Brigador Killers

Was very, very excited by the gameplay I saw online and interviews with the devs. First tutorial missions are fun if a bit hand holdy but then you’re immediately thrown into a pitch black cave where you have none of the tools you were just taught how to use, none of the fun cyberpunk vibes of the previous games and no tutorialising to explain how stealth works, the fact that you lose all your gear (including your flashlight) when you die, the fact that using your flashlight not only makes you unable to interact with objects but also stops intractable objects from being even highlighted, making the flashlight less useful that walking around in the dark. I understand this is early access and I do appreciate games that make you earn your power fantasy but I bought this game to shoot guns and drive mechs in a capitalist dystopia not scurry about in a hole as some loser in a capitalist dystopia. If I wanted the latter I’d go outside and dig. I am an adult with a job and limited time. If I have bought your cool game I want to play your cool game, sections like this just feel like a dev wasting my time. Hope to pick this up again when it’s good.

I like what they're going for but at the end of the day I'm still playing the demo over the game I bought because the demo lets me actually reliably scavenge APCs and stuff and upgrade them and just generally derp around more. I don't HAVE to finish a level I hate in the demo to advance to obtaining other random gear I want. The demo let me hop around the order with which I did things whereas this hits you with arbitrary difficulty walls like RANDOM TANK or ♥♥♥♥ YOU TERROR MISSION HOLD THE POINT AND GET MOBBED BY A MILLION NPCs that don't really support the same creative builds as the other missions.

It sucks to say this, but this is not ready for prime time. The economy and mission order comes together to make a game that is frequently frustrating, punishing and just not very fun to play. Which is absolutely wild, as Brigador is a masterpiece, and the demo for this showed incredbile promise. I fear the devs might have got a bit of playtester syndrome, where an entrenched group of players have mastered the game and keep asking for it to be harder and more complex. It's just not fun using the tools you have to tackle the problems you are given - all the chaos and joy of the trailer (and the demo!) is replaced with gruelling, miserable missions where you crawl around maps pulling singular bullets and bags of chips off enemies, get hit, and lose all your stuff. Progression isn't satisfying - there is a very small range of usable, effective weaponry and the upgunned vehicles you get access to arrive too late to be useful. The campaign has a great story but, after a kinectic, thrilling four mission opener that gives you a sampling platter of everything the game has to offer, kicks you into throwing rocks at people underground. It's slow, boring and not a good example of what Brigador does best. Enemy variety is awful - comp[ared to the readability of a Brigador encounter, where the mix of vehicles and mechs in a group all lead to dynamic, evolving challenges and a high level of readbility, Killers throws mobs of blurry little guys at you with nondescript guns, who you deal with in mostly the same way. There's some wonderful lore here, but like the rest of the game it feels broadly sketched out with a few quality deep dives that unfortunately don't currently add up to much. This is an incredibly ambitious and admirable project by the devs, and I hope they put some new and inexperienced players through the mission flow to get some feedback. I can't recommend the game in its current state but the demo provides everything good here and more, and is free. Pop this on your wishlist, enjoy the soundtrack, and hope that the next few years see this game hit its potential.

Don't recommend it in its current state

Mad cause bad

Still very Early access, but have faith! the only place to go from here is up. Buy it.

This feels like an RPG set in the Brigador world. The difficulty curve is steep, but it's worth it. Never expected to find a game where Bubba's pissin hot reloads are an actual usable ammo type.

Honestly would not recommend playing in its current state but I'm marking this review as positive because I feel bad for the developers especially given the poor initial reception of the original Brigador and desperately wish for this game to succeed. Its got good bones, but is missing a lot of its flesh and some of its skin is covered in fleas. They gutted half the vehicle roster compared to the demo (can't even play as a mech in the "mech game" lmao). Pacing is off (mostly because they got rid of the latter half of vehicle and suit progression but kept the same enemy progression). Difficulty on foot is 80% of guys can't scratch you but then 1 guy lasers you and guns you down in an instant with almost no time to react. Knockdown system would be ok if this game didn't make you lose all of your stuff upon death (forced to lie on the ground spamming bandages hoping the .22 rounds don't shred you to pieces). Nospol apc turrets seem far more accurate when in enemy hands compared to using them yourself (maybe this is just my imagination idk, just find it ridiculous that a machinegun is way less accurate mounted to an apc than when handheld). Extraction shooter elements encourage the player to take as few risks as possible or you could just alt+f4 cheese because the last 2 missions of the game are ridiculously difficult compared to prior missions. Funnily enough I think the start of the game where you're forced to throw rocks cause you have no bullets was actually pretty fun although a lot of people seemed to hate this. The "good" vehicles you currently have access to feel bland, all the interesting ones (i.e. upgunned motorbike, cannon sprat van, armored forklift, upgunned mobility scooter) are impractical and not advisable to use when the cost of death is so high. I know you're supposed to be this somewhat stealthy "guerilla operator" but so much of the fun in the original brigador was how unique each vehicle felt. Now if you wanna win it's just "van with gun" or "van with 4 guns" or "car with gun", if you're gonna gatekeep all the well designed vehicles from the original game behind 10 hours of clicking on dudes with the sẽnor graxa at least let us paint the van after we strap a gun to it. Like the brigador killers are a group of vengeful fanatics that constantly reference their beloved founding colonists, is it really that crazy to imagine them getting a little corvid with the vehicular decorating? That being said it's not like this game is completely doomed or anything. That's what's so infuriating about it, I can imagine a version of this game where everything works and it's beautiful. The story (even though there isn't much) feels intriguing. The idea of scoping out your target and coming up with a strategy to take them out sounds really cool. Being able to disembark from your mongoose to score a cheeky LAW shot on an unaware enemy, or detonating a covertly placed explosive to attract attention away from you when you're about to enter a heavily guarded compound, they're all very fun ideas. The devs have still improved on some elements since the demo, notably the merchant system seems like a good way to make the "lose gear on death" part of the game not as grueling. The enemy suppression system is really fun, I love how they eventually just throw their hands up and run away if you lay down mg fire. Exit's character, although not fleshed out yet, seems fascinating. If (and hopefully when) the devs fully flesh out this game it will be wonderful. But as it stands, unless you're buying the game to support the dev team, I can't say it's worth the price or time investment. Also honorable mention to how horrific they managed to make the lil' buddies look, like 10/10 job on that one it makes my skin crawl. TLDR: Don't buy the game unless you just wanna support the devs, also BRING BACK THE PARTY VAN