By Jaime Nava –

If you don’t like video games, stop reading. This is my first game recommendation/review for those looking for something fun. I’ll be popping these in every once in a while as I feel like it. If you have suggestions of games you think I should check out, let me know in the comments below.

Back in the day, my brother had a CD for Planetside. It was around the time when pay to play online games were coming out. I installed this game only to realize it was pay to play. I was (still am) way too cheap to shell out cash each month for a game. No thank you. It must have had a trial period or something because I played the game online. My graphics were able to handle it. I love(d) this game. It was a first person shooter that used teamwork and technology to capture buildings and continents. As someone who likes the stealthier side of things, I often ran around stealing enemy vehicles with my little beeping hacker gun. So fun.

There is a newer iteration of the same game, Planetside 2. I truly enjoy this game. Although I wish they had some of the old mechanics of the first game, I have to say it is some of the most fun I’ve had in video games. The best part, it’s free. Totally and completely free. Every weapon and class feature is available without spending a dime. If you want different cosmetics, that’ll cost you.

First there’s the classes. Where Planetside 1 had suit slots that one could insert different things, each class comes as it is with possibilities to improve certain features of the class. The Heavy Assault is the beast, more firepower, more protection, and very effective. The Light Assault class has a jet pack (I mean, come on!) and has the potential to ruin a vehicle’s day not to mention sending players back to a spawn point because they never look up. The Engineer carries anti-vehicle or anti-personnel packs while able to provide cover from a turret. He repairs broken vehicles, provides ammo, and he maintains a backbone of support for any squad. The Medic class gets people up off the ground. He can also keep people there. He’s a medic. C’mon. The Infiltrator can provide a couple of different roles. He can sit back from a perch and provide cover for his team or he can also creep deep behind enemy lines and cause havoc by hacking turrets/terminals or even popping in and out stealth. Infiltrator’s my favorite. All classes are effective in the right hands.

There’s also vehicles. You have aircraft that can dogfight, move entire squads of twelve, or move four soldiers with some main gunner support. There are two types of tanks. One is basic while the other is specific to the faction. There is a dune-buggy with a gun on top and a seat in the back or an ATV with a rumble seat. There’s also the Sunderer that moves squads and becomes a mobile spawn point. Each is customizable with different abilities and weapons to suit the task at hand.

Beyond all of that, the servers are massive. There are fights over some bases that can potentially hold hundreds of players all engaging at the same time. Add in vehicles flying overhead full of good and bad guys, tanks rolling in from the hills, the chaotic mess of online video games, and you have a pile of fun.

There are outfits that organize (or try to) the mayhem. Some provide training that helps squads clear rooms and buildings. They know where to go and when to do it. It also provides a group of people who are, more often than not, going through a lot of the same things you are in the real world. These people are students, nurses, pastors (ahem), baristas, car salesmen and whatever all gathered to have some strategic fun in real time.

If you decide to hop into Planetside 2, you can find me under the moniker: Dagesh. For all the flaws that it has (like any game) it is a game worth playing and the only thing it will cost you is time away from another game.