Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Breakpoint

[Jupiter]

The concept of pay-to-win is that you can purchase gameloop-affecting items in a shop for real money rather than grinding through the game's mechanics and normal gameplay loop to earn them. I'm not sure how this isn't pay-to-win? Especially with skill point purchases and weapon upgrades. I can literally start the game and progress to a point that likely someone would have to spend weeks/months playing at any normal rate to earn those. The argument that most of the items can be earned in-game doesn't exclude it from being a pay-to-win game.

You know that you can still enjoy the game and what they've created and not feel it's necessary to defend the company and the decisions they make on-high to fleece as much money from consumers as possible far beyond what is needed to support the game. You're not required to feel any loyalty to Ubisoft. You seem uncomfortable with the idea that this game is pay-to-win though, I guess because of the stigma around the label.

I always wanted to try Wildlands and would consider Breakpoint but without a good group of friends to play with I don't think it would be a very good experience for me.

For me Pay to Win means something else. For example, when you can buy the best stuff in PvP games where normal players can't get anywhere without investing money. Or if it takes an endless amount of time to unlock those things. If one reduced the playtime by buying the items it this does not automatically make it pay to win for me.

I don't buy that kind of stuff normally. In the past there were DLC weapons in games that you could only get at with money. Strangely enough not so many people got upset.

The microtransactions are in an extra menu. You really have to go there and look for it. It is not constantly held in front of your nose.

Wildlands is not for solo players. Breakpoint is better but also not super great. The Division 1 and 2 are better suited for solo players.

In a Ubisoft game this is usually not the case.

When I look at the playtimes I doubt it. In With 600 Hours playtime you were only in midfield of play time in The Division. Over 1500 hours were often the norm. There aren't many other video games that come close.

In other games like Wildlands, many players have come back recently.

 

[homerdog]

Or not ? The grinding can be boring as f to "force" people to pay...
It's a shame...

Oh I guess game design has changed with these things. So they make the game so unbearable that you would literally rather pay them more to not have to play it?

 

[Malo]

Oh I guess game design has changed with these things. So they make the game so unbearable that you would literally rather pay them more to not have to play it?

That's how live service games are designed nowadays, especially by Ubisoft. Progression is balanced overall so that the game is paced accordingly and then they reduce the progression to allow the introduction of "time savers"... for a price of course. That's why Assassin's Creed was shifted to an XP model with levels and skills etc. over a few editions, so that they could monetize the progression as well.

 

[Jupiter]

Servers are down since two hours! https://forums.ubisoft.com/showthread.php/2137457

I understand things like Always Online in other games such as The Division but not here. In Wildlands there was no Always Online either.

 

[Malo]

Some MTX removed from the store already

"From the beginning, two key factors stood out as extremely important for the team: That Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Breakpoint doesn’t include any pay-to-win elements, [and] to make sure that players not choosing to engage with in-game purchases do not see their experience affected. Players will be able to unlock skills and get access to plenty of varied loot and items by simply playing the game."

The "Time Savers" that were available for purchase in the Breakpoint store are a slightly different matter, however. UbiBorghal explained that weren't actually supposed to be there, and they have since removed, although they'll be back at some point down the road.

Does anyone actually believe these companies? Oh no, yet another release of a game with MTX that "weren't supposed to be there". Oops, how did that happen? Those silly devs.

 

[homerdog]

The idea of paid "Time Savers" is something I would come up with if I were trying to parody the industry.

 

[Jupiter]

Whether one has the rarest weapon er the one from the beginning it makes no difference. One shot in the head is enough. The whole debate just seems to be artificial and the YouTuber etc. who complain about it are just looking for something to generate clicks. One can easily tell they've all never been into the game. There would be far more pressing problems than this stuff which does not affect one at all but they all live from clicks, donations etc.

The running costs for extensions etc. do not pay for themselves through nothing. If the YouTubers want to live in the highly praised communism they should go to North Korea and so on. Where I live there used to be socialism and economically it destroys everything. There it's all about relations and so on.

EDIT:

For PvP the values of weapons and equipment are all brought to a standard.

 

[Jupiter]

This is how this game needs to be played in my opinion

What kind of game offers me such an experience? Unfortunately there are also immersion killers like AI mistakes etc. Then there are the Azrael drones which are not an immersion killer by tself but what happens when one is discovered. Within seconds enemy soldiers are materialized even on a mountain peak.

 

[Jupiter]

The world of this game has real charm. Optically it is also once again clearly better than Wildlands.

Compared to Wildlands the main and side missions are on a completely different level and sometimes take more than an hour. Often they lead over various steps across half the island and also all the info fragments and the optional dialogues are not just thrown away so that you have something to collect but bring you closer to the Island. Many missions come back later simply because you weren't even in the area. Even though I liked the cartel setting in Wildlands a lot Breakpoint somehow offers the better staging in terms of story and mission introduction. The story takes place very slowly but I somehow have the feeling that you should do side missions first because there are events there that should actually have an effect on the story.

In the beta the Faction Missions were mostly very similar and one had the feeling that the mission generator is bad. Now I already did a few and if you hadn't said they came out of the retort I wouldn't have noticed that. They fit well into the game and don't look like retorts at all. I don't know if Ubisoft always helps itself with the beta versions. By the way, the Faction Mission rewards are really strong. One gets a nice rifle quite early (so no pay to game). When I think of all the weapon parts Wildlands was also a big run on loot with a grind factor. In Assassin's Creed Odyssey it was more problematic and there you could buy the best weapons in the shop. Why is that seen so critically in Breakpoint now?

Whoever plays with enabled Guided Mode has misjudged the game. Do not do it!. HUD preset to a minimum or close to minimum and then you get an awesome game. Difficulty should be at least high or maximum at best.

As far as the fights are concerned I find almost everything better. The opponents move more realistically, the hit behaviour and physics are very good (before the opponents behaved like cardboard) and the death animations are very fluid. What I particularly like is the way in which they have implemented the lying and sealing of the character.

Ubisoft has a very subtle narrative style in many of their open world games. Again there are missions with a philosophical character and in the end there is no super loot. This French influence is refreshing and is pure game design. Of course you have to see and understand that. If you don't take your time you'll sweep over the dialogue and race from one point to the other you you'll get upset about it.

Despite the negatives one has to admit the game also does a lot better than it's predecessor. I like it a lot and the experiences I had in this game once again show me at what level players can get extremely annoyed today. There is nothing wrong with criticism but if one really hates everything I've experienced in the game he has to be disturbed in his head. The game has many improvements over it's predecessor that I can't list them all. If you liked the predecessor you should love this. Maybe there are a few things that are a matter of taste but what I'm experiencing is a big leap.

 

[suryad]

I played the beta.

+extremely many options
+there's even a mode that doesn't display waypoints. For missions there is just a text which says something like "meet in area xyxy in northeast direction". You have to search by yourself.
+for the HUD alone there are approximately 50 things you can adjust
+visuals, sound and control can also be adjusted very precisely

+new mechanics are convincing but the survival aspect should be deepened significantly
+weapons, equipment, etc. can be heavily modified
+AI has been improved and the drones and robots bring variety into the fights
+the combat drones sometimes fly very fast and that looks impressive
+many possibilities to complete missions

+better animations
+character models look much better
+extensive graphic improvements


-there are visible pop-ups unlike in the predecessor
-in contrast to Wildlands the graphics at a distance is no longer as overwhelming
-some urban areas and outposts look great while others look empty and boring
-compared to the predecessor the climate zones and biotopes are not so realistic and the transitions are abrupt
-always online
-AI in combat could still be better (see The Division 2)
-the transitions to the cutscenes are not fluid
-some stupid dialogs and cutscenes
-I dont't see the need for RPG mechanics with gear level etc.

= coop expeience is the best I know
= for the best experience the difficulty level should be as high as possible with any HUD elements deactivated

Maybe I will come up with more points bit by bit.

Wow thanks for the review. I am definitely excited to play this game. My brother and I had a fantastic time playing GR Wildlands. Even when I was playing it in single player I had a blast. I genuinely enjoy these kinds of open world games where I can choose to play how I want to. I usually go stealth and then switch to CQC so a mix and it's a lot of fun.

I am still playing R6 Siege and it's great. I haven't played Wildlands in a while after playing the DLCs there's nothing new is there after the DLCs?

 

[Jupiter]

Several missions were added for the singleplayer/coop mode.. For example, there were missions from Sam Fisher, the main opponent from Breakpoint and so on.

 

[orangpelupa]

That's how live service games are designed nowadays, especially by Ubisoft. Progression is balanced overall so that the game is paced accordingly and then they reduce the progression to allow the introduction of "time savers"... for a price of course. That's why Assassin's Creed was shifted to an XP model with levels and skills etc. over a few editions, so that they could monetize the progression as well.

Then ubusift truly know their own strengths. Because even before they do micro-transactions, their games already have "boring slog" moments, and people still love their games.

I almost always use cheats tho to make the boring slogs come to pass faster.

 

[Jupiter]

The game is the hardest thing I've played in a long time. With large bases you have to make a very good plan if you want to clean a whole base without being noticed. If you manage it it's very satisfying. But even so, silent action is desirable. I just died after about an hour by a single sniper shot (I didn't even know anybody was targeting me) and now I have to start the whole thing over again. Even if the base is almost cleaned a single mistake can cost you your life in a fraction of a second. Today I played a side mission which lasted about 2+ hours. All those who criticized the mission design in Wildlands should be happy about such missions.

After about 30 hours I hardly saw anything of the main missions so far. If one likes small details he will be able to discover a lot again. Starting with the game mechanics, game mechanics, graphics, animations, ambient sounds, atmosphere, font and color layout etc.