Earth Defence Force sequel

[twmac]

Well I have my copy and I can't wait to get home.

Me and two friends bought the only three copies in the local Future Shop... The guy hadn't even bothered to put them out on the shelf when we went in at midday.

He was genuinely baffled by the fact that we each wanted a copy.

[Raff]

NBG have openly threatened a 'limited release' in the UK.

[miffy495]

Well I have my copy and I can't wait to get home.

Me and two friends bought the only three copies in the local Future Shop... The guy hadn't even bothered to put them out on the shelf when we went in at midday.

He was genuinely baffled by the fact that we each wanted a copy.

I await your verdict with baited breath. I actually have a local co-op partner for EDF now, which was definitely NOT the case when the first came out (even played some with him on the big screen at work. Fucking awesome), so this is even more tempting for me.

[Sno]

I just ran through the first five levels with a buddy on normal. (Netcode is pretty solid.) We tried to start out on hard, but kept getting beat to hell on the second level. The harder difficulties will probably be where the real fun is to be had with this game, but with just the starter gear, the enemies are such incredible bullet sponges. So I don't recommend starting out on hard, even though normal actually feels too easy. (Normal is the lowest difficulty level in the game.)

The different armors are all pretty interesting, i focused mostly on the battle armor which has extra health, a shield, and a burst attack. (There's also the tactical armor, which is all about auto turrets and support. The jet armor is based on the Pale Wing character from EDF2, so flight and energy weapons. The final trooper armor has no explicit abilities, but ultimately gets the best weapons and can perform special interactions like co-op revives at a faster rate than the other characters.)

Anyways.

It's good.

It is a good game.

After playing for a few hours, I think Vicious Cycle has done justice to Sandlot's games, while refining a lot of the rough edges. (Vehicles are actually useful, and you don't have to spend your entire magazine before you can reload.) I mean, and for how different that game is visually? It's actually really very faithful to the b-movie tone of the series, there is some really great bad dialogue in that game, heh. It also pulls in a lot of small touches and details from past games in a way that i think shows that these guys actually knew what they were doing. (For example? Weapons with long reload cycles will retain progress through that cycle when stowed, which is a small detail, but it's an important one for the way these games handle their weapons.)

And all those worries people have had that this game would be tamed down compared to the other games, it's now evident that literally all of the pre-release footage was being pulled from the first two levels. Actually playing the game, by the time we got to the first major boss fight, i found myself in the position of having my vision obscured by all the enemies bearing down on me. That has me pretty convinced that they've got the feel down right, that is completely the experience of playing EDF, and it's awesome.

So i played five of fifteen levels, and i'm feeling pretty confident in saying that this game is pretty awesome. (Fifteen levels is a little worrisome, compared to the fifty plus of 2017, i will say. Though the average level in EDF:IA is longer than the average level in EDF 2017, and there's also a remix mode. Not exactly clear what that entails, but it's probably exactly what the name suggests, remixed levels.)

Edit - Just to be clear about some of the co-operative options.

Campaign co-op is three people online, two players as local split-screen. There's also a survival mode that supports up to six players annnnnd i'm not sure if you can split-screen that. (Only the trooper armor is available in the survival mode, which seems odd.)

[twmac]

I am now on on Chapter 2 Mission 5 after about 5 hours of play.

The mood and tone of the game stays very faithful to the cheesey B Movie feel of the 2017, however, it can be a little too knowing in places (there is a pilot who narrates a mercifully brief turret section who knows he is in a crappy plot and hams it up) when the one of the grunts screams 'They got fatty!' it is clearly as a throw back. I would agree with Sno that they have definitely managed to keep enough of what made EDF compelling in the game (it has both weapons that unlock as you gain experience and weapons that appear in random drops and can be purchased).

The game does get reasonably hectic but so far I've never felt utterly overwhelmed and there is definitely a much heavier limit on the number of creatures onscreen at one time. You will never have the same moments as on the beach in EDF 2017 when you see thousands of red ants charge at you and just think 'Holy shit, I am so fucked'. That said the larger variety in enemies is welcome and the decidedly greyer pallette is not as bad as I was expecting especially as the environments are more varied in the way they decompose.

My main gripe, which won't bother everyone, is that they have made a lot of the interactions needlessly complicated. I don't need a reload button, I certainly don't want an active reload option either. The four classes are great but due to the levelling system it feels like they took out the grind for random weapons and replaced it with having to level each class so that they are able to tackle the harder difficulties. I think it is good that they have understood that EDF thrives on replaying challenges for better weapons and more health but it just feels a little muddied.

Now for some of the petty complaints:

- The drops are now fully 3-D rendered packages instead of the stark 2-D icons, it makes them much harder to spot

- Some of the Nihilism has gone, your team mates are very much able to hold their own and as a result you don't watch tens of men getting slaughtered, even the desolation of razing a whole City is gone because your teammates tend to quip 'There doesn't seem much to save now that we are done, huh?' - I know

- I want my frame rate drops! In single player it stays solid through out, some of the most epic moments in 2017 were when the whole thing would grind to a halt as explosions went off everywhere and you felt like you were walking through treacle as Ravagers swaremd all around you. I know this is a pathetic complaint.

Overall though, this game is ace fun and an extremely welcome return for the game. The weapons are satisfying as you unlock them, the strategies required on later levels are fun to figure out and some of the new mega bosses feel more artistically coherent with their smaller bretheren. I might have moaned about the separate classes but so far they have all been fun to muck around with and it does mean that people will naturally gravitate towards one particular class in multiplayer.

I think the most important part is to that it is still fun. 'And fun is number 1.'

[Raff]

I don't need a reload button, I certainly don't want an active reload option either.

Perhaps not active reload, but the lack of any control in the Sandlot games did irritate me.

[Sno]

If we want to talk really small, dumb, nitpicky things: I miss the ridiculous bug blood spraying all over the place, and the pinballing bug corpses.

You also don't end up

in terms of how many things are on screen, but the game comes a lot closer than i would have ever expected.

Additionally, one issue i am having with the game is the way certain styles of mission events just randomly spawn enemies all around you instead of from clear origin points. It's something that will probably change a lot of the tactics that go into surviving on the harder difficulties, probably not for the better.

I also kind of understand where Twmac is coming from on the game needlessly complicating things. It's like the way they've changed anthills, instead of just shooting them and having them close, shooting them now only closes them temporarily. You have to go up and set a bomb to permanently seal it, and the game isn't even particularly clear about any of this.

I mean, I actually like this change so far, it forces you to get closer to the anthills instead of just sniping them shut from afar, but it feels like something that is ripe for frustration. They took something simple and made it kind of obtuse and complicated, i won't be surprised if it's something people react negatively to. (I've already seen some people complain about it.)

[twmac]

Perhaps not active reload, but the lack of any control in the Sandlot games did irritate me.

But the games were entirely designed with that in mind, the relentless nature of the game meant you would be constantly firing and had no time to make that conscious effort.

I don't mean to complain about the reload feature, it just never seemed necessary before and it doesn't in this game.

[Sno]

But the games were entirely designed with that in mind, the relentless nature of the game meant you would be constantly firing and had no time to make that conscious effort.

I don't mean to complain about the reload feature, it just never seemed necessary before and it doesn't in this game.

The lack of a reload button was not something that really bothered me in 2017, but it did feel like something i was just having to tolerate, it was less control over an element of shooters you commonly expect to have control over. It was just a weird bit of idiosyncratic japanese design that didn't wreck that game, but it was something you had to be able to accept and deal with. If you focused your builds around weapons with longer reload cycles, such as the turrets, not being able to choose to reload during lulls in the battle was annoying. It became a trial and error thing, you had to know the levels well enough to be thinking several steps ahead, so as to make sure you wouldn't be surprised with an overwhelming situation when you ran out of ammo.

I mean, but the levels were simple and short, replaying tough levels over and over was enjoyable. I don't think it would have worked out as well with EDF:IA's longer and more elaborate missions.

So yeah, I don't think the active reload gimmick was necessary for EDF:IA, but simply being able to choose when to reload at all is welcome.

[Raff]

The lack of a reload button was always really annoying in later levels because you'd often be using guns with massive (or tiny) capacity and massive reload times. On your way over to the next load of bugs you'd have to empty out your guns in order to reload so that you'd be fully prepared. I remember doing that dozens of times in bigger missions.

[twmac]

Don't remember that ever being a problem (mainly because I always needed turrets not matter what).

I am maybe one level off the end of the game on normal. It has started to get a bit more hectic. The gap between level 2 and 3 is a bit of a chasm so I imagine that I might have to replay some fo the earlier levels to make my guys competent enough to tackle hard (or go over the survival mode).

Achievement chasers are going to have a field day with this game as there are so many spots you can grind for kills if you so choose.

Looking forward to playing this multiplayer, the AI is good but there are just moments where you are being hit by two ant hills and giant Hectors that simply require you to have someone covering your back.

[Sno]

I am maybe one level off the end of the game on normal.

The game goes completely wild in the third chapter, that is definitely the EDF people remember. I think they've done themselves quite a disservice using up so much of the campaign's duration before they get to that level of chaos. At least it seems like the campaign remix mode is significantly more crazy at a significantly earlier point than the standard mission set.

The campaign also closes on a pretty lame non-ending, and there's a lot of speculation of there being DLC mission packs planned to fill it out. (Given that this was a budget game, and that i don't feel cheated on the amount of content it had to begin with, i would be mostly ok with this.)

Looking forward to playing this multiplayer, the AI is good but there are just moments where you are being hit by two ant hills and giant Hectors that simply require you to have someone covering your back.

The squad AI's are surprisingly good, actually. Still, i've been playing almost nothing but co-op and have been having an incredibly fun time with it, easily one of my favorite games so far this year. It makes me crazy knowing that this is just bound to be passed on and misunderstood by so many people. (I just watched the Giant Bomb quick look, where they spend around ten minutes trying to attack a carrier with a grenade launcher and then quit out in boredom.)

[twmac]

I thought should post my review up here, as well as the second opinions of two of the co-writers from Arcadian Rhythms:

http://www.arcadianrhythms.com/2011/07/earth-defense-force-insect-armageddon-review/

There is a really good LA Noire article up there too.

[miffy495]

That's the sort of thing I've been waiting for! Thanks for the link, I'll be reading it shortly. Our every-so-often mostly-two-way "holy crap EDF2017 is the best why don't more people understand?" exchanges mean that your opinion on this game is the one I've been most interested in.

EDIT: Just read it. Yeah, I think I need to dig myself up a copy of this game.

Edited August 15, 2011 by miffy495

[twmac]

Glad that the review was good enough to sway you one way or another.

I do like Insect Armageddon, the online is particularly ace so if you can arrange a multiplayer session in split screen or multiplayer then do it.

If you are bored it is worth browsing the site, there is other stuff that the guys have written that is definitely worth reading.