GROUND BRANCH

This game is really boring unless you have friends to play with, and the AI can aimbot you in milliseconds.

As a controller player looking for games like this, I would have kept this game if it had proper controller support or at least didn't have issues trying to remap buttons on the controller, especially with modifiers which do not work when trying to map. Not recommended for a controller player at the moment and will be refunding,

"A thinking man's first person shooter" roughly translates to "enemies will one shot you as soon as they see you so play like you hate fun"

Gameplay looked decent, but as of this writing there doesn't seem to be any players to play with. I had it refunded so I won't be buying it again until it's out of early access.

half the keybinds dont bind everytime i shoot the scope flies downwards and randomly jerks in random directions when standing still

1. GET UP
2. play game
3. die to AI with AIMBOT
3. eat/sleep/repeat

great game, fun and easy if u want it to be... IF. i like a challange, and look at your target, they havent spotted you yet? great. take the shot.
well done, you eliminated 1...2...3,4,5,6... ok, we get the picture. but you havent looked behind you yet and are about to get shot in the back.
7/10 for slow updates and crack shot AI.

This game is honestly an embarrassment for how long its been in development and the price they're asking. There is very little content and what is there is lacking.

The single player experience is nonexistant without AI teammates like Ready or Not, and multiplayer can be fun with friends and hell with randoms, don't even bother if you don't have people you know to play with. The community is made up solely of the worst kind of tactical larpers that will teamkill if your PEQ box is the wrong colour, or god forbid you have the wrong patches, and refuse to talk like regular human beings. MilSim is fun when its not life or death serious, like people in Arma and Squad can still mess around without ruining the experience for others and being mostly realistic. There is absolutely no fun allowed here though, but you can't even get immersed because the larpers will always find something to complain about.

The enemy AI is genuinely shockingly bad, it makes RoN's beta AI look sentient by comparison. Want to do room clearing like Zero Dark Thirty? Sorry, every AI in the building got stuck on the stairs so all the rooms are empty. This literally happens every single time, on every map, its pretty sad such a big issue is still in the game after the big AI pathing update. The difficulty settings don't change the behaviour whatsoever, it only changes their reaction time. Like beta RoN, the AI can either laser you through walls with one shot before you even peek the doorway, or will stand motionless and not shoot at all. They don't react to the player's actions at all unless the player is in line of sight, they don't even run from grenades, they just stand there and die. They don't communicate despite what the three or four voicelines endlessly repeated might suggest, they don't use any kind of team work, they don't use grenades, they don't take cover, they hardly even move. They feel like a pre-pre-alpha placeholder so ragdoll physics and damage can be tested, not actual AI. And fighting these guys is the entire game, so that's pretty bad.

The movement and shooting are pretty janky; the game tries to replicate other tactical shooters in having your whole body and gun exist as a physical object in the game world, as opposed to the traditional floating arms and gun that doesn't have actual collision. However, The maps don't appear to have been designed with this physicality in mind, and so interior spaces feel way too small. Your gun is constantly being brought up to avoid hitting walls and other objects,, even with short rifles and pistols, which makes it very difficult to actually do CQB (not that the abysmal AI would allow for that) as the game randomly decides to point your gun towards the ceiling every time you peek a doorway. This was an issue in early RoN but its since been fixed and Tarkov has had this down for years, so there are no excuses here. Either the buildings and interiors need to be scaled up a bit, or your character needs to be able to pull their gun closer to themselves and still be able to point it forward, like in real life.

The graphics are fine, nothing stunning, but vary pretty far based on the map. Dense foliage and sunlight look fine, but the urban/less natural environments look like cheap Unity store assets, and the lighting can look terrible in places. Like the AI, this is after a big graphics overhaul, so not a lot of hope for the future. The maps themselves are fine and surprisingly big, although some are kind of randomly sprawling mazes without real design like Depot. They might even feel good to play if there was actually AI in the game instead of practically static models with guns.

The sound is lackluster all around. guns sound okay, but there seems to only be one set of sound affects for each calibre. All 5.56 rifles sound the exact same, all 9mms sound the same, etc. Considering You'll pretty much only use 5.56 rifles, this gets pretty repetitive, and isn't necessarily realistic either. Also I'm pretty sure 5.56 and 5.45 weapons use the same sound files, which definitely isn't realistic. The 5.56 sounds fine, but the 7.62 effects are pretty weak. I already mentioned the very small number of AI voicelines, which don't indicate any kind of behaviour and are often just repeated over and over, which is probably a bug that has gone unfixed for years.

The only redeeming quality of the entire game, and what I'm pretty sure 99% of the playerbase plays for, is the character and weapon customisation. The ability to choose what pouches and equipment go on your plate carrier/chest rig and belt is pretty cool, and that along with the nearly unrestricted use of railspace on guns is not only novel, but significantly more realistic than other tactical shooters like RoN, Tarkov, and Arma. My only complaint is not being able to place canted red dot mounts under larger scopes like you can in real life. The models aren't even touching, but you get an 'attachments are overlapping' message, and you then have to make the canted sight either way too close or too far from your face.

Look, I understand there is a very small dev team behind this game, but it was first conceptualised in 2007, and began development in earnest sometime between 2012-2016. Being as generous as possible, that's almost decade of development. That's ridiculous for three undercooked modes, a handful of maps, and the worst AI I've ever played against. . Other indie titles like RoN and Six Days in Fallujah have done far more than Ground Branch has in a fraction of the time. Project Wingman, a far more ambitious project (albeit in a completely different genre), started development in 2015-2017 and had a polished released in 2020, and that game is not only in a different realm of quality, but it had just one developer, so the excuse of GB's dev team being small doesn't hold up, not after a decade. Updates release at a snails pace, if at all, and hardly change anything. Sure, RoN was janky as hell in the alpha and beta, I was there, but it was constantly changing and improving. GB is not. This game has no future, and that 1.0 release is never coming. There's a poor mod on the GB reddit that's desperately trying to defend this game by shit talking RoN and other games, as if those don't make this (alleged) scam game look like Steam new release shovelware. Go play Ready Or Not.

This game might be good once it's finished, but currently it's a disgrace to the Early Access program.
The point of Early Access is to be able to deliver the game to people when it still needs some work. This right here should be still in closed beta.
You can see someone put in some effort here but I didn't see even a single thing that didn't feel like it's about to physically fall apart.
The animations are extremely janky and don't feel great, things that should feel quick and snappy feel unnaturaly soft, and things that should be a fluid motion feel unnaturaly snappy. Doing a inspect magazine animation on a pistol with its slide pulled back, will make the slide magically teleport forward and then teleport back. The way your character holds the gun makes you wonder if his bones are okay..
The sounds are absolutely horrible, I didn't think that bad sound design would ever be a problem to me, but this game makes things that are close sound distant and really far away, and the things that are distant sound like they're right next to you. The NPC's lack any kind of intelligence. The game itself runs like shit and looks like a unity preset. Which is surprising how well ready or not runs for me while looking absolutely stunning. The gun customisation is just swapping some attachments, most of them act exactly the same and the only "depth" this game actually adds is the ability to move the attachemtns freely along the rail, which most of the time is completely useless. The grenade throwing system is horrible, the implementation of DLSS is extremely unstable, making the game just give up on framerate the second you use a scope with any zoom whatsoever, making it run worse than without DLSS. If you really want this game specifically, wait for it to release, though I don't think it ever will, for now just get RoN

8 years and still in Early Access and is still the same as when I played it 8 years ago.

Ground Branch is Tacticool Barbie.

I've had a great time using it as secondary media for music, podcasts, and news I want to listen to. I just customize the gear, run the bare-bones missions, and repeat until I'm done with the album or whatever.

But for Solo/Coop PvE that's really all this game is good for. The mission types, AI, and general content pool is stale and poorly executed. Mods can address some weak spots, gear especially, but they don't fix the core issues with gameplay.

Ground Branch is worth checking out on sale, but at its standard price it's just not worth the time. Hopefully with some further development this will be worthy of its price tag, but seeing the state of development its in since being dropped in 2018, I can't say I'm confident in that ever happening.

AI AND NPC ENCOUNTER EXPERIENCE QUALITY
The AI is very bad (with occasional moments of x-ray vision) making it difficult to have an engaging or challenging experience. They lack almost all capacity for thoughtful and organised movement or strategy, so they kinda just wander around and swarm at threats. And as far as aim goes, its almost like they roll dice per shot but the odds are terrible, so they usually miss, but they still can instantaneously dome you in every now and then.

Pretty much all other aspects of engaging with the NPCs are similarly low quality: They bunch up in really bizarre ways, the voice acting, animations, and customization options are all bad, and then there is the sound... NPCs move almost silently yet scream constantly, but those screams have a questionable relationship with distance and surfaces. So when one NPC screams from the other side of a wall 100 meters away it sounds like they are right on top of you.

PVP
PvP is interesting and engaging considering how this game plays but with such a small community you have some obvious drawbacks there.

CONTROL & GENERAL GAMEPLAY
The control isn't as polished as I'd like but there is a unique appeal to the much more stable aiming and slower mechanics. This is super noticeable when active aiming, there's almost no sway and limited interference from breathing. Its giving CS:GO gamefeel vibes with the laser, and I actually really like it! My only issue is there is the lack of cool content to use it with.

As far as encounter creation goes, the mission sets are so limited that I recommend making liberal use of the steam workshop to give yourself a little more variety. But even with that added variety, the limited map selection and bad NPC performance can make it feel more fun to play dress up than run missions on some days.

GEAR
Gear is where its at really, the customization here- *especially* with mods is pretty impressive, it is tacticool Barbie after all. *But* the bulk of my kits are some kind of modded content, its just better done and often times more thoughtfully implemented than some of the base gear.
And beyond Ammo, a couple explosives, and your guns there isn't much else to carry. So it feels like this impressive and flexible customization is wasted on the lack of things like a water bladder, an IFAK, different packs, shears, tq, etc. So even as a tacticool barbie dress up sim, this feels lacking a little.
The guns are sick but mods also feel required to put any time into the customization. So with a healthy sweep through the steam workshop, setting up guns will feel pretty great (maybe you see a theme developing with this review)

RELIANCE ON MODDING
Had this game dropped with day one modding support there would be a significantly more robust community, but instead they waited until 2024 to add it... 6 years after release... So rather than having a symbiotic relationship between indie dev and community, we are left with a "Too little, too late" situation: A small slice of a tiny community desperately trying to keep the game alive with whatever content they can add.

Mods are the only pulse you can give this game at this point, which is a bittersweet experience, since even with every mod on nexus/steam workshop, this game still feels like a mess.

CONCLUSION
So in all ways this is just a bit too unfinished to suggest to anyone this late into its development at its current full price. Especially since a good experience is so heavily reliant on a fairly limited modding community. With some 'Ready or Not' style map design and AI (including teammate NPCs as well) this could be a lot more complete of a package, but as it stands this is a $10-$15 experience at best.

Ground Branch is messy, and sure, with a more active modding community (and more importantly way more funding for the actual development) this thing could finally pop off... But lets be real, that's not happening.

Buy it on sale, get a bunch of mods, have fun playing tacticool barbie with your soldier and guns, run it with some music, coop, or pvp if you can, it'll be fun.

Feels very basic & cheap. Gameplay & graphics are ok but i don't recommend it. AI isn't the best. Can't believe it released in 2018, the development should be a lot further along than this. It's running on an old engine too & it shows. It's fallen behind graphically. There's better FPS mil-sims than this now, this is dead. I got a refund. 4/10

Good game but when you aim down sights its instant when you crouch its instant its also very buggy needs work done

solid shooter gameplay, kind of a shooter sandbox experience, enemy AI is very funky but its still in production so that makes sense

Love the pace of this game. No fancy radars or jumping around just solid tactics to win the day.

gonna be honest, theres a few things that would be cool to see, i discussed it with a mate recently
- air support
- instead of spawning randomly, get dropped of by a chinook, blackhawk, or even paratroop in
- more maps
- better AI system
- maybe new missions, like protect the point, hostage situations
- humvee with 50 cal (for certain maps)
- more weapons and attatchments
- idk if this happens irl, but fix it so its not blurry with NV and zooming in on scopes
- new sound fx (for certain weapons)
- new weapons
- part of new maps but, an embassy with hostages you can rescue would be super cool
- real military branch patches e.g. SAS arm patch plate patch or delta force patch idk
- injury can affect the way you play "non lethal" headshot = brain damage, concussion etc broken legs blood loss
- ability to cant weapon without a canted sight attatched (for nv)
- more character customizability if thats even a word
all in all, i'd recommend the game, i'd love to see what potential is has in the future. I also feel like the dev's are relying on the community to make mods to be like actual game features, i don't wanna join a server with a billion mods just to play the game just to have the luxury of cool features and extra guns

Best Operator simulator hands down. Amazing modding content. Wish there were more updates. Amazing potential

i would recommend this game but it does need more development with a focus on the AI and making them patrol more realistically and life like. There should be more voice overs between the A.i such as conversations while they are patrolling. this could be done through stages or phases based off there alert status. The maps are pretty decent but i do wish i could pick up enemy weapons

I discovered this game largely by accident, but it was one of the best purchases I’ve made in my 15 years on Steam. I grew up on games like the original Rainbow Six in the late 90’s, and they sparked a love for tactical shooters that has stayed with me ever since.

The trouble in the past decade has been finding games that “scratch the itch” like the classics did. Sure, some Triple A titles came close, but they lacked attention to detail, and left me wanting more.

The dev team behind Ground Branch is clearly dedicated to making this game better, listening to the community, and pouring their heart and soul into this title. They’re a smaller team, so updates can feel far apart, but honestly - it’s better that way. I’d much rather let a developer cook for a longer period of time if it means the end result is going to be worth the wait, and bring true quality to the game (unlike the approach so many other big studio names take these days).

Bravo, BlackFoot Studios - don’t give up on this one, you have a loving and dedicated community who wants to see this game flourish.

The game is so close to being good, but the AI ruins it. The difficulty (AI experience level) is scaled via aimbot. On easier-medium difficulties, the AI will be delayed in their reactions to you and miss multiple shots at times. On higher difficulties, they will laser you as soon as you turn a corner or, in some cases, through walls. There is no change in behavior otherwise. They don't take cover, they don't flank, nothing. Everything else about this game is awesome, especially with friends, but the AI makes it hard to enjoy thoroughly, especially given the price.

AI should not be able to see/shoot through concrete walls and dense foliage. Sorry but I cant recommend this at the moment.

Love the game so far. The immersion of realism from players perspective is great but the game needs more development on a couple of things.
a) The AI movement is underdeveloped and gets hanged up in stairs, doorways and corners.
b) The AI aiming at times feels like aim-bot with accuracy at distances that shouldn't be possible, especially with a shotgun.
c) When shot at from a distance there no intersectionality in the sound. You can hear the crack and the landing of the bullet but no the direction so locating a sniper at a distance can be tricky.
d) When aiming over a wall or through a window (at close proximity) the game should recognize that not only the sights / scope is able to clear the obstacle but the muzzle is clearing as well. Had multiple time that I was clearing the window but the hit box was registering the window sill or frame.
Overall is a great game and supper fun to play, with a lot of potential to grow and became even more great.

Very nice game, love the customization, multiplayer, singleplayer, the missions, everyyhing.
9/10

Its just a dress up game for men, and the game doesn't offer much than shooting dumb bots. i get its a sanbox game... but most sandbox game does a lot more, than shooting bots and running around the map looking for objectives to interact

Still needs lots of work, but the gunplay is great!

fun game. great combat.
not the best AI but o well.
my real complaint.......where the fuck is the content?

Walked up 6 feet in front of an AI enemy and it didn't see me. Sums up most of the AI. Probably fun in pvp, was too turned off by how boring the game was already to try it though

Very fun. Although no osama bin laden for compound, so yeah, cool game though, for operator custom get mods, cool game.

Yes, the game is not fully baked but it's in a state where you can enjoy it! Especially if you find a group or have a friend to play with.But even for a solo player it's intense and has a steep learning curve but it's something I do enjoy. I recommend giving it a try. Even if you play it for a while and take a break from it i'm sure when you will return the devs updated the game with some new stuff to keep you entertained. They are not weekly updates but there are a few and good ones. They just have to keep an eye for detail. Hopefully if the game grows so does their team

Ground Branch is still cooking in the oven, but I think it'll be a banger when it drops.

I can 100% recommend it at this point in development, on sale, for both solo and co-op players.

Out of all tac shooters in early access, this one is the most consistently fun to play.

The game is a lot of fun, the developers care about the players and listen to feedback. Understand as it says the game is in Alpha. There are bugs and the game sometimes crashes, you should expect that from Alpha.

After playing for a considerable amount of time I've worked out a tactic of playing "lone wolf" mode for one map, get angry, close it, then come back after a few hours, each time out of vengeance, rinse and repeat. It's infuriatingly addictive, or addictively infuriating.
It’s early access and it shows, predominantly in level design and AI.

Level design and graphics on the surface are OK, but not good enough for +2020 game. Levels are missing details for the most part and where there are some, it's so poorly optimised my PC which happily runs most games on ultra details, struggles with larger levels like 747 or oil rig.

AI is a whole 'nother ball game. Spend most time fighting around 30 “Trained” opponents, but it might as well be “Deity” difficulty level. I’m convinced AI agents can track you at all times, seeing through the walls and foliage with aimbot-like accuracy, broad daylight or pitch black night.
There were situations where they were standing and the simple act of aiming at them through the scope made them aware of my presence and start shooting. They do like to get stuck in simple passages too, no matter how big the map is, with hotspot mode on, there will be 5 of them stuck at the stairs. When I’m walking slowly they can hear me through the walls, the “I hears it” nonsense, but they might as well be ghosts, only steps on shaky wooden floors will make sound, no brushes, sand/gravel, branches on the ground will make you aware of NPCs sneaking up on you.

One detail that throws me off the most must be Picture-In-Picture scopes which no matter the settings are ridiculously poor quality.

Weapons are highly customisable and the look and feel great, the night time ops with with NVGs look great with depth-of-field blurring out things that would be out of focus etc.

I recommend to get it on sale to try out but don’t get your hopes up.

I have recommended this game, but it comes with a few caveats you should be aware of:

- This game is very barebones. It was released in early access in 2018, and not a whole lot of actual content has been added since then.
- That being said, they have improved every aspect of what they have made to a high degree. Things they tout such as "True First Person" as well as the feel of the controls do work very well.
- Unless you are very into solo terrorist hunt type games, you will get bored without friends. Simple as that.

This game is basically a barbie dress up for milsim lovers, and it does that quite well. Customization of your operator and all of your weapons is extensive. Hang out with friends, or go online against people I guess. I didn't have fun in the online pvp aspect though as it was kinda janky.

Amazing game, very easy to play, gun play is awesome.

In development hell for over a decade. Clunky controls. Dumb AI - sometimes they will gun you from 100 meters, but most of the time they will give you a second or two before they start reacting. The only way to "play" this game is usually with unstable branches, because those are at least getting updated once a year.

All around, I've enjoyed it. Played mostly with buddies, and messed around with some of the workshop stuff on it. It's pretty fun, could use a few tweaks here and there. But what game can't, right?

Man this game has a lot of potential and a dedicated community! Find the right people and you're in for a hell of a good time. Gun customization heaven!

AI behavior could be described as comatose aimbot. Hopefully this will be worked on in future updates. Still put 200hrs into it despite that because of the awesome people that play this game!

Love this game, except player

: play in PvE server
: he join
: he friendly fire
: he wanna lone wolf
: he die with simple bot
: do it again x3
: he die again
: he start vote PvP
: decline
: he yell

;)

: yes, he is
https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198036741289

Pretty good game only complaint is that the enemies are all knowing they always know where i am at all times. They scream even though nothing is happening.

in general its a really good game. I really like the realistic touch to the game, as an early access game it has little to no bugs. the worst bug is that sometimes when your running it will glitch out for about a second then your back to popping heads off. really good game if you want a shooter or a realistic game pick this one

The game still hasbn't a lot of content. The city map is way to big for Lone Wolf and you can't see the enemy that easily. There isn't a lot apart from just killing terrorist and 2 other mission but that's it. The gear and weapon customization was a great feature of the game, lot's of gun and attacment to try out.

Overall it's to early and tbh it wasn't up my interest that much. Sorry.

Wonderful tactical shooter with multiple modes, plenty of maps, and lots of content to enjoy!

This Game took me several sessions to get use to controls and human teammate tactics but this is the best shooter I have ever played. The Graphics are amazing and every detail including orientation of barrel via mouse wheel to avoid flagging your buddies is unmatched in any game I have played. I look forward to the full release.

The best tactical shooter on steam. way better than ready or not. The customization is amazing you get to choose exactly where you want your stuff to go. im not sure if grips do anything tho. funnest with friends but still very playable solo. Basicly no bugs at all. the bots are smart now and are fun to play against. i do wish there were more shotguns in the game but the devs seem to be adding more guns and attachments every now and then. buy it and you wont regret it.

Great game with a group of friends. Either super tactical or laid back and straight balls to the wall. How ever you play it its worth it. Not the greatest due to some bugs but all and all good fun.

so unbelievably incompatible with the control no matter what you do you just can't change the option from aiming and running at the same time probably one of the most annoying things possible

Ground Branch would definitely benefit from more polish and content, but it is already built on a solid foundation. I appreciate the attention to detail, and how you can customize your guns and operator to a great extent. It's nice to have your loadout exactly how you want and just hop into one of the servers, and go take out some enemies or retrieve intel.

That being said, the player count does feel a bit low lately, and I can only hope that future updates bring in some more players. The roadmap does look promising to me, so I remain optimistic.

Here's a video review I made for it: youtube.com/watch?v=xpmL2u_6AOQ

This first person shooter has good potential but graphics aren't the best for 2022+ also game is pretty laggy.

Ground Branch... I love you... but I also hate you...

Obviously I've played a decent amount of this. It's a blast. However, it feels like it's regressed a bit. When I first bought this I honestly didn't have a lot of complaints. The gunplay is completely unique. It's probably the only time I've played a game where it feels like my character is actually holding the weapon. Bringing the gun from low ready to firing position feels weighty, it feels like your arms are actually proportional to your body. It's honestly hard to understand if you haven't played it.

With that being said, the AI come in 1 of 2 forms:

-Brain dead
-Brain dead with aimbot

It's not very fun. They move awkwardly, they are inconsistent with the difficulty, it's just frustrating and breaks immersion. Now if you play with friends, you are good to go, just run some drills in the shoot house or do some PVP. That's always fun. But I play solo, and the lack of AI development was discouraging.

Even with that though, I still dumped hours into this game. I've kind of stopped playing, but there are two things that will bring me back:

1. Please please please address the multiplayer servers. There is so much potential for fun PVP lobbies, but it is a mess. There is no map rotation, the game modes don't ever change, and there is almost never any active servers for PVP. It's so frustrating because the multiplayer could be good, but it's just not. Please just create some sort of vanilla server or two where it's PVP and it rotates maps and game mode. That's all I ask.

2. Just a little more blood and gore. I could live with the AI for a bit longer if there was just a little bit better gore. I don't want to sound crazy, but for me at least, it would add a tiny bit more immersion that would make the AI bearable.

Overall, so unique, so fun, very talented team, please don't ever let this die.

Even tho the game might have a lot great things like weapon building and all of this stuff, it's all that that it has. Multiplayer it's just bad or non existing.
After giving it a try its all it has , i wished i had saved my money