Crytek is bringing its new first-person shooter Warface to a web browser near you. The goal is to bring a triple A-like quality experience to players no matter the hardware they possess. It’s also perfect for when you need to blow off some steam after sitting in commute traffic and you need to blow some shit up.
Warface has been available for nearly a year in other markets and it already has more than 7 million players. Trion Worlds is publishing Warface in the U.S. and is getting ready to launch a handful of closed betas to get players here into the battle.
Warface is a modern combat styled first-person shooter that is the first game from Crytek’s new free to play model of delivering games to players. Their goal in the next five years is to make the transition from physical media like the recently released Crysis 3 to an always-connected, free to play online system of browser based games.
Warface is built from the ground up on the CryEngine 3. It naturally provides great visuals that players have come to expect as with previous games from the team at Crytek. Executive producer Joshua Howard said they are building Warface to be able to run on a variety of both desktop and laptop PC’s including hardware that might be two or three years old.
Cervat Yerli, the chief executive of Crytek said the idea behind Warface came from a visit to South Korea. He saw the fun that gamers were having interacting with each other for hours on end playing online games in internet cafes. He wanted to create games that encouraged social interactions on a global scale.
We had a go with Warface at a recent preview in San Francisco. Warface starts players with a tutorial that shows you how to handle your gun and basic movement. There are four classes of soldier to choose from. A rifleman, the all-around solder that can supply ammo to your teammates. A medic with healing abilities. A sniper for that long-distance kiss of death and an engineer that handles explosive and heavy ordinance.
A great feature of Warface is the ability to change weapon options during gameplay. You can switch to a long range scope to take out enemies at a distance or switch to an under slung grenade launcher to annihilate enemies huddled together. Hitting the “C” key on your keyboard allowed you to customize your barrel, undercarriage and scope on the fly.
Some of Warface’s social interactions allow you to help out your teammates in a number of ways. If a buddy gets knocked to the ground you can help him back up with a “raise” function. You can help a buddy get to a higher position with the “climb” function. You also have the ability to run and drop into a “slide” function when in desperate need of cover from fire.
Players will do a onetime download and install of Warface. Aside from the occasional update you’ll be able to get online, log into your Gface account and play Warface through your browser of choice. Warface has both versus and cooperative modes of play. The game feels familiar enough for both casual and hardcore fps fans but has enough style to set it apart from other modern combat shooters. It’s very easy to get into.
Gface is the social platform that Crytek has set up to host Warface as well as future games that they’ll deploy to the network. It’s easy to register and there’s no credit card required. There is an in-game virtual currency but it can only be earned through exploits in combat. The Gface game network is aimed at making life easy for gamers to get into multiplayer gaming experiences. It will have an assortment of free to play games for players to choose from. You have the ability to chat with your teammates both prior to playing and during your gaming sessions.
Warface shows a lot of potential as a free to play shooter in an overcrowded genre. With the impending launches of new hardware from Sony, Microsoft and Valve, Crytek definitely has their work cut out for them. With the number of players already actively playing Warface and its beta getting ready to go live here in the U.S. it might be a viable alternative to gamers not ready to part with their hard earned money just yet.
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