Nexon and Embark Studios have announced The Finals playtest sign-ups during Gamescom 2022 along with a short teaser revealing just a snippet of the free-to-play shooter. If you head over to the game’s Steam page, you can register your interest in the playtest and be notified via email for when the developer is ready to accept participants. No announcement on the playtest’s release date nor whether it’s a beta or alpha has been made. From the looks of it, the playtest will only be available on PC at the moment. The Finals was previously codenamed Project Discovery at Embark Studios.
The Finals is a team-based shooter made by ex-Battlefield developers
CAN YOU REACH #THEFINALS? https://t.co/uQzbxPNte3 pic.twitter.com/OPVCbt7QNs
— THE FINALS (@reachthefinals) August 23, 2022
The Finals is centered around a game show where contestants form teams that battle each other in virtual arenas. While the environments look beautiful, this is a first-person shooter where buildings are completely destructible. In fact, winning wouldn’t simply be based on how well you can shoot, but on your ability to blow up the setting to smithereens, promptly trapping or damaging opponents in your way. The game explains this away by having characters be in a virtual world, though the arenas themselves are based on real-world locations.
The Finals will allow you to wield different weapons, not just guns. If you have the skill, you can sneak up on enemies and take them out with a katana, or use explosives to blow up a wall. Along the way, you’ll be able to build and customize a unique avatar by earning skins through in-game sponsors. The shooter looks to be strictly multiplayer, similar to Apex Legends, but that could change in the future.
The game, let alone the playtest, has no release window yet. The Stockholm-based studio is best known for being founded by former developers of Battlefield and for announcing Arc Raiders, which was delayed specifically because its progress with The Finals was going faster. A longer gameplay reveal for The Finals has been slated for next month.
In other news, beta sign-ups for a Killer Klowns From Outer Space game were announced, and Quantic Dream’s new game Under the Waves is coming to PS5, PS4, Xbox, and PC.
