For a genre built entirely on the appeal of its characters, recent hero shooters have woefully lacked spice and creativity. Poor, forgettable designs have made recent failures and underwhelming hero shooters on the horizon (sorry Concord and Project Ethos ) look like trend chasers showing up years late to the party. However, there is one upcoming hero shooter that's doing everything right: Fragpunk.
It's giving the genre a shot of adrenaline it desperately needs right now. Developed by NetEase’s Bad Guitar Studio, Fragpunk is a 5v5 Valorant-style hero shooter but with much shorter games, seven rounds maximum, and more forgiving gunplay (although you still need good aim). Fragpunk doesn't feel like it has a Chinese mega-publisher behind it.
Instead it feels like an experience sketched out in a teenager’s notebook or conjured up in a dorm room by a bunch of college students, because its ideas and presentation are so unsafe from a business perspective. I put 20 hours into the closed beta last month and found that its main twist and unparalleled presentation are genuine innovations for a genre that's been pretty stagnant since Overwatch came onto the scene almost a decade ago. Shard cards are that gameplay twist: These are power-ups activated at the start of each round by acquiring points upon kills, deaths, round completions, etc.
They are effectively cheat codes designed to break the strict ruleset you often find in competitive shooters. Lifesteal, when activated, heals you.
