Killing Floor 2.0 Review

[tronicmind]

First of all

Killing floor 2.0 is the best game experience in a long time. Last time I was so addicted to a game was doom on psx and this is 10 years ago. In the meantime I played a lot of games…
I like the story: human made Frankenstein-like specimens threaten the world. The madness of power-hungry deciders and blind scientist leads to this mess. Like in the real world. Great message! I love it!
Great ideas is one thing. good implementing in the game is another. You did a great job. random spawn , good ai , healing, shop, welding:
The whole composition of KF 2.0 is a beauty in it self. All the elements flow and interact so good, it is a pleasure to watch it and a fantastic horror-trip to play it.
Allow me to take a closer look to all of this work and let you know my thoughts about it.

Network:
The network-code is a bitch and then you die. I have no intention to say anything about it. I am sure you know all the flaws, the connection problems, the problems with self-healing on clients, the missing death-animation on clients. That`s all ok and we (ten people playing KF 2.0 on our LAN: Todesplanet) overlook it.

Levels:
All the levels look very good. All the levels are very good extended. I like the “open hallways” as specimen spawn areas. Every level has its own challenge and we think West London is the easiest to play, followed by Manor, Bio-lab and Offices as the hardest.
There are some areas in manor were the specimen get stuck (especially on the stairs down to the cellar, from the house as well as from the swamp). But that is ok.

Specimens:
All the enemys are well specified and programmed. The speed ,the health, the damage the behaviour: perfect (I hate charging gorefasts ). From the glot over the Bloat to the Fleshpound. They are all scary characters in behaviour and look. The moment Sirenes enter the level is condition red for everyone! You should hear the shouts of the one who has first contact. Great moments!
There is no specimen without a meaning and they all play their nasty little role in the oncoming waves. (Stalkers are my personal nightmare)

Weapons:
Well, this is the point were I have to add some critics but not to much. Read on.

The Knife is the best melee weapon in the game. Fast, good damage, high running speed.
The Pipe and the Axe are nice to look at, cool animation but in game very hard to use.
The problem is the let me call it the starting period. The moment before you strike and hit the speci. It is tooooooo loooooong. Especially with the axe. In good old KF 1.0 times it was great fun to beat specis with melee weapons in KF 2.0 times its extremely risky. It is nearly impossible to hit the enemy before it hits you and getting hit is not a good thing in KF 2.0.
Solution: shorten the time before hit or take pipe and axe out of the game.

9 mm and dualies are fair weapons. They deal a good amount of damage in relation to the other weapons. Their positions in the weapon- hierarchy is perfect.

The desert eagle is good to use. Good damage, fast reload. A fine one.

The shotgun is perfect for close up situations. One stalker or clut with one shot: thats it.
Reloading is slow but thats the price. I like this weapon as it is.

The Winchester wins the “most useless” award.
Why should I use this rifle? For the range or the possibility to aim? Nothing a desert eagle can`t do better. Combined with the slow reloading this weapon is best used as a bag of money or a gold bar. Collect it, sell it in the shop and buy something usefull.
This is too bad cause the model is fine and the animations are good.
Solution: make the Winchester the shotgun for the distance. Give her the same amount of damage like the shotgun has in close range.

The Hunting shotgun is the alpha and the omega. A soldier with the hunting and nine grenades is god. Enormous firepower and nearly bottomless ammo supply makes this weapon the one and only speci-killer. This is good and this is bad at the same time.
Nothing before and nothing after the hunting-shotgun can compare with her. She is a hitscann rocketlauncher without splash damage. The only threat is the sirene but i always have my grenades as little presents for this cute girl.
The law and the crossbow are standing in the shadow of the hunting-shotgun and noone will save the pounds to buy them.
Solution: make the law and the crossbow worth buying them.

The Crossbow is a nice idea. I like the scope but compared with the hunting.....
Solution: make the crossbow the hunting-shotgun for distance. Same as the Winchester and the shotgun. Simply spice up the damage and your done. Everyones happy.
The other idea is more difficult to do. remember the crossbow from halflife 1?.
Explosive arrows without scope, hitscan sniper when zoomed.
Or nailing specimens to wall , floor or celing ala painkillers stakegun.
I think correcting the damage to nearly huntingshotgun levels is the best way.

I have my problems with the Law in KF 2.0. is it just me or is it harder to hit anything?
In KF 1.0 I loved the law and splashed around with her. But in KF 2.0 it is somehow different.
To be honest i didn’t test this weapon to much cause it is hard to get her and harder to use her with all the fast paced specimens always in close range to you. Well i guess we are simply not good enough as team. My teamates simply have to keep the enemys away from me.
I wish the law would have some aiming help like a scope or a laser dot. This would help alot.

The Grenade is super useable with this offhand key and it is a fair move that you don’t get money for specis you blow up. This way the grenade is more a safety measure than a weapon and you have to fight personally if you want the money. Perfect.

So I repeat it: KF 2.0 is a big hit!
I like it
I play it
Even if there will be no more changes.

One last request to everyone who is able to u-script:
Please write a mutator to raise the damage-level of the Winchester to shotgun, and the damage a crossbow arrow to the damage the hunting-shotgun inflicts in close range.

I tried it myself but get soooo lost in the code.

Alternative give me a step by step procedure to find the relevant piece of code i have to change.

Veeery much thanx in advance

[faust]

All good and valid points. I disagree on the melee-weapons, though. Sure, you have to be a bit more skillfull to handle the axe, but the axe still damages and stunnes multiple enemies. It is always my first chioce when going to the shop before the first round.

The thing is, you have to begin the attack before running into an enemy. It is really no defensive weapon.

[zombieButcher]

I Disagree on the HS, i mean boddemles ammo?
No.
I find myself switching between the dualies and hs all the time, and then still only having like 1 shotgun shell at the end of the round.
But still, finaly some solid opinions.

[Abyx]

HS and bottomless ammo don't go together, seriously.

I do agree on the winchester though... it's really underpowered, which is why I tend to shy away from using it now..

[evildoctorian]

The winchester is underpowered and should have its damage ramped up, but I still use it (for style ). Faust is right about the axe and bat in that they have to be "charged up" before you can effectivly attack an enemy. I've only experimented briefly with the Xbow, but I do remember being quite disappointed with the lack of damage. Making explosive rounds for it or upping the damage would be cool, but I've been toying around with another option: have the Xbow inject specimens with a "berzerk" syrum or create a could of agitating gass. This would mean that enemies hit by the Xbow would attack each other or become stunned (respectively). Those could be a sweet spins on a sorely underused weapon or just crappy ideas.

[udyrfrykte]

Very nice review and good points.
I think the winch currently blows tbh. I dont use the pipe but i think the axe is decent and needs no chance.

Xbow should be buffed in some way, but making it another winch would be boring. Evildoctorians idea is nice, but making a fleshpound mashing away at other specimens sounds imbalanced. Explosive arrows... mmmyes...

edit: i called the specimens zombies again

[uwasawaya]

Or make the crossbow penetrate everything it hits, as it would in real life... I still haven't used it yet, can't let myself sell the Handcannon and Shotgun.

Melee is interesting, I have something to say about it as well... couple of nights ago, the same night I played with Lara, this player named Asshat was in game with us. He used pretty much a pipe the whole round, and never, ever died... until the Fleshpounds overran the rest of us. At first we thought he was cheating (on offices, no less) but his death kinda changed that... he did have a funny gloss to his character model... but he did stand toe to toe with Stalkers, Clots and Gorefasts... kind of over powered if he wasn't cheating...

[Doyora]

I've used the Xbow a few times. It isn't that great, and useless unless your opponents are at extreme range. Also, It didn't seem to hit. There wasn't even blood splashes when I landed what must've been a direct hit. It's also redundant if anyone has a shotgun, as they can run up to your target and mow them down in far fewer shots.

The winchester is better at this job than the Xbow, but still not great. If you use it to decap bloats and other troublesome specimens before they reach you tacticaly it is useful.. but then you don't often get kills. And this means no cash, and no ammo.

The LAW is harder to use because there's no trail to the rocket, and the explosion is a bit feeble looking. So it doesn't look like it's doing much. Also, there is perhaps some delay between pressing fire and the gun working? The projectile also travels faster than before AFAIK.

But the handcannon owns.

[zombieButcher]

Just tested the new Xbow and Winchester, id wait before you post any more comments on them .

[tabcef]

Actually, the pipe is probably the best melee weapon of them all.
It's swing rate is actually exaggerated in the starting animation- once you get a hit in, the enemies can't hit you, period- it's stun period and re-swing period cause the enemy to stun before they can start up their attack. That, along with the range (it's a little over the knife, I believe), allows it to be more effective in dealing with enemies.
Alex himself has personally seen me taking on 5 or so zeds at once with just a pipe, and surviving with nigh full health..

[Doyora]

I gotta say I do recon the pipe is more 1337 than I first thought. The knife works, too (unlike in 1.0).

[uwasawaya]

Maybe the melee should be toned down? Kinda rediculous that it can overpower creatures that don't fear physical pain and whatnot... since all they really have is melee, shouldn't that be discouraged? Besides, melee blocks firing lines... it should be last resort... not first.

One real comment I have to make is the bullpup... I really think it needs to be stronger or slowed down... ideally, I think a three shot burst would be the best option, with each shot maybe on par with the 9mm and high accuracy. It's too much of a throwaway weapon at the moment, as far as I can tell. I still perfer pistols to it, and that just isn't right.

[faust]

well being a melee-player by standard, I have to say that I don't fear gorefasts, stalkers and clots. I do fear the rest though. Trying to fight crawlers with melee-weapons is almost always futile.

[uwasawaya]

That's true I suppose. Maybe my mind set is too AvP... humans being ranged, aliens being close, etc.

[mkilbride]

I agree with the Winchester. As a gun buff, I find it offensive to of made it so inaccurate, and weak.

When I pop a bullet in a zombie in his face, and it takes three...I mean, what the hell. The Winchester is a symbol of fast firing rifles, with power rivaling if a high powered rifle! it's so weak. As others have said, I rarely use it now, after seeing it being so ineffective.

I hope this is FIXED in the next release, as t his cannot possibiliy be ment to be....