Starship Troopers: Extermination Review (LuBronyr)
I rarely write reviews but I have to put down some words about the 1.0 release, because I have been playing the game all the way from the beginning with 266 hours on record. All the jank, the glitches, the lag, the overall unpolished nature of this game the other reviews talk about? It's all true. It has been this way throughout the whole early access but that did not really discourage me from playing. I love shooting, I also love base building and I love large scale 16-player PVE. I am not aware of any game which provided me with this. The 16-player ARC and AAS modes were unique. They've kept me playing and ignoring the flaws of the game.
I don't want to talk about that now. I what to talk about how something very few reviews have mentioned. The so-called "solo play tutorial" for new players which is supposed introduce the game mechanics and the vast scope of the Starship Troopers universe. According to the words of the developers, this tutorial was supposed the answer the questions: "How do I build a base?" or "How did this bug kill me?" or "What is this ore thing?" You know, question new players often asked us, the experienced ones.
Well, let me tell you this "tutorial" does it. There are 25 "missions" in total. 1 mission is "go to ore refinery, mine one canister, deposit one canister" then there is another mission "go to gas refinery, mine one gas canister, deposit the gas canister." At no point do these missions explain, how to build a base, or that you can mine multiple canisters or that the engineer class can carry multiple canisters. In fact, it doesn't explain what any of the classes do. Hey, but these are only 2 missions. The other 23 surely go more complex and introduce the nuances of the games, don't they? Well, they do introduce all the possible glitches and many ways in which the may break because you always spawn in 3 AI squad-mates who are mindnumbingly stupid. Mission 1: one go through a linear cave, kill drone bugs. Mission 2: Go through a linear cave, kill warrior bugs. Mission: 3: Go through a linear cave, kill a tiger. Mission 4: Go through a linear cave, and kill some more bugs. Mission 5: Go through a linear cave, kill some bugs before the timer runs out. Every. Single. Time. Every mission. It is never explained what are priority targets, what the bugs do, what are the best weapons to take them down. You just thrown down there to deal with the jank, blind. I was able to do it, because I've played the game since it's inception. The only thing a new player is going to learn from this is: "Bugger off, stop playing our game. Can't you see how frustrating it is? We obviously don't want you to play it."
For some bizarre reason, the plasma bug is never introduced. The MAIN PRIORITY TARGET. The biggest enemy of your base. Oh, I'm sorry, what base? There is no base building in the tutorial. You've expected to learn something about the main game modes? Well, jokes on you. The bombardiers are also never introduced, they just kinda appear and wipe you and your squad when you don't know what they are. Well, I forgot there are a few unique missions. One is "Escort one trooper through a linear cave." OH MY GOOOOD! WOOOW! An escort mission? What will the game devs think of next? Oh I know, how about "go through a linear cave and pick up 3 datapads." What thrill. What excitement. The last 5 missions are all about blowing up hive cores. What are hive cores? What do they do in the main game modes? Who cares? All you know is that you have to go through a linear cave and blow up 1 core on misssion 21. Then 2 hive cores. On mission 25 it's 3 hive cores, with a royal guard and friends. It's excruciatingly frustrating and the only way to do it is cheesing it with a guardian class. Maybe the mission should teach that you need more troopers to take on such a large force of bugs but nope. It's CHEEEEEEESE!
This is not a "tutorial". This is not a "campaign". This does not introduce the game mechanics or classes or the scope of Starship Troopers. It's 3 hours of going through a linear cave bloatware. It's not just bad, it's shockingly bad. I have not played such a boring, uninformative, broken solo experience in a long time.
Someone. Some game dev actually designed this a thought to themselves: "This is okay. This is a great introduction for new players while still being engaging for experienced players."
It broke me and I am quiting the game because if people working on this game think this is fun, I am honestly horrified with what they will add to the game next and I have neither the patience nor the will to see the future updates.