Gray Zone Warfare
Following a mysterious event on a fictional Southeast Asian island, the entire area has been put under international quarantine. With almost all the civilian population evacuated by the United Nations, three PMCs are tasked by their enigmatic clients to explore the region, uncover its secrets, and bring back anything of value.
TACTICAL FPS GAMEPLAY
Embrace the challenges of an intense tactical FPS featuring a realistic ballistic simulation that incorporates precise real-world values and authentic ballistics models. In this high-stakes environment, every move matters, and every fight could result in the loss of your hard-earned gear and progress.
HIGHLY CUSTOMIZABLE WEAPONS
Create your own firearm that perfectly suits your needs and playstyle. By exchanging, removing, or adding hundreds of various parts, mounts, and accessories, the behavior and performance of each weapon can change, making it adaptable to any situation.
UNIQUE HEALTH SYSTEM
Discover a unique health system that moves away from the common concept of hitpoints to simulate the human body realistically. Each injury affects your perception and performance. Mastering injury identification and finding appropriate solutions are crucial for survival and helping your teammates.
LIVING MMO OPEN WORLD
Explore a sprawling 42km² of the Democratic Republic of Lamang, a fictional Southeast Asian country inspired by the stunning landscapes of Laos. Utilize explorable Landing Zones and helicopters to move through a persistent world that keeps living even when you’re not playing.
MATURE STORY
Immerse yourself in a mature experience with an engaging storyline told through numerous missions. Encounter a colorful cast of characters, each with their secrets and agendas. Navigate the web of lies, decide who you can trust, and expose the truth. Nothing is black and white, only different shades of gray…
Steam User 1302
Tarkov for people with a job and a family.
Steam User 209
So far I've played this game 35 hours, all in the PVE mode called Joint Operations. This review is more for semi relaxed tactical shooter fans who don't care about sweaty PVP or K/D ratios. I usually don't post reviews, but with the brigading that took place with this title I felt the need to review it positively.
TLDR review: At launch this game is pretty fun, especially in the PVE mode (for me). I bought the $35 base version and plan to upgrade to the $100 supporter edition.
Pros:
- Top tier weapon dynamic, customization, physics and firefighting. Better then COD or Battlefield, very similar to Tarkov, and arguably similar to games like Squad, Arma, etc. There are some weapon and projectile dynamics bugs at launch, but overall I think its a good balance between an arcade shooter like COD and a full on sim like Arma or Squad. Even just seeing the gas blowback when you shoot with a suppressor cluod your scope is something I have never seen in a game before and is a real life touch.
- Amazing visuals, possibly best looking shooter on the market at time of review. Not as polished as a AAA game as far as performance, but the visuals are top notch if you have the hardware to run it.
- Huge open world map that you can literally walk for hours and hours through, with a really high attention to detail. Some assets were definately reused, but each major location feels distinct
- An amazing coop experience. The fact they launched with VOIP and it seems like 90% of players both use it and communicate in the battlefield with it is amazing. So many other games you barely hear other players in the game, but in this one you almost always hears players working together, offering help with a mission, even sometimes from the other factions. I haven't seen or heard a toxic player yet.
- One of the best medical systems in a game, bar none. The only better medical systems I've seen is something like KAT medical in arma (a mod) and some medical mods in squad.
Neither cons or pros:
- I do think the game play loop may be a bit repetitive. I still don't see what end game content looks like, but the main game play loop is - get a quest to explore a new area, then 3 quests to find or pickup or deliver something to the area, then kill the boss. Its definitely been fun, but I worry it might get old.
- I also worry about the long term support. Unlike squad where servers are hosted by third parties, if the devs run out of money this game will be dead in the water. I usually don't like to support these types of games. This developer has only created mobile games so keep that in mind.
- It seems like for performance at launch there is a mixed bag. Here is another point of data for those who are curious: I have AMD 5800X3D, 32gb of ram, and a 4080 super. At 4k I get around 100fps with max settings DLSS on, 60fp with it off. My GPU usage is 90% and CPU usage is around 20%.
Cons (overall):
Currently none. There are many cons to this game, but I see them being fixed long term. I will update this in a few months though.
Cons (launch only - hoping these are fixed):
- As many have mentioned, the server situation, especially for US servers and during peak gaming hours, are pretty bad. There is a lot of stuttering, walking in place, etc. Even on a good server, throwing a grenade results in watching the grenade move, pause, move, pause, etc. Leaving your server and rejoining fixes this most of the time, but sometimes it takes 4 or 5 times trying to rejoin to even get in a new server.
- The projectile physics are bizarre. It seems like 5.56 and 5.45 does more damage then 7.62, as well as shooting through windows, huts, fences, bushes can be a mixed bag with different outcomes. Sometimes an AI takes one head shot, sometimes 3.
- There is a no time of day/weather at launch, but the devs have said they will add this.
- The only using little birds for transportation is currently just not enough. I'm not even talking about people camping LZs on PVP, as much as its just an annoying and painful to use mechanic. The devs have said they will add basecamps, which will be good but I still think an ATV or something similar would be nice.
Things I would like the devs to add (at launch - will update if they add them):
- Searching and filtering in the vendor menus
- See linked items in the item description - i.e. a flash hider necessary for a suppressor or a plate adapter for a sight.
- Turn in quests from quests tab of tablet
- Other people should be able to loot your body in PVE mode if you die twice or disconnect
- Keys, especially quest required ones need to be less RNG. I still have not found most quest required keys despite clearing the mobs in area several times.
- Audio needs to be reworked. Footsteps and bush moving is essentially inaudible, while gunshots are too loud with headsets on. The different ear pro either just mute everything (razer) or make everything louder (gssh).
Steam User 490
Buggy, Unoptimized, Crashing, Losing stuff randomly? Yes.
Is it still fun, have a good start for early access, and have promise? Yes.
Steam User 10935
At least it doesn't cost 250 dollars
Steam User 389
This game is ABSOLUTELY on the right track but it runs very very poorly, i hope they fix it soon because its immensely fun.
Steam User 1628
Boost performance (for people without DLSS or Intel cards)
I'm getting 66 to 75fps steady.
1440p
1080 Ti
i7 6850K
Settings: Medium (shadows and reflections: Low)
Anti-Aliasting/Upscaling Method: FSR
FidelityFX Frame Generation: ON
FidelityFX Super Resolution: "Balanced"
Play with your settings! I was only getting 40fps until I changed literally two things!
edit: idk what it is, but
Changed my overall quality to Epic, but I turned shadows and post processing to Low and ended up gaining about 10fps or more.
Steam User 2881
I imagine the bad reviews were expecting a fully released aaa game when they purchased gzw. Early access has literally been up for a few hours, there are some server issues atm causing lag but the devs have already said there investigating this issue, the game will be buggy, it will have issues but that is to be expected its day one of ea, i have had no issues with anything other than lag, dont buy into ea if your just going to review bomb the game and constantly moan in the discord