Hell Let Loose Vietnam Gameplay and Impressions...

Welcome to Hell Let Loose Vietnam. I was invited to play this last week for a couple of matches of their signature mode, Warfare. And today, I'm allowed to show you some gameplay and first impressions. We'll be discussing what this game is and looking at some of the new features. I'll let you know what I liked, what I didn't like, and everything in between. Just a note on the footage, too. This is B-roll that I was sent by the dev team. Unfortunately, the motion blur was bugged in this build and couldn't be turned off, but in the future and the full game, they're saying that you will be able to disable it. You're also going to see some frame drops there, too. All right, then. So, as somebody who's a big fan of Hell Let Loose World War II, when I learned about this game for the first time, I was very excited to see how they would take that style of gameplay and inject it into the Vietnam War setting, especially with the two armies in that conflict being so different from each other. So, this is a standalone game. It's not an expansion pack or anything like that. It's a new standalone project on a new engine. And if you've played the original Hell Let Loose, you'll know what you're in for here. They call it authentic warfare. And in gaming terms, that means 50 versus 50 PvP on large sprawling maps. You've got authentic weapons, vehicles, uniforms, all historically sensitive and accurate to the conflict that you're fighting in. You're not going to see any obsidian camos here. Teamwork, of course, is paramount. Communication, planning, tactics, and then on top of these, each team has a commander and squad leaders who are talking to each other through radios with the goal of finishing the fight. And yes, you have squad chat and proximity chat too for communicating with your nearby teammates. The gameplay is exceptionally hardcore too with barely any handholding. Although this time they have made a pretty sick tutorial that you can opt to play if it's your first time around. There's a lot of good stuff there. We'll talk about that later. But typically speaking in Hell Let Loose KD doesn't matter as much and tactical and strategic play towards victory is what's going to count the most. In what ways will this differ to the World War II experience then? Well, before we jumped into the game, they gave us a little presentation on what they thought were the biggest hitters. With this being one of history's most grueling conflicts with challenging terrain, combined arms, and some absolutely horrific firepower, they think that the immersion has been dialed up to 11 here with brutal combat in dense jungles full of hostiles where communication skills are really put to the test. And we'll go more in depth into this a bit later, too. But in terms of the big hitters, what I think is we've got the addition of new aerial units, including helicopters. We've got boats, which are brand new. You can swim now on the surface and underwater. You can build interconnected tunnel networks. And there's some insane commander abilities. As well as this, the asymmetric sides and an emphasis on more modern, fully automatic weapons. You notice that a lot. And I would say that on first impression, the gameplay felt more fast-paced and actionheavy than Hell Let Loose World War II. I mean, you can get in some crazy action moments in Hell Let Loose World War II. Don't get me wrong, but I don't mean that in a bad way either. I don't think they've gone Call of Duty with it and just ruined it. It still feels very Hell Let Loose, tactical heavy, but I did notice that some of the movement actions had been sped up a bit to make it feel a bit more fluid. Some people are going to like that and some won't. The map that we played on was called ConHo, also known as Dragon Jaws. This was one of the most heavily defended and fortified locations in the Vietnam War with a huge bridge in the middle that crosses the Namnar River. As you can see, this is a big jungle biome map with foliage literally everywhere that block sight lines and that gave you more cover so you could sneak around a bit easier, flank people, hide in plain sight. Can't climb trees though, maybe in an update, although that would be mad. Or you could jump into a boat, use the waterways that are connected. They kind of all snake through the map. And with the boats, you could quickly relocate. You could patrol. They got guns on them. You can mount an assault. And there's a few smaller bridges, too, which are really nasty pinch points for tanks and trucks. And we definitely ambushed a few of those to great effect when I was playing. And while the map was big, I did feel like it was a bit more compact than your typical Hell Let Loose World War II map. I did ask the question, too, about how many maps are going to be in the game at launch and map variety. We were told six at launch, I think, from memory. And in terms of map variety, the devs are saying that there is a surprising amount of that and contrast in Vietnam that they've taken advantage of from large military bases, rolling dunes, villages, semi- urban locations with intense street fighting and tight jungle confines. I only got to play one of the maps, of course, which definitely gave me that classic jungle Vietnam war vibe. War as heck. The asymmetry between the sides definitely piqued my interest though, and it shakes up the game significantly. They mentioned how in Hell Let Loose World War II, the differences between each army were quite small, and that was an intentional choice for balancing purposes, but in Vietnam, they've scratched that and really lent into the differences between the forces. And as I mentioned, this is authentic to that conflict. But it also creates more interesting strategy and gameplay. The US, for example, can take to the skies in helicopters, transporting infantry, dropping off supplies, raining down intense machine gun fire from above. The helicopters definitely shook up that classic Hell at Loose gameplay a lot. In the two matches that I played, they were a constant part of the gameplay loop. We were using them to flank deep behind enemy lines. They can carry up to 12 soldiers at once. Think about the power of that. They can suppress large areas with gunfire. and they just create these awesome cinematic moments when you're in them. If you're flying or a passenger, you're taking small arms fire. You've got anyone who's carrying an RPG at the time trying to shoot you down out of the sky as you foolishly attempt to go for the fly under the bridge. Really good fun. I will say though that I felt they moved quite slowly and appear to have a low flight ceiling, making them incredibly easy targets. There might be some deeper balancing concerns there to look at before the game launches. The NVA don't have access to helicopters at all, though. Seems pretty OP, right? Well, what they do have are tunnels, slightly better boats, and more anti-air options. The tunnel system is cool. Certain NVA classes, like officers, as an example, can build tunnel entrances, and connect them on the map. You can then quickly use these tunnels to move to a location, making them great for flanking, surprise attacks, and quickly reinforcing, especially if you have a well-connected tunnel system. Unfortunately, these are not physical tunnels on the map which you move through. That would have been incredible, especially if both teams could have access to them and fight in them. But I guess that might have ruined performance. Maybe down the line they could do that. That would be amazing. Instead, you click on the map when you enter a tunnel and pick where you want to exit and then you teleport there, per se. However, if a tunnel is destroyed or the network collapses when you're quote unquote traveling in it, you will die as if you've been crushed or denied an exit. Either way, the tunnel system is definitely the counterplay for the helicopters and allows for rapid movement over long distances. The boats that the MVA have can be used to transport supplies too, whereas the US boats can't. And if you turn the engine of the boat off, you can use that boat as a spawn, which is super powerful. The boats were generally a great addition to the game in my opinion. Very fun to speed up and down the waterways, fighting infantry, other boats, helicopters. Some of them have massive twin barrel machine guns on that sound incredible. Boats were a big highlight. The NBA can also deploy static anti-air guns virtually anywhere on the map to try and keep the airspace clear. Obviously, that's a huge threat to any helicopters flying around, especially if they haven't spotted that anti-air team. The point is that despite the asymmetric nature of the game that I mentioned, there appears to be a lot of counterplay options here, which is great to see. In terms of the guns, no surprises here. You've got the classics for each side that you would expect. The M16, AK, M60, grenade launchers, etc. They sound great to shoot, but perhaps felt a bit too floaty for my tastes. Definitely some improvement is needed there. There's also more flexibility with loadouts now, too. Yes, there is still some RO restrictions, but you've got more freedom this time with customizing the weapons and equipment that you deploy with. For example, there is a new weight system, which means you can make the choice, let's say, that you want to take an extra magazine with you, or more frags instead of smokes, or perhaps more medical supplies instead of frags to keep yourself patched up. In terms of new movement options, when you're infantry, as I mentioned before, you can now swim. This is massive in Hell Let Loose, as the original only had waist high water, which you could wade across, or drowning. Not great. Now you can swim fast across big deep rivers or even dive under the water to temporarily hold your breath and avoid gunfire. This was really great for sneak attacks. Soldier dragging is in the game now as well. Any player can drag any other down player and get them into a safer space to potentially be revived by a medic. And the medic has an extra perk here. When the medic is dragging, they can shoot their pistol at the same time. So, expect some incredibly dramatic and cinematic moments there if you get lucky with a couple of shots as you're trying to save a buddy. Some of the commander abilities include the US using devastating napalm strikes which will create a blanket of engulfing flames, killing anyone caught in them. This is pretty brutal to witness or be a victim of. It also leaves a wall of flames that burns and stays behind for a while, which will block that area for movement. You've got artillery bargages too recon planes that will spot players on the map. The NVA commander can actually build emergency tunnels too. So if you time that right and position it correctly just after a strategic US naparm strike for example, you could actually circumvent that with a tunnel underneath it avoiding that danger and continuing on to an objective. Battalions are coming to the game. This is the hell let loose version of clans teaming up with a large group of players under a shared banner. And this is an ideal way to rally and play with friends. Mortar squads are new. There are new mobile artillery units that deliver lethal shells to bombard targets anywhere on the map and also have the flexibility to reposition themselves around the map. These are going to be very effective. I think that new tutorial system that I mentioned, I really like this for new players and for accessibility. I played through some of it and it basically teaches you how to play the game effectively. So, it shows you how to use outposts, garrisons, capture territory, build structures, operate vehicles, and more. There's going to be four game modes at launch. Warfare and offensive are the classics. But there are two new modes with conquest and domination. Conquest, that just sounds like Conquest from Battlefield, maybe, allowing capture points to be taken out of sequence across the entire map, and it adds a morale system with every death and capture point lost. Conquest, I can see myself playing that a lot. Another new feature, the map is now 3D and live. It looks pretty, but it could be exploited depending on the level of detail there. And the performance when you open the map definitely chugged a bit. So then, is it fun? I would say generally yes. I had a really good time with this game in the limited time that I've spent with it so far. And after I'd finished, I was looking forward to playing it again and in different locations. It gave me all of those Vietnam moments that I would expect from a game like this. And it felt like hell let loose in a new setting with some gameplay evolution, especially with the addition of helicopters and boats. However, I do have a few concerns that I wanted to mention. It's definitely not all good. There's a few things I'm kind of worried about. And this is a beta build, so they're probably looking for feedback, and they've got the opportunity to change or update the game before launch, which is great. So, here we go. Number one, visibility. While the motion blur in the build I played was bugged and couldn't be turned off, their implementation of it in the game is very bad and smeary. I actually got motion sick on a couple of occasions playing this and that never happens to me in video games unless I'm playing VR. The color grading that they've gone for too made the visibility worse as well. The lighting in particular was very hazy and it has this orangey yellow tint to it. Yes, I think that's purposeful art direction, but for me it didn't land and it didn't work and it hampered my experience of playing the game. So, I'd like to see that toned down a bit and perhaps more contrast added that would help the character models stand out a bit more. They've still gone for this very minimal muzzle flash and smoke from gun barrels again like in Hell Let Loose World War II, which some people will love or hate, but I will say it's very easy to not be seen in this game, and that could end up frustrating more players than pleasing them. Number two, directional audio is really bad. gunshots, footsteps, tanks, helicopters. While the sounds themselves I thought were impressive, locating where they were coming from was not. The audio directionality needs a lot of work before launch. Number three, performance is a bit worrying. This is an Unreal Engine 5 game, and we know from past experiences that it doesn't do great at large multiplayer, and for my PC setup, I was expecting more performance and less stuttering. So, I'm a bit concerned there for mid and lower spec PCs. consoles too, of course, they've got a lot of optimization to do. I also felt a bit of latency on the mouse and lots of graphical popping issues and bugs along the way. Number four, the boats were really good, but I found a few occasions where I wanted to use the boat again, relocate it, move it up closer to a frontline objective, for example, but because the boat had been beached, I couldn't do that. So, I would love there to be a mechanic in the game where you could push the boats back into the water to reuse them, then use it to fight further upstream or again beach it further up as a spawn. We had something like this in Battlefield 4 that worked really well. Number five, for a new game in 2026, the map that I played on felt very static and I really missed destruction. Considering that we are in a jungle, none of the foliage moved when you're walking through it or when explosions were going off. As far as I could tell, too, there was no destruction, even on small shacks or buildings that were made out of wood when hit with artillery or RPGs, which definitely took me out of the immersion a bit. Number six, I mentioned it before, but I think the gunplay leaves a lot to be desired. Number seven, there's no licensed music as far as I can tell. This isn't a big deal. And I know that this isn't great for me as a content creator, but for every other player, I feel like you got our fortunate son in there blasting from the helicopter, and some music on radios or vehicles wouldn't go a miss. It would just add a bit of ambience to the whole environment. And finally, number eight, some of the thirdp person animations in the game felt a bit old generation. I thought the quality of the animations could have been improved a lot. And that's all I've got for today, folks. To summarize, good first impression. Some great new additions, but I think they've got a fair few kinks in there to iron out before launch on PC and console later this year. There's no solid release date set as of yet, and I think they're planning an open beta for sometime in May. So, that would be a good time for you to check out the game for free and decide if you like it or not. I'm definitely going to be playing it then and covering it more in the future, too. Keeping an eye on development. So, look out for more videos soon. Do let me know your thoughts below, though. Thank you for watching and drop a like if you would be so kind. Cheers. Subscribe if you're new here, and I'll see you next time. Bye-bye.