My impressions after playing for several rounds: feels like "CM lite" but is still relatively fun. On the technical side, it's a lot better with all sorts of bells and whistles that old CM didn't have. But to be sort of cliche here, it's lacking soul. There isn't the same sense of atmosphere, the standards for RP are lower--though not by much, CM always had a crowd of memers and the like. And having cliques of players who did RP a lot created its own problems--and in general it feels more like TDM than it ever did. I also didn't see many improvements, if any, to the gameplay formula. Getting rid of the SD feels like a step backward: no cool final stands, less immersion in actually trying to scuttle the ship, and so on. The new pred ship is pretty sweet tho! Always wanted to see that reworked.
In terms of combat, I left right after the Almayer came out and the end of hugger xenos. I like that the xenomorphs are individually even deadlier in lethal encounters, though there is far less emphasis on them capturing people in return. Despite the years it has been, xenos are still bullet sponges, and I'm not a huge fan of that. But what can you do. I was never great at medical while I played, but I do think that despite being less engaging, the wound system does a decent enough job of making the player vulnerable. Friendly fire is still a pain in the ass, though medical treatment seems to be far more frequent and quicker to get you back on your feet.
My overall impression is that the game moved sideways, and it most notably lacks overarching vision to move forward. Some things are definitely better, specifically on the technical side, some things are not great, like the stale gameplay loop that hasn't changed in 6? years. But my sample size is fairly small, and this is all just my opinion.
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Originally Posted by Obscurify
