Those who were able to score a Beta key for Beta 1 would have noticed that after a few weeks of solid sewer dwelling, the local Beta servers started to empty out at a phenomenal rate. I guess there are only so many times you can enjoy trying to build that damn EMP Generator. Last week Beta 2 landed and managed to blow some life back into the local Beta server scene, bringing with it some new toys for the GDF boys, a new map, and 25000 more players.

 After 768 megabytes of new Beta client is downloaded we are introduced to Valley, a map set in the Yosemite Valley, USA, where in a nutshell, the GDF are still trying to get the Strogg to bugger off. This time around the Strogg are no longer trying to find somewhere to live and breed, their new objective is to contaminate the local water supply to turn the population into mindless zombies. Not surprisingly, the GDF are trying to stop this from happening.

The map itself requires the Strogg to do nothing other than defend, it's up to the GDF to do all the work yet again. The GDF's main objectives are to repair a bridge, drive a monstrosity of a vehicle to different points whereupon it blows its way into the water station, allowing the GDF to plant explosives at the contamination device (it's got a bit of a Fuel Depot from ET feel about it). Now this all sounds fairly straightforward, until you factor in the Strogg, multiple deployable turrets and jagged mountains.

One big issue I have with this map is how easy it is to be absolutely creamed as GDF, especially if your team isn't on the ball. Driving the massive GDF vehicle over the first bridge brings it through a road tunnel, before it has to cross open space to a nicely marked square in a holding yard. That's great and all and should be a pretty painless task. The only problem is capturing the tunnel spawn gives the GDF absolutely nowhere useful to deploy turrets, where as all along the run to the holding yard the Strogg are able to and usually do construct a plethora of anti-vehicle and anti-personnel turrets. Enter the problem of having a GDF team that's not on the ball. The age old problem of a team of 12 having only 1 engineer arises and there's only so much one engineer can do against 12 angry Strogg. More often than not, the GDF's massive vehicle gets stranded in no-man's land with no hope of repair. My number one tip for ETQW Beta2, if you're GDF, spawn as an engineer until the water station is breached, unless you like the idea of spawning and dying for 10 minutes. Giving the GDF enough build zone to construct a couple of anti-vehicle turrets near the exit of the tunnel would help immensely.

Another dislike of mine is the fact that unlike ET, the vehicle the GDF are escorting now takes damage while it's under repair. No longer can you send wave after wave of engineer to the rescue until repairs are fully complete. It's totally devastating to almost have the thing fully repaired until one plasma blast brings you right back where you started. Sometimes this makes repairing the vehicle damn near impossible.

The final rant is about the jagged mountains. No, I'm not complaining about their looks, they look fine, it's the fact that the Strogg have access to a ledge perched 50+ metres above the ground. What's the problem with that? One word, Railgun. When a diehard sniper is on the Strogg team and you're a hapless GDF goon, you'll soon find yourself insta-dying as soon as you set foot out of the protection of the road tunnel. The rate of fire of the Railgun seems to be more impressive than the GDF sniper rifle, yet this makes no difference as it's near impossible to nerf the Strogg snipers from the ground. Field Ops have the only real chance and only by calling a Hammer strike on the ridge, whilst this gives you massive satisfaction to watch, it's not really effective as 20 seconds later they're back and your Hammer has ages to recharge. Using an alternative artillery platform is near impossible as the lack of deployable sites on the exit of the road tunnel mean you've got to plop your artillery near spawn or the entrance of the tunnel. The artillery cannon and rocket artillery just don't have the height to get over the chunk of rock the road tunnel goes through, rendering them useless.

Don't despair! All is not lost! If the GDF vehicle makes it to its first objective, the GDF get access to their new toys, a couple of attack helicopters. One apache style chopper I personally haven't had a chance to try, I've only been able to get a fly of the bumblebee, the lethargic cousin of the attack chopper. The bumblebee is armed with a chaingun and seats for some of your buddies and whilst its attack usefulness is limited, it's a great transport and can be highly annoying for the Strogg as the chaingun is surprisingly good at strafing and mowing them down.

So what’s the verdict of Beta 2? Personally I have noticed some of the annoying things of Beta 1 are gone. The biggest difference I've noticed is that hits actually register now. In Beta 1, where were times you could unload a whole clip while ironsighted at someone and nothing would hit (extremely frustrating to say the least). The addition of the GDF air vehicles make things more even and a bit more exciting, if you've got a GDF team that actually works together to complete the objective. If you've got a dud GDF team, expect a dud experience as GDF, I'm sure it's highly entertaining for the Strogg though.

Overall Valley seems to encourage better teamwork and can be great fun when everything is going well. It really does give a good impression of how competitive and intense ladder matches could become when it's finally released. If ET:QW gets the community support ET received and still does receive, it has the potential to be a cracker of a competitive game with enough features to allow hilarity to ensue (like the Strogg Flyer Drone, nothing funnier than seeing a random explosion kill the guy in front of you!).