I've had this game for roughly six years now and went through multiple iterations and the release. Yet it feels like a tech demo. A very nice tech demo with great customization options and a massive range of weapons, including mods.
But what are they for? I have probably two dozen assault rifles at my disposal. Yet, which one I choose does not really make a difference. Some are shorter, some are longer, which can be a deciding factor in close quarters, but do they differ otherwise? Not really. I do not notice a change in precision or how many times I have to hit my target for it to go down. The only real difference is between weapon classes (assault rifle, sniper rifle, submachine gun...), but within it doesn't really seem to matter if its 5.56x45, 7.62x39 or 5.45x39. So why overload with choices?
What will I do with it anyway? There are a lot of single player missions available with multiple game modes. But they all feel more like a sandbox. There's no reward for finishing it. I just did it. Or not. Apart from my own personal motivation, there's no incentive. Now there's an actual (partial?) story for single player with the release out of early access, but at least for me it doesn't work. It just aborts right in the middle without reason. At least it doesn't tell me. Maybe I am just too operator with the Hawaii shirt mod.
The state of the game is also questionable for it being full release now. A game that prides itself on realism has no discernable damage model. Of course, with the degrading armour symstem, we got some improvement. But I can shoot my opponent in the leg from 50 m with a 5.56 and it does nothing. Running around happily, full speed, no implications. I do it again, they are dead. Same for me in game though, either I die or I am fully fine. The developers do have this feature on their road map. For more than a year after full release. Is that not something that should've been part of early access testing for a long time?
The only thing that keeps this alive for me is the mods, mainly two main creators who basically replaced all the in game gear for me. I don't think I use anything original right now. Find new cool mods, try them out, die in a mission, ALT-F4 until I can be bothered again.
Literally the thing that kept me from uninstalling it yesterday was that the Hawaii shirt mod has one pattern that I own in real life. Otherwise, this would've been gone again.
