Taking on the trash
Scavengers delivers a shot of new ideas
How many times now have we stared down from a dropship, standing alongside a huge number of other online players, and prepared to battle to be the last team standing? Scavengers might seem to fit the familiar template, but a few hours with the beta proves Improbable’s take on mass online gaming is a deep, tactical shooter, and something wholly unique.
Full matches have 60 players divided into three-person squads, but more often than not you won’t be gunning down other players very quickly. This is PvPvE (player vs player vs environment, not something you need to ask your doctor about), and if you want to top the leaderboards and win you’ll have to secure enough data. Achieving that means grabbing sufficient materials to craft gear to protect you long enough to make it to the dropship before it takes off.
DO THE TWIST
Because of the need to survive and get away with your data, every match is a careful balancing act (and takes about half an hour on average). Checking the map, you need to see which points remain unscavenged while determining which ones players are likely to be fighting over. At the same time a storm closes a ring around you (standard battle royale fare, though here it never gets tiny), and freezing tornadoes worm their way across the battlefield – you need to stop by fires to restore your heat or take cover in structures, otherwise your maximum health will drop off.
Many AI enemies lie in wait protecting resources, and these encounters are random in each game (to a point), so you’ll never be able to draw up an entirely foolproof strategy. Each camp plays out like a mini-Borderlands encounter, except you also need to be aware of other squads of players that might be nosing around. Spend materials to fix up a vehicle, then have another team nick it while you’re busy? That’s tough.
Even if you don’t bank enough data to win the game, then at least getting out alive is still something, right? Don’t take survival for granted. If you’re on that dropship when it takes off, you manage to get out alive, but other players can still use those final seconds to kill you and take your data. The results aren’t as definitive as, say, Fortnite. Often as the clock ticks down there’s still everything to play for, and if you’re skilful you could snatch a last-minute victory.
Get ready to gather data and scramble for the dropship later this year.