Blacklight Retribution Beginner’s Guide

Blacklight Retribution Beginner’s Guide by exoskeleton

First and foremost (you probably know that already but anyways), Blacklight: Retribution is a free-to-play first person shooter developed by Zombie Studios. The aim of this Guide is to explain to Blacklight: Retribution newcomers the basic features of the game in its current form.

Game features

HRV

The Hyper Reality Visor (HRV) is your best weapon in this game. The F-35 pilot’s situational awareness is provided by the Distributed Aperture System (DAS) and the AN/APG-81 AESA radar, you on the other hand have the HRV and it, unlike DAS and APG-81, can help you see through walls.

The HRV provides you with an unparalleled situational awareness. Through it you can see the enemy, your teammates, Hardsuit weak points, points of interest on the map such as: map points that must be captured (in KoTH and Domination), Weapon Depots, mines, deployable auto-turrets. The HRV can be used for several seconds and then it needs some time to recharge in order to be used again. Note that you can’t shoot when using the HRV, but once activated it can be turned off (default key “V”). The longer you are in “HRV mode” the longer it would take to recharge for the next use.

The HRV is a great tool but relying solely on it might get you into trouble. There is a gear item called HRV Blackout which purpose is to conceal the enemy from your HRV. It creates a bubble several meters in diameter and makes any enemy inside of it invisible to your HRV. Another countermeasure used against HRV users is the HRV decoy.

Hardsuit

The Hardsuit (HS) is BLR’s heavy-armored and armed to the teeth mech that we all love so much… well most of us Once bought at a Depot it must be delivered, so with the designator that you receive when you buy a HS, point at a clear place on the ground (you must be outside and not in a building as the HS is dropped at the designated location from the skies) and hold down left mouse button for several seconds. A hologram image of the HS will appear and if the location is correctly chosen and accessible the HS will be delivered in an instance. Approach it from any direction and hold down default key “E” until you find yourself in the steel beast. Comfy? Good.

While in the HS you can’t use your HRV but at higher levels you can unlock the Hardsuit HRV ping ability, which is used to reveal enemy in close proximity.

The HS is armed with a railgun (an excelent long range one hit one kill weapon) and a minigun.

Empty Hardsuits can be taken over, but have in mind that entering a HS that is not yours takes several seconds longer, so make sure there is no enemy close by to get you by surprise.

Every HS has a randomly generated weak point that is visible when using the HRV. When shot at that particular point the HS takes ten times more damage. Another effective way to defeat a HS is to burn its driver out of the suit with the flamethrower. It burns the driver to death rather quickly and if you like you can jump in the empty suit. The companies manufacturing the pretty helmets you can wear on your head equip them with air filters so you won’t sense the smell of… burned… yuck!

Customization

I won’t go through the game’s menu in detail, but will give you some info on Customization, as this is a key element of BLR.

This section is where you buy/rent/equip available weapons, tactical gear, equipment and other things like taunts, camo, etc. This is the place where you will spend most of your time at, when you are not actually shooting at people. Before joining a server or between rounds (Intermission) you can access Customization and equip newly unlocked items to create your ultimate character.
Customization section is divided into four sub-sections: Profile, Character, Skills, Weapons.

Currency in BLR

In BLR items can be permanently bought using Zen currency. ZEN is the name of the virtual currency used to purchase items in the game’ cash shop to enhance the user’s gameplay experience. There are a number of ways to purchase ZEN, ranging from credit card payments and prepaid cards to mobile phone payments. Follow this link for more info on ZEN and how to purchase it: https://billing.perfectworld.com/whatiszen

BLR items can also be rented for a fixed period of time using Zen or in-game currency (GP). GP is generated as you play the game and the amount gained depends on yours and that of your team performance. After every single round you gain certain amount of GP that is calculated based on how many kills and assists you’ve made during the round, how many objectives you have completed, whether your team has won or lost the game, etc. Do not confuse GP with CP (Combat Points), which are generated in a similar way but have significance only in the particular round in which they are obtained. CP and their use are explained in “Weapon Depot and Combat Points”.

Profile

Contains different taunts (emotes), announcer voices, and other profile customizations.

Character

Here you can change your character’s armor, gear, tactical gear, and choose the items available for purchase at Weapon Depots (explained below in “Weapon Depot and Combat Points“). Different pieces of equipment affect your armor rating, run speed, stamina and Hyper Reality Visor (HRV) use time.

Weapons

No doubt the most interesting part of Customization. This is where you can change and customize your primary and secondary weapons. When you click on the primary or secondary weapon icon, a drop-down menu with different categories shows up.

The first category is Receiver. This is where you choose a weapon type, while the other categories are where you make a fine “tuning” of the chosen weapon. The primary weapons are: the Assault Rifle (the AR is the default primary weapon), the Combat Rifle (the CR is a semi-automatic rifle, the speed of your finger determines the fire rate), Submachine Gun (SMG), Light Machine Gun (LMG), Burst-fire Rifle (BR), Bolt-action Rifle (BAR). Once you select the weapon type you can customize it to your liking by choosing various parts, thus you increase some of the weapon stats at the expense of others. The changes, the chosen parts introduce, can be seen on the weapon stats menu. If the stats page is not visible by default, click on the arrow in the upper right corner below your name.
Experiment with the huge number of combinations to find the one/ones you like the most.

If you want to keep track of all weapons and equipment unlocked, bought or rented, including detailed information on their expire time, visit Inventory. It can be accessed by clicking on you Profile Name in the upper right corner on the main menu page.

Weapons, including those bought from the Weapons Depot, can be picked up from the bodies of fallen teammates and enemy soldiers.

Weapon Depot and Combat Points

Killing enemy soldiers and completing team objectives such as capturing points or scoring points by taking the enemy flag to your base in the different game modes gets you CP. These points are gained in every single game round and can be used only in that particular round to restore health, refill ammo or buy weapons available through the many Weapon Depots scattered throughout the maps. Think of these Depot items as sort of kill-streaks, but unlike the kill-streaks in CoD series, BLR Depot items are bought with CP received based on yours and your team’s actions and performance during the round and are not zeroed if you get killed.

The Weapon Depot offers various items and services, each at a different CP price : Replenish Health, Replenish Ammo (including grenades), RL-335 Stinger rocket launcher,T-56 Trident Minigun,RG-001 Ghost Railgun, AT-D4 Deplyoyable Auto-turret, FT-1138 Flamethrower, A36 Brimstone Airstrike, GL-7 Bear Claw Grenade Launcher, Hardsuit.

All these have in-game descriptions, but note that not all of them will be visible at Depots right from the start. Some of them are unlocked only after the respective skill has been activated.

Marketplace

Apart from Customization, another place where you can purchase items with ZEN, is the Marketplace. There are items that can be only be bought from the Marketplace.

Game modes

Currently the available game modes are: King of the Hill (KoTH), Domination, DM, TDM, CTF

KoTH’s objective is to capture a point called Beacon. This can be done by simply standing next to it, untill the bar on the point fills up. Once the first point is captured another one is activated and available for capturing. The first team to consecutively get five Beacons wins.

Domination is a bit specific and requires a more detailed explanation. In this mode there are several Control Points on the map that must be hacked. Once hacked the Control Point starts generating points for the team controlling it (a point generating points…I’m not kidding), more Control Locations (sounds better) give more points, ultimately the winning team is the one that gets 1000 points first, or the one that has more points when the time runs out. Nothing new so far, but I’m seeing people struggling with the hacking system so here’s how it’s done: go to a Control Point and interact with it (default key “E”), the hacking interface will open, you will see 3 numbers (see the image below) and will have to match the number in the middle with the corresponding number to the left or right by pressing default key “A” or “D” (left or right). In the example below the number in the middle is 13 and it matches with the number on the right so we press “D”. This procedure must be done four times consecutively in order to successfully hack the Control Point. And may I note it must be done as fast as possible as every second lost means points lost! Picking the wrong number resets the hacking process and you’ll have to start all over again. It’s a piece of cake, soldier! Don’t fail!

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5 Responses

  1. Anonymous says:

    u can get to ur inventory by pressing your name on the right top corner in the main page

  2. josh says:

    how do u use zen it shows in my profile but not in the game

  3. Anonymous says:

    How do I get to my Inventory??

  4. Anonymous says:

    this is really good

  5. Anonymous says:

    Thanks for this guide :)

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