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So far, Exoprimal has made a less-than-stellar first impression with fans. Currently, the game is sitting at 61 Metacritic Score, with a 4.8 audience score. But for all its problems, Exoprimal is a game oozing with potential. If given the proper updates and DLC, I could see it make a comeback and deliver the dino-hunting experience it probably should have at launch.
For those that don’t know, Exoprimal is Capcom’s new team-based third-person shooter in which players don Exosuits and fight waves of dinosaurs. Teams compete to fight through the dinosaurs, with the team to finish first gaining an advantage in a final PvP round. Various Exosuits have special abilities and classes that can help give players an edge in combat. As is standard with most team-based shooters, suits fall into three categories, Assault, Tank, and Support. These boil down to DPS, tank, and healer respectively. At times, players can also take control of various dinosaurs to attack their opponents.
Overall, Exoprimal is an extremely unique addition to the team-based shooter genre. This alone is enough to make Exoprimal worth playing for many. Unfortunately, there have been a number of frustrating issues that are inherent to live-service products, which often launch with very little content on the promise of future updates.
Exoprimal Suffered From A Rocky Launch
Indeed, Exoprimal has had a very disappointing start. It’s lacking depth at launch, with very little content to explore. While the main Dino Survival mode is fun, there isn’t much to the game outside of it. There is a bit of mission variety throughout the mode; however, after playing a handful of matches, they all seem to blend. If you’re not in love with the Dino Survival mode, then the game is not worth checking out. Exoprimal boils down to a fun multiplayer game and not much more. Things like a single-player mode, more game mode variety, and additional Exosuits would have been amazing additions to see. Luckily, it isn’t too late for Exoprimal to become a game worth playing.
Exoprimal’s Core Gameplay Is Worth Playing
Let’s get one thing clear, though: for its core gameplay, Exoprimal is an absolute blast to play. Inherently, the concept of fighting dinosaurs in mech suits is superb. The impact of fighting swarms of dinosaurs is satisfying and each Exosuit feels unique compared to the others. To me, Dino Survival was extremely addicting and is a breath of fresh air from other team-based shooters. While it may lack content, Capcom’s new IP has some extremely refined gameplay.
DLC And Updates May Save Exoprimal
In a way, playing Exoprimal now is like making an investment. Overall, the core of the game is amazing and the main gameplay loop is fun and satisfying. Since Exoprimal will eventually receive multiple seasons and updates, we should see more content come in the future. Hopefully, more maps and game modes would be excellent initial additions. Specifically, a single-player mode would make Exoprimal worth playing and add some gameplay variety. Adding more of the Exosuits would help bolster replayability. Although each Exosuit already feels unique, having only 10 total gets stale after a little while. Finally, seeing more dinosaur types would be amazing. Focusing on including more unique controllable dinosaurs may bring back some fans to the game.
Underneath all of its problems, Exoprimal has a really solid core loop and robust gameplay. Despite its glaring issues, like a lack of content, as it stands, Exoprimal at least feels exciting to play. The issues that have spoiled its launch are easy fixes that could be solved with a few updates. Now, is that acceptable to those who have paid for its content at launch? Well, perhaps not, and admittedly Exoprimal is yet another mainstream game that is barebones at launch with the promise of future content. This is a reoccurring issue we’ve seen over and over in contemporary gaming. So much so, it’s also worth noting that judging live-service games at launch is always tricky.
What I would say is that if the concept of fighting massive dinosaurs sounds at least a little interesting, I would recommend checking out Exoprimal after a few months — especially through Game Pass In the future, Exoprimal, hopefully, will solve all the problems that contributed to its rocky launch. So long as the players stick around, I suppose…
