Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon is a semi-reboot of the series and is the only game in the series not made by the original developers Sandlot. It takes place around the same time of EDF 2017 and is set in the city of New Detroit. Upon starting the game you can either choose to play the game by yourself or create a new online game for people to join. If you decide to go it alone you will be accompanied by two AI bots named Kid and Cyrus who are not entirely useless but nowhere near as helpful as real players. You can then choose from one of four classes to play as. The Trooper who is your jack of all trades with no real special talents, the Tactical who can lay down turrets and mines, the Battle who is essentially a walking tank with the biggest and most destructive weapons and finally the Jet who can zoom around in a jetpack.
Each class has a different set of weapons exclusive to them and with the addition of being able to change your armor to a few different colors it helps making each class feel unique. So far the game is looking awesome and you eagerly jump into mission 1. The first thing you will likely notice is that this game looks much better than the previous entries and every enemy has been resigned to fit this new, gritty theme it’s going for. Personally I actually prefer this art direction compared to the previous entries and it makes it all the more of a shame when you actually start playing it. You see they decided to add RPG mechanics by gathering experience and leveling up your character but the problem lies in that you’ll start off completely rubbish.
Your gun barely does any damage, the clip for each weapon is insanely small meaning that you’ll be reloading 80% of the time since this is a game about fighting hordes of enemies and probably worst of all is how the Jet class starts off. You know how he has a jetpack? Well yeah, starting off you can very likely jump higher in real life than that thing lifts him off the ground which is just sad to look at and turns him into a glorified roller-skater. 7 hours of playing nearly exclusively as this class and his jetpack is noticeably better after leveling a few times but don’t expect to be able to reach most of the surrounding rooftops for a vantage point.
One of the selling points of the game is that it features 300 guns. Well that too is messed up by this completely unnecessary leveling system since whenever you pick up a gun crate from the battlefield they are inexplicably unable to be used until you reach a certain level. Not only does that take the fun out of collecting loot since it takes so long to level up but it also means you will be forced to stick with your rubbish weaponry due to bad game design. Another thing that is really strange is that every weapon of a category looks exactly the same. As an example the first rocket launcher looks the same as the latest rocket launcher you just picked up, the latest assault rifle does too and every other gun has a single weapon model for its entire category. This makes the feel of finally leveling up and being able to use a new gun all the more disappointing.
Using explosives in the midst of battle is still as satisfying as ever since every building is completely destructible and by the end of a mission most of the city will be in ruins due to fierce fighting. Unfortunately these new and improved graphics do come at a great cost. There are red “invisible walls” everywhere and you will quickly notice how small the area you can actually play in are. The game tries to hide this fact by drastically changing how missions are designed. While most of the mission from the previous games set you in a huge environment and tasked you with simply surviving the onslaught, this game is chock filled with way-points you must head to. Go to a certain area and switch a beacon or something equally mundane, fight a horde, then go switch another beacon and rinse and repeat until the game finishes.
This gets old fast and since there are only 15 missions in this game, each of them last quite some time further making the repetition noticeable. The worst part of it all is that this game switched from the cheesy, plain dumb dialogue of the rest of the series and instead went the dull, serious route. I found the dialogue plain unbearable and most every word you hear out of someone’s mouth will be a random string of words like “Bravo Zulu Lightning over” or “Affirmative, Oscar Bravo Lightning Strike”. I guess they were trying to make it sound cool and edgy but it just sounds like a bunch of things kids would say when they take a match of CS:GO far too seriously.
Moving back to the topic of compromises caused by the improved graphics, the amount of enemies that can be on the screen at any one time has been greatly reduced. To give the illusion of facing a horde of enemies they now spawn right around you by crawling out of the ground. This could have been cool if it was used a few times but that is how most of your encounters play out. You go to a way point, receive a string of random words from the mission handler and then enemies predictably pop out of nowhere instantly surrounding you time and time again. Gone are the days when you see hundreds of ants marching to your location as you desperately pick off as many as you can before they reach you. Yes the previous games had graphics right out of the original Xbox but this is a prime case in where graphics are not everything.
Ant hills make a return and still spawn in infinite number of enemies until destroyed. Yes, they messed that up too as you are likely imagining. No longer can you destroy the hill with your rocket launcher that is capable of destroying several skyscrapers with a single blast, now you must walk up right next to the hill and plant a tiny charge on the outside. The worst part of this is that it takes several seconds to set it up and a single hit causes you to start all over again. This was clearly designed to “enhance” coop by forcing your friends to cover you but with how fast most weapons run out of ammo, it’s likely they simply won’t be able to in many cases. Friendly fire is always on and you will take damage if you mindlessly run in front of a friend that is firing his gun. Your AI companions if playing on solo are pretty good at not shooting you but seem to constantly try to get themselves killed when you are firing.
If you are downed they can revive you and you will be back at full health. Once you finish the campaign you will have the option to turn off the AI bots in future playthroughs. You will also unlock a “campaign remix” mode that randomizes the enemies encountered. Not really a mode that makes much of a difference to the missions. You also have survival mode where you can play with up to 6 other players and fight until you all drop. In survival you can only play as the Trooper class, gain no experience and none of your guns from campaign can be used. One thing I must praise this game for is that vehicles are now finally helpful and no longer have controls designed by someone that has never played a video game. It is pretty fun to ride in tanks, mechs or just get into anti-air turrets. There are quite a few new awesome looking enemies added as well. At the end of the day I get the feeling that Insect Armageddon wasn’t even originally supposed to be an EDF game due to how badly they messed up the basic features this series is known for. It may be fun for a bit if you plan on playing with some friends but I just cannot recommend it.
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