A lot of people will jump the gun when it comes to hero shooters and ultimately want Overwatch or Valorant, and while they are excellent choices I want to turn everyone’s attention to Rogue Company. Rogue Company is a multiplayer tactical third-person hero shooter developed by First Watch and Published by High Rez Studios. It is playable on all last-generation platforms and current-gen, and is free to play! I very much enjoyed this game being a big hero shooter fan in general, and for the fact, it felt more realistic.
In Rogue Company, you pick an elite mercenary with a special loadout pertaining to them. You’ll participate in matches that are 4 versus 4, and try to build a team to outmaneuver the opposing one. Each character has a special set of talents, for example, you can play as Gl1tch who uses a pump-action shotgun with high damage with a semi-automatic pistol to cave in your enemies chest, or switch over to the Fixer who uses a .50 caliber sniper rifle and a silenced pistol for satisfying precision aimed headshots. Each character also gets their own individual abilities like Saint who can revive downed teammates in a pinch or Trench who can create a barbed wired field for the defense to hold off the enemy team. In each game, you can also upgrade different weapons and mods by earning money for each round of the match. You gain money by getting kills and assists, as well as using your abilities. Your end match stats are based on your K/D and money earned. This is just one of the extremely unique characteristics of this game that make it so much fun as well as making it so much more competitive in a whole new way.
The matches are broken down into three different versions; demolition, strikeout, and extraction. Demolition is a more objective-based match type and highly competitive. Teams are required to either plant a bomb at a designated location or defend against the opposing team from plating said bomb. There are a total of 6 rounds in this particular match and this one is so far my favorite. Strikeout is more equivalent to Call of Duty’s Team Death Match. Each team gets a total of 12 tickets and starts with 12,000 cash to upgrade anything they can or save for the next round. There are designated points you can control per round which will reduce the losing side’s tickets, or you can pick off the enemy team reducing their lives. Lastly, there is Extraction which is just like Call of Duty’s Control. You just fight over an area to gain control which exchanges from round to round. The more exciting news is that Season 1 has been out for ranked finally since January, and you can place and move up the ranks starting from Bronze and ending in Rogue.
While the game brings unique content, great diversity, and great tactical gameplay, there are some aspects that can be improved. The map layouts feel a little lacking when it comes to strategic setup and can feel overall lackluster. For a cover-based kind of tactile game that feels almost Gears of War-like, the maps do not compensate for that kind of movement. I also think there needs to be more to punishing players for leaving matches and penalties. There have been matches where I have played and people left either right away leaving it to be a 4 on 2 or sore losers that leave towards the end of the match. I would also like to see more match styles in the game, for while the three given match types are fun they do get old fast. More match types would help not only improve gameplay and skill cap but also help keep players more interested in competition and motivation to practice.
The game has a lot to offer and I am excited to see if it will eventually grow into more tournaments and in the MLG world. I highly recommend players that love Hero Shooters to give this a try, for it is definitely a game with high skill cap. This game not only has replaced Overwatch for me to kill time, but also has improved my overall skill in shooters and team based games. So to recap, yes! Grab this game now!
DVS Score- 7.5/10
Veteran gamer, tech nerd, comic addict, anime lover, and just your average introverted weeb.
