No Money Down
When I first started playing Blacklight: Retribution's open beta, I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. It felt like every time I turned a corner, I ended up with yet another gun barrel tickling my tonsils. And -- thick-skulled though I may be -- my cranium proved all too squishy to beat those odds. Naturally, I jumped to the conclusion that my opponents had succumbed to the cash shop's seductive wiles and had purchased some unholy advantage. But then I started making use of Blacklight's standard-issue X-ray vision visor myself, and suddenly I was holding my own. That's Blacklight in a nutshell: when I was face-down in a puddle of my own blood and also I didn't have a face, it was usually my own damn fault for not making use of its toys.
Sure, I initially joined the futuristic shooting fray with only a no-frills assault rifle and pistol to my name, but they were far from spitball launchers. The assault rifle, especially, offered an only slightly sloppy mix of range and stopping power. Granted, I gave myself a pat on the back if I managed a middle-of-the-road ranking in team deathmatch, but given my less-than-pro multiplayer shooter track record, I'd say that's a pretty solid starting point.
I discovered a surprising amount of nuance to what is, on the surface, a fairly traditional online shooter.
Which is not to say that Blacklight didn't make it amply clear that it wanted my money. A quick peek at my character's equipment screen revealed a positively insane number of customization options -- scopes, muzzles, barrels, magazines, and all manner of other attachments for guns, tons of armor, stat-boosting "nodes," etc -- but most of it was locked up tight from the get-go. Fortunately, most items are unlockable via a combination of earnable in-game currency and good old-fashioned experience gain, so I grabbed my gun and attempted to become a soldier of fame and fortune. In the process, I discovered a surprising amount of nuance to what is, on the surface, a fairly traditional online shooter. I learned when to leave myself briefly defenseless and hurriedly whip out my future X-ray glasses to peek at the entire battlefield. I figured out how to use levels' verticality to my advantage -- raining down death from above when defending points in modes like King of the Hill and Domination. And, perhaps most importantly, I learned to flee for dear life from lumbering mechs -- which can be unlocked mid-match by any players (paying or not) who've accrued enough performance-based combat points.
A chilling look at the future of emoticons.
On one hand, I really enjoyed running and gunning my way to a healthy understanding of Blacklight's ins-and-outs. But on the other, progression was slow. Without the aid of cold hard cash, it took me roughly five hours to hit level five, which gave me access to a revival tool, a better knife, and some slightly improved armor -- the meat 'n' potatoes basics, in other words. I watched with Grinch-like envy as higher-level players (20 and beyond) brought their coolest toys to show-and-kill-everything-that-moves. A cloaking device? A melee hammer that Thor would be proud to nickname "Mjolnir Jr"? A helmet that makes me look like Skeletor? To quote the finest minds of tomorrow (by which I mean current two-year-olds): I want it noooooow. So I went on a little shopping spree.
Insert Coin
That impressive-sounding weapon only caused enemies to die from rib-shattering laughter.
Blacklight runs on a tiered microtransaction model. Basically, almost every item is available for purchase via Perfect World Entertainment's "Zen" currency -- bypassing level requirements entirely -- for rentals of one day, a week, a month, or a full-on permanent purchase. On the upside, that means experimentation is a fairly attractive option. For instance, I kitted my standard SMG out with a Vulcan R19 Rift muzzle for higher damage and less recoil, a Vulcan BP15 barrel to reduce recoil even more, and a Vulcan STD 04 XL S magazine for more ammo. Each component cost 20 Zen to rent for one day, and the total came to 60 Zen, or $0.60. Unfortunately, that impressive-sounding weapon only caused enemies to die from rib-shattering laughter at anything other than the closest of ranges. If you're this close, it's already too late.
So, sour taste in my mouth, I decided to take the pre-made equivalent of its polar opposite for a test drive. The Titan Standard Barrage combat rifle gave me range in spades for a 40 Zen one day rental. But while it offered a nice amount of variability when paired with a shotgun, I became a frightened baby deer any time combat entered mid-range. And given the popularity of assault rifles, that was pretty much all the time. Also, pre-mades can't be customized, so a visit from the gun fairy (think Rambo with giant sparkly wings) was out of the question. As such, I opted to let my rental expire instead of ponying up the positively exorbitant price of 750 Zen to add it to my permanent arsenal.
It was pure love from the moment we first embraced, so I decided to tie the knot. And that's where things got pricey.
Finally, I settled on a heavily modified assault rifle. Specifically, I added a Briar TDF-13 barrel for significantly better range and less recoil, a Vulcan R-19 Rift muzzle for higher damage and even less recoil, a Vulcan drum for a bigger clip, and a Lightsky ELO-tech scope for solid mid-range precision. It was pure love from the moment we first embraced, so I decided to tie the knot. And that's where things got pricey. Full ownership of each component ran me 400 Zen -- for a grand total of 1600, or $16.00. Buying multiple guns, then, is a slippery slope for all but the richest of Richies. Alternatively, there's always the option to try new configurations in the field for free by swiping drops from dead opponents. And that would've been perfectly viable if not for the fact that I couldn't actually examine components of weapons I'd used post-match. Instead, Blacklight uses an oddly obtuse naming scheme for custom guns that'd feel more at home in Diablo. For instance, my assault rifle was rechristened Extended Thundering Boxer after I customized it. "Extended," I imagine, was tied to the drum, and "thundering" might have had something to do with the fact that I upped its fire power, but the precise combination of components needed to generate a certain name is very unclear. The long and short of it? No reverse-engineering enemy guns for me. At least, not in any convenient or practical manner.
Visor view can look through walls, but can it see why kids love Cinnamon Toast Crunch?
Even so, I can't give Blacklight too much flack. It is, after all, a game of skill first and foremost, and buyable/earnable items primarily add options rather than pure power. Even when I dove in head first with a comparatively naked gun, I didn't find myself out of my depth. That's a Herculean balancing task in a game with so many possible configurations, and for that, Zombie Studios deserves a standing ovation standing on the shoulders of another standing ovation.
Free or Flee?
Blacklight: Retribution is still in open beta, but don't let that fool you: this futuristic FPS is capable of going toe-to-toe with shooting's finest, F2P or not. The biggest drawback to free play is that leveling and unlocking is fairly sluggish, so if you're in a hurry you might want to drop about $20 or so on gun and armor upgrades -- if only to expand your breadth of potential combat strategies beyond the most vanilla of basics.