Global Agenda: Decidedly Flimsy

You can easily to get caught up in playing the game and forget that it has no story (though it pretends occasionally to), involves an arbitrary vertical advancement timesink, has "loot" that is unappetizing, has a funky auto-matching system that is a crapshoot in general (even though I'm sure it is pretty good for what it is), mediocre level design, and uninspired PvP and PvE modes. The game is fairly generic and uninviting unless you actually want to play Global Agenda because you've heard specifically about the few good parts.

"If you ignore the gaping holes in this sweater, it's actually quite a nice article of clothing!"

GA is a tactical third-person shooter, but at night when no one is around it dresses up as an MMO. Sometimes, in fits of extreme fantasy, it fancies itself as a real MMORPG.

But this is nonsense. Whenever you get into a match, it’s clear the game is a shooter. It’s skill-based, relatively fast-paced, and tactical. HiRez would need to severely alter the game to make it a recognizable MMORPG—it’s never going to happen, and if it does it would alienate most of the players who play it now.

Regardless of how much HiRez and the game’s fans trumpet how the game is some kind of MMORPG/FPS hybrid, don’t be fooled. This game plays like a shooter, not an MMORPG. Tacking on character advancement doesn't magically make the game an RPG, let alone an MMORPG. Adding crafting and naming a cooperative mode “PvE'” doesn’t convince any but those who very much want to be convinced.

GA is a game trapped between two worlds. Overall the game is "blah". The individual aspects of the game don’t cohere well, the interface isn't particularly good, and I generally get a directionless feeling from the game's design--or perhaps its the feeling that there are too many directions and nothing is taken far enough. Is the game an MMO, or a competitive FPS? Is it supposed to be some kind of RPG? I don’t know—all I know is that when I play a match, I have fun playing a tacitcal third-person shooter.

I find playing in individual matches is fun, but everything on a wider scale is “meh”. The game is less than the sum of its parts. The difference between subscription-free play and the Conquest mode style that you pay to play is too awkward—Conquest isn’t particularly fulfilling, but it’s the only place you can play with a full organized team of players instead of being stuck in a group of 4 queuing to be thrown into pick-up groups of ten players.

I hope HiRez can move the game forward, though. I'm enjoying this skeleton of what a future GA should be.