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Riot Games recently released the new Xenohunter skinline in Valorant. This is a very interesting skinline because it features a heartbeat sensor on the weapons that can equip this skin.
However, for a few reasons, this skinline didn't quite sit well with the community. Although they look really good, they offer a disadvantage in terms of gameplay.
New Xenohunter skinline limits vision, Valorant fans term it pay-to-lose
The new Xenohunter skinline was released for the following weapons:
- Odin
- Bucky
- Phantom
- Frenzy
- Melee
The base variants of this weapon are perfectly normal, just like the regular skins in the game. However, at level 2, the Odin, Phantom, and Bucky receive a heartbeat sensor, which is just a cosmetic upgrade, and doesn't offer any additional functionality in terms of gameplay.
However, when the skins are upgraded to the heartbeat sensor variant, it becomes an extension of the skin in such a way that it blocks the visibility of the agent using it to a certain extent. Members of the community feel that it does offer a competitive disadvantage.
Few also mentioned that this skin was the reason why they couldn't understand how their teammates died, because they couldn't see their enemies on their flanks. Here are how the guns look with and without the Xenohunter skin equipped.
As pointed out by a user going by the name u/Aabed_Nerd on Reddit, the second image reveals that visibility is reduced with this skin equipped.
Visibility is one of the main aspects in Valorant. If someone cannot see their enemies, they can't shoot them. Moreover, it makes no sense to buy a skinline and not upgrade it to the fullest.
Keeping all this in mind, players in the community have dubbed this skin as a pay-to-lose skin. The only skin that doesn't offer this disadvantage in the game is the Frenzy skin. The community also pointed out that players using a left hand setup would face additional difficulty while using this skin line.
This isn't the only reason why the community is unhappy. Sadly enough, the Xenohunter skinline looks very minimalistic, very much like the default skins in the game. The only difference between the two is that the default options are black and the base Xenohunter skins are a darker shade of green in Valorant.
That said, the community also pointed out that there was a skin in Valorant that caused FPS to drop. The Vandal RGX Pz11 allegedly caused this issue. That said, it's unlikely that Riot Games will introduce a patch that would fix the issue with the Xenohunter skinline.
Since it's available in the store, players can choose to not buy it if they don't like the line. Overall, the community hasn't had a very proper reaction to the Xenohunter line in Valorant. Hopefully, the developers will take this into account before releasing special skinlines in the future.
