The Art of War

No not a Chinese military text, but instead a bit about hunting, which will undoubtedly be the most popular of the three main game play elements.  And to be fair the game world does feel a bit like a world at war.  

The back story is sketchy at the moment, but the land is filled (well not quite filled yet, but it's getting there) with various mutated creatures and maniacal robots, all of which are only to happy to take a proverbial bite out of Qweeg - and so being geared up for battle is pretty much essential.

Hunting equipment currently falls into two main categories - items the deal damage i.e. weapons; and items that heal damage - healing kits.  Currently there is no concept of Armour - although this is planned for a little further down the line.

In terms of weapons there are 3 styles available:  Melee; pistols; and rifles.  Weapons need to be equipped to the character before they can be accessed and are used by clicking and holding down the left mouse button.

 Items can be assigned to a toolbar with shortcut keys (0 - 9) defined for quick equipping.

The differences between the 3 types of weapons are - in very general terms:

• Melee - only useful for close quarters combat, but generally good damage.  Also they don't require ammunition to use.
• Pistols - Shorter range than rifles but better than melee.  Generally lower damage, but faster rate of fire than rifles
• Rifles - good range and damage.  Slower rate of fire.

Whilst this is a general guide, should you come across the Protoype or Adjusted Prototype range of weapons you will find that the rifles have much the same rate of fire as the pistols.  So the weapon of choice for the aspiring hunter is currently the Adjusted Prototype X rifle (although as expected this is much rarer than other weapons).

Healing kits and ranged weapons require secondary components to use them - in the case of healing kits they need a supply of the appropriate type of bandage; for guns the appropriate ammunition.  These can all be looted; bought; or crafted.

So from a basic standpoint hunting is very straightforward - find a mob on your radar (red dots are mobs; green are other players)  - point your gun at said mob, start shooting, run over its corpse when it is dead to loot it.  Heal in between or at the end if you take damage.  Rinse and repeat.  Of course in practice things are a little more complex - with no armour you can quickly get overrun if you are not careful so some planning is often needed - especially if you plan on taking on the larger mobs on your own.

So don a gun, a healing kit and get out there - before you know it you too will be taking on the mighty mutant spider! ;-)