Thread: Tribes: Ascend (free multiplayer FPS)

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