Hands-on Preview: Killzone Mercenary (PS Vita)

While Killzone: Mercenary has been in closed beta for a bit of time now, the game will soon allow anyone with a Vita and a PSN account to take the beta for a spin.

The Vita is no stranger to shooters; however, their quality had left something to be desired. Both Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 Declasified and Resistance, two commercially successful franchises on the PlayStation 3 were both slammed by critics for being poorly made by nStigate Games.

Guerilla seeks to change that with Killzone: Mercenary.

Unfortunately, the closed beta had a bit more content available. In the public beta, users will be able to access a single game mode, and a single map. This is far from a deal-breaker however, as the actual gameplay is incredibly satisfying. Gunplay has a great “chunk!” to it, and all the weapons are quite efficient in taking out your enemies. There was less customization than in previous console Killzone games; however, there is still plenty of weapon variety, and I’m sure there will be even more once the game actually releases.

The graphics are phenomenal! There is no other title on the Vita that comes close to the fidelity that Mercenary brings. While games like Uncharted, Soul Sacrifice, Dragons Crown and Lumines are all visually pleasing in their own right, Killzone takes the Vita’s hardware to a whole new echelon. Guerilla has really hit it out of the park with the visuals, and the game looks utterly fantastic. Sadly I think this will result in a slightly lower average battery time, but I’ve yet to play my Vita to actually being drained 100%, which seems to be
the case with most players.

While at first it may seem like a generic FPS, the sole game mode in the beta known as Warfare shakes
things up a bit.

The map will periodically spawn nodes known as Vanguards that you can hack. Once activated, they spawn a robotic ally that hovers around with you, providing some extra help on the battlefield. These range from missile-spewing death dealers to one that cloaks you, should you favour a more stealthy approach. There are a number of these available for unlocking and should do well to keep the gameplay fresh.

Killzone: Mercenary also introduces a system called Valor, and this is the meta-game.

Each day, your Valor is recalculated based on your play from the previous day, and you are issued a new Valor card. The Valor system goes a bit deeper, as well. You can change suits by performing various feats such as a killstreak with a certain weapon type.

These cards are also collected in the single player campaign, and by making “hands," you can gain significant cash bonuses, helping to expand your armoury. Be sure to keep in mind that you can slide back if you do poorly online, but it’s a good incentive to keep playing and improving to ascend the ranks.

Source: Giant Bomb

Another area that Killzone does right is the controls. An immediate gripe with a lot of bigger titles for the Vita was the somewhat forced use of the touchscreen. This is not the case in Killzone: Mercenary. The option is there for you to use touch controls for things like melee takedowns, but you can disable most of them via the options menu. The aiming for sniper rifles is another example, but it makes use of the rear pad, something a lot of games aren't utilizing that well, if at all. It’s easy to pull off, and sniping is relatively easy to get into, while still just as rewarding.

There’s no info on how long the beta will last, but I imagine it will be for the foreseeable future, at least until the game drops in September. If you have a Vita, but no code then do not fret. The beta goes public next week as of my writing this, and everyone can partake in some extremely fun multiplayer. Guerilla’s done a great job in proving that FPS titles can not only work on the Vita, they can work extremely well.

Killzone Mercenary is scheduled to ship September 17, 2013.

- Scott Sullivan