PAX 2011: Hands-On Huttball!

One of the big reveals of out of gamescom last week was the announcement of Hutball, a brand new Warzone in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Hutball is a little different in that it’s the only Warzone (so far) where you can have same faction vs. same faction matches.

BioWare has been quoted as saying the reason beyond that was to avoid population imbalance problems between factions. Writing Director Daniel Erickson wrote a story to wrap around Hutball so that fighting your own faction would have context. Now, not everyone were pleased about this decision, including our own Professor, but, Huttball appears here to stay.

So this morning, I was excited to learn that my first hands-on gameplay with TOR at PAX Prime 2011 would in fact be a Huttball match! I could now see first-hand if this “elastic-ization” of the lore was worth the tradeoff.

The Setting

First, this particular build of the game is more spectacular in every way compared to the build we played at the Fan Site Summit earlier this year. I would say even since E3 things have improved a great deal in terms of visuals, performance and user interface.

The Huttball match takes place on Nar Shadaa in an arena called The Pit that appears to be purpose-built for the game (it would be mighty dangerous warehouse otherwise!) As with most things seedy, Huttball is operated by a Hutt cartel for entertainment and gambling purposes. Surprise!

The visuals that the BioWare art team have created for Nar Shadaa are perfect. With all of the “neon” lighting in garish colors, it evokes that Vegas feeling just enough. The sound effects are equally complementary with the carnival barker-style voice over to introduce the match and the rules.

As you look around the arena, you see places where spectators in private booths might be watching the festivities… or perhaps, we hope, where someday other real players may spectate!

As Dallas Dickinson described it, the arena itself is a “death trap.” The map has 3 levels to it, which isn’t immediately apparent until you make a wrong turn off the right ramp and end up on the bottom. This is mostly an inconvenience because it does take some time to get back up top, but makes strategy interesting.

There are acid pits which do massive damage and slow down your character when you run through them, and there are the flame vents that periodically do tons of damage as well. There are also some strategically placed air vents that those of you familiar with FPS games like Unreal Tournament are sure to love.

All in all, it does a good job at making you feel like you’re actually in an arena on Nar Shadaa, blowing off some steam with (or against) your buddies.

The Gameplay

Let me start off by saying that I’m not much of a PvP’er. If you read my hands-on impressions of the Alderaan Warzone from the Fan Site Summit, I go into it a bit there, so I won’t bore you here.

I was playing a Trooper Vanguard, which meant I was heavily armored, focused on defense, had a lot of health and I was damn tough to kill. The PvP in TOR is already very engaging and tactical, not a one-shot bunny-hop system by any means. But when you add in the health, armor and abilities of the Vanguard, it makes even a PvP noob like myself stand a real chance. There were times I had 3-4 players on me, and lasted a minute or more with maybe minor assistance from my team. Not that I wouldn’t have liked more support, but they were off doing, well you know… something unrelated to teamwork.

The match starts with both teams at opposite ends of the arena, with the ball set in the center. When the shield goes down, both teams start the mad dash to the center, to make an attempt at gaining control of the ball. I’m sure there’s some kind of strategy you could apply, but something tells me this will be closer to the every-day matches you will see once the game goes live. Controlled chaos at the center of the map.

Lo-and-behold, I somehow managed to get the ball first… so I began to make a mad dash toward the end zone. However, since the map is symmetrical, its easy to get turned around and run the wrong way. Which I of course did.

BioWare has plenty of color cues on the walls and ceilings though, which should keep you oriented well enough. Once Daniel Erickson stopped yelling “WHY DON’T YOU KILL SOMEONE!?!” in my ear, I was able get my bearings and move forward.

As a Vanguard, i concentrated on advancing the ball since I had abilities such as grenades and my reactive shield that I could use to keep enemies at bay and mitigate a lot of damage. I was hoping my team mates would come along and mop up some of the mess, and maybe toss me a heal once in a while. But, it didn’t pan out as nicely as I had hoped!

So as I am making my way, I am literally inches from the end zone about to score, and I decided to pop an ability on my action bar that I hadn’t tried before! Much to my dismay, it was the “Throw Ball” ability, which handed it off to a nearby player, and needless to say, we didn’t score! BioWare said they are working on the UI for throwing the ball a bit, so it may not show up as just another ability in your bar.

When you die, you are sent back to your base and you have to run in again, much the same as any other instanced battleground in other MMOs. One key difference in the play style though is when the ball carrier is “killed”, the ball transfers to the player that killed him, not the nearest enemy player nor does it drop to the ground. BioWare has stated they are currently testing this.

The Summary

I can see the need for teamwork being a big factor here, given the style of PvP BioWare is going for, but I wonder how that will play out in the live game. We’ve all probably been in pick-up groups in other MMOs that just wanted to make you pull your hair out because they weren’t co-operating, or even trying, to win the match or achieve objectives. Since BioWare has also revealed they’re only going to allow you to queue as a 4-person group, almost everyone is going to experience some level of pug-ness. It could become very frustrating very quickly given the tactical style of gameplay and map layout BioWare has created.

So, aside from the specifics mentioned above, was it fun? You bet it was. Even though I had no clue what I was doing with all of the abilities, and hadn’t really worked or strategies and tactics for the map, it was the most satisfying PvP experience I’ve had in a long time, That heart-pounding stress-inducing feeling when you engage other players, combined with the tactical style of gameplay BioWare is going for, creates a pretty special PvP experience.