PlanetSide 2 update adds Hossin and continent locking

PlanetSide 2's latest update has released and it has long-time fans ecstatic. The long-awaited Hossin map has finally arrived, as well as the game's equally-anticipated continent locking feature and some nifty bonuses that should have the game's factions all set to pick up their arms once more.

Ozzie Mejia

June 26, 2014 4:30 PM

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PlanetSide 2's latest update has released and it has long-time fans ecstatic. The long-awaited Hossin map has finally arrived, as well as the game's equally-anticipated continent locking feature and some nifty bonuses that should have the game's factions all set to pick up their arms once more.

While Hossin is finished, creative director Matt Higby has previously stated that the continent is a work in progress and should be considered to be in an "Early Exploration" state. While players can begin battling atop the continent, the PlanetSide 2 designers will be ironing out any kinks over the coming months and taking player reports of any bugs or glitches that may still be present.

"Another reason we're going with this Early Expedition approach, besides just getting the continent to you earlier, is we know that we won't really discover what works and doesn't work in the continent until it's live," Higby stated in a post on Friday. "We've had to go back and redo a lot in our other continents once they were exposed to the masses and we expect Hossin will be similar. It makes a lot of sense to us to be doing that while we're actively developing the continent, instead of waiting for it to be 100% finished, before redoing all the stuff that didn't work exactly right. Some people are sure to ask 'isn't that what [Player Test Servers] is for?', yes and no. PTS has been great for determining if features worked or not, if things are fun to use or not, but it's not great for figuring out large scale balance or flow issues. Players just aren't on PTS enough or playing legitimately there, even during events, for us to really figure out if some of these more complex balance changes or level flows are working well or not."

Continent locking will now limit capturing to unlocked continents, adding incentive for the three factions to tackle and capture those lands. The update will also toss in new Outfit recruitment features and base capture benefits.

The full list of update notes (including balance tweaks and bug fixes) can be found here. Thanks to poster ant_hillbilly for the tip.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?