Tribes: Ascend is a F2P game and let me tell you now, it’s amazing. It has 5 different game modes, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, CTF Blitz, Capture and Hold, and Arena. Each one is entirely unique and presents a completely different playing style. The game has been out for some time now, but I’ve only just started playing it and within around an hour of playing it I found that I had found my new muse. It was no longer Counter-Strike, but it was playing Tribes: Ascend for hours and hours on end. The game is addictive, fun and very entertaining.
- TEAM DEATHMATCH: OBLITERATE EVERYTHING
Team Deathmatch is the traditional FPS style of game play. See something that isn’t on your side? Kill it. Before it kills you. It’s without a doubt the most popular game style. I cannot think of a well-known FPS that hasn’t got Team Deathmatch in it. It is the backbone of every FPS game ever released. In Tribes: Ascend Team Deathmatch games are generally on wide open maps, allowing the player to get in and out of action as fast as possible. For the most part, to get into the battle you simple ‘ski’ into the center of the map and start shooting your desired weapon. Kill someone? Great! Now do it again. And again.
- CAPTURE THE FLAG: BASE, VEHICLES AND STRATEGY
Capture the flag is a fairly obvious game style, right? Go to the enemies base, take their flag and make it back home. Well, Tribes: Ascend brings something new to the table. In CTF on Tribes: Ascend there are vehicles, turrets, radars and a whole load of bad guys wanting to kill you. The idea is still simple, get their flag, get back home. Rinse and repeat. However just with the inclusion of ‘ski-ing’, vehicles and turrets it changes the entire atmosphere of the CTF game style. Ski-ing is by far the most popular way of retrieving an enemy flag. Build up speed and swoop in and out of the enemies base with their flag in under two seconds flat. It sounds pretty badass, and believe me. It is. You could also go in with a tank-like vehicle and blitz the be-jebus out of your enemy, of course.
- CTF BLITZ: CTF! JUST WITH MOVING FLAG STANDS…
CTF Blitz is a game style that, yet again, revolutionises the way CTF is played. Before, players were used to learning the best way in and out of a flag capture. Ski in at the same place, ski out. However now, the flag stand will move with each successful flag capture, completely changing the way you need to capture the flag. It could be placed on the top of a mountain, or in the depth of the enemy base. You have no way of knowing where the flag will spawn, you just have to wait and find out. I’ve not played CTF Blitz, it’s not a game style that appeals to me very well. CTF or TDM are my main game styles, however, CTF Blitz certainly looks like it could be a lot of fun when working as a team as it’ll require tonnes of teamwork in order to co-ordinate a successful flag capture if the flag is in the enemies base.
- CAPTURE AND HOLD: CAPTURE A LOCATION. HOLD IT.
Capture and Hold is pretty much base defence. You have to first of all capture the structure (Done simply by standing on the marked area) and then holding it off from attackers. There are three points. A, B and C. The more structures you own the more points you’ll get per every five seconds, and you have to hold the structures until either the time limit runs out or the score limit is reached. Unfortunately, just like in Domination on Call of Duty, once a team owns two structures, they tend to camp them structures and not let go of them, usually resulting in a very dull game experience. It’s far more enjoyable when you have buddies that are playing the game correctly, and you can all co-ordinate a powerful strike onto the enemies structures.
- ARENA: BATTLE IT OUT!
From my layman’s perspective, Arena seems like a smaller version of team deathmatch. The maps are extremely small, and spawning will often have you in a gun fight almost instantly. It mainly appeals to those who just want a chaotic, blood bath form of team deathmatch. Needless to say, I don’t like it much. I prefer having a small break between fights, however I can see why people would find the game style that is found in Arena extremely entertaining.
Aside from all the game styles, there are loads of weapons, equipment and powerups. All have the option to pay with either real life money, or using your experience points you have gained along your travels (and battles!). I personally use experience points as I’m cheap as hell, not to mention I think using real life money to make a game faster to complete almost defeats the entire point of playing it, the exception being that you play for fun entirely.
Overall, Tribes: Ascend is absolutely outstanding! It’s a great game if you like FPS’ and hey, for £0 you can’t really go wrong!
Gaming Respite 