They're hardly the most taxing of puzzles - the complexity never goes that much further than a game of Pipe Mania or triggering pressure pads and seeking out targets to shoot in the environment, though when you're playing with three others it makes sense there's nothing stickier involved - and instead offer a slightly different texture to sit aside the shooting. The levels - of which there's a generous selection, given how it'll take around 12 hours to see them all through - are sprawling, branching messes of caverns and corridors and courtyards, complete with various puzzles to provide diversions along the way.
It's the battlefield itself that's of more interest, really, and where you'll find the strongest traces of imagination in Strange Brigade. It adds a slim layer of strategy to the straight-up shooting (fuelled itself by a fairly slim arsenal that harbours few surprises, though weapons can be upgraded in-mission with upgrades persistent across characters, and more exotic tools can be had temporarily for a small price when you find them on the battlefield).
Each character has an amulet that can be charged by collecting the souls of fallen enemies, and when full it gives you access to a super - which vary by character, each able to unlock a slim selection that range from summoning scarab swarms to charging headlong into mobs. This is aggressively simple stuff, the sturdy gunplay backed up by a couple of the Strange Brigade's own quirks. Strange Brigade shoots for a cute British quirkiness and misses by a mile, the end result about as appealing as boiled mutton.īeneath all that it's a little more effective, a knowing throwback to a bygone age of shooters when things were much simpler. Cholmondley-Warner, but with absolutely none of the charm that combination might imply. If you find troweled-on British accents hilarious, and don't mind the dark heart of the colonial era served up with a shit-eating smile, then maybe this is for you - personally, I found it ends up a like a cut-rate Indy complete with cloying narration by Mr. There's a dash of Destiny to Strange Brigade, and it's commendable that Rebellion have gone for the same hooks while doing its best to do away with the time commitment that Bungie's game demands.Īll that window dressing might well have worked if it wasn't so hollow, the comic book stylings - penned by 2000AD veteran Gordon Rennie, a writer who seems to have had more success with other similarly pulpy outings for Rebellion's publications - ringing loud and clumsy with its one-note approach. And then there's Nalangu, the spirit warrior who can draw upon the supernatural as she draws health from the recently deceased. There's Frank, the thick-skinned and hard-edged veteran! De Quincey, the magician who can absorb souls readily and is a dab hand at sourcing secrets! Gracie, a Rosie the Riveter repro who's good with her fists and will remind you at every given opportunity - and a few more besides - that she's a no-nonsense Lancashire lass.
Strange Brigade takes the straight-to-the-point gunplay of Zombie Army and throws in its own kinks, doubling down on the co-op - the campaign can be soloed, or opened up to friends or strangers to play alongside you - and sprinkling the lightest amount of strategy atop the shooting.Īnd so you have four characters (five if you include the pre-order bonus, of course), all loosely drawn from some dusty archetypes, and all with their own particular traits. Still, if this studio has forged a reputation for anything over the past few years, it's for making big, dumb and - more often than not - enjoyable action games.