Ubisoft's XDefiant is here (sort of), with the closed beta currently running until Sunday, April 23.
Previously known as Tom Clancy's XDefiant, Ubisoft ultimately dropped the Tom Clancy and so we were left with simply XDefiant; a fast-paced free-to-play FPS title that's drawn comparisons with Call of Duty. Activision's mammoth franchise still dominates the FPS genre, despite the current community discontent with Warzone 2, so how does XDefiant compare?
To find out, Mirror Gaming tried out the XDefiant closed beta in a recent live stream, which you can see for yourself on the Mirror Gaming YouTube channel, to see if Call of Duty should be quaking in its boots.
Although many have compared XDefiant to Call of Duty, it's actually more similar to Valorant in the way it plays. That's largely down to the playable Factions, similar to the Agents characters in Valorant, with each Factions group having unique skills that have a major impact on gameplay mechanics. Sound familiar?
For example, the Echelon Faction, who are heavily inspired by Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell, are essentially super spies and are able to use an ability which makes them almost completely invisible for a limited amount of time. I felt this ability was pretty overpowered as obviously, being invisible to enemies gives you a significant advantage. Call of Duty players aren't happy with Dead Silence being in Warzone 2, so god knows how they'd feel about invisibility.
The movement mechanics in XDefiant, however, did feel more Call of Duty than Valorant, but in a bad way, as movement felt quite sluggish and slow overall, although the big outlier was the sliding mechanic, which felt significantly faster than sliding in Warzone 2. And the Call of Duty similarities don't stop there, as players have the ability to create custom loadouts, with specific weapon attachments, of which more can be unlocked through XP progression, and there's also a Battle Pass. Because, of course there is.
And although the gunplay mechanics look to be very Call of Duty-like in their appearance, it certainly didn't feel that way.
I can't quite put my finger on a direct gunplay comparison but think of Rainbow Six: Siege as the main course, with sprinkles of Valorant and Fortnite on top. Whatever it felt like, it made for a pretty fun, if somewhat inconsistent gameplay experience. There were a few times when I was pretty sure I had cover and yet still got eliminated; it was almost as if there was a slight delay between my gameplay versus my adversary, but this may be a server issue rather than a mechanics one.
The time-to-kill was also pretty fast, which has similarities with Warzone 2, but in a fast-paced multiplayer map, this felt fine and balanced enough.
Playing XDefiant was far from a bad time. It was actually pretty enjoyable for the most part, and considering this is a closed beta, that's a very good starting point. Whilst there are some links between it and Call of Duty visually and in some gunplay elements, I just don't see XDefiant as being a direct competitor. It's got far more in common with the likes of Apex Legends and Valorant.
Even so, if I was made to stack them up against each other right now, Top Trumps style, I would still enjoy playing Warzone 2 over XDefiant, as it stands (ducks for cover). But of course, your mileage may vary. If you've got a closed beta code, it's well worth your time to try it out, and you might even have some fun (I'm looking at you, Call of Duty player).
The XDefiant closed beta runs until April 24 at 7am BST / 2am EDT and Sunday, April 23 at 11PM PDT. You can get access to the beta through a signup page on the Ubisoft XDefiant beta website, but this isn't guaranteed, or by watching XDefiant streams on Twitch with drops enabled.
