I hate First Person Shooters but I cant stop playing Third Person Shooters

I have been a hater of FPS games my entire life.

I must admit I was a bit of a story purist. If there was nothing for me to get invested in, what was the point? No characters to fall in love with? No dialogue trees? What was even the point? I had played a bit of Overwatch a year or so after it first came out but quickly discarded it in favour of the new Assassin’s Creed game. This all changed about two years ago.

University is a time for exploring the world and learning new things. For my friends it was also a time to get back on Fortnite. They had all grown up with Fortnite. They loved it. And they had discarded it when it became too convoluted. When the OG season map was relaunched in 2023 every single man in my life became incredibly engrossed in a game that I had all but forgotten about. We went from playing Lethal Company and Phasmophobia to them begging me to get Fortnite. Not wanting to feel left out, I obliged.

I did not like it at first. I was infuriated by the lack of free skins (and the lack of ability to even select a permanent default skin!!) and I could barely aim. All my years of gaming were utterly useless in the face of a game that required me to hit a target. But I persisted. I was so, so bad, but I was oddly having so much fun.

It was really funny to yell at my friends on the mic and it was funny to accidentally drive cars into the side of mountains. It was really fun to play Fortnite Festival for a short time. And it was fun to slowly get better. I started to be able to hit people which was incredibly exciting. And eventually I was able to get kills on my own.

When the Greek Gods season came out I was even convinced to buy the Battlepass. Something that would’ve sounded absolutely ludicrous to a version of myself in the past. I unlocked my first ever skin and there was immediately a longstanding joke about how angry I was to be trapped in ‘the ugly dog skin.’

Post-graduation I continued to play Fortnite with my friends on a semi-consistent basis. I spent more money, I bought new skins, and I kept getting better. My qualms with shooters were over! This was even reaffirmed when Marvel Rivals came out.

My friend group has a love-hate relationship with Marvel Rivals. Two of us love it and one of us truly hates it with every fiber of his being. Yet we play! It’s fun, I understand the mechanics, and I have innate knowledge of every hero’s skillset due to my interest in the superhero genre. I’m not incredibly good but I’m not noticeably terrible. That is also my skillset for Fortnite.

So, when my friend suggested we download Apex Legends, I was all in! Sounds fun! I clearly enjoy these sorts of games now so why not expand the roster?

I hated Apex Legends. I hated it so much it brought back that old feeling of anti-FPS pretentiousness. I could barely understand where my character was, I found it incredibly difficult to aim, and I died without even realizing I was being attacked.

We switched to Valorant and it was the same thing all over again. Confusion, squinting, and then death. I couldn’t understand it! Where had my newfound enjoyment of shooters gone?

And then we played the new Overwatch third person mode and everything clicked for me. I hated first person shooters. But I really enjoyed third person shooters. Every shooting game that I had grown to love had exactly that one thing in common. I was in third person.

The obvious question is why? My earnest answer is I don’t really know. I sense it’s due to my past experience solely playing third person RPG’s. I found it easier to navigate the map and to have an understanding of where my character was in terms of the setting. This made me recall my past experiences with Far Cry Primal and Cyberpunk 2077. Both games I had been really excited to play but instantly dropped when I loaded into them for reasons I couldn’t really understand.

I believe I understand now.

First person feels dizzying to me. I don’t have a strong understanding of where my character is and I have a limited scope of vision. In third person I have a wider view of the map. I understand where other people and characters are in relation to myself. I find it easier to navigate the game and the world. Aiming also just feels more difficult in first compared to third, but I really don’t have an explanation for that. Probably difficult to shoot someone else if I barely understand where I am.

I will say this curse has been broken recently but only based on a technicality. The Finals is a lot of fun. I am having so much fun playing The Finals. But I am also so bad at The Finals. I can barely get a single kill per game and I die a lot. The thing that’s different about The Finals however, is that you are basically never out of the game. In Apex Legends once you die that’s pretty much it. Valorant I just didn’t enjoy the gameplay to be honest it felt very slow to me. The Finals is incredibly fast-paced and virtually non-stop. In a world of shorter attention spans this is the game to play cause you don’t have to wait very long to be back in. Deaths are less permanent and the gameplay is neverending. I think this is the only reason I like The Finals. While I am so bad at it I still am having fun cause even though I’m basically instantly dead, I’m also instantly alive again.

I have been begged to download Apex Legends which is also set in first-person and honestly I don’t really have high hopes. But after playing The Finals it seems things can always change. So I guess we’ll see!