Good enough
Every mission I’ve played is a minor variation on killing everything that spawns in a room or defending a position while shooting everything in the room (another thing it has in common with Destiny). I’ve fought a handful of bosses now and most of them have weirdly relied on the same gimmick of floating balls that you have to shoot to make them vulnerable to your guns. I guess these “immunity spheres” are so common that they’re already becoming an inside joke in the community.
Quantity does have its perks: There’s so much going on in The First Descendant between its campaign missions, big-budget cutscenes, Strike-like repeatable missions, and endlessly customizable weapon traits. I even like the hero shooter approach with the Descendants themselves.
I’ve only unlocked my one starter guy who throws grenades and has a gun arm, but I got to test drive a few others in a demo at Summer Game Fest last month. None of the abilities knocked my socks off, but I appreciate they all have their own thing going on, like laying down shields, healing, or speeding around the map. There are 14 Descendants at launch and I’m sure Nexon plans to add to that. That’s more than I can say for Destiny’s modest class variety.
With better missions, I could see getting the itch to collect ’em all in The First Descendants. Unfortunately, new characters take a long time to unlock for free and otherwise cost a pop. No thanks. It’s easy to imagine where Nexon might be hiding progression roadblocks meant to get dedicated players to start paying down the road, but even if that’s the case, you could duck out of The First Descendant before that and have still played a decent amount of game for free.
That said, I’ve had my fill of generic looter shooter for the year. I’d rather play more Suicide Squad.
