FPS Quest
Gameplay for the upcoming FPS Quest shows off how we will need to simulate low FPS to make it through FPS Quest
As gamers out there, we all have the mythical frames per second that we think are the best, and now FPS Quest is going to show you how that might not always be the case. At least as part of the gameplay in the PC title that Farlight Games Industry is putting together for us. Here we have a title where the FPS is your health, but having a lower setting in the game world of FPS Quest can also lead to some great little risks and rewards. As long as the following gameplay we have to share is any true indication of what is going on out there. I am sure that all sounds weird, so let us just jump into the gameplay we do have to see if we can make a little more sense out of it all.
If the thought of having low FPS in a game frightens you, take note that FPS Quest will only be simulating that aspect. The premise of the game is that we downloaded a mod that allows us to tweak settings on the fly in a basic first-person shooter. This may raise or lower the FPS in the game, which is your health, but these choices can and will change the game world. FPS Quest will also have what looks like the ability to shift the FPS on the fly too, so we can get a bullet time effect for some combat, but that will be part of the risky bits mentioned above. Although making sure things are downgraded for the in-game temperature to be lowered and other bits more optimized might actually open up new paths and ways to explore the game world. It is definitely an interesting idea that can change some of these perceptions that PC gamers have out there. Take a look and see how the gameplay is going to flow.
FPS Quest — Gameplay
FPS Quest is an FPS where FPS is your health. Every hit, every mistake, and every bad decision reduces your performance… and breaks the game itself.
To survive, you’ll need to tweak the settings on the fly: lower the graphical quality of walls, enemies, and weapons; remove columns, doors, ceilings, walls… and even the floor. Anything goes to gain FPS. But beware: remove too much, and the world becomes more dangerous, confusing, or outright absurd. In FPS Quest, optimizing is risky.
But not everything is bad. As you progress, you can obtain scripts: abilities that let you use FPS to your advantage. You’ll be able to control FPS with your mouse wheel at the cost of temperature, speeding up the game or slowing it down like a dynamic bullet time.
Explore prebuilt but recombined levels each run, advance through floors with increasingly glitched enemies, in a constant battle to see who can cheat the most, and choose between new settings, global upgrades, or alternative weapons at the end of each level. Every choice affects not only your combat power, but the state of the game itself.
As you progress, different factions will try to influence you:
- The Patch Engine Developers, desperate to keep the mod alive and monetize it.
- The OutofBounds, enemies of monetization and difficulty, guiding you with shortcuts and secrets.
- The Custodians, defenders of the original developer’s vision, opponents of glitches and cheats.
- The Null Process, a broken AI that only wants you to stop progressing so it can rest.
Your actions, not your words, will determine which faction you ultimately side with.
And watch out for the Dungeon Lord, an overenthusiastic, paternalistic, and clumsily offensive AI who tries to “help” by removing obstacles… though sometimes it makes everything worse.
FPS Quest is more than a shooter: it’s a constant fight against the game, its performance, and its own rules. The fewer FPS you have, the slower your actions. Your worst enemy isn’t always a demon or a skeleton, it can be your own framerate.
Lower graphics to survive?
Create glitches to progress?
Break the game to stay alive?
Here, it’s not only allowed… it’s part of the design.
Important: FPS Quest doesn’t affect your real FPS. Playing at low real FPS is uncomfortable and nauseating.
That’s why the game simulates a low-FPS world and turns it into gameplay: a fun challenge, just like other games turn unfun or boring real-life tasks into playable mechanics.
What are your thoughts on FPS Quest, and will this be a bit of a mind boggle for PC gamers to undertake? Will we be able to actually play the game if the FPS gets down to one, or will there be a limit that the game will downgrade to? Will it be odd to run the game at a very high real FPS, while in-game it is an insanely low one? Let us have all of those thoughts in the comment section so we can discuss all of this. I am sure there will be more out there for FPS Quest in the coming weeks and months. Please keep on checking the website and all of our social media to see and hear all of it as it flows out there. These are the kinds of games I enjoy seeing out there, as they can push the industry forward with odd concepts and mechanics, so I am certainly excited for it all.
