When The First Descendant was first announced, I wasn’t entirely sure what it was. I knew for certain it was a shooter of some kind, but I couldn’t tell if it was an extraction shooter, a hero shooter, or something more PvE focused like Destiny or Warframe. At Summer Game Fest 2024, I was given the opportunity to sit down with the game and chat with Lead Producer of The First Descendant Beomjun Lee to get a better grasp on whatever The First Descendant was.
The First Descendant reminded me a lot of Warframe — at least in terms of characters having unique skills, and I wouldn’t really call this a “hero shooter” by any stretch of the imagination. Players are able to more or less select the load-out they want before jumping into missions or traversing the various zones available in The First Descendant. I ended up taking an SMG and automatic rifle into a small instance as Yujin — a support-style character who can provide a team with shields and healing. Generally, I’m always the one that plays support in MMORPGs, be it a healer or through a class that provides supplemental buffs. So Yujin was the natural choice for me.
Despite his role being limited and my abilities focused solely on healing, I was still agile and able to mostly fend for myself. However, with a lack of any real offensive capability outside of my propensity for headshots thanks to sinking a hundred or more hours into Riot Games’ Valorant, I narrowly cleared these encounters with slivers of health. Which makes me think certain characters are more tailored towards group play over others. I wasn’t able to test this theory since I was only given enough time to test out one character. Overall, gameplay felt a bit rough. Recoil on my weapons was sometimes a bother, but it did force me to adjust how I was approaching enemies and since I would take loads of damage from more elite mobs, I had to be more precise with every shot just to scrape by.
Enemy types do have some variation to them, but they all share a similar aesthetic. Everything I fought was humanoid and swathed in shades of gray, and sometimes dotted with neon lights. There are enemies that charge you and enemies with shields, and enemies with passives that require you to get up close and personal as they will cover their general proximity with a bothersome immunity shield. I can’t say there was anything spectacular about these encounters, as it more or less reminded me of playing the early days of Destiny and clearing waves of mobs in some vain attempt to feel as though I was making some kind of negligible process in a game I barely understood. But it is definitely a game I can see myself enjoying with a group of friends once I get a better taste of what other content The First Descent will have to offer, specifically the Void Intercept Battles, and how it’s balanced.
While there are strong shades of Warframe and Destiny in The First Descendant, Lead Producer Beomjun Lee shared that the narrative surrounding The First Descendants themselves is what sets this game apart from games that exist within the same market. A specific Descendant will occupy each zone, and as you progress these individual areas you will learn more about them. “You’ll become part of a team with that Descendant, and while you’re doing that within that specific region you’ll get to learn about the background, the personality, and the trauma that particular character carries.” Lee stated that Ajax was his personal favorite of the Descendants and elaborated a bit on his background and how he had clawed his way out of the void he had been flung into, and that he hopes that players will enjoy experiencing his story once they get their hands on The First Descendant.
Lee also mentioned that every new season will feature a new Descendant-focused story, with Bunny being the first to receive her own individual storyline. “Every three months we plan on rolling out an update, which will include a new character. And since this is a game with global players, we’d like to develop characters that suit different cultures and different backgrounds.” He said. “Because I’m a Korean developer, I don’t know how the global audience will react, so sometimes my assumptions may be wrong, or in some cases it may be right. You know, sometimes you focus on one character, but another character may get more attention.” Lee said when asked about what kinds of characters the development team would like to make for future content updates. He also asked what kind of character I enjoyed playing, genuinely interested in the perspective of a player outside of the Korean market. I mentioned Yujin, for his ability to heal his teammates, and Blair who I gravitated towards purely based on his design.
I also had the opportunity to ask Lee more about content updates, and if they would be rolling out simultaneously worldwide, or would launch in Asian regions before making it to North America or Europe. “The content updates will be rolling out at the same time across all platforms and regions.” However, Lee said that this was a first and that this approach has been difficult. He also stressed that once The First Descendant is released, and updates continue to roll out, that he and the team would love to receive feedback from players, as their intention is to hopefully continue service the game for the foreseeable future. “We want to be able to share each different story, and make more new characters.”
The First Descendant will release on July 2, 2024 for PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
