[Perry] Prepare for Titanfall

Gunfire coming from a window on the third story of a building across the street. The rest of my team is pinned down behind what scant cover they have, taking potshots when they can, but their angle is bad. 

I approach from the left side of the street. A jetpack boosted leap at the top of my jump gets me across the street and hanging off the wall of the building around the second floor. A moment of running along the wall and I jump off, bracing myself off a hanging signpost before reversing directions. I use my jetpack to leap back along the wall, now aligned with the third floor window. 

I jump in through the window and kick the offending enemy in the face. 

He didn’t even know what hit him.

Titanfall is a recently released game for the PC and the Xbox One. It’s a multiplayer shooter with well balanced maps, Mechs (called Titans), and interesting weapons.

Did I mention the jetpacks?

An enemy Titan is rampaging around. It’s an Ogre class, with heavy shields and heavier armor. My team is having a hard time taking it down. 

I leap from my rooftop vantage point, using my jetpack to boost me at the top of my jump so that I can run along the wall of the building across the street. 

Gaining some momentum, I jump again as the Titan passes beneath me, landing on top of its shoulders. I reach for the hatch and start opening it when I hear the sound I’ve been waiting for. 

The Titan drops to its knees and starts powering down as the cockpit opens up. The enemy pilot knows I’m up here and he knows that I can shoot into the vulnerable circuitry and take him out alone if he doesn’t deal with me. He’s planning on leaping out and finishing me off while I’m perched up here, then, he’ll hop back in and continue his rampage. 

Luckily, I have a plan. 

As soon as his cockpit opens, I leap off, using my jetpack to boost into the air and gain some distance. I call down my titan on top of his location. 

I have the Warpfall Transmitter perk. My Titan drops out of the sky in two seconds flat, smashing the enemy pilot and his stationary Titan before they have the chance to react.

I run along the wall, away from the point of impact, telling my Titan to auto-follow behind me as I search for more enemies.

Titanfall has your usual map types, there’s no real surprises there. It has your team deathmatch, Hardpoint control (Dominion type), and Capture the Flag. It also has one or two unique modes to the game like Last Titan Standing and Pilot Hunt, but they’re nothing too special and don’t add all that much.

No, the standard modes that seem most popular so far seem to be Attrition (team deathmatch), Hardpoint control, and the Capture the Flag.

I’m running around on my Stryder Titan. It’s a fast Titan. More suited for hit and run engagements with other Titans and squishing enemy pilots than it is for stand up, face to face fights.

It pays for this extra mobility with drastically weaker armor and shields. I’m running through the inside of a ruined factory, looking for enemies.

When the enemy finds me.

An alert chimes on my heads up display, flashing red in the corner, telling me that an enemy pilot has boarded my Titan.

I don’t have a lot of time. Even simple pilots can destroy a Titan with their weapons if they hop on and open up the hatches.

I trigger a cockpit release, flooding the compartment with light as the walls unfold around me and my Titan goes immobile, crouched down.

I clamber out of the cockpit with a leap into open air. I twist in mid air, triggering my jetpack and up and over behind me, to where the industrious enemy pilot is firing his pistol into the open hatch of my Titan.

I lash out with a kick, knocking him off and to his death.

Threat dealt with, I drop down and hop back into my Titan, ready to continue my rampage.

Balance is key to games like this and balance is handled supremely well here. Every weapon feels pretty solid and none of them really pull away from the others.

Granted, you’re likely to run into more than your fair share of shotgun and smart pistol users than anything else, but thus far, I’ve met death from all the manner of weapons and methods and I’ve never felt that one weapon or another had a crazy, unfair advantage over me than any of the others.

I hang from the corner, just under the roof in the factory complex, waiting. My Titan stands below me, a silent unmoving sentinel. 

An enemy pilot spots my Titan, sees the ‘auto pilot’ sign flashing above his head and leaps up, catching hold of the Titan to ‘rodeo’ it, by yanking open the hatch and destroying it. 

I’d had my eye on this guy as he came up. Long before he can do any damage, my smart pistol had acquired its three lock ons. I pull the trigger and three bullets fly out, automatically embedding themselves in the pilot’s head. 

I chuckle and activate my cloaking again before his friends come to find me.

What I found most interesting was Titanfall’s little nods to those who may pick up the game, but maybe aren’t so good with the FPS genre.

For those without killer, split second aim, or lightning fast reactions, they introduced a weapon called the smart pistol.

It’s pretty easy to use. Doesn’t require much aim or precision.

Have the smart pistol equipped and the center portion of your screen (literally, like 50% of your screen space from the center outward) is your targeting reticle.

As long as you’re within a certain distance, all you need to do is keep an enemy pilot within that portion of your screen for your pistol to start locking on.

Once 2-3 seconds go by, the lock ons will go red and you pull the trigger, sending three bullets directly into the enemy’s head.

It’s that simple.

A pack of 5-6 red dots flash on my minimap, just around the corner. I dash forward with my Titan. 

My Dash Core special is online so dashing doesn’t cost anything. I cross the space in a moment, readying my weapon, prepared for a fight…

There’s nothing there but a mixed pack of enemy Grunts and Spectres. 

I don’t waste too much time on them. I stomp around their area, smushing them all underfoot in moments before eyeing my minimap and heading for the next red dot.

Matches are all 6v6, but there’s a little more to it than that.

Littered throughout the map are grunts and Spectres.

Grunts are AI controlled enemy soldier, and Spectres are AI controlled, enemy robotic soldiers (they’re a little tougher and deal a little more damage, but easily dealt with).

Their inclusion serves a few purposes.

These AI controlled minions DO deal damage, but it’s miniscule. It almost seems a complete non-threat…right until the first time you run away from a fight with another human opponent, run off with the barest hint of life…only to turn a corner, run into a pack of grunts and get your face blown off.

They’re a lot easier to kill than other pilots, taking 1-2 shots and they don’t move around much, preferring to stand in small clumps, shooting at any nearby enemy.

Killing them advances your team’s score in the Deathmatch mode, and killing them also reduces the cooldown timer on your Titanfall.

But they serve a greater purpose than that.

They help to populate the battlefield.

They help convey the impression that every match is a large scale battle operation. There may only be 6 human controlled opponents to deal with, but if you count up the neverending stream of grunts and Spectres for each side, battles feel more like 30 on 30 affairs and lend a suitably epic feel to the fights.

We’ve won the match. The enemy’s been routed and now it’s time to hunt down the survivors. 

A red highlighted area shows up on my minimap, marking the spot the enemy drop ship will be coming down to evacuate survivors. 

We won’t let them get away. 

I push my Titan to its limits, dashing to where the enemy drop ship is carting off pilots to fight another day. 

I see the timer ticking down till the drop ship is departing, I’ll barely make it to the spot in time…

There! I see it. It’s perched next to a rooftop, its shields flaring as other members of my team fire rockets and bullets toward it, trying to bring it down. 

I see a blip on my minimap and look up. 

One last enemy pilot, trying to make the plane. He’s running off walls, using his jet assisted leaps to cross distances and avoid fire. 

He’s across the street from the drop ship, running for the edge of the roof. He jumps, popping his jet pack for one last burst of speed that will carry him to safety…

Not a chance. 

I dashed my Titan forward, fist cocked and powering up a punch as I move. My mechanical fist lashes out, catching the pilot in mid air, inches from the open drop ship doors. 

He dies, falling to the ground. 

The drop ship gets away, battered, but whole. 

But this pilot? This last pilot? 

He ain’t going nowhere.

There’s a lot to love about Titanfall.

A frenetically paced action game.

Great shooting mechanics.

The Titans…watching them drop from atmosphere? Seeing them crush enemies unfortunate enough to be standing beneath them. Leaping up to yours and hitting the key to enter will have the Titan grab you, cockpit opening as it sort of rams you inside before the cockpit closes and the viewscreens come to life. Or? You can drop your titan and set it to auto-follow/guard mode and run around as a pilot.

The newest thing is the concession made to the less experienced players of the genre.

The maps are populated with weak, AI controlled units to kill so that if you feel a little intimidated by the thought of chasing down a player, you can go hunting the AI units and still be contributing to your team’s victory.

The smart pistol helps cover the gap if your reactions are slow or your aim a little unsteady, affording everyone the chance to rack up kills, regardless of if their precision aiming is suffering from lack of practice or not.

There’s a lot to love about the game and I highly recommend it to just about any gamer who enjoys the competitive games.

Just be advised that there isn’t much of a story on offer here.

There’s a shell of a campaign, but they’re all just the same multiplayer match types with a little bit of dialogue attached to the beginning and the end to give it context.

Still, there’s a lot on offer here and if you have interest in the genre at all, it’s great title to spend a bit of time on.

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