The Finals season three takes its destructive players to 16th-century Kyoto next week
With bows, katanas and spears
The Finals is a multiplayer first-person shooter about stealing cash and demolishing buildings in a virtual reality game show. Why does it need to be set in a virtual reality game show? So it can do things like transport players to Kyoto in the year 1568, which is what will happen when season three arrives on June 13th.
Here's the season 3 announcement trailer, shown during last night's Summer Game Fest broadcast:
The new season brings a new 5v5 ranked mode, Terminal Attack, in which one team attacks by delivering a decryption key to one of two terminals, while the other team defends them. The mode is designed to empasise "a more tactical and competitive" style of play, with matches being decided by the best of 13 rounds, and with no healing or revives.
Although set in different cities and slightly different time periods, so far all of The Finals' maps have been modern urban environments. Kyoto in the 16th century, meanwhile, consists of temples, gardens and bamboo forests - all of which you can demolish as per any other environment in the game.
The setting also brings a set of themed weapons and cosmetics, including dual katanas for Mediums, a spear for Heavies, and a recurve bow for Lights. I love a bow in any game.
I haven't returned to play it in a while, but I'm still rooting for The Finals. Being able to demolish buildings is fun on its own terms, as are grappling hooks and portable jump pads, but its real strength is making these overpowered tools into tactically significant options in the push-and-pull of its various game modes. I had great fun with it for a couple of months and I hope it continues to draw enough of an audience to keep its servers online.