APB - My Thoughts

I know I have seen threads about this before, but I'm not sure if the search feature is broken as searching for "APB" or "All Points Bulletin" bring back no results.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure that all previous threads were about BETA, or hype before the release. Since it's release I have seen nothing on these forums. So I thought I'd give it a whirl.

After purchasing, downloading and installing the game I finally loaded it up. I chose my side, enforcers, and got to the character creation screen. I was overwhelmed with the amount of choices you had in creating your new character, the possibilities are literally limitless. After spending quite some time, I reverted to using the "random" button before finding a char that didn't look too bad so I accepted it. Into the training session I go.

When it loads up, the graphics didn't look too bad, even though my system doesn't actually meet the minimum requirements (CPU only). There's very little lag and quite high frame rate, so I am impressed as it's such a new game. The only thing that lets it down is that the training session is only a couple of missions to give you an idea of how the mission system works, there's nothing else (apart from a bit of movement instructions). No mention of changing weapons, reloading, cover, vehicle control, climbing ladders, climbing walls or fences, character advancement (I still have no idea what "level" I am as there's about 4 different places it could be, but I'm not sure which one it actually is), PvP, hanging out of vehicles to shoot when you're a passenger, what decreases your "score" (I call it that because I don't know what it actually is called, but if you're an enforcer it goes down if you run over a ped - probably quite obvious I know, but mistakes happen and you aren't warned about them)... I could go on.

Then there's also the social district, there's so many "consoles" to use, but you have no idea which does what until you use it and trying to buy some new clothing for my character took a long time to work out how to do. Also, I wasn't even aware that you could customise every piece of your clothing until hours into the game! There doesn't appear to be any tutorials about anything in the game making it very hard to pick up and play.

After I have done all this, I then go out into the "real world", pick the financial district (not because I know any differences about them, I still don't, it was just the next district on the list) and hop in. At this point, things are popping up on the screen telling me things, but I'm totally confused as to what's going on. I'm put into a group, but I don't know what to do. I nick a car (coz it takes me quite a while to find out that you can spawn your own car) and go chasing some green markers on the screen which turn out to be my team mates. However, in the real world, I do get a bit of lag... and driving as an enforcer, I'm losing points everywhere due to running over peds, because they either load infront of my car, or I turn to avoid them and about 2 seconds after running them over the car turns. Then I see someone in red, assume he's my enemy, and try to shoot him, but it's no good because I'm dead already. The match making system put my R19 (Is this my level?? I have no idea...) up against someone with an R number WELL over 100 with obviously far better gear and a much better grasp of the game. This carries on, for a couple of hours, with different teams or even solo play. I still have no idea what half the stuff on my screen means, I have no idea about who I'm doing missions for and why I'm doing them for one person, I can't kill anyone, I run over peds due to lag, I crash into invisible walls that then appear 2 seconds later, I think I've purchased a new weapon but dunno if it's better, it doesn't seem to hit anyone either... OK, it's starting to get frustrating now.

That was a few days ago when I first purchased it. I haven't played it since, and am struggling to find a reason to try it again.

Anyone played it? What's your thoughts? Are you having as bad a time with it as I am?

P.S. I just have to add, the IDEA of the game is excellent and is what drew me to it all those months ago when I first heard about it. After playing the game for a few hours though, I'm ready to throw in the towel. A new game shouldn't make me feel like this.

Quite a lot here:

http://forums.hexus.net/gaming-news/...lletin-pc.html

/sigh

Search didn't bring that up. I knew I had seen something about it somewhere.

Still, that's supposed to be a discussion of the review that seemed to get slightly derailed, hope discussion can be brought into this thread now, in the right sub-forum.

Seems like many others suffer the same problems that I do though. I guess I should look for a clan to join and try it again.