Who plays competitive FPS?

Got sick of realism games so I abandoned CoD and all that. If you decide to get Ravaged, look for me on there. Very much like the old-school BF1942 Desert Combat mod. I will destroy you in a helicopter. Name is Syndil on Steam.

The more recent BF games got more and more realistic, which is when I kind of lost interest in them. The original BF1942 (and the Desert Combat mod) was not so realistic, but a huge amount of fun. There's still quite a large player base for BF1942 and DC.

I'm almost embarrassed to say I have over 800 hours in TF2. But I stopped playing when it went F2P. Became too much like a card game with all the items. Opponent equips one item, you equip one to counter, on and on. Became too much about items and not enough about skill. That said, you can still find me on the DDR Fullcrits server occasionally, playing spy or scout. Very fast-paced compared to normal TF2, so if you're not used to it, expect to die constantly.

I tend to be a bit finicky about game balance.

Monday Night Combat is one of the best games ever, IMO, except that the assault class ruins it. Very steep learning curve. Newbies have no chance, unless they stick to it and put in the time to really learn how each class works. Very much about skill, and a skilled player can carry an entire team if there is no one of equal skill on the opposing team. When I started to get good at it I thought I wouldn't miss TF2 any more. And if you can find a server where no one is playing assault (fat chance of that), it's damned good fun. But I stopped playing MNC when everyone figured out how to exploit the overpowered assault class. I can't play a game without an assault in it, because even if I do manage to join a server without an assault in it, someone will eventually get frustrated playing against me and switch.

Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory is another brilliant game ruined by an imbalance, with the medic class carrying the same gun as other combat classes, yet being able to heal themselves very quickly. Get in a game with a decent combat medic, and striving towards the objectives becomes pointless. It turns into a game of kill the medic or be killed by the medic, ruining it.

I've got more time in TF2 than just about anything, but as soon as it went F2P and the item flood began, it was ruined. You're almost always going to come across a scout with a Shortstop or a spy with an Enforcer or a demo with Booties and a Persuader... etc. etc. If the only way I can be killed is by a player with certain items equipped, then it is not about the skill, but rather the items.

But Shattered Horizon is perhaps the ultimate story of a game being ruined by an imbalance. When it first came out, it was absolute perfection. Very simple to learn the basics, as there were no classes or unlocks or XP or anything, and you only had one weapon, although a very versatile one. Premise is simple: space combat. A zero gravity FPS, kind of like Descent, except you're fighting with people in space suits instead of tiny ships. You get one rifle, and that was it. Fire it from the hip like a machine gun, or zoom in to use it as a sniper (consuming 5 ammo per shot) or use the attached bayonet to cut an enemy's spacesuit open for an instant kill. Also had an attached grenade launcher for firing 3 different types of grenades. But it didn't matter whether you were an absolute newbie or a pro at it, everyone was carrying the exact same gear. And because of that, this game was the ultimate at separating the skilled from the unskilled. Despite the fact that everyone was playing as the exact same class/loadout, to play the game well took a high level of skill. But ultimately, certain players complained about the lack of classes, and the developers eventually caved in and changed the game entirely, adding 5 or 6 different classes with different primary/secondary weapons, grenades, etc. Nothing at all like the original and a complete waste of time. I still say the people complaining about the lack of classes were the ones who couldn't play the original game well. Here's a video of the original game, before classes were added (set to Devin Townsend's DeadHead, even!):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqsU5nWLguU

Of all the games to be ruined by an imbalance, this is still the one I mourn the most.

1500, wow. That's a lot. I did like AA (the first one) but not that much!

That's the way it is sometimes. It's a shame really. I also kind of wish game developers would slow down a bit. The market is just being flooded with games, a lot being sequels or franchise games, and the gamer base is just getting spread thinner and thinner, and the games really are not getting any better as far as gameplay is concerned. There's been a few innovators here and there, like Mirror's Edge, for example, but most of it seems to be just re-hashed versions of something else. CoD, Battlefield... I've just plain had enough. Not interested. I kind of miss the days when there were only a few choices, but you could pick one of those choices and find hundreds of populated servers. Now everyone is drawn to the newest/latest in a particular franchise, and often it may not even be any good.