Splitgate 2 is kicking off its open alpha on Feb. 27, featuring a couple of major additions you might not have expected. While this is far from the game’s final form, what we’ve seen so far sets a strong impression of what’s to come.
On Feb. 12, I played Splitgate 2‘s second alpha and tried out some of the new additions for the first time. The flagship feature of this playtest is the Multi-Team Portal Warfare—an eight-vs-eight-vs-eight mode on larger maps that turns every match into complete chaos.
The Multi-Team Portal Warfare is a significant leap from the format we’re used to. During the playtest presentation, the CEO of 1047 Games, Ian Proulx, shared that this mode is inspired by Halo‘s Big Team Battle mode and THE FINALS‘ multi-team gameplay. Splitgate 2 takes those ideas and puts its own spin on it, which is, of course, portals.
During the preview, I got to play Multi-Team Hotzone, Multi-Team Team Deathmatch, and Multi-Team Domination on the snowy Glacier map. Glacier isn’t as portal-heavy as some of the other larger maps coming to Splitgate 2, which significantly slowed down the pace of the game.
There were multiple objectives on the map that rotated depending on the mode. The areas around the objective are what you’d expect from Splitgate: jump pads, walls where you can place portals all around, and more. However, outside of the objective areas, the gameplay is noticeably more grounded in every meaning of that word.
It felt like Splitgate 2 suddenly turned into a regular FPS in those moments when I was simply running from spawn to the zone. Barely any portals, occasional gunfights, and that’s it. If you felt like the core four-vs-four gameplay focused less on portals than the original game, you may have mixed feelings about this one, too. But this is only one map, and there are more maps in the pipeline, so it’s certainly something to revisit at later stages of the game.
While the eight-vs-eight-vs-eight modes have their appeal in the form of complete chaos, I still look at the four-vs-four arena modes as Splitgate 2’s main attraction. They offer more calculated action on smaller maps with enough space to focus on portals. Despite smaller maps, there’s more room for you to learn how the portals work, whether denying enemy portals (yes, you can do that) or coming up with a perfect flank.
The regular four-vs-four modes I played included Hotzone, Domination, Splitball, and Firecracker. There was also a more party-like Chaos Team Deathmatch where everyone would fly around in low gravity, trying to kill each other.
The new mode in this lineup is Firecracker, which is Splitgate’s take on the classic Search and Destroy concept. Unlike Search and Destroy, though, it has respawns, allowing you to make multiple attempts at planting or defusing the firecracker. This keeps the mode casual while allowing you to play the same objective format.
A variety of game modes paired with three playable factions, multiple weapons, and perks to choose from, as well as the game’s sporty and competitive aesthetic, which I personally love, create a solid base of what you can expect from Splitgate 2. Proulx emphasized that everything we’ve seen so far is about half of the game. Apart from the four-vs-four and the eight-vs-eight-vs-eight modes, there are still two major components yet to be revealed, leaving me excited to see what’s next.
