Deadly Piecharts: 30 Minutes Of Planetside 2 Footage

News by Craig Pearson Contributor

Published on March 7, 2012

This morning I've been watching this off-screen GDC presentation of Planetside 2, and realising that my life is incomplete without it. I thought I need a cat, flat and significant other, but really my goal in life is to be the best damn Infiltrator I can be. There are four videos below, with about 30 minutes of Planetside 2 exposition, starting with an overview and showing everything from the large scale battles and maps, to the store and stats. They've finally released details about the most important/worrying aspect: the business model. Succinctly: they're selling customisation options, side-grade weaponry can be earned or bought, and anything that'll directly affect the way you play (medkits or implants) are earned in-game. As is the way of these things, there will be a subscription option as well.

Of course, the next question is how long unlocks take, but SOE are going to enable Eve style offline advancement, so it shouldn't be a grind. That was always my biggest concern, over and above the shooting which I'd already assumed would be good. It does look proper shooty, and bases are complex, multi-level things. Cracking them requires resources and team-work, and it has that shivery Planetside atmosphere where you can approach a fight in a dropship, watching those flashes of light coalesce into raging localised battles.

The details are really starting to come together. Jump to the fourth if you want to see the stats that they're tracking and exposing: weapon proficiency will trace how accurate you are over time, and there's a delicious looking pie-chart that delivers faction specific murdering information. That's what ultimately got me: guns are good, but graphs are better.

Part 1: A glimpse of war