Having collected the platinum trophy on the PlayStation and hit 100% Achievement completion on the Xbox, I thought it was high time I wrote a few words about what I see as the best free-to-play game available on consoles. Rogue Company took me by surprise and devoured many an hour of my free time. The multiplayer shooter from First Watch Games is more than deserving to be the subject of my first free-to-play game review.
Rogue Company Game Modes
With three core modes, it’s easy enough to mix things up a little if you start to find one mode a little stale. Rogue Company is also home to a few additional modes, but I’ll concentrate on the three most popular: Strikeout, Team Deathmatch, and Demolition.
Strikeout: Strikeout is easily the most populated game mode on Rogue Company. This is played by two teams of four battling it out for an objective that rotates with each new round. After one team has held an objective down for thirty seconds, the opposing team loses a ticket. Tickets are also deducted for each death and the loser is the first team to lose all sixteen tickets. The winning team is the first to win three rounds and equipment can be purchased at the start of each.
It’s certainly my preferred mode. The rounds don’t seem to drag out as with Team Deathmatch and there’s always ample opportunity to turn the tides of battle.
Team Deathmatch: The defaulted mode of any shooter. Team Deathmatch is played on a six-versus-six basis and is played over one twelve-minute round and players leave cash drops upon dying. The TDM mode of Rogue Company allows for unlimited respawns with a five-second spawn time and the winning team is the one with the most kills at the end of the round.
While Rogue’s Team Deathmatch is straightforward, it lacks and real variety, and the rounds can quickly seem to become repetitive and boring. A shorter time limit for this mode certainly wouldn’t have gone amiss.
Demolition: Demolition is played with two teams of four; one being the attackers, and the other the defenders. The attacking team’s objective is to plant a bomb at a pre-determined bombsite and defend it until it detonates. Guessably, the defenders defend these sites and disarm the bomb if it is detonation is initialized. Demolition is played over a maximum of thirteen rounds with the winner being the first team to reach seven rounds won.
Demolition matches can swing both ways. They can be either very close and near-the-knuckle or a whitewash from either side; there’s doesn’t seem to be any middle ground. The objective, however, is a great way to keep the rounds interesting and despite the first-to-seven basis, they aren’t often drawn out.
The Rogues of Rogue Company
The playable characters of Rogue Company are arguably the best part of the game. You start with twelve rogues; I won’t go into all of these here but I may write a tactical guide in the near future and list them all, along with their pros and cons.
The rogues each differ widely and have two unique special abilities; a passive and a main ability. The passive ability is a background ability that is always active, while the main ability is triggered by hitting the two shoulder buttons and is often far more powerful. Some of the more useful abilities in Rogue Company are immensely powerful if in the right hands and can easily determine the victor in any given match. These abilities include things like being able to run quickly and with silent footsteps to get you behind the enemy lines and self-revives.
Rogue Company is Free-to-Play and not Pay-to-Win
Unlike many of the “free” games we see today, RC doesn’t force micro-transactions on you. Yes, the choice is there if you want one of the many cool skins available, but money will only ever give you an aesthetical advantage. This means there are no rich kids with daddy’s credit card and an OP arsenal, it’s a level playing field.
You don’t even need to use your hard-earned money to buy new rogues. These can be unlocked via reputation points that you earn by completing various daily tasks. Such a refreshing approach to free games from First Watch Games.
Summary
Rogue Company is, in my opinion, one of the very best free games on the market. By omitting the usual greedy approach we see these days, where micro-transactions are needed to prevent unfair opponent advantages, First Watch Games have made the game accessible to all. Coupled with the smooth, fluid and exciting gameplay, there’s very little reason to not try Rogue Company out. Despite the many hours I have dedicated to this game, I know it will still be installed on my consoles in years to come.