Nexon's looter-shooter The First Descendant heads into beta in October

Nexon's free-to-play co-op shooter The First Descendant announced itself with a shooty teaser trailer last month, and now it’s back with another look at the game’s colossal bosses in all their Unreal Engine 5 glory. You’ll be able to take a crack at them yourself when the closed beta begins on October 20th. For now, though, wander moodily away from the camera before leaping into action to watch the latest trailer below.

The First Descendant│Official Trailer Reveal (4K)│Gamescom 2022

The First Descendant pops you into the armoured shoes of a warrior battling alien invaders on the fictional continent of Ingris. It’s a four-player co-op game, and there’ll be ten characters to try out in the upcoming beta. Each character has different skills such as warping space or electrical attacks. Most importantly, there’s a grappling hook that looks a bit like Monster Hunter Rise’s Wirebug, and this can lop parts off bosses if applied correctly. Crikey.

It will be getting a proper showing later on once Gamescom kicks off in full, but Korean publishers Nexon describe The First Descendant as “sci-fi fantasy”, which baffles me somewhat. I don’t really know what people mean when they use both of those together – Star Wars flavoured? Space wizards with gun-wands? I blame Destiny for this being a thing, but there’s other culprits such as Warframe and, ahem, Anthem. Any sufficiently advanced technology, I guess… Those ginormous bosses do seem cool though.

The First Descendant’s closed beta runs October 20th to 26th on Steam. You can sign up at the official site here. When the free-to-play shooter launches, it’ll also hit PlayStation and Xbox consoles.