Back in 2003, the original Planetside was one of the first high-profile first-person shooters to mix twitch infantry combat and combined-arms vehicle combat with a dynamic metagame and, most importantly, a persistent world. Since then, other developers seem to have caught on to the idea of persistence as a way for the FPS genre to evolve. Titles from World War II Online to the upcoming Heroes and Generals and Dust 514 have players fighting it out in worlds where the wider battle continues even when they aren't playing. Planetside 2 offers another step in this evolution, but seems to be tying its persistence more to unlockable weapons and abilities and less to things like territorial control and conquest.

While Planetside 2 will be offered as a free-to-play title rather than a boxed product, the game's most fundamental mechanics are unchanged from its predecessor. Three factions fight for control over bases on huge maps in wide-ranging battles involving dropships, fighter craft, tanks, armored personnel carriers and all-terrain vehicles. There are twelve bases on every map, each one covering about the size of a full map in Call of Duty (walking from one end of a Planetside 2 map to the other would take about half an hour, we're told).

Players will still be able to group together to share experience points generated by group efforts, forming into Squads of up to 10 soldiers and multi-squad Outfits of up to 100 players. Publisher Sony Online Entertainment is also working on an even higher level of player organization that will contain multiple Outfits, we're told. Players still earn Certification Points to unlock new abilities and increase proficiencies in those abilities, and there will be Warp Gates which connect different maps so that players can move freely from battlefield to battlefield.

While the fundamental mechanics may be the same, some things have been simplified for the sequel. The developers have reduced the number of character classes from eight to six, experience points are no longer divided into three separate pools, and players no longer need special equipment to hack base terminals and seize control over facilities.

Territorial changes

Control over bases, at least judging by our hands-on demo, is now less about gaining benefits directly from owning that base and more about seizing control over the eight square kilometer section of the map surrounding it. Different areas of the map generate different kinds of resources that players need to spawn vehicles or upgrade equipment. Some areas generate a currency called Auraxium which can be spent in the game's store.

But the most important difference between Planetside and Planetside 2 seems to be the lack of more permanent victory conditions. In the first Planetside, factions could seize control over entire maps and severely truncate enemy movement across the entire span. This doesn't seem to be the case in the Planetside 2 demo we were shown, in which each faction had a permanent base that enemies could only encroach for a short time before dying. The idea is for factions to always have a beachhead that allows them to develop a new attack, a change that alters the metagame from a high-level battle for permanent territorial control to a series of never-ending tug-of-war skirmishes.

The change is somewhat understandable, given that Planetside 2 won't be launching with many maps. If Planetside 2 stuck to the old system, one faction could fully dominate and lock down all of those maps relatively quickly, making for a very uninteresting game. The simplified metagame could also speak to SOE's desire to keep the free-to-play game more accessible to new customers.

Customization and monetization

Regardless, it seems likely that players will stick with Planetside 2 for its wide array of unlockable customizations as much as for the persistent territorial battle. Each class features hundreds and hundreds of skills, with top-level certification expanding into about a dozen sub-certifications, each with two to four levels of progression. The number of weapons in Planetside 2 is similarly ludicrous—while the original Planetside had about 30 different infantry weapons, Planetside 2 features 30 Assault Rifles alone, each with a slew of customization options. SOE says it would take about three years of consistent play to unlock everything in the game.

Players will also be able to use an iPad/Android tablet app to view maps, track things like territorial control and resource production, and keep track of their character's personal stats and progression. The app also allows players to chat live with friends who are currently in-game, letting players help provide information and organize a counterattack even when they're away from their computers.

Of course Planetside 2 offers a number of visual improvements, including a day/night cycle that is more than just eye candy. The battlefield actually changes markedly at night, and the game offers a robust suite of night-fighting gear to allow for better visibility. Well-equipped factions could wait to launch nighttime raids in the hopes that their opponents haven't geared up for the darker conditions, putting them at a significant disadvantage.

There's always the question of monetization models when we're talking about free-to-play games. While SOE insists that store purchases are mostly about customizations like armor color and skins, I saw store categories for stat amplifiers, weapons, equipment, and vehicle weapons and equipment. Most of the items had prices listed in Auraxium, an in-game currency earned through territorial control, but I also saw items such as experience point boosts that could be purchased with Station Cash, an analog for real money.

SOE stressed several times during our demo that the online store we were being shown wasn't final, however, and that there would be a lot of balancing to do during the upcoming beta. The devil is definitely going to be in the details, as far as that balancing is concerned, and SOE is going to have to walk a fine line between maximizing revenues and preventing players from simply paying to win.

Dennis Scimeca is a freelance writer from Boston, Massachusetts. You can enjoy his random excitations on Twitter: @DennisScimeca.