Tweaking the standard – Badlanders developer interview

Badlanders is a looter shooter that players can consider akin to a battle royale, pitting 25 players against each other to grab loot in an area and get out. In such a competitive genre, we ran the Badlanders devs through an interview regarding the game.

The devs acknowledge that there are quite a lot similar games out there, learning to reference while still introducing innovative gameplay into their own game. Quite a lot of their time is devoted towards designing and researching gameplay, the gaming experience and of course, the player growth cycle. These aspects meant great difficulties and long development cycles.

Battle royale games often fall into a strict formula, and, over longer periods, have the potential to be stale. The team is of the opinion that battle royale game experience is also often limited to the rounds themselves, without much else outside of it. As such, Badlanders looks to add more to the “standard” to overcome what they see as shortcomings: it isn’t just about surviving to the end of the round, you also need to successfully escape, allowing an alternative way to win a round. This allows for more options for players with different playstyles. Maybe you want to avoid as much trouble as you can, grabbing stuff and escape; maybe you’re in to snipe other players and grab their stuff; and it gives you fresh experiences whichever way you decide to approach it.

Once you’ve gotten your loot, you can trade or create your gear outside of rounds, further expanding the ways you can interact with the game. It becomes a game of resources, be it in wealth or materials, and doing one aspect of the game well means you can do better in the other. Attention is brought to the many, many resources you can opt to fiddle about with for your gear, with the gameplay loops essentially feeding into each other to help improve one or the other.

For the time being, the focus is on refining fundamental gameplay features and enriching game content for both a diversified and smooth gaming experience. More firearms, accessories and extended attributes are in the works, alongside additional gameplay mechanisms for combat rounds. One of them is the Desert map; the larger environment will allow for more players, with scattered secrets around for those interested in learning about the backstory of the game’s universe.

In a multiplayer title, security is naturally going to be a concern for players. The dev team firmly states their “zero tolerance” stance on cheating in order to maintain a fair and just faming environment. There is a dedicated technical team for such anti-cheating measures, including patent-pending approaches with regards to mobile games, meting out harsh penalties on those trying to game the system. The player voluntary feedback system will continue to be optimized for prompt report processing and disclosures as needed, with manual measures like the Anti-Cheating Inspector where required. That’s not even going into the various tools and technologies already in place. With over 37,000 accounts investigated and banned over the course of the beta tests, the team hopes you will be assured that no one will get unfair advantages.

That’s about as much time the Badlanders team had with us for the interview. If you haven’t tried the game already, it’s also available on PC if you so prefer, so might as well give it a fair shake and see how well you do.

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Badlanders

Developer: Netease

Release Date: 2022-01-14

Android, iOS, Microsoft Windows, Steam

Here, upon the ruins of a once-great civilization, scavengers fight for treasure and glory. The Red Beach Sanctuary once housed the world's most advanced weapon tech but, in the face of natural disasters, became a beacon for the preservation of science and technology for all mankind. However, it was short-lived as war broke out and the preservation plan collapsed. The only things left on that bloody beach are massive ruins, competing scavengers, and endless opportunities... Gear up and get ready to enter the hot zone of riches and danger.

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