Defiance

Customer Ratings:
List Price: $49.99
Sale Price: $11.35
Today's Bonus: 77% Off

Defiance came as a surprise to me. I must say first of all that this was my first MMO (Massively Multi-player Online Game). Before this I had only dabbled for a few minutes at a time in any MMO that I tried. None kept my attention whatsoever and at first, Defiance looked to be no different. I had actually downloaded the Beta(A test run for a game) but was severely underwhelmed at the first couple of hours I spent playing. I really only came back to it out of having to kill some time. The beta was pretty bad with glitches and bugs at every turn (that is why they run a beta though after all) and I teetered on the fence of whether or not I wanted to make the full purchase when the game came out. After spending a few more hours in the world of Defiance, I decided I'd give it a shot. I finally ended up downloading it from PSN because I had some points I needed to use up anyway.

Now as to the game itself, at present there are still numerous glitches but I haven't had any that were game breaking or more than an annoyance. First, if you are a passerby that has just taken interest in this game without knowing anything about it, know that it is an MMO. And as such you have to be connected to PSN via the internet to actually play the game. You will be playing with other people, though your interaction with them is up to you. This game is mostly player verses the environment(PvE). In other words, you'll be fighting computer controlled bad guys and you can team up with other players on the fly to tackle these baddies. There is no player verses player in the main game other than optional 'Shadow Wars'. PvP comes in the form of competitive multi-player maps that have you facing off against other human opponents. There are also co-operative maps that task you and three other players with objectives through mini-stories.

Defiance is a third person shooter(TPS) that plays like a cross between Borderlands and Fallout. There is a lot of loot but guns offer differing abilities instead of higher and higher damage output. In other words, you have to find what works for you and there are a lot of options. I personally found an assault rifle and semi-auto sniper (You equip two main weapons) to be my bread and butter but people had all range of load-outs from rocket launchers that rain down cluster bombs to pistols that infect their target with insects that break off and attack other enemies. You'll also pick from four abilities, one an invisibility cloak, one that increases damage output temporarily, one that speeds your character to a blur and one that creates a hologram of yourself that tricks enemies into attacking it instead of you. These can all be upgraded and given time you can unlock all of them if you want. In addition you can add perks to your character that give you a slight edge against the outside world.

The Bad

-The game takes hours to get interesting. As I said, the game starts out so underwhelmingly average or slightly below that I don't blame anyone for giving up. You very slowly gain new abilities and weapons. Very slowly. The game really doesn't get interesting until you've done a good handful of the main story missions, unlocked some perks and scavenged some decent weapons.

-Vehicles control like boats. This isn't really a problem until you try to do any of the racing challenges. Going for a low race time means making minute adjustments to your vehicle that the controls just don't allow without frustration. The courses go on too long for having to make a flawless run as well.

-Frustrating boss fights. There were two fights in the game, one about half way through and the other the final villain, that went on for far too long and without checkpoints. The first overwhelms you with enemies and a too difficult procedure to actually damage the boss. The last I actually managed to beat in one go but my hands were shaking by the time I laid the controller down. Add to this the fact that the bosses can effectively one-shot you into oblivion. I don't mind a challenge, just give me some checkpoints between the multiple boss forms. The final boss had me on edge as well because I was playing during a storm and was afraid my internet would go out, kicking me off of the server and restarting the whole procedure. Thankfully it didn't.

-Enemies re-spawn too fast. I can't tell you my loathing of clearing a room of enemies, proceeding to the next and having a gaggle of bad guys kill me from the room I just cleared. Luckily most of the time the only penalty is a very small fraction of your total scrip(cash) and having to get back to the battle from too far apart spawning points. But objectives you've completed carry over.

-Missions, while objective based, usually just boil down to killing a bunch of baddies, throwing a switch and then killing some bigger baddies.

-The Map doesn't have enough detail. Really it only shows you quests and the names of the main five areas. Looking for a specific farm to complete an optional objective relies solely on your memory.

-Schtako. The stupidest word I've heard in a long time. Come on SyFy, we know what you're trying to say and skirting the issue is frakking stupid.

The Good

-The shooting is tight, if you get a critical hit it's because you lined the shot up right.

-The driving. I know I said it's like driving a boat but you never have to use your vehicle so precisely besides the races. I spent a lot of time just driving the jagged terrain of the world and hitting jumps to my hearts content. Also just having to hit the up button to summon the vehicle meant a lot less frustration if you landed in say a tree or something.

-The assortment of weapons is varied and each one is useful in a different way. You can customize them with mods and equip any two you want at a time.

-Enemy variety. At first there are only a couple of types but after exploring the world, which is split into five zones(no loading between them) with new enemy types altogether in each. Different enemies require different tactics and some weapons are beneficial to some and not so much with others.

-I actually grew to like the characters in the story. Sure they're stereotypes, the burned out law enforcer, the scheming business man, the scoundrel of a bounty hunter, but in the end they were memorable in their own way.

-Side Quests and daily events. So there are a lot of side quests, some repeatable and there are Arkfalls which are massive land-spanning boss battles that you can participate in or completely ignore, but there are also daily and weekly 'contracts' that you can do to build up favor with in-game companies to get better gear. Most of the contracts are just to kill a certain amount of a certain type of enemy in a certain area but at least it adds a lot of keep-playability.

So in the end I am satisfied with my purchase. As my first real MMO I feel intrigued. If you're looking for a time sink that gets better the longer you play this game might be for you. If you just want something for the short term or aren't the patient type I'd advise you look elsewhere. I am interested in seeing where Defiance goes in the future, especially once the show starts on SyFy since there are already cross-over events in-game. I would like to see some events in game that weren't just going out and shooting up bad guys or racing. There are ample bars and meeting places where player congregate. It would be cool to have some arcade games set up or card games and the like to let people just unwind in a virtual world with their friends. But all in all I had more fun than frustration with Defiance.

As a final note to a too long review I offer some tips in getting the game running. Turn off motion blur in the options. In my experience it makes the game a lot less choppy. And if you get a 'you've been queued' message that says to wait for hours, just give it five or ten minutes. It's just a bug in the system and I never had to wait long to get into the game.

Click Here to Read More Reviews >>

The strangest thing about this game was how little information there was out there on it. I googled it a fair amount and couldn't find a whole lot of anything with substance. When I ordered it, it was because of pretty good Amazon reviews (ignoring the ones that were posted for some reason other than to help Amazon buyers.)

The good:

The game really is pretty fun. I'll be honest, I put off my finance homework for way too long because I was playing co-op missions and having a blast with them. There is a huge variety of weapons, just enough loot to keep you addicted to looking, and the story is pretty decent. Graphics and playability are pretty good as well and seem to be improving, I get the impression there is a lot of tweaking going on by the developers. It's a lot like Borderlands except that it isn't as smooth or polished, I'm guessing the MMO had a lot to do with this but they're getting there.

The bad:

Lag is hilariously bad sometimes, I've been kicked repeatedly, I'm writing this review because of constant server timeouts. People gripe about the PvP being ruined by Cloakers... to avoid this problem... pick Cloak as your power and be one of the guys people cry about. It's amusingly overpowered. I've also had several bugged missions and several bugged items. My best advice is to simply abandon the mission and keep trying with the items. Leveling is sporadic and comes in big clumps of levels gained but overall it's functional.

In short, when the game is working well it is seriously very fun. When it's not working well, just go find something else to do for a while and try again later. Trion is doing a lot of new things with this game and it clearly has some growing pains.

Buy Defiance Now

High action mostly for online gamers good game. It is with buying and playing and keep watching on tv great story.

Read Best Reviews of Defiance Here

I have been waiting for this game for quite some time now and I can honestly say it has been well worth the wait. I have been playing for about 15 to 20 hours so far and decided I would share my opinion of the game. As I progress further into the game I will update my review.

Graphics : The graphics in this game will not blow your mind but they are pleasing to look at. The closest example I can give you would be to compare them to Gears of War 3. The facial animations could have been a touch better but everything else is comparable to Gears 3.

Character movements : Everything seems to be spot on. character movements are smooth and easy. just like in any third person shooter you have your dodge from side to side where you do a roll to escape whatever you are trying to get away from. also the same is true from front and back. Control of your character is very tight and responsive.

Vehicles : This is the way you will get from point A to point B. At any time all you have to do is press up on your D-Pad and what ever vehicle you have equipped will appear a short distance away. The few vehicles I have been able to use so far handle just fine , I didnt flip my four wheeler once. This feature is awesome , being able to call for a ride whenever you want cant be beat. It is deffinately preferable to trudging the whole way by foot or scouting around for something to drive. You can walk/run everywhere if you please but I had rather ride.

Gunplay : Hit detection seems to be spot on. Your reticle will turn a bright red when you run it across an enemy and when you fire you can feel the effects through the controller. You can not only see that you are hitting your intended target but you can also feel it.

Skill Tree : Since I have just began to play There is no way I can remember everything about this but i will give you a general summary. You can choose a certain ability like Cloak where you become invisible to your enemies for a certain time frame. As you progress you begin to unlock perks for that particular ability. Since the cloak ability is a stealth ability the types of perks you unlock will be stealth based. The same is true for all the other available abilities. I really cant go anymore indepth with this because the cloak ability is what I have started with and am currently useing and have not tried anything else. Something I can tell you is that there are LOTS of perks to build around your abilities.

Character Progression : As you level your character up you will unlock new guns , perks , armor/clothing to make your character your own. You gain (XP = Experience points) for just about everything you do. the best way to get the most XP out of killing an enemy is to shoot them a bit then walk/run to them and meele them. This gives you about 40 XP per kill verses only 15 XP per kill if you just gunn them down. So shoot a bit then run up to them and give them a smack to the face.

This is about all i can tell you at the moment. I got this game as soon as Best Buy opened its doors then ran home and popped it in. You will have to be very patient when you first begin to play. Before you begin to play you will have to install the game , update patches , and you will recieve an Xbox live / PSN update. This will take some time so just wait and be patient. I am getting a 25 meg internet speed from comcast and this still took a while. So the slower your speeds the slower the install/updates and vice versa the faster your connections the faster the install/updates will be. When I first tried to play I couldnt get online because of everyone trying to get on at one time. I expected this as it happens with all online games on release date. I waited about an hour then tried again and popped right into the game without a hitch. For all of you that dont know THIS IS AN ONLINE ONLY GAME ( MMO = MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER ONLINE ). I dont want anyone to make the mistake of buying this game thinking you can play offline.

And in closing : In my opinion this is a great game so far, also I am extreemly happy with my purchase and reccomend this game to any action/shooter fan. The world is a huge open world just begging you to explore and kill the nasty alien/mutant. I just cant reccomend this game enough. There have been some rough spots with the PS 3 and the Xbox 360 versions but the developers have been working very hard to give us the game we were promised and as of 4-5-2013 at about 11:45 pm. I have not been droped from a game or had any server crashes, so Game on everyone , have fun.

Update : 4-11-13 I have just beaten the main campaign and I must say it was an awesome ride. the reason for this update is to tell you all that the last boss fight of this game is one of the hardest I have ever fought.I went through every gun in my inventory until I finally figured out how to beat him . You will need to have the magforce weapon equipped to beat him. the fight is three stages and your opponent can kill you in only a few hits. With the magforce equipped you can shoot him and also heal yourself. That is the beauty of this weapon, it will take a while to kill him with it but you can keep healing yourself and recharge your shields with it. If this is a little of a spoiler im sorry , I just dont want anyone rage quitting like I just about did. The magforce is a BMG ( Bio-Magnetic Gun ) and there are more in the game that are very similar that do basically the same thing. any of those will work, some just have a little more power than others. I promise by the end of the main campaign you will really feel like you accomplished something , and then you realize the game has so much more to offer that you will want to continue your journey in defiance for a long long time.

Want Defiance Discount?

Good game. You can play alone or with others, but it is better to play online with others. The tv show says it is a lot like it, but the story lines are a lot different.