Starship Troopers Extermination [Review]
Starship Troopers Extermination combines first-person shooter with tower defense elements, where players confront the same relentless bug threats featured in the movie. Gameplay involves base establishment and resource extraction, and at the end of missions, players must make a timely escape to avoid being overwhelmed. However, our experience on the Xbox Series X was marred by technical issues, including multiple game crashes. Notably, my group completed only two full matches together out of several attempts. I however crashed numerous times. Also, the class I was playing is able to set a small ringlike barrier around themselves to provide cover fire and protect themselves from the bugs. I was unable to jump or even leave the barrier I created for the entire match. I had to quit the game because I was stuck in a place with no ammunition and no way to leave my post.
The game finally has the movie's cave setting which was missing from the early access build for the game but, unfortunately, it's still missing the iconic Brain Bug. The primary enemies are grunt-like bugs, supplemented by intermittent encounters with larger, more formidable bugs, including Tiger Bugs. The game features six classes: sniper, demolisher, guardian, engineer, medic, and ranger. Notably, the Ranger class closely resembles the soldiers depicted in the movie, while the engineer class enables the deployment of barriers to mitigate knock back effects. The Medic class provides access to healing items and a deployable drone for enhanced assistance. Classes can be leveled up to unlock perks, skills, and additional weaponry.
Establishing bases during downtime is crucial for survival and mission success. A critical consideration is ensuring timely extraction, as failure to board the ship will result in abandonment, and respawn is disabled during escape sequences. Furthermore, various game modes, including horde mode, are accessible based on player level. Many times during gameplay, enemies would spawn right on top of you or just pop out of thin air. This is both frustrating and strange, and it will take you out of the immersion of the game. On the surface, this game is easy to compare to Helldivers 2, but at least the one big difference is Starship Troopers Extermination is a 16-player co-op vs. Helldivers 4 players. So more players can play together, and people can get a group going with all of their friends. Unfortunately, this game is hard to recommend with Helldivers 2 competing with it. On the flip side, Xbox players at least have a Helldivers alternative.
