It is truthful to say that the online game business is present process a interval of alarming disarray. Studios are closing, growth budgets are exploding and worthwhile genres have gotten saturated by mega-budget pick-me candidates that really feel completely interchangeable.
Into this troubling market comes Harmony, Sony’s new five-v-five “hero” shooter, the subgenre of the multiplayer on-line blaster the place gamers management characters with elaborate particular powers slightly than identikit spec-ops troopers or area marines. Set in a warring galaxy managed by an autocratic regime referred to as The Guild, the sport offers us management of assorted Freegunners – mercenaries who plough the area lanes on the lookout for jobs whereas additionally slinging one-liners at one another within the sport’s extremely polished cutscenes. Within the sport, nonetheless, what they do is battle.
All the usual characters of the hero shooter are current – vanilla soldier, floaty witch, teleporting weirdo, sassy tank – but none have the rapid enchantment of Overwatch denizens reminiscent of D.Va or Mei. They do, nonetheless, convey plenty of selection to the fight zone. Lark is a weird mushroom alien who crops spores that gradual enemies whereas therapeutic allies; Kyps is a stealthy murderer who can reveal enemy positions to her staff; cumbersome robotic 1-Off throws exploding trash cans. I just like the innate flexibility of those abilities and the way in which they mix between characters. The submachine-gun-toting Duchess can throw down a defensive barrier, which is beneficial for canopy, but additionally blocks off goal factors from the opposing staff, and can be used to funnel enemy troopers into ambushes. Daveers can bomb an space with a napalm-like substance named Burnite, which might then be ignited by incendiary fireplace from different gamers doubling its impact.
The 12 launch maps are principally hypercolourful variations on the sci-fi industrial areas we used to see in Quake. Backbone Works and Sorting Hub are labyrinthine complexes, all interconnected metal walkways, transport containers and box-like warehouse choke factors. Water Hazard is an deserted oil rig with the stays of an enormous sea monster mendacity throughout the highest like some type of nightmarish Lovecraftian sushi dish. My favorite is Practice Hassle, a post-apocalyptic railway graveyard the place Mad Max meets Tatooine.
When it comes all the way down to what counts, the moment-to-moment pleasure and stress of team-based fight, Harmony actually flies at occasions. Motion has that barely floaty really feel of Future, which works brilliantly in these extraordinarily vertical maps, encouraging gamers to utilize double jumps in order that fights are really three dimensional. The gun really feel is great: from shotguns to laser pistols, each weapon is strong and readable, the audio and visible suggestions completely conveying its distinctive capabilities. There are chic moments, when your complete staff is collectively, and all their talents are combining and exploding in unpredictable methods, making a euphoric shooter expertise equal to your finest occasions with Overwatch.
However proper now, the massive query is whether or not it has sufficient to tear gamers away from Activision’s sport, or Valorant, or Apex Legends, or any of the others. It’s fantastically made, however massive elements of it are achingly acquainted, not simply by way of character sorts or the anime-tinged visible aesthetic, however within the construction. The sport modes are all the usual sorts – there’s a staff dying match, there’s one the place it’s important to dominate three goal zones, one other the place there is just one zone however it’s at all times transferring, one other the place it’s important to decide up tokens from downed enemies to register the kill. That is the stuff we now have been taking part in since Doom. In the meantime, the dialogue and humour is similar post-Whedon ironic detachment shtick that Marvel and Netflix YA dramas have been force-feeding us for a decade. Oh for the darkish, wanton satire and anarchic team-mate-slaughtering mayhem of Helldivers 2.
Harmony’s most fascinating wrinkle is within the sport’s “meta”, the strategic half outdoors the primary motion. The sport has launched some deck-building parts, in that it’s important to assemble your personal crew of characters, every with slight variants on the standard talents. All these characters have distinctive buffs referred to as Crew Bonuses that add delicate boosts to your staff’s well being, armour or firepower everytime you play them in a match; these stack all through the battle – so in case you are taking part in with an organised staff, you may work collectively to construct a formidable statistical benefit, like a very good hand in Hearthstone. It’s an fascinating concept, however within the chaos of public servers, the place solely a fraction of contributors play as a part of an organised staff, it’s laborious to know if it’ll have any impact.
Maybe the bravest aspect of Harmony is that it’s a premium-priced product, slightly than a “reside service” free-to-play launch – so as a substitute of the ever-present season move mannequin, any subsequent content material shall be free. It is usually unapologetically and loudly various, which is able to upset the types of gamers who trendy on-line video games ought to be upsetting as a result of, frankly, this minority of misanthropic gatekeeping blowhards is ruining the enjoyable for everybody else.
Finally, Harmony wants time, area and a wholesome neighborhood whether it is to soar above its older, wiser opponents. Proper now, with gamers getting the texture of the place, it’s skittish and unfocused – but additionally, sometimes, wonderful enjoyable. With its perspective, its element, its elaborate backstory (explorable by way of a visible encyclopedia absolutely impressed by The Hitchhiker’s Information to the Galaxy) it seems like one thing the event staff really cherishes. Assuming the life help of writer funding isn’t ripped out too quickly, there’s an opportunity it’ll discover an viewers that feels the identical.
