REVIEW: Defiance 2050: Should you give it a shot? (PC)

Trion Worlds has relaunched the once popular TV show tie-in MMORPG, Defiance, as Defiance 2050. Now you’re probably curious about what’s new to the game, especially since it looks EXACTLY the same as the originally released game from the world of PS3 and Xbox 360. The changes come in the form of gameplay adaptations and free DLC, but the main storyline remains unchanged.

If you’re on the fence about the game or haven’t heard of it before, let’s break down the game to determine if you’ll like this game. We’ll start off with the positives.

Defiance 2050 took a lot of what was already good in Defiance Vanilla and kept it, which is good. For example, the combat in the game is fun and fast paced. When you run into enemies they are ready to take you out just as fast as you are them. When you shoot an enemy you can interrupt them allowing skilled players to be able to eliminate threats before they even can get their attacks off.

Classes in the game are new compared to the original version, where you able to access all the skills but made leveling up a bit daunting if you didn’t know what you wanted to build towards those skills. In 2050 each class has its own primary, secondary, and tertiary skills accompanied with a variety of passives. The one thing I like about this change is that respec of skills is free, wherein the original Defiance there was a fee associated with respec like you would do in Borderlands series.

Though each class has it’s specialization in specific weapons, that doesn’t mean you have to stick with those weapons. You can equip whatever weapons you enjoy playing and also level them up to make them stronger. There are different categories of weapons and within them are subcategories as well, so 2 players could both be using a pistol, but one could have a Magnum class and do a lot of stagger and damage up close and the other could have a burst pistol to land a swift kill. So collecting your favorite type of weapons is always something fun to do in this game. Also as you complete Pursuits, which are achievements in this game, you can unlock legendary weapons that have their own unique perks associated with them, thus making them something to be earned.

I can’t really see any open world game, not having dynamic events involved as this is what helps to keep the game from getting stale and boring too fast. In 2050 the dynamic events come in various flavors from massive Arkfalls that lead up massive boss battles in the end to saving a group of NPCs from enemies. The variety is great and also is a good way to earn experience, resources, and weapons.

Now to speak on the “end game” content, from what I remember from Defiance vanilla, raids and dungeons are intensive excursions that consist of several rooms with objectives and then an end boss who’s pretty much a walking tank. Upon completion of the mission, you’re granted a choice of 3 chests, with one requiring a special item called an Ark Key, which as the time of writing not sure how to get in-game, but they can be purchased from the Shop for money. Running these activities are probably the best way to get higher quality gear. So grind away.

Now we spoke about the good things about the game, let’s chat about the bad things we have here to deal with. Honestly to me, there’s not a lot of cons in my opinion aside from three things.

The first would be character movement. The way your character moves while in crouch is severely awkward and hilarious, it’s as if you’re a humanoid crab. I had hoped they fixed that animation when they revamped, but I guess it wasn’t something Trion felt needed to be changed.

Next, would be aiming. In this game, it’s sometimes REALLY bad with certain weapons. Now before someone mentions recoil in this game, I’m talking about getting your shots lined up before you even pull the trigger at times can be really wonky and you may think you have the shot lined up, pull the trigger, and you can clearly miss the entire shot. This issue is mainly due to the annoying amounts of lag in this game right now.

Speaking on lag, Defiance 2050 is impacted by lag so severely that you will even crash and get booted out the game which can be infuriating, especially when in the middle of an arkfall or even a dungeon/raid. Now it doesn’t happen all the time, but you feel it when it does. Hopefully they are still working on fixing that debilitating issue before a lot of people just end up skipping their game.

All in all, Defiance 2050 has the potential to be a fun free-to-play open world shooter, once it kicks the lag in the face. Until I see this game possibly not getting the love that it had back in 2013 when it came out for the Xbox 360 and PS3 when accompanied with a rather great SyFy show of the same name. Cheers to hoping.