Right, Day 1 of playing Freelancer was…something.
I’ll start with the good.
The customisable safehouse is something I feel like will be worth unlocking, but I do feel like the levels to unlock the safehouse needs to be toned down in general (Level 4 to unlock a Bathroom, really IOI?)
The optional modifiers for targets is something I rather like, allowing you to get more mercers to encourage riskier and varied play-styles. But there’s a bit of an issue with them that i’ll talk about in a moment. Not a bad idea, and most of them are generic enough to work.
The re-use of ghost crates within the level as stashes is a cool idea. I dislike the random nature of them, but that’s a “me” thing, more than anything.
The ability to look at guns is something I’ve wanted in the main game for years; I love it. Very Tomb Raider =)
Okay. The bad/ need improving:
The game feels…self aware, in a rather strange way. I’m reminded of a Jimquisition video from years ago called “Damn Fine Coffee”, in which they talk about focus groups and what they say versus what they actually want. I think you can see where this going.
Players have always requested more freedom in approach, so you’re not always tied down by a Silent Assassin rank. The issue, is that, as @Khakiasp has said, this mode has NO Silent Assassin functionality, meaning, much like the early rounds of Ghost Mode, there’s basically no punishment for dicking about and getting into trouble. So long as the trouble is contained to a specific section of the map, then you can get away scot free. There’s no downside, and very little to work toward level to level.
The syndicate encounters simply have FAR too many mechanics going on. Assassins, lookouts, the amount of “tells”, really it’s a strange hodge-podge of ideas. Each mechanic is good on its own, but each one obscures the other and makes it very tricky to stay focused.
I’m not a fan of the lootbox rewards crate system in the safehouse, I’d rather Diana just give me something over a chest of many possibilities; I’m reminded of Hitman Sniper (and The Shadows) and it feels like a mobile game, and that is already a bit of a red flag. I’ll be fair, everything I’ve gotten so far has been useful (which, at this point in time, is hardly good enough for critique), but it still puts me in the same mindset, especially in the early-game.
I suspect it’s trying to copy Hades’ Boon system, where, if you defeat a dungeon with such boon inside, you are given a powerset from one of the Gods that’s helping you escape. That works because, although it’s still random, there’s only so many variations of powers you can get. With Hitman, weapons to choose are literally in the hundreds.
The picking of NPC’s to be targets in contracts is really weird. Like, in one of the contracts, one of Yuki’s Guards is a target. Unfortunately, because he doesn’t react to any kind of distraction, you cannot isolate him, meaning you have to wait for ages to pull the classic dwindling party scenario on the other people around him, or go loud and deal with those consequences. Those complications I mentioned earlier? Yeah, one of them was to push the target over a ledge; which is just impossible. The complications oftentimes don’t correlate to the targets.
Another target I had was just some random ETHER scientist, which isn’t bad by itself, but her routine was tiny, and collateral damage potential was quite high. This highlights quite well the problem with using background NPC’s as targets, as, by design, they’re not meant to be treated like main mission targets, and so don’t have the same AI opportunities, and are deliberately rather one-note.
Doors. They need to be unlocked. Any door that requires a key or lockpick needs to be unlocked. I felt too boxed in a lot of the time, and routes that i’d be able to take in the main mission are simply not open to me. Hell, in the ETHER Lab, you have to Pacify people in the labs to get in/ out, so it may be wise to put keycards for the doors in there too.
I’ll likely make this a thing for each day I play, so watch this space. I’m gonna stick to 1pm - 4pm (UK Time), and i’ll be streaming this on Twitch just so I can look back on things. Alright, that’s it for today; seeya tomorrow!