Tribes: Ascend: My Guilty Pleasure

No, this is not the title of some random Japanese game that is poorly translated into English. The title of the game is Tribes: Ascend. Tribes games have been around forever, I’ve always known what they were but never experienced them. I say this game is my guilty pleasure because when I should be spending my time on the game I waited a decade for (Diablo 3) I find myself more and more playing Tribes. It is a first person shooter unlike any other I’ve ever played before. Tribes: Ascend is 100% free to play, there are bonuses to becoming a premium member but there is literally nothing you can do as a VIP that you can’t do as a regular member. 

Tribes: Ascend is a futuristic shooter with a unique method of transportation around the map. The skill is called skiing (similar to real world except without snow and a lot more fun/less cold/less painful, so nothing like real world skiing in all actuality). While skiing you can get ‘mad air’, ‘mad speed’, ‘mad something’. Let’s just say it is fun, fast paced, and action packed. Just like that movie you went to see this summer that was a total disappointment, except nothing like that.  If you aren’t skiing in Tribes you are dead. Speed and energy for your jetpacks is what keeps you alive in Tribes. Did he just say jetpacks? Hell yes he did. Jetpacks, this game has them, they are fun as hell, you can fly.

Tribes has a ton of classes; defensive, support, offensive, scout-like, it has them all. All of them have very distinct play styles and for the most part they all seem fairly balanced. I’ve heard that some of them on the more professional level are less useful but for amateur matches all of them can excel when used by a proficient player. My personal favorite is the technician (one of the ones I’ve heard is less spectacular at higher level play), its focus is defensive, laying sentries to defend the flag or generator or as a trap for some unexpecting opponent. However, the technician isn’t useless without his sentries. With strong grenades and one of the more powerful LMGs the technician can provide strong base defense with the potential to chase down players if positioned correctly. 

I’ve played all of the classes, just to experience them; and I have others that I like to play on certain maps. This isn’t a statement that I would normally say for other FPS’s. I will play any class just to try it out, but rarely do I find a class that I like for a specific map. Tribe’s wide variety of maps allows me to enjoy a specific play style depending on the map, if I want to be offensive I play a pathfinder, if I want to cause chaos in the enemies base I will play an infiltrator, if I want to focus on defense (without playing technician) I will be a brute. Tribes excels at allowing you the opportunity to play whatever the hell you like.

IT’S KIND OF LIKE A RPG! I’m serious. Because it is a 100% free to play game there has to be a system in place to unlock premium items. There is a leveling up system based on experience that is, in my opinion, completely fair. No there is no story, this is a multiplayer game (so I guess technically it’s not a rpg) but it has that system of progression. Currently my technician (my most played class, and the one I focus on unlocking stuff for first) has 58% of all the items for the class unlocked. I’ve spent about 30 hours in the game thus far and focused mostly on unlocking stuff for this class. If your priority is unlocking/progression, this game is going to offer a lot it while being fun as hell. 

Tribes: Ascend is powered by UE3, Epic Games’ engine that it allows developers to use for their games. The graphics are pretty (I like the shadows a lot). That’s about all I have to say on the topic. Tribes isn’t going to push your computer to its limits (if you have a relatively new one), but it definitely won’t look bad at all. Really the only game I can think of to compare it to in terms of style is the Halo series (as far as armor is concerned) except MUCH faster. 

CLOSIN’ IT OUT

Tribes: Ascend; a game that is completely free to play, with a strong community (that is developing professional leagues/tournaments), an active development team, and SKIING… FAST.  That kind of sums it up, if you are looking for a new first-person shooter that doesn’t fall in line with the stale Call of Duty mold, try this out. I’m certain you won’t regret it. 

P.S. For those wondering, I am not assigning numeric values for a game, if I don't like a game I will say it, if I like a game (like this one) I will have said it (like I did). 

P.P.S I'll add links to download the game and some pics in the morning, but for now it's late and I need some sleep. 

Enjoy.