Gray Zone Warfare: 10 Improvements The Game Needs

Gray Zone Warfare

By Lucas Simons

Published 3 days ago

Thread

Gray Zone Warfare

Highlights

Improve UI, weapon inspection, and attachment compatibility for better gameplay experience.
Add options to reduce helicopter noise and implement camouflage, tweak enemy AI, and include land vehicles.
Increase loot availability, add more landing zones, and rework pistols for a more engaging gameplay.

The Extraction Shooter developed by Madfinger Studios, Gray Zone Warfare, has a long way to go before its full release. While the developers have been quite active in addressing critical changes brought to their attention by players' feedback, there are a lot of things that could be improved to make the game more attractive for new players.

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This is a list of ten improvements the game needs to boost the overall experience, from changes to its UI, to gameplay balance for weapons, enemies, loot, and extraction mechanics.

10 User-Friendly Interface

A Change Many Players Are Asking For

From all the things that can be said about Gray Zone Warfare, is that its UI Design is quite lacking. It is not only confusing, due to the sheer amount of information that appears at the same time, but it also blocks most of the screen when using it.

Opening the inventory takes so much of the screen vision that it is easy to become a sitting duck when trying to make all the loot fit in the backpack. The shop and storage interfaces are merged, but are clunky and could use some remodeling to make them more intuitive for the user. The map takes the whole screen, and though players have a mini-map with a GPS-like feature they can activate, they can only call for choppers by entering the main map interface, and that is basically asking to get shot.

Desperately In Need Of An Overhaul

When inspecting weapons, players will notice that a small window pops up, indicating which attachments and stats that weapon currently has. But the window is too small, and the attachment slots seem to offset and become buggy.

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Working towards a standalone weapon assembly system, similar to the one Arena Breakout: Infinite has, could be the way to improve the overall weapon modding experience, and to attract weapon customization enthusiasts as well. Besides, two out of three times, when attaching mods to a weapon, it becomes bugged and players need to reset the game.

8 Attachment Compatibility Indicator

The Current System Works 50% Of The Time

Speaking about weapon attachments, the game has a way to let players know which ones are compatible with the weapon currently being inspected. Compatible mods appear highlighted in yellow, but since the interface tends to be clogged with hundreds of parts (be it at the store or those players are hoarding in their storage) it becomes near impossible to distinguish them. There are occasions when the attachment system bugs and logging seems to be the only way to fix it.

If the UI offered a way to toggle attachment compatibility or sort attachments only compatible with the weapon in a separate window, that could improve the overall experience when modding weapons.

7 Toggle Helicopter Background Noises Option

One Of The Most Annoying Things The Game Has

When deploying for the first time in Lamang Island, players will soon learn about Helicopters and how extraction works. The noise of the choppers can be overwhelming though, and these tend to be roaming around the map all the time.

Choppers can steal players' attention during critical moments and completely block their perception. Losing awareness of their surroundings in the middle of a run can be lethal. There should be an option to at least, diminish the noise those annoying birds make when they pass flying over the player's head.

6 Enemy AI Needs To Be Tweaked

Do The Enemies Have A Sixth Sense?

There are a lot of complaints about this, and hundreds of reports of enemy AI suddenly turning around to face the player (and even shooting them the second they aim at them) even if they know the player is hiding. Even more so, enemy bullets seem to have little to no falloff and will cause full damage to players even when they're protected by armor.

Perhaps Combat AI needs a tweak or two before giving off that sense of peril the developers wish for the game, without feeling like players are facing off against Ultra Instinct Goku all the time. This problem also discourages new users from keeping up with the game, when dealing with uber-powerful AI enemies from minute 0, the game becomes too frustrating and progression stagnates.

5 Camouflage For All

Camping Should Be Fun For Everyone, Not Just For Campers

Another weak point the game has is the lack of tools that extracting players have to defend themselves from campers and roaming enemies attracted by malicious same-faction players. Completing all the missions from faction vendors becomes hard if players are constantly being targeted by campers and losing their precious Quest Items.

Some sandbags covering the extraction zones would be nice, and improved smoke grenades would be even better. But what the game really needs is a way to use camouflage to avoid detection from hostile players. Ghillie Suits would work nicely, but the developers may have concerns about these breaking gameplay balance.

4 Land Vehicles

Having A Designated Driver Won’t Break The Game

Despite what many players believe, land vehicles are not all-powerful. They get stuck, they’re noisy, and are exposed to enemy fire. Having one teammate play as the driver can bring a lot of value to the game, and offer an alternative to the chopper-extraction. So, why might the developers be reluctant to implement them in Gray Zone Warfare?

The faction selection screen in Gray Zone Warfare

Gray Zone Warfare: How To Change Factions

Players need to be in the same faction if they want to play Gray Zone Warfare together. Luckily an option to switch factions is readily available.

Well, the answer might point towards other FPS like Modern Warfare, where roaming vehicles can become a menace for distracted players, and the hit-and-run statistics are spiking. But in Gray Zone Warfare, where the grasp of a single bullet can make anyone bleed to death in seconds, there’s no point in fearing a small Humvee or Jeep crossing through the jungle. Players should be more concerned about the Supernatural-sense-empowered AI. On that note: want to avoid vehicle roaming abuse? Limit refueling to the base. That way the driver will not roam around killing players and stick to picking up their friends from wherever they are.

3 Landing Zones Are Too Scarce

How To Solve The Camping Problem In One Step

Gray Zone Warfare is bound to become a fun-for-all game, but first, it needs to go through a deep revision on how Helicopters and Landing Zones/Extraction Zones work. Most of the Points of Interest in the massive Lamang Island map have from one to three LZs tops.

This is encouraging campers to sit all day long just destroying players, without any true objective other than getting more loot than they can actually carry back to base. Meaningless, and frustrating for players just trying to carry that Task/Quest Item back to their base. So why not add a few Landing Zones In The Map? Or even better, make them rotate randomly among factions, to keep the campers guessing.

2 More Loot, Please

For An Incredibly Huge Island, Lamang Seems To Be Scarce In Lootables

If players come to Gray Zone Warfare looking for an Extraction Looter Shooter, they should know that loot is tremendously limited right now. Except for weapons, ammo, food, and the occasional cash cache players can find by paying close attention to shops, the rest seems deserted. Sure, there are a few lootable containers here and there, but it doesn't quite feel enough.

This is a big issue for a game that is so heavily focused on deploying, looting, and extracting. Purchasing new gear in late-game is expensive, and the sources of income are mostly bound to completing hundreds of tasks instead of a guaranteed return for the players' hard-earned loot.

1 Pistols Need A Rework

Why Carry A Sidearm, If It Does Zero Damage?

The first time players deploy in Gray Zone Warfare, they’ll notice that their tactical belt is the designated slot for a Glock-17 sidearm. Many weapon enthusiasts will say: Oh, boy, here I Go John Wick-ing again! But they’ll soon discover the harsh reality: sidearms are no good at the moment. Even a shot to the face does close to no damage to enemies.

From the seemingly impossible-to-handle Glock-17 to the uncontrollable T-51, sidearms need an overhaul. In any FPS, situations where the primary weapon runs out of ammo mean “time to switch to a sidearm.” But in Gray Zone Warfare, players are better off trying their luck bringing their knives to a gunfight. The problem is that enemies seem to be immune to melee damage.