Lost Planet 3 – Hands-on with Multiplayer

Lost Planet 3 will be out in August. I covered the single-player Lost Planet 3 experience way, way back in June of last year and after having a quick bash at a newer build this week, it plays much the same. The insectoid enemies are very aggressive but with some good positioning and the right, you can take on hordes at once. The highlight for me this time round was one of the characters, Crazy Neil who seems to have an odd relationship with penguins. Watch out for him.

Capcom revealed two of the four multiplayer modes that will be available and I spent a few hours with one of them; Scenario. Multiplayer is primarily a third-person shooter, with the familiar grapple hook changing your normal deathmatch dynamics. This time around you’ll rarely be able to use it to propel yourself horizontally or up sheer walls, at least in multiplayer. Instead, you’re limited to the platforms and towers placed strategically around the maps. This is a pity because the standard run speed is quite slow compared to most recent shooters.

Each player has four loadouts to choose from, with weapons like the Valkyrie, a crossbow with explosive bolts, and your more typical shotgun or assault rifle options. Support options include portable shields and grenades. When you down a rival, you’ll need to race up to their prone body for a curbstomp to finish them off and score some extra points. As a result, one of the loadout options is a gas bomb that players can activate even while down. Wait for the enemy to get up close and then let loose, spraying clouds of purple gas around the map and (hopefully) taking out your killer.

Scenario 1

The Scenario mode offers, as you might expect, a series of scenarios that team need to achieve. Pitting the Snow Pirates against the Nevec forces, I spent the first mission attempting to prevent a Battlecat drilling machine from grinding its way into my base through the doors. It’s a little like the Minecart mode of Team Fortress 2 but there’s no way to push the Battlecat back or destroy it. Instead, you disable it, the other team repairs it, you disable it again and so forth until the timer runs out. Makes a change from straight team deatchmatch I suppose.

The map itself is claustrophobic, filled with wending tunnels and hidden entrances that become more or less important as the Battlecat slowly progresses down its path. As a ginormous target, it’s fairly easy to disable by slinging grenades from the upper platforms or shooting from behind a rock. The key is to disable it in a spot where the other team doesn’t have a covered approach from which to repair the thing.

Scenario 2

The second objective-based matches required one team to set a series of explosives around key targets within a base. Again, there were plenty of high platforms to reach with the grappling hook and portable turrets to place around the area. The target zones are partially sheltered but fairly easy to access if you had a teammate to cover you from above.

This match saw quite a few players dropping portable turrets around the base. These are hackable. If you do it right, you can nab one from your opponent and set it up to defend you instead.

Scenario 3

Both teams were dropped in a snowy landscape with the same series objectives – extract a sample from a large akrid and take it back to your base. Sure, you could probably work together to take down the beast. Once we found it rampaging around a cave, I just lobbed grenades and bullets in its general direction until everything nearby was dead. It seemed most efficient.

Here’s the new trailer covering the Scenario and Akrid Survival modes.

Lost Planet 3 will be out in August on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC.