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Streets of Tarkov Map - what we know, what we expect, and what we hope for
Streets of Tarkov map - what we know, what we expect, and what we hope for
Introduction
On the 13 of Jun 2020, Battlestate has published a teaser for their new Streets of Tarkov map for EfT. It is the mapthey are currently working onand it will be the 8th location added to the game. They have stated that it will be the biggest one to date, so there will be a lot to explore and even more to loot. The planned release for the map is Patch 13; If Battlestate sticks to their monthly update schedule, it should be released this fall.
The teaser is rather enigmatic, as we can see just a little portion of the Streets, but it shows enough to make us make some educated guesses and assumptions, and there are some things Nikita (Director of EfT Project and Chief Operating Officer of Battlestate Games Limited))has said that shed some more light on this newest addition to the EfT map pool.
Note1:This article featuresour thoughts and speculations, based on the limited amount of information currently available, please don't treat it as 100% confirmed info or you might be disappointed.
Note2: Clicking on a screenshot will open its full-size version in a new window.
What we know
Things that are more or less confirmed,were shown on the teaser, or directly hinted at by the developers. Information featured in this section should give you a good overall idea of how the map will look andfeel like.
Streets of Tarkov will be huge This will bethe biggest map in the game, not only byacreage by also by the number of accessible areas. Battlestate's goal is to make almost every building fully open for exploration- this means literal thousands of apartments, stores, offices, cellars, and rooms open for players! This sounds greatbut also unlikely, right... fear not though, as Battlestate has implemented procedural generation to aid them with area designs*. Thanks to this, they are able to create the map much faster, without leaving the majority of buildings as inaccessible props. Sadly, it is confirmed that skyscrapers,seen at the beginning and at the end of the teaser, will not be a part of the Streets of Tarkov map, they might be added to the game at a later date, however, as a part of a post-launch DLC. *Not in the "No Man's Sky" style, but rather as a device for creating varying room/building projects/templatesthat can later be finished by their designartists. Think of it as a tool that creates basic state buildings (like a construction developer) that are later on finished manually to make them look unique. |
We will have to wait a bit longer for these. |
Streets of Tarkov will feel like streets of a real city
Battlestate has stated that they design the Streets to feel and look like a real modern city. This means that the map will, most likely, be divided into districtsdedicated to different aspects of life in such a place. There will be areas dedicated to leisure, filled with bars and restaurants, areas specialized in services and retail trade, luxury districts withfive-star hotels and expensive apartments, and areas, dedicated to commoners, that will feature normal townhouses and day-to-day businesses, like hair salons and groceries. Knowing Battlestate's attention to detail, traversing the map for the first time will be a breath-taking experience (metaphorically and literally as bullets are known for causing breathing problems...).
Prepare for PvP on the biggest scale yet
Streets of Tarkov is said to be able to accommodate up to 40 PMC players (this number is very likely to fall down a bit, however). Even if the final maximum number of players falls down by 25%, every Raid on Streets will still feature over twice as many PMCs as a Raid on the second-largest map currently available (Interchange with PMC player limit of 14). This will make Streets one of the hardest maps to extract from, but also a very profitable one, especially if you are good at PvP. Expect team firefights to be extremely common and don't be surprised if three or even four squads run into each other at a point of interest.
At least 2 Scav Bosses will roamStreets of Tarkov
Battlestate has stated that their goal is to put at least two NPC Scav Bosses on the Streets map. This means that we will, most likely,get two boss spawns from the map's launch day, and we might get a third (and possibly even fourth) one added at a later date. Now, knowingBattlestate's tendency to make each subsequent Scav Boss added to Tarkov more dangerous than the previous one, we expect that they will pose a serious threat, even to the experienced player squads (not to mention solo players). We expect them to have multiple well-trained bodyguards, high-end gear, and deadly aim, but also very worthwhile loot (including stuff that will not spawn anywhere else, maybe even the dreaded under-barrel grenade launchers... which they will also use against players*).
*This part is heavy speculation, but Battlestate has worked on under-barrels since launch (and didn't implement them for balance reasons).
What we expect
These are our thoughts and speculations based on available information and in-game experience taken from other EfT maps. We are reasonably sure that the things, we go over in this section, will look more or less like described. Don't take our word for it, however.
Traversing the streets will be extremely dangerous Free access to almost every room of every building featured on the map will havesome very big gameplay consequences. Do you know that feeling when you approach a large building on the Reserve (or any other Tarkov map) and you try to keep an eye on all its windows at once because you know that shots can come from any of them? Multiply it ten times and you'll more or less know how traversing the Streets of Tarkov will feel like. We expect that dying from sniper fire will be extremely common on the Streets of Tarkov and spotting the said sniper will be extremely difficult. Snipers will not have it easier, however, at least if they decide to try and loot their victims - hunter will become the hunted then; looting bodies on the streets will be suicidal, to say the least. |
A Sniper can be waiting in any window; even thinking about crossing the street on this map makes us anxious. |
There will be a lot of loot to be taken
The map thatfeatures hundreds upon hundredsof explorable rooms, apartments, and other areas musthave thousandsof random loot spawns. We expect Streets of Tarkov to be a gold mine (an extremely dangerous gold mine, mind you). Judging from the Tarkov's lore, there will be UN and Military blockades on the streets - these might contain mil-spec loot. Every modern city has a plethora of luxurious stores and boutiques - expect to find rare and very expensive stuff in these. The teaser features a pharmacy (probably not the only one on the map) - so there will be places in which we will find meds. Many hotels were built in Tarkov, and some of them will, for sure, be accessible from the Streets - stuff like Lab Keycards, secret documents, and other things left by Terra Group operatives might be hidden in their rooms and apartments. On top of all of this, there also will be a lot of day-to-day loot scattered around the map; consumables in groceries, duffle bags left by refugees, various types of lootable crates, and more - the standard Battlestate's approach to loot, basically.
It will not be low-spec-computer-friendly
The sheer size of the map and the known problems with Tarkov's graphics engine strongly suggest that players will experience frame drops, stutters, and possibly even desyncs while traversing it. All we can do is hope that Battlestate will polish it as well as they can and come up with solutions that will reduce the strain Streets of Tarkov has on our computers. Fingers crossed.
Note: We might see a slight increase to the recommended computer specs for Escape from Tarkov near the maps release date...
What we hope for
These are things that we would very much like to see implemented in the Streets map, but are not that likely (at least currently), with some minor exceptions (wishful thinking and theory-crafting, basically).
Scav Wars on Streets of Tarkov
A map this big should feature more than one Scav gang and Scav gangs should be hostile to each other, and constantly be fighting for control over the streets of Tarkov. We would like to see the above-mentioned Scav Bosses as leaders of these factions - this would make the NPC vs NPC encounters very interesting to watch (but also hard to implement and balance, as large amount of dead NPCs means large amounts of easy (rare) loot, and we don't want that). Who knows, maybe in the future we will see something like this, as a part of the teased EfT's story mode for example.
Easter Eggs and other well-hidden things Note: the main problem with hiding something in an online game is the fact that onceone person finds it, everyone instantly knows where it is, which means that it's no longer hidden. A large number of explorable areas, apartments, rooms, cellars, and staircases means that there is a lot of room for hiding stuff, and we are not talking about loot this time. Some of the best-hidden things in every self-respecting game are Easter Eggs. We would like to see at least some of these added to the Streets of Tarkov map. There is a picture of a Doge* shown on the teaser, inside one of the rooms, which fills us with optimism in this regard. Just imagine finding a hidden room in an apartment just to discover that the only thing that's inside is a large picture of the Kappa emote... that would be just the thing Battlestate likes to doto their loot-hungry players. *A well known-and-loved internet meme, such original, much classic. |
We bet that this is not the only one "modern internet culture" reference that can be found on the Streets of Tarkov map. |
END NOTE
Everything seems to suggest that Streets of Tarkov will be a truly revolutionary addition, not only to EfT but also to the online FPS genre as a whole. Its scale will be a thing to behold, and surviving a Raid on it will be something to boast about.
We hope that you have found this guide useful and informative.We will be happy to receive constructive criticismthat will help us improve our future workso leave your suggestions in the comments section below.
Screenshots used in this article have been taken from the official Streets of Tarkov teaser trailer published by Battlestate Games, the original video can be foundhere.
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