When I originally tried The Nest last year, one of the very first sniping VR games that actually featured a believable scope and long-range shooting, the team at Invrse was quick to allude to plans for a multiplayer mode. Dueling snipers atop towers opposite one another sounded like a fun game of hide and seek, but what the developers actually built is much more elaborate than that.
The Nest’s upcoming “Ctrl, Alt, Delete” multiplayer update introduces a brand new character class, multiple game modes, and a ton of bullet-soaked action. You can see some gameplay footage right here:
Right now there are two main classes to choose from: the Sniper and the Slinger. Each of them feature unique movement systems and entirely different weapons. In the case of the Sniper you’ve got a powerful scoped rifle that lets you pick off enemies from almost anywhere on the map if your aim is good enough. To move, you toss a grenade that bounces around and eventually teleports you to the new location once it’s stopped.
For the Slinger you’ve got two pistols that can alternate between lasers or grenades and instead of teleportation-based movement you have to use your two grappling hooks that let you traverse the environment like a combination of Spider-Man’s webs and Bionic Commando.
As the update’s name suggests everything is computer-themed. Ctrl is a point-control Domination-style game mode, while Delete is like deathmatch. Eventually a new mode dubbed, you guessed it, Alt, will debut with alternating defensive and offensive maps and they’re even planning future modes around the concepts behind words like Shift and Space.
Continuing along this line of pun-fueled names the two factions at war are known as Angroid and DieOS, because obviously. During my demo (shown in the video up top) I got to try both classes on two different maps. Since this is a fully roomscale game you’re free to move around your play space in addition to your character’s chosen movement method, which does give the Sniper a tiny bit of extra mobility.
The grappling hooks on the Slinger were difficult to get the hang of since they didn’t work like actual ropes or webs. There was no swinging motion at all, as they were always perfectly straight, so it was more like using your own momentum to push and pull off of them in opposite directions.
Since each class controls so differently the games got intense with balancing which class you’d play and trying to quickly move to and defend new points as they popped up. I was only able to try the Ctrl game mode.
Previously The Nest was about $10 on Steam, but with this big new update adding so much new content, including an entire multiplayer side to the game, the price is expected to increase to about $20. The new update is large enough to honestly have warranted its own game entirely, but updating an existing product instead should help retain and boost the population at launch. If you bought the game previously the update will be included of course completely free of charge. It will likely be available starting tomorrow December 8th, 2017.
Check it out on Steam right now with official HTC Vive support and let us know what you think once it’s available down in the comments below!
