REACTION - FragPunk has peaked our interest despite stepping in to a crowded space
Free to play deathmatch.
By Jonathan Garrett
09/07/24
There is no shortage of free to play, battle pass supported titles doing the rounds, both from older franchises continuing to find success, and newer games looking to carve a piece of the pie. FragPunk, at face value, might seem like one hero shooter too many. It boasts many familiar aspects to its design, and visually evokes similar experiences like Apex Legends or Valorant.
However, the cavalcade of footage published following the recent Closed Alpha (which was US exclusive) paints quite a vivid picture of a game that has more to it than perhaps we’d first assumed. The marquee addition of the card modifier, which can affect moment to moment gameplay or apply a positive effect at the start of a round, keep things varied and forces you to make meaningful choices.
The time to kill is extremely quick, and certainly leans away from Warzone or battle royale type experiences where you have more opportunities to take fire and reposition yourself once you get flanked. It’s definitely aiming to be more of a hardcore experience, with a free to play release due at some point in 2025.
TARPS?
At the bottom of some of our articles, you’ll see a series of absurd looking images (with equally stupid, in joke laden names). These are the TARP badges, which represent our ‘Totally Accurate Rating Platform’. They allow us to identify specific things, recognise positive or negative aspects of a games design, and generally indulge our consistent silliness with some visual tomfoolery.
