Killing Floor 3 Has Taken Big Strides Since Its Beta, But It’s Still Not Perfect

After a last-minute delay, Killing Floor 3 has been released. This is the third installment in a series that’s known for its Zed Time mechanic, fast-paced combat, and old-school arcade game feeling. Part of playing this new entry involves considering how KF3 holds up to its predecessors, but I believe that it’s also important to take a look at how the game has changed since its beta, and how it holds up as a standalone title.

Not only have I been able to dump hours into both Killing Floor and Killing Floor 2 over the years, but I was also part of the closed beta for Killing Floor 3 that led to its release date being delayed. While I don’t blame players for jumping into the game now for the first time and finding that it’s not at a place where they’d recommend it to others, I think it’s important to look at how it’s changed from the previous beta. Right now, I wouldn’t say that KF3 is an upgrade from KF2, but I believe that could change as it continues being updated.

Combat and Mechanics Are the Core of Killing Floor

When you play a Killing Floor game, the feeling of combat and how mechanics work are a core part of the experience. There’s still room for improvement, but the combat already feels better in Killing Floor 3 than it previously did in beta. Some of the remaining issues with combat seem to stem from performance struggles, so as those are addressed in patches, that should help as well. When you start out without upgrades, you can feel the difference in what weapon you use for combat, which I believe needs a bit of balancing for early game. Melee is quite strong at the start, but some guns just don’t feel effective when you haven’t been able to level that perk or upgrade weapons yet.

In the closed beta, the combat gave me motion sickness even when I went into settings to try adjusting them to help prevent it. However, with the motion blur, camera shake, and camera bob all turned off in settings, I’m glad to say that I no longer get motion sickness in Killing Floor 3. It seems like Zed Time was adjusted between the beta and release, as that was one of the main portions that made me motion sick. By extension, I’d say that the Zed Time feels smoother overall than it did before, which is great for what’s essentially a core mechanic that makes Killing Floor unique as a series.

Perks and Specialists Are Receiving Updates

If this was the closed beta, I’d have the same complaint that perks are set to one specialist, meaning you have to play that specialist if you want to use that perk. In past games, part of the fun came from the specialists you could unlock and playing them with your favorite perks. Right now, perks are still set to one specialist, but Tripwire has confirmed that this is going to be changed in future updates. While it’s annoying in the meantime, it’s easier to deal with when you know there’s an end in sight.

As far as your perk options, you have the pretty standard set of choices, but now with skills you can use to customize your perk. I miss the Berserker from KF1, but the Ninja has a similar feel to it with a focus on swift attacks rather than getting a claymore and using brute force. While the Engineer and Medic perks feel lackluster to me, it’s possible that feeling is due to them simply not being my preferred playstyle as I like to be in the middle of combat with melee weapons. Since new weapons and mods are on the list of things to come according to the KF3 roadmap, I expect that to impact how each perk feels to play in combat.

Listening to Players Counts

I might feel differently about the game if I hadn’t been in the closed beta, but because of that experience, I can see the efforts being made by Tripwire to improve based on player feedback. Also, if you played KF2 during its early days, you might remember that it wasn’t as polished in the beginning either due to similar issues that KF3 is having right now, which were eventually addressed. I understand that KF3 isn’t at the polished level I would’ve liked to see from its launch, and it could have used a longer delay to let the developers improve it further. However, they made the choice to delay the game and gave us a roadmap of how they plan to continue improving it past release.

I had a good time slashing Zeds, even with performance issues, and I’ll likely continue sinking hours into Killing Floor 3. It’s fun to play with friends, and seeing the improvements between the beta and now, I trust that the developers are going to bring the game to a place where it’s able to outshine previous entries in the series in the same way that KF2 evolved in its early days.

Killing Floor 3 is now available for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.