News – GRW PvP (“Ghost War”) open beta and release update

Oh boy does it seem Ubisoft like to drag their feet with PvP for Ghost Recon Wildlands? And the community has been pretty vocal on Reddit and the forums every time there’s a sniff of progress on the game. Whenever patches and updates to the game are mentioned, people cry for PvP. In fairness to the community, PvP was announced even before the game launched in a blog post outlining all the planned post-release content.

PvP also featured on the roadmap released in the dev Q&A post in May, but still with no sniff of a release date. And while in fairness to Ubisoft that they’ve never said when PvP would be added to the game, they haven’t been very good at managing expectations either. I’ve seen plenty of people say they’ve left the game now to play something else, although some do say they plan to return for PvP.

But finally we have some news. Oddly the best of it doesn’t come by way of the Ghost Recon blog, but via the generic Ubisoft blog. So we have two sources of new information.

This first one via Ghost Recon on the Twitters only explains that they’ve been getting 12 fans involved in seeing Ghost War (the name now, for PvP) and gauging their reactions.

You can check that out to see their early impressions for yourself. I guess some of them look at least amused. Right?

expect it “this fall” and we’re getting an open beta “later this summer”

But there’s much more exciting and interesting information on the boring old Ubisoft blog that nobody looks at. This gives us a logo for Ghost War, tell us we can expect it “this fall” and we’re getting an open beta “later this summer” to allow them to balance the game.

Perhaps even more exciting is we get a video showing some early gameplay. Check that out!

As for the format of the game, it’s going to be 4 versus 4 (squad v squad co-op) team death match gameplay, set in large arenas taken from areas of the main game map, including mixed terrain such as mountains, deserts, jungles and forests.

Games will play out using the dynamic day/night cycle and changing weather conditions, and players’ knowledge of the map will be very useful in playing strategically to earn the W.

They tell us we’ll be choosing our load outs from player classes with their own strengths, weaknesses and perks, which you select to suit your play style and complement your team, such as:

• Scout
• Sniper
• Tank

I can also see from the video what look like other potential class names:

• Grunt
• Artillery
• Enforcer
• Pointman

We can make a few assumptions at this stage about the focus of some of these. Scout will be the drone/binocular spotter, tagging enemy positions. Sniper is an obvious one. Tank will presumably be heavily armoured – possibly LMG wielding – and slower moving soldier.

The others are up for interpretation, but I’ll be interested to see what specialism the Artillery class has.

The game also included new mechanics such as a suppression system and sound markers, but I think we’ll need to play it for ourselves to better understand what those do and how they work.

a focus on team play, communication and strategic skills

Ubisoft are suggesting Ghost War will put a focus on team play, communication, and strategic skills, and it looks like it’s certainly going to be a more tactical multiplayer experience than other run-and-gun arcade shooters.

The open beta will be available on all platforms for players to get involved, so jump on that to get an early look at the new game mode and help Ubisoft gather data to get things balanced out.

None of us want a full release containing an unbalanced OP class that ends up being nerfed and pissing people off. Plus, who doesn’t want to play early?

Also look out for more information “in the coming weeks” about the player classes on GhostRecon.com.

What do you think of this new information? Leave a comment below, and let me know what you think those class specialisms might be.