XDefiant Review

first person shooter, gaming, hero shooter, review, Ubisoft, xdefiant review

Having never played any of the betas or early access versions of XDefiant, I had no idea what I was getting myself into with Ubisoft's new IP, the free to play Hero Shooter XDefiant. Being a huge fan of most Ubisoft games, was this going to be my chance to take control of Sam again?

Ubisoft's Ultimate Dream Team

When someone says "Hero Shooter" a few games spring to mind, Valorant, Apex Legends, Overwatch even Battleborn so what makes XDefiant different? When I saw that XDefiant were brining Factions from different Ubisoft Titles it got me a little excited. Ubisoft have a plethora of Heros to choose from, right? Sam, Vaas, Aidian, Cole, the list goes on. So why do we get these NPC nothing characters? There are no named characters from any of the games. Maybe it's a licensing issue, but if that was the case how can they use the factions from The Division, Ghost Recon, Far Cry 6, Splinter Cell, and Watch Dogs?

Ok enough complaining about not being able to play as Vivian Conley (leader of the cleaners) Upon loading up XDefiant for the first time what jumped out at me was how clean the menu was. ‘Play’ is front and center, tabbing right you scroll over a battle pass (which is to be expected), the factions, and weapon loadouts.

The Weapons are your standard Assault Rifles, SMGs, Shotguns, LMGs, Marksman Rifles, Sniper Rifles and Pistols. One weapon from each category is unlocked form the start and all the rest are unlocked by completing challenges ranging from X amount of damage to long shots or hip fire kills. The challenges are not labor intensive it's just a couple of each which is a major relief. Attachments need to be unlocked from leveling the weapon, unfortunately it only unlocks for the weapon you have equipped, so you will have to do it again for each weapon. This is a major grind, the XP you get is very little. I played for a whole afternoon/evening and only managed to get one gun to level 10.

You unlock attachments through weapon progression. Its a very slow grind.

The Factions are split up into 5 different groups each with 2 separate abilities (you can only have one active) but share an ultimate. Each Faction serves a different purpose. The Cleaners (The Division) are an offensive class having access to an Incinerator Drone and Firebombs, these are perfect for flushing out enemies in cover or clearing objective zones. The Phantoms (Ghost Recon) are your defensive operators. They are equipped with 3 different shields. The Mag Shield that can be deployed protecting you from enemy fire while you are able to shoot through it and a deployable Riot Shield. The next faction is from Far Cry 6. These are your team healers. Splinter Cells Echelon use cloaking devices and portable UAVs to support your team. The last is DedSec from Watch Dogs. Your DedSec operators use hacking to disable the enemy's abilities and are even able to turn some of them against you. DedSec are locked behind a huge 700k XP wall or you can just buy them for $15AUD

Each faction has 3 operators which are just cosmetic but need to be unlocked by completing challenges with each faction.

The different Factions really look the part

Shooty Shooty Blam Blam

So, let's get into the nitty gritty. The movement in XDefiant is fast and the shooting feels great. You can slide cancel and jump corners to you hearts content. This is combated by a very long TTK (time to kill) I had people sliding all over the show and you can just open up on them. Its very satisfying. I did find myself not winning very many 2 on 1 gunfights, this could come down to me not being very good or that it's meant to be played as a team. Love them or hate them XDefiant has the classic Ubisoft health bars. I personally am not a fan of health bars in PVP, as it takes away from the immersion.

The abilities are a fun addition, when I first loaded in everybody was using Phantom's Shields, they were everywhere it was hilarious, but as time went on, I started to see some variation.

Currently there are 5 game modes. You have your classic Domination, a King of the Hill style mode called Occupy. There is a mode like Destiny's Supremacy called Hotshot, where enemies drop "˜bounties' upon death that need to be picked up, only difference is a random operator in the game will become the “Hot Shot”. When they pick up bounties its worth more. Now for the fun ones. Zone Control is an attack or defend mode where there are 5 points that need to be captured one at a time. Once you capture an objective you move on to the next. You can not lose an objective once controled. It reminds me of this old Xbox game called Frontlines: Fuel of War, this mode is a lot of fun and probably my favourite. Then there is Escort, you are required to stay close to a walker that is moving through the map. When you leave its proximity, it will stop moving, so you are constantly moving and unable to set up a proper defense, while being attacked from all angles.

There is no killcam but there is a funny little addition, you can send emotes upon death to your killer. From thumbs up to laughing to downright sad face. It adds a little fun to your death.

Sending an emoji to you killer is just salt in the wound.

The maps are very well designed, with great site lines, little vents, and narrow walkways and plenty of ways to flank the objectives.

Each map feels like it has been pulled from all over the UBIverse. There is crashed planes and rubbish littered streets of The Division, the beautiful sunny villages of Cuba from Far Cry 6 and some old maps straight from Ghost Recon.

Being back on the streets of The Division was a real trip down memory lane.

My only gripe with XDefiant is the sound. The guns don't sound chunky, they are tinny and sound like toys. I had to go back and play a few matches because I couldn't remember there being any music, there is not. So the matches don't have a lot of feeling.

Overall XDefiant is a lot of fun and has a lot of potential to be great. Im excited to see which Heroes and Factions they bring in the future. They just need to do somthing about the sound.