Absolute Airsoft (Reading) Review

[BrightCandle]

Date played: 01/03/2015

Weather: Cold (below green gas functioning wel!) and windy (25mph gusts)

Type: Woodland (ish)

Cost: £20 +£5 for lunch

 

 

The area itself

Absolute airsoft has a site right next to Deltaforce paintball. From their description it sounds like a high developed site:

 

"One of our new sites set in approx 100 acres of woodland and has the following features:

Church, Vietcong Village, Berlin Wall, Ammo Dump, Double Decker Bus & a 2 Story Castle

All make for varied gameplay and cater for all styles of weapons."

 

What I saw was something they called the prison which is a bit of plastic coated wood in the middle of the woods with a couple of small rooms and one of the paintball fields full of oil drums at the end of the day for 15 minutes. No castle, no double decker bus, no berlin wall, in fact mostly we played to capture a trench in the same place in the game area across a range of area I would estimate about 100metres by maybe 60metres. The entire wood was covered in brambles, even the walk ways had them imposing and you will get thorns sticking in you through your BDUs. The ground level brush is quite thick so just kneeling or laying down will give you really good cover a lot of the time. Most of the area is very hard to pass or impassable, between the fallen down trees and the thick brambles its hard to really move quickly. You can't really run here and it slows the game down a lot. Due to the limited area of combat and the fact at head height visibility is easily the entire field combat gets bogged down really quickly.

 

This wasn't what I was expecting given the description of the site, these special elements they have listed belong to the paintball site and they seem to be in individual fields separated from everything else, so despite the total size of the area its not all in play at once. Since paintball was running we only played in the woods except for that one game. This site is a mess, its poorly maintained and underdeveloped. Its much smaller than they would suggest due to the deal with the local paint ball site. You will play different games but all in the same place and then supposedly at 1430 they get access to the paintball sites (which are smaller but developed). Only that didn't happen until 1600 so we got one short game on one field that was shorter than the range of our guns.

 

Marshalling

I have a number of issues with the Marshalling for this site.

1) We spent about half of our total time in the safe zone, it was ridiculous. Rather than the long 5 minutes most sites do it was 15+ minutes here. It was so much longer than anyone needed people had time to smoke twice and still sit around.

2) The safety briefing was pretty poor.

3) The rules for games were poorly described most of the time. The first game was "capture the flag". Not a lot else was said other than respawn details. But the game lasted about 45 seconds as one team was really close to the flags and we barely got into engagement range by the time they had them at their base! We swapped and then it become clear there were 3 flags in the middle of the game zone not the 1 that we all assumed, but to be fair it was only clear the flag must be in the middle and not the enemy base when we had no flag in the base. It was not the usual capture the flag and there was no explanation. This went on all day and multiple games had unclear objectives and problems with the rules and you just learnt to roll with it.

4) Dealing with cheats and problem characters was non-existent and the site has some terminators who are regulars.

5) The marshals tell terrible off jokes, I have seen them shoot players in the briefing, disrupting the mission brief, for fun.

6) At one point a Marshall was complaining that people were taking too long stepping off towards the game area and said "its your time your wasting". Oh the irony having wasted the entirety of our day in the safe zone (see 1) all day and here we were taking 30 seconds to avoid the big puddle and getting that thrown at us was just beyond ridiculous.

7) At the end of the day one of the marshals threw a pyro just behind us, within 5metres or so away from us, in the safe zone. Obviously no one had eye protection on at this point.

8) The point where you can start firing is basically in the safe zone, a ricochet from a tree could easily make it back into the safe zone given the distances, I don't consider that good enough and it made me nervous all day.

9) I saw multiple guys with magazines in before leaving the safe zone, told a few off myself but the Marshals didn't seem to notice or pay any attention to these incidents and they kept happening.

 

Safety

The site is very thick brambled, has a lot of fallen down trees you have to cross, some of which are at the sort of height that is an issue. You will trip a lot, fall a bit and generally find you walk everywhere untangling your feet. Combine that with the fact they don't chronograph guns as far as I can tell (they have one they just didn't use it) and almost no rules from the safety briefing and it leaves a worry in me that says people are going to get hurt here. I made it out alive but I have small cuts all over my legs from the brambles and I stayed mostly on the paths because of how impassable much of the terrain was. The lack of safety in the safe zone is a real concern as well.

 

Games

The games are really short. Some lasted just 45 seconds, none went above 20 minutes. Then it was back to the safe zone to reload (15+ minutes) and back out again. I played so many different games in the same area it was just boring. More than half the time was actually sat in the safe zone and that is the real game here.

 

Facilities

The safe zone was OK, park benches under some tarp. Not much use against the wind but should keep some of the rain off. Lunch was reasonable value, a 9" pizza which wasn't all that impressive but for the price was good. It had toilets which is a plus, they didn't have running water however so yeah that wasn't great.

 

Overall impression is this site is pretty bad, the worst I have played at so far. Its kind of Bunker 51 in the woods but it goes on for longer, is just as bogged down in terms of gameplay with too many people in a small space but with the drawback of being outside in the elements so the wind will blow your BBs everywhere and you have the brambles to be dealing with. I wouldn't ever go back and I am surprised the regulars do, its pretty awful in my opinion and has none of the benefits of woodland (the fire and movement possibilities due to the space you have).

[n1ckh]

Hmmmm sounds pretty poor mate, a complete waste of money what was the price for this shambles of a game day ??

[Esoterick]

I can't say I've ever heard a good thing about that site. Whilst I wouldn't wish a bad day on anyone I'm not surprised by the review, look at who you get discount with for having site membership....

[M_P]

It's run by special Airsoft supplies or is at least associated with them to my knowledge so I'm not surprised. Some guys came to my local and told us they'd paid for membership and stuff but never had their ukara and stuff supported despite regular phoning and emails etc.

[CaptainDumbass]

I went last sunday.
Firstly i would like to say this is no disrespect to any staff at this site. I did enjoy my day and i couldn't fault how f***ing lovely the staff and marshals were. I would like to return and i hope there are no hard feelings about this post. There are just rooms for improvement and then i would 100% consider being a regular player for sure. If this causes offence or concern any members of staff that may see this are free to contact me here to discuss.

 

In my opinion compared to the other local sites in and around berkshire. The day i went (and by the sounds of things other days since its been open aswell), was just run poorly and it was very boring......

• Firstly the safety brief covered everything most safety briefs cover, however the lad that explained it was quiet as f*ck. If you werent close to him you couldnt hear him. This could be dangerous for new players or those that may not be familiar with the site. 
• Getting your gun chrono'd was practically pointless. They read your reading and sent you on your way. No tag on your gun or anything. I saw and overheard two lads in the safe zone purposely not get chrono'd because no-one would have been able to tell if they had or hadnt..... This potentially allowed players with hot guns play without being caught. 
• Game briefs were explained very poorly with no indication where certain areas marshals mentioned actually were. I spent a whole game trying to find where a flag was we had to capture. So no-one had an actual clue what they were doing half the time.
• During game briefs (and i think this f*cked me off the most) players AND MARSHALS found it funny to shoot eachother. Now this happens nearly everywhere i go airsofting and i get it, its banter and it can be funny, but this site took the piss. People would be running around spraying eachother with high ROF guns, shotguns, and even launchers. While this is all shits and giggles there is a time and a place, and during a game brief where people are trying to listen, this was dangerous, stupid and overall annoying. 
• On top of the stupidity during game briefs, someone (i honestly wasnt able to work out who, player or marshal) would set off firecracker bangers, these werent BFG's these were actual fireworks which were even louder than .12g blanks... thats saying something. At one occasion one went off next to someones foot which caused them to fall over aswell as burning their legs. Setting one or two off to scare people is funny, im not a grumpy ass hole i promise. But I dont think i need to explain how annoying and dangerous that was and how the marshalls would encourage it... Set a f*cking example. 

Moving onto game play

 

• We played on the same "map" the entire day which was a pretty open woodland field with no features or anything other than a couple small huts and trenches. While this is great for long ranged combat it felt like we were being picked off by DMR's and snipers all day and those with AEG's and GBBR's had no proper combat most of the day.
• Compared to the other fields this site had to offer i personally think this was the worst. When i questioned this with a marshal they explained it was because paintballers were also playing that day and they didnt want confusion. While i understand this, it doesnt take a genius to communicate with the paintball company so both airsofters and paintballers could play on other fields while still staying a good distance from eachother to avoid confusion. 
• Hit taking was very good, i didnt once have to question myself whether my shots were falling short or people were cheating or simply not noticing that they were hit. It was a pleasant surprise. Marshals would also occasionally shoot players with their own pistols as a "hit checking" precaution and allowed players to get back into cover and continue playing. This meant everyone was playing fairly and honestly.
• While this isnt really the sites fault they could have enforced this way more: DEAD PLAYERS DO NOT TALK. On so many occasions people who were dead would walk past me and whisper "theres 3 of them behind that bush they dont know youre here" or just give away information of enemy players positions. Ruins the fun. 
• Team balancing was awful. They put all the rentals and young players on one team with a couple adults (me and my friends lmao) and then all the clearly experienced players with proper kit on the other, i dont need to explain who spent their day pinned in their regen point........ This lead to the majority of my team just walking back to the safe zone in the middle of a game. Even when mentioned to marshals there was no change.

 

• The website says walk on is £20 and it includes a hotdog and you can get a pizza for £5 more. I chose pizza and wherever they ordered them for they were 8 short so people had to go without pizza and get food from the paintball kitchen to the same value. Kinda sucks....

 

• Also, this might be petty but at the start of the day i needed my lipo's charged, gave them to the lad in the shop before i even signed in and got chrono'd and he just left them on the side and forgot about them for half the day.... so i had to use my SMG-8 in a woodland site for hours which you can imagine was wank. 

 

[Jay91]

rip im booked in for sunday

[Sacarathe]

On 07/07/2017 at 4:04 PM, Jay91 said:

rip im booked in for sunday

 

This is the site where a guy lost sight I believe?

[Jay91]

Was there today seems something must have happened here as it would seem they've tightened up a few loose ends so to speak

On sign in every one was made to chrono and checked off a list when done

The guy giving the safety brief was a little quiet but there was around 80 people there so thats forgivable being I was at the back and managed to understand what was being said

People weren't shooting eachother during game briefs

We used all fields bar the bus which is understandable as there was so many of us

Played different games of varying lengths 

Everyone got their food and people played pretty fair

 

I also like the trading table and the little shop seemed reasonably priced at worst maybe a little expensive on the consumables ie ammo and pyros 

 

I had a good experience 

[EDcase]

Was there last Sunday and pretty good experience overall.

We were not required to chrono but we could if we wanted to.

Yeah, Matt was a bit quiet and sometimes people were talking while he was explaining a game.  (some younguns there)

 

Games were quite varied.  Rescue pilot, capture trench, statues, get VIP to castle and a couple attack/defend.

Not bad but did feel a few of the games lacked good objectives.  Attack and defend doesn't have any surprises when defenders have limited lives and attackers do not...

 

Have to say price is great at £20 (walkon) including a hotdog for lunch. (There were some leftover which could be had for £1)

Definitely a good day and will be returning asap

[snuff]

On 7/9/2017 at 11:29 AM, Sacarathe said:

 

This is the site where a guy lost sight I believe?

No that was their site at Maidenhead,shut down because of that...always found Reading good if a bit inconsistent which depended on the players and marshals.

[gasman]

Just played there at the weekend. Very friendly bunch of people and for an old git I had a lot of fun. Thanks to my son in law Les for making it a good day and cooking me lunch!

The new village is good and will be great when complete. Thanks to Mark who runs it all and is very good on price for every thing air soft.

I wish to say sorry again to the young lad that ran in front of me as I was shooting at one of the opposition that I accidentally shot oops. I changed masks after that as It was steaming up from the sides, still learning.

 

[gasman]

Hi I played there on Sunday with over 70 others and the site now has a new village which is not yet complete but very good. The brambles are being cleared but being such a large site its a mammoth task.

We did use the 2 story castle which was a laugh and very impressive.

The estate that owns the land has harvested some of the trees so quite a few defensive barriers have been erected for game play.

I had a great day and would recommend it as a site which will get better and better.

Mark was giving out some ukara cards from a huge pile to players, it is a three month process.

[Albiscuit]

On 3/27/2018 at 12:26 PM, Duff said:

I'm really looking to do some woodland and this site is my nearest. Mixed reviews, fair enopugh. Will see what's what when I get booked in on a warmish day.

 

ALL sites have mixed reviews to be fair. Woodlands fun, not as fun as CQB but it required a different gameplay

[Bobby]

Just been,

1) no chrono at all for anyone!

2) Marshall’s were dreadful. Bad safety briefing, games not explained well and poorly thought out leading to uneven games. When feedback was offered the marshals became aggressive.

3) pizza was cold and like cardboard.

 

worst site I’ve been to.

[gasman]

Was it you that was sent off site for being aggressive and in the marshals face yesterday Bobby?

As regards chrono some people were chronoed the HPA guns and a few that had not been through chrono before.

With a hundred and fifty people playing it is very hard to run perfect games always. The site could not use the Berlin wall or castle yesterday which is controlled by the paintball side due to maintenance and insurance issues. A couple of the games played were an experiment and did not go as expected with the aggressive and unexpected speed of some of the younger players completing the task before I even fired a shot!

As for the pizza being cold I have no answer for that I never eat take away food!

2 weeks ago all guns were chronoed with 3 people doing the chrono on all guns and only one hot gun!

A few weeks before that random chrono in game happened, again no hot guns.