Friendly fire in Wardogs is part of its special sauce

Not only does it make battles against the enemy more intense, it leads to hilarious accidents.

Some of the funniest moments in Wardogs happen because you can kill your teammates. A stray bullet here, an erroneous grenade there, or a mortar shell that’s a bit too danger close, these add a spicy taste to a game that is already bursting at the seams with cinematic moments. It’s part of the reason why Wardogs is as good as it is, and it seems like Bulkhead knew this was an ingredient it needed in order to succeed.

There’s been a shift in first-person shooters over the last few years which has seen friendly fire all but disappear. In 2020, Halo Infinite released, and it had completely removed the ability to deal any damage to your allies in all but the ranked modes. It was weird to have a Halo title where you didn’t have to think carefully about where you shoot your rocket or throw a grenade. Even Destiny opted out of friendly fire, likely due to the bombastic abilities players could hurl out at any moment.

The fact you can damage your teammates in Wardogs heightens the experience. Shootouts are more intense when you need your teammates to crouch when in the frontlines. Everyone needs to aim carefully and mind the desk pops when flying in a helicopter to the control zone. Are you thinking about attacking another tower while there’s air and armor support? Mind the explosions.

What’s impressive is that as a lot of triple-A titles distance themselves from friendly fire, Bulkhead stood its ground despite pressure from publishers to do the same. In an interview with Christopher Dring of The Game Business, Bulkhead CEO Joe Brammer said “All of the publishers said, ‘You can’t have team killing on.’ And we were like, ‘Absolutely not. We need team killing on.’ The amount of funny stuff that happens with team killing, it’s hilarious.”

Brammer is absolutely correct. I’ve had numerous situations where accidental friendly fire has led to tear-soaked cheeks from laughter. In one instance, I was creeping through a house with a shotgun to revive my mate. I get him up, retrace my steps, and begin scouring for enemies. He rounds a corner I’m holding, I scream, pull the trigger, and he drops like a sack of potatoes. He scared the life out of me and I shot the life out of him. The break in tension as we realized what happened set off a round laughter. I quickly revived him and we continued on our mission.

In another match, we were holding a position, my friend was cooking a grenade to throw, and he got domed through a window. He didn’t get to throw that grenade. Instead, that cooked grenade rolled to the ground and exploded, taking out two friendly teammates.

They’re not big and outrageous moments. You don’t build an entire game around friendly fire, you include it to add another wrinkle to combat. Another bit of resistance to the push and pull of combat as you fight for victory.

Wardogs is better because of friendly fire, and I hope publishers learn that most players can be trusted with it.

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