core is fine, great even. but unpolished. an absurdly large amount of annoying bits everywhere. (and i wanna complain)

Like how sounds are badly inconsistent in volume, some aren't synced with their actions, and a bunch of important stuff don't have sound effects at all
Hitboxes for some objects are oddly/badly sized or positioned weirdly. devastator & berserker heads for example are blocked by their torso, making headshots alot more precise than it visually looks like.
Player animations/states: although the whole system is clearly meant to be part of the difficulty, it is at best fiddly and annoying. unreliable in ways that can't even anticipate for. (but willing to say it could be mostly fixed by shifting numbers or other simplistic changes. having buffers for example would be a big help.)

Map design does its job, have had plenty of cool moments using environment. but firstly both terrain & structures are quite simplistic & boring. second it doesn't seem to fit players/enemies and how they move and play. fighting enemy patrols & camps can be awful with certain terrain. also there's just TONS of ledges that are 50/50 climbable or not, and players & enemies can very easily get stuck on small steps or physics objects.

There is none/poor difficulty scaling for player-count. not that huge, but still "eugh" for lower skilled solo/duos to needlessly be limited from enemy-types and rewards

Progression: stratagem unlocking is neato (although has a couple weird placements), upgrades are boring +stat stuff and the sample grind feels lame. But warbonds are VERY bad: items are all packaged into bundles, and unlocking them requires lengthy RNG grinding. made worse by every item other than stratagems (edit: not anymore) being locked behind this system. (also there's an armor store that uses same currency. buying anything from there will add 15-40% more grinding for next warbond)
+ i usually like grinding in games, but here it's overall lame. rewards are slow from start to end, doing the grind itself feels boring, and a large half of the grinding is very detached from the main gameplay. plus, system is quite predatory. not as bad as other games, but still poor nonetheless.

Poor job of withholding info (? idk what do you call this in gamedesign). game has many things like silent enemies, unpredictable patrol spawning, alot of fog, and some of the planet and mission modifiers hide info in other ways. but the problem is that most of the game expects all/most information to be known by the player to function as intended. and i think it doesn't provide a fun challenge with the partial knowledge you're sometimes given.

many important objects stand out too poorly in the environment visually. doesn't provide difficulty and is just inconvenient, so presumably unintended.

one thing i hate most of all, is how the RNG deaths do not fit into the game. deaths are punished alot, with the 6-lives limit, dropping samples + support weapons, and the "all-or-nothing" progression of medals & samples requiring 100% fulfilled objectives and giving 0 rewards below that.
ultimately plays like any other traditional co-op shooter, having to avoid death in almost the exact same way. slightly more expendable, but i think not enough to allow having the insta-kills or unavoidable deaths.

(and ya, the friggin samples! those things need POI clearing and/or enemy base clearing AND ALSO extracting! awful combo. randomly wiping means such large amounts of wasted time. possibly a big reason most can't dismiss the unfair mechanics. )

((am not including super-credits as "progression" that crap is simply RNG and nothing else. happy for all of those who have not repeatedly reached max medals with no warbonds... but i, despite being OCD brained and 100%'ing most missions, have multiple times had to stop playing & go do some super-credits grind for some hours. ))

(((personal wish: improved helldiver-dropping. reinforcing seems like it should be a total refresh of the situation. a fresh fully-stocked diver to drop at some beneficial spot or escape for the team. but currently more functions like the arcadey halo co-op respawn. good for casual fun and humor, but is not for balanced gameplay. )))

also no offline, despite already having functional solo-play. dumb how it is still missing

core is fine, great even. but unpolished. an absurdly large amount of annoying bits everywhere. (and i wanna complain) Like how sounds are badly inconsistent in volume, some aren't synced with their actions, and a bunch of important stuff don't have sound effects at all Hitboxes for some objects are oddly/badly sized or positioned weirdly. devastator & berserker heads for example are blocked by their torso, making headshots alot more precise than it visually looks like. Player animations/states: although the whole system is clearly meant to be part of the difficulty, it is at best fiddly and annoying. unreliable in ways that can't even anticipate for. (but willing to say it could be mostly fixed by shifting numbers or other simplistic changes. having buffers for example would be a big help.) Map design does its job, have had plenty of cool moments using environment. but firstly both terrain & structures are quite simplistic & boring. second it doesn't seem to fit players/enemies and how they move and play. fighting enemy patrols & camps can be awful with certain terrain. also there's just TONS of ledges that are 50/50 climbable or not, and players & enemies can very easily get stuck on small steps or physics objects. There is none/poor difficulty scaling for player-count. not that huge, but still "eugh" for lower skilled solo/duos to needlessly be limited from enemy-types and rewards Progression: stratagem unlocking is neato (although has a couple weird placements), upgrades are boring +stat stuff and the sample grind feels lame. But warbonds are VERY bad: items are all packaged into bundles, and unlocking them requires lengthy RNG grinding. made worse by every item other than stratagems (edit: not anymore) being locked behind this system. (also there's an armor store that uses same currency. buying anything from there will add 15-40% more grinding for next warbond) + i usually like grinding in games, but here it's overall lame. rewards are slow from start to end, doing the grind itself feels boring, and a large half of the grinding is very detached from the main gameplay. plus, system is quite predatory. not as bad as other games, but still poor nonetheless. Poor job of withholding info (? idk what do you call this in gamedesign). game has many things like silent enemies, unpredictable patrol spawning, alot of fog, and some of the planet and mission modifiers hide info in other ways. but the problem is that most of the game expects all/most information to be known by the player to function as intended. and i think it doesn't provide a fun challenge with the partial knowledge you're sometimes given. many important objects stand out too poorly in the environment visually. doesn't provide difficulty and is just inconvenient, so presumably unintended. one thing i hate most of all, is how the RNG deaths do not fit into the game. deaths are punished alot, with the 6-lives limit, dropping samples + support weapons, and the "all-or-nothing" progression of medals & samples requiring 100% fulfilled objectives and giving 0 rewards below that. ultimately plays like any other traditional co-op shooter, having to avoid death in almost the exact same way. slightly more expendable, but i think not enough to allow having the insta-kills or unavoidable deaths. (and ya, the friggin samples! those things need POI clearing and/or enemy base clearing AND ALSO extracting! awful combo. randomly wiping means such large amounts of wasted time. possibly a big reason most can't dismiss the unfair mechanics. ) ((am not including super-credits as "progression" that crap is simply RNG and nothing else. happy for all of those who have not repeatedly reached max medals with no warbonds... but i, despite being OCD brained and 100%'ing most missions, have multiple times had to stop playing & go do some super-credits grind for some hours. )) (((personal wish: improved helldiver-dropping. reinforcing seems like it should be a total refresh of the situation. a fresh fully-stocked diver to drop at some beneficial spot or escape for the team. but currently more functions like the arcadey halo co-op respawn. good for casual fun and humor, but is not for balanced gameplay. ))) also no offline, despite already having functional solo-play. dumb how it is still missing