Gray Zone Warfare Update Fixes Its Biggest Gameplay Problem

0 2 2 minutes read

Gray Zone Warfare Update Fixes Its Biggest Gameplay Problem

Gray Zone Warfare distinguishes itself as the first PvE game, but it also has plenty of ‘goodies’ to trade for players. This is especially cool if it happens in densely populated areas like Fort Narith headquarters, but as the player count increases from patch 0.4.0, a negative, passive PvP flow has developed in combat zones (COP).

Because you have unlimited respawns in battlegrounds, dead players would simply come back, get a cheap kit (or sometimes even go naked with a knife and a dream), and run to get back into the fight.. The COPs would alternate every two minutes, and that sector of the map would be Call of Duty’s lobby.

To do this, update 0.4.5.0 of Gray Zone Warfare made some big changes to the way COP and PvP work in general.

Sand: Raiders of Sophie Preview: A Great Game That’s Little Lost

Finding out what lies beneath the sands

Making a Fanfare From War

The first and perhaps the most important change here is that outer spaces now have a 30 minute cooldown after being captured. This won’t stop players from raiding it and pushing it to its edge, but it means they’ll have to hold it for a long time to get it back.

PvP location markers have also been adjusted to make combat more lively. If you die in a PvP environment, you can’t respawn in a COP after your first death, which means you no longer have those human wave attack moments of old.

The COPs would alternate every two minutes, and that sector of the map would be Call of Duty’s lobby.

One of my biggest issues with how the PvP areas worked was that they actually took away the attacker’s initiative. As soon as the first shot lands, the game will draw a circle of 200 meters in diameter between both players. A defender may use this to pinpoint an attacker’s location, removing the confusion that comes with hiding.

In update 0.4.5.0, the circle has been expanded to a width of 400 meters, and to make things better, it now focuses on the target. All it does now is tell you that you’re tied to the player instead of the AI, but the rest is up to you to figure out.

This will finally make long-range sniper engagement work again, as the enemy won’t be able to magically know where you’re shooting from just by looking at the map.

Getting Technical With It

Aside from the gameplay changes, another big-ticket addition to the latest Gray Zone Warfare patch is the arrival of DLSS 4.5 for Nvidia card owners. This is part of a performance improvement program that started with the early access release of the game, where it became a critical issue.

Two years later, especially with DLSS 4.5, Gray Zone Warfare is playable on mid-range rigs without sacrificing visual fidelity.

Gray Zone Warfare recently crossed the 1.5 million sales mark and reached a peak after launch this year of 43770 simultaneous players. The game has up to 48 players per server, with a maximum of 16 per team to keep things balanced.

Madfinger Games is participating in this year’s Steam Summer sale, which means you can get Gray Zone Warfare for 33% off for $26.79. I may be biased as I’ve put over 500 hours into the game, but I’d be happy to put in another 500 (and probably will).

Gray Zone Warfare is only available on PC via Steam.