is a shooter, I never intended to include MMORPGs in this. I agree those need some kind of story as a hook.