There aren’t many games that leave me in awe, but Embark Studios’ The Finals certainly left me speechless. This multiplayer FPS from a developer team of DICE veterans appeared out of nowhere and suddenly appeared as a closed beta product. After earning the title, I played this chaotic game and have a lot to say about everything I’ve seen so far.
For the few hours I played this closed beta, I had a rather mixed impression. On the one hand, the presentation, the concept, the action and the performance are of very high quality, interesting and current. On the other hand, there are other aspects that didn’t impress me so much. From the weapons, to the moves, to the character class system, to the level design, there were aspects of The Finals that left me wanting more. Again, though, this is a closed beta, and as of this writing the title doesn’t even have a release date yet, so there’s plenty of time to resolve any kind of issue.
But, what is the Final? It’s a multiplayer shooter in which teams of three compete in extravagant combat. At least in the beta, that means participating in a type of game called Cashout. In this game mode, teams must break through the chests on a medium-sized map and then bring the objective, which is an amount of money, to a cashout station in order to deposit the money and earn points to get ahead. the rival. teams. The problem is that there are usually only two cameras and two boxes active at the same time. At any given time, there will be four teams on the field at once, all competing for the same or similar goals.
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It’s simple gameplay and quite easy to understand, but it’s quite difficult to master. The Endgame isn’t your typical down-to-earth shooter. Rather, it’s more like the Apex Legends moveset, with fast jumps and long dashes, and all sorts of abilities and gadgets that provide additional movement options. For example, grappling hooks, abseiling ropes and jumping mats. But that’s one of the things that I think wasn’t perfected in The Finals, because the characters aren’t really built for rooftop combat, and because every map is very vertical, most of the time, you find yourself struggling to take an elevator or climb stairs. It’s not the best moveset in the world, as it looks like what Apex Legends was doing back in the day, but on maps that look more like Hyperscape.
At first, all that The Finals brings to the table with its weapons and destructive physics may surprise you, but it’s really no more impressive than any Battlefield game. Yes, the physics of destruction in Battlefield is amazing, but it’s also more of a factor that goes hand in hand with weapons in the overall goal of the game, whereas in The Finals it seems the opposite. The characters and their weapons are designed to blast the map into a thousand and one pieces and it is true that strategically a lot can be gained by doing this (for example, moving a team by literally destroying the floor of the building in which they are located) . However, since the weapon gameplay seems a little rough, most players use explosives, which are the most valuable at the moment. That’s why the game is absurdly chaotic, to the point that it’s hard to really focus on what’s going on. By making some changes to the damage numbers and kill system, the game can be improved further, but then the problem would become the maps.
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The finale has some of the flashiest and most engaging maps I’ve seen in a shooter in a long time, but the problem is that they feel pretty empty. The buildings are empty and have no furniture or aesthetics to make them look like the real thing. There is no more life on the map than that of the 16 players, which makes them even more inhospitable. Also, while I’m not allowed to complain about resources being reused, since I understand game development is a very slow and complicated process, the fact that most buildings and rooms look like identical replicas (especially on the map of Monaco), leaves us with a bitter sense of repetition.
And what about customization? Well, being a beta, I only had a limited number of weapons and items to play with, but for the most part it’s great. Some are designed purely for damage and destruction (like hand grenades and auto turrets), while others are more strategic and supportive in design (like mines that block doors and slow down enemy attacks or thermal vision that detects enemies through smoke). All this aspect of customization promises, but I am not so convinced by the classes, among which we can choose between Light, Medium or Heavy characters.
The light (light) are the weakest, but the most agile. The heavy (heavy) are slow, but impossible to take down, while the medium class (medium) falls somewhere in between. In my opinion, the middle class is by far the most balanced of the three. The heavy class is too oppressive and difficult to take down most of the time, and the light class is an overly high skill level class that is either untouchable or useless, usually depending on whether you combine invisibility with a murder knife for a fair hit. Again, with various tweaks and revisions, this set of classes could be even better. However, as things stand, that’s not what I’m most excited about in The Finals.
Overall, The Finals left me uncertain. On the one hand, I can see the full potential of this game. But then again, I’m also afraid that this title will meet the same fate as countless other “up-and-coming” shooters over the years. So my question after playing the beta is: what else can we do? The withdrawal is amazing. Also, the tournament mode, where you compete against 16 other teams in Cashout matches, where the top two teams in each stage advance to the next round until the winner is decided, is a great concept. But The Finals has to give us more if it wants to survive.
This game won’t thrive without other game modes to sustain it, as the monetization and progression is like every other live service multiplayer title released in the last decade. It’s a little worrying and hopefully The Finals won’t be swamped with monetized offers, but when a beta includes a battle pass and a randomly-running shop, alarm bells start ringing. in my head. It may be a bit of a prejudice, but I don’t want to be fooled anymore.
But even so, The Finals doesn’t have a release date and we don’t know when the game will actually arrive, so for now I’ll stay more or less optimistic with what I’ve already played. It needs a few tweaks here and there, but as a starting point, the developers at Embark Studios have shown that without support from EA and DICE, they can also make some pretty cool multiplayer shooters.