Who's in?

Ordered on Playstation, but I'm second guessing that. Xbox chat is most convenient for many of my peeps.

Come to think of it, the way proximity voice works in this game, maybe I never want to be in console chat.

I’m on the fence right now. I really enjoyed playing it last weekend, but I’m not sure how long I would actually stick with it. But for $40, I think I’ll end up getting it and just play for a few weeks then drop back in from time to time as it gets updates.

I own a PS5 and an Xbox Series X. I have friends on both platforms, IRL friends, gamer friends who have become real friends, and a lot of gamer acquaintances who I've picked up over the years. The number of people I play with is pretty low these days. I've got one close friend on Xbox who is buying Arc Raiders. I know it's got cross-play, but should I get a refund and move to Xbox just for convenience? I do have an elite controller, so there's that.

Just wondering how you multi-platform owners make such decisions. Are any still here?

Wasn't nearly as sweaty as I feared. The sound design is a marvel. The fit and finish reminds me of Bungie of old. Proximity chat unlocks a lot of the potential that Bungie talked about when they first talked about public spaces in Destiny.

I played a bunch last night, and so far it's a lot of fun. Matches have ranged from not encountering a single player, to grouping up with some folks I just encountered out in the wild, to tense firefights with both enemy players and ARC. In solos, a lot of people tend to be friendly. If they don't want to team up and stick together, they at least seem to be okay with just sort of passing each other by without starting anything. That's not always the case, but that's also great. The tension of running into another player and not knowing if it's going to be a firefight or not is just cool.

The progression seems cool so far. There is a skill tree to work through, along with building and upgrading crafting stations. You can pin recipes for stuff you need to craft, and it works well to give every match a purpose. Sometimes you can focus on one of the vendor quests (which range from finding specific materials to killing ARC to doing little things out in the world), and sometimes I just need a specific thing to craft a new weapon or upgrade a workbench, so I'm trying to find that thing and get out.

The sound design is the real standout feature for me. Distant gunfire and explosions, bullets whizzing by, the shield pop noise, etc. all sound incredible. The directionality is better than just about any game I've ever played--I feel like I can always pinpoint exactly where something came from. Even the proximity chat has filters applied so that it sounds convincing for the environment the players are in, like echoing in big open underground bunkers and such.

I also love that the enemies non-humanoid robots. I haven't played many extraction shooters, but most of them I've seen seem to just have NPC combatants be other humans, so having something distinct is a huge plus. And they are so well designed. There's a bunch of variation, but they all have weak spots you can focus on to bring down even big ARC if you're smart.

I have three maps unlocked, and I like the way they handle that, too. Each has a difficulty rating, which seems to mostly affect the ARC enemies. The higher the difficulty, the more ARC there are on the map, and the more deadly ones will be more common, so they do feel like distinct experiences. Each map seems to also have at least one unique variant that will pop up on a timer such as night time or extreme weather.

I've been playing a pretty even split of solo and with a matchmade squad, and it's a lot of fun either way. Squad matches definitely tend to be more aggressive with more PvP encounters. Other squads seem to want to fight more than the randoms I encounter in solo matches, although that does happen occasionally too.

The crafting and upgrade loop is fun. There are a set of crafting benches that are constructed back at home base, and each can be upgraded to allow for crafting of better guns and gear and healing equipment, along with a refiner than can combine low level junk into higher tier crafting parts. When combined with the limited stash inventory (which means you can't just hoard everything), it leads to there always being a goal for any particular raid topside. Sometimes I focus on doing quests (which so far lean into taking down ARC machines), sometimes I need a specific component to upgrade a workbench. ARC parts are required to craft some of the better equipment, which forces engagements. It all just works so well, but it's also kind of low enough stakes that a bad run doesn't ruin the enjoyment. The ARC are definitely the best part of the game--they're fun to fight but also can be really terrifying if you're on a solo night raid and with a backpack full of good shit and you just want to get out of there.

The maps all cycle through different conditions. Night raids pop up for each map on timers, and it makes the loot in the map better, but closes all the raider hatches (which function as quick escape paths, so long as you have a key), so it can force engagements at the limited escape elevators. Each map can also cycle through different event variants. One features a Harvester filled with good loot but is guarded by a massive Queen ARC. One scatters raider caches around the map filled with guns and gear. I haven't seen nearly all of them, I don't think, but it's enough to make every run feel like it has different opportunities for loot or engagements.

It's just really fun.

Only had enough time to play the tutorial mission. It felt good, all the controls were intuitive and smooth. Yes, the sound design is really cool! Hoping to catch you all on there sometime.