Tribes: Ascend (free multiplayer FPS)

**Marvo** · 02-06-2012 01:46 AM

So today I got a beta key for Tribes: Ascend from a friend, and I must say, it's an incredible game. I never played the other Tribes games before it (it's an old franchise, going back to 1998), probably because it wasn't so well known and I was occupied at the time with SC, CS and UT.

I'll give a quick introduction of what the game is.

It's an extremely fast paced game, rivaling that of Quake and Unreal Tournament. Technically, the game speed is not faster than Quake, but you move very quickly. I'll go over the game mechanics here!

Movement (skiing, jetpack)

Maps in Tribes: Ascend are very big, even in team death match. This is because you never really move around on foot, but instead slide around on the ground, or as the game calls it, skiing. Basically the player becomes frictionless, meaning you can ski down hills and build up very high velocity. When going up hills, you lose velocity. To counter this, you have a jetpack with a limited amount of energy, which regens fairly quickly.
You can move around simply by running, although this is fairly slow and will get you killed quickly. It's only good for making precision movements, like picking up or positioning things.
The skiing game mechanic is very fun and results in a very immersive experience, in my opinion.

Weapons and classes

There are hitscan (instant hit) and projectile (rockets etc.) weapons. Hitscan weapons usually have lower damage and no splash, but a much higher firing rate. Projectile weapons are usually explosive and requires that the player is very good at predicting where the enemy will be, when your shot lands.
There is 9 classes in Tribes, divided into 3 categories: Light, Medium and Heavy. The difference between the three is basically mobility, weapons strength, health and armour.
The classes are somewhat comparable to those of TF2, although their roles are not quite as defined as TF2.
Weapons can be upgraded for XP (gained through playing) and Tribes Gold (bought for real money). Upgrades improve stats slightly, and you can gather the XP to upgrade things within 4 or 5 matches.
Upgrades don't really make a big difference though, compared to skill. A good player will destroy a bad player, even if the bad player has all upgrades and the good player has none.

The game is largely team based. It currently has three game modes.

Team deathmatch

It's exactly what you'd expect. Two teams go up against each other. Each time you kill an enemy, their team score is lowered. The first one to reach 0 loses. There is a flag in the map, that when carried by a person on your team, will double the amount of points the enemy loses.

Capture the flag

Just regular old CTF, although it also has vehicles. Players can fortify positions with forcefield barriers, mines and turrets.

Rabbit

Who can hold the flag the longest. This is an FFA gamemode, where only the person holding the flag can be attacked, and the flag carrier can attack anyone. When you hold the flag, you slowly gain points. Reach 30 points and you win the round. Killing the flag carrier, picking up the flag and killing people while holding the flag also gets you points.

When playing the game, you will want to be moving at 60km/h+ at all times. Standing still will get you killed quickly. Knowing the map like your backpocket also gives you enormous advantages, as you can then ski backwards and shoot at people chasing you, without skiing into things that will break your speed.

Over all, it's a very fun game, and probably the only game since UT3 and TF2, that really returns to the roots of FPS gaming, though also bringing some innovation.

If you are looking for a good LAN party game, this is definitely one to check out. When it launches, it will be free to play, making it very accessible.

You can register for the game here:
https://account.hirezstudios.com/tribesascend/
You can get a beta key by liking Hi-Rez Studios on Facebook:
Tribes Ascend | Facebook

If you have issues with the game after installation, run the "Hi-Rez Diagnostics and Support" tool. It seems that the texture pack installation gets messed up a lot.
The game is fairly demanding, running on Unreal Engine 3.0. A decent frame rate is very nice to have when moving quickly. Settings are very flexible, and you can basically make the game ugly as hell, if need be.

edit: video added, also shazbot

**Original Poster** · 02-06-2012 07:40 AM

Oh yeah I used to ply the Tribes Demo. I wish I had a computer that could run it, it was a fun game.

**Marvo** · 02-06-2012 11:40 AM

I should say I play on the European region, my nick is "Rambowjo". You can switch which region you play on in the options menu under "Region Select" or something like that. Nicks are not restricted to regions, meaning you can be on a US region and watch me as I play on a European region.

Omnis, Tribes Ascend can probably run on most machines. Have you tried?

**Original Poster** · 02-06-2012 05:28 PM

I can't even run minecraft

At least not in a way I consider playable.

But this laptop cost me 250 bucks, I wasn't exactly expecting much.

**Marvo** · 02-06-2012 10:10 PM

Oh yeah, a $250 laptop won't get you too far

**JussiKala** · 02-06-2012 10:42 PM

I really like what they did with the last major update: Really gave some variation to the gameplay. Perhaps a good compromise between the restricting class system of the tribes ascend a couple of weeks back and the old tribes games' system.

The one real issue I have with the game is that gathering the XP takes forever. Even if you got boosted XP, it'd take forever to unlock most items/perks/skills. On unboosted XP I get like 500XP per game, so items that take like 40k XP seem very distant.

**Marvo** · 02-07-2012 12:34 AM

I just got like 1500 XP for a match. The better you play, the more XP you get.

Compared to League of Legends, the amount of time you need to play in Tribes is nothing. I think it's perfectly acceptable, especially considering it's a free to play game.

**LucidFlanders** · 02-07-2012 01:01 AM

Game is awesome. Here is a screenshot of me. I play as wiZZkiDD, and have no tribes expierience.

http://screenshot.xfire.com/s/121252800-4.jpg (almost double scored the next guy on my team)

My best score, but i suck now. Seems i keep playing in servers with vets, instead of noobs.

**LucidFlanders** · 02-07-2012 01:11 AM

BTW here is a 19 minute long video on a guy skiing for the match. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3ucbSBctrQ

**LucidFlanders** · 02-18-2012 05:26 PM

FRADD569278BBD4FA1A14F501

1 free beta key, hurry up because i have it posted on a few sites.

**Marvo** · 02-24-2012 01:07 AM

Tribes: Ascend has now entered open beta, meaning anyone can sign up and play. Really, check it out if you want something different from your traditional first person shooter. It's a ton of fun!

https://account.hirezstudios.com/tribesascend/

**Supernova** · 02-24-2012 04:00 AM

Originally Posted by Marvo

The classes are somewhat comparable to those of TF2

You have my attention.

Ironically, I was just thinking about this and trying to remember the name of it earlier today, and here it is. One thing that stands out to me is that it seems like it would be fairly difficult to actually make contact with a hitscan weapon, although I'd have to give it a try to see. I like the sound of the whole "skiing" mechanic. I'd definately be willing to give this a try. I'm willing to bet my laptop would run it fairly well; it's months old, and ran Skyrim at fairly high settings with little difficulty (for a good benchmark, WoW at max settings averaged roughly 50 fps).

**Supernova** · 02-25-2012 05:18 AM

WOW! This game is a very interesting take on the FPS genre. There are a number of things that I would tweak, just based on playing maybe 6 or 7 matches, but all in all I'm very impressed. Another thing I'll note, is DAMN this game requires good fast-twitch aim. Makes it challenging, but also leads to a lot of suspenseful moments. On top of the usual FPS gameplay, this game brings maneuvering into the equation 100%. All the stuff going on around you and all the movements you have to coordinate makes for an interesting challenge. The emphasis on spatial relationships is a cool twist.

For a game like this, I imagine map design is even more essential than normal. A couple of the maps I played I didn't really like too much, some were very good though. The desert map is my favorite so far. I just played it in my last match of the night - my best so far, topping the lobby with 11 kills and I think a few assists (I tried to take a screenshot via the printscreen button but I got nothing.

Thanks a lot for posting this Marvo, this is a great find.

**Marvo** · 02-25-2012 05:31 AM

Something I first realised after a few days in this game, is that projectiles are different in this game, than most other games. This is because projectiles "inherit" your velocity, when you fire. Here is a GIF I made, illustrating it:

As you can see from the GIF, the projectile moves through the side of the barrel of the gun. This is because projectiles in Tribes only inherit 50% of the player's velocity, rather than 100%, like the real world. This is a gameplay decision that Hi Rez has decided on for some ungodly reason.

This GIF shows how the projectiles would act in a proper system, that is, 100% inheritance of velocity.

Anyway, the point is, in order to hit people, you have to consider their velocity relative to you and your velocity relative to the ground. Once I figured out how the game worked, I had a much easier time landing shots.

edit: to clarify a little, in nearly all other FPS games, projectiles never inherit the player's velocity. This is mostly because we move at such low velocities, that it doesn't matter that much and because a lot of the weapons are hitscan. In Tribes you move extremely fast, so without inheritance, it would be nearly impossible to hit other players who are moving, while you are also moving yourself.

**Black_Eagle** · 02-28-2012 08:43 PM

So you're saying the direction you are travelling as you fire a shot affects the bullet's trajectory?

**Supernova** · 02-28-2012 08:49 PM

Originally Posted by Marvo

Something I first realised after a few days in this game, is that projectiles are different in this game, than most other games. This is because projectiles "inherit" your velocity, when you fire. Here is a GIF I made, illustrating it:

As you can see from the GIF, the projectile moves through the side of the barrel of the gun. This is because projectiles in Tribes only inherit 50% of the player's velocity, rather than 100%, like the real world. This is a gameplay decision that Hi Rez has decided on for some ungodly reason.

This GIF shows how the projectiles would act in a proper system, that is, 100% inheritance of velocity.

Anyway, the point is, in order to hit people, you have to consider their velocity relative to you and your velocity relative to the ground. Once I figured out how the game worked, I had a much easier time landing shots.

edit: to clarify a little, in nearly all other FPS games, projectiles never inherit the player's velocity. This is mostly because we move at such low velocities, that it doesn't matter that much and because a lot of the weapons are hitscan. In Tribes you move extremely fast, so without inheritance, it would be nearly impossible to hit other players who are moving, while you are also moving yourself.

Never thought of that, but it explains a lot. I use the pathfinder because my fast twitch aim is not nearly good enough to use a hitscan assault rifle in a game like that, and it would always confuse me when I noticed that a lot of the time the spot I was aiming at when I fired wasn't the spot the projectile hit. That's still a pretty tricky system, especially with it only inheriting 50% of the player's velocity (WHY?)

**Marvo** · 02-28-2012 09:23 PM

The system is made like that, because when you move at high velocities, while fighting another guy moving at a similar velocity, you wouldn't be able to hit anything without the inheritance system.

Why is it only 50%, as opposed to 100%? Hi Rez, the guys developing the game, are dumb. A while back it was only 20%, which was REALLY weird. Currently a lot of the weapons also use inconsistent values. The fusion mortar is much lower, for example. Similarly, some weapons CHANGE inheritance, depending on which direction you are aiming, in relation to which direction you are moving. It's completely nuts.

If you want to voice your opinion on the matter, you can go to either of these threads and say "+1"

forum.hirezstudios.com - View topic - Yet another 100% inheritance thread

forum.hirezstudios.com - View topic - please address the many CORE PHYSICS ISSUES ASAP

Originally Posted by Black_Eagle

So you're saying the direction you are travelling as you fire a shot affects the bullet's trajectory?

Exactly.

edit: side note, there are only very few hitscan weapons in the game. All the sniper rifles are hitscan (sentinel class), the eagle pistol on soldier, the shotguns (technician, pathfinder, brute) and the colt (brute). They all have fall-off, meaning that the longer away the target you hit is, the less damage the shot does. Shotguns are only effective on very short ranges.
The assault rifles and all other bullet weapons (including the nova blaster, which shoots light), have real projectiles that are fairly fast, but still challenging to hit anything with.

**Marvo** · 03-10-2012 01:21 AM

New trailer for the game, turns out they will release the game the 12th of april. Can't say I'm too happy about that.

Trailer is very funny though, it really shows the annoying llama grabbing you see in this game. Llama grabbing is basically when a player who isn't moving very fast at all, takes the flag. In this video it is further emphasized by the teammate coming in at 150km/h sliding right by behind him.

**Taosaur** · 03-10-2012 07:00 PM

I grabbed this last night and played quite a bit--it's very addicting. The movement style makes me think of those '80s/'90s movies about futuristic death sports where everyone wears rollerblades

I'm taosaur in-game, been playing team deathmatch on the NA: East server.