Like Riot with Valorant, Amazon is looking to make its own big-name shooter game to compete with the likes of Valve's CS:GO and Blizzard's Overwatch, named Crucible. It blends hero mechanics with shooter tropes, in a persistent world setting that is always changing. It's an intriguing prospect, and early looks suggest it could be quite the hit.
Especially since Crucible will be entirely free to play.
Crucible will pit two teams of "hunters" against one another, and offers a variety of characters to play as, blending augmented humans, with robots, and aliens in a mashup of avatars that should mean there's something for everyone. They'll be trying to take down the other team, while collecting the prize resource of Essence, all while battling a hostile PvE environment.
There will be three key game modes to start with, offering a 4v4 mode with PvE and PvP elements, a 2v2v2v2 mode called Alpha Hunters, which will be PvP only, and a Harvest Copmmand mode, which has two teams of eight competing to earn points by controlling points on a map.
That's enough to keep the game fresh in its own right, but with ten characters to pick from, unique abilities and weapons to use, upgrades, unlocks, and cosmetic enhancement, Crucible has all the makings of a mega hit.
Do you think Amazon can siphon off some of the popular hero shooter audience when it debuts in a few weeks time?