"To save our mother Earth from any alien attack,
From vicious giant insects who have once again come back,
We'll unleash all our forces, we won't cut them any slack,
The EDF deploys!"
So Good It's Good
Most mainstream games journalism websites tend to declare that EDF 4.1 is "so bad it's good", much like the Beginning of the End (1957), and other relatively well known "giant insect" and "kaiju" b grade science fiction films that EDF so gleefully draws the majority of its inspiration from. I'm here to tell you that EDF is not "so bad it's good". While it may be based in some of the most delightfully cheesy media ever produced by mankind, the game is surprisingly well designed, and- most importantly- extremely fun.
The Sense of Scale
In EDF 4.1, you and 3 other friends take on the roles of 4 z-list ground trooper grunts fighting as Japan's last line of defense against an unimaginably enormous fleet of flying saucers, quadroped fortresses, and countless other chromed out technological horrors taken straight from the nightmares of early to mid 1900s science fiction illustrators. These invaders have brought with them a seemingly never ending supply of horrifyingly oversized insects, arthropods, and arachnids.
You are what little the EDF can muster to defend against this onslaught, and shockingly, it absolutely feels like it. Even on normal difficulty, you and your squad will find yourselves leading daring assaults against tidal waves of oversized insects, outnumbered beyond your wildest dreams; fleeing desperately from hopelessly overpowered mechas the size of entire cities- and watching in horror as your tank line crumbles around you, leaving you, the pitiful infantry, flanked on all sides by enormous and deadly walkers.
And time and again, you will pull through by the skin of your teeth. You will find yourself totally immersed in this horrendously one-sided battle, where it really does feel like you stand absolutely no chance against the scale of the invasion.
One thing this game absolutely gets right, is the scale of the monsters, and how it feels to be confronting these beasts with just a handful of terrified squad members following you as you lead the charge. Third person was not only the smartest decision in terms of the gameplay, but also in terms of showing off the invaders. You are always forced to crane your camera upwards to look at basically anything that is attacking you, and in this, you automatically place yourself in one of the most well known forced perspective shots in film making. The tiny, powerless character standing before something so enormous it is incomprehensible.
The Military Experience
Initially something I thought was going to be unbelievably annoying, as it assailed me instantly upon trying to navigate the menus with the arrow keys, was the built in voice commands menu. Ultimately, it turns out that this command menu may be one of the best parts of the entire game.
It's not just the fact that you too, get to shout npc lines and run around screaming your head off, it's the fact that certain voice commands will rouse similar reactions from the AI soldiers around you. Imagine for a moment charging into battle with an endless onslaught of giant ants, all the while singing the anthem of the EDF, or shouting out taunts at the thousands of insects piling into your position-- with even the dozens of npcs behind you joining in. It's actually flat out amazing. EDF really puts you in the shoes of your soldier and gives you a real sense of comraderie, not just with your actual friends or the random players who might join your lobby, but even with the AI.
Another excellent aspect of this experience is that, from a writing and story perspective, EDF isn't afraid to force the players into losing battles, or to illustrate genuine communication or strategic errors coming from your commanders as they babble over your headset about giant insects and tunnels. One of my favorite missions thus far is your first encounter with the giant quadroped fortresses, in which you, your friends, a couple squads of infantry, and only 3 tanks attempt to stand up to the single most powerful enemy we have yet encountered in the story. Up until this point, the campaign has largely been relatively easy missions of clearing out swarms of insects-- to the point where the player's are feeling just as over confident as the military they are working for. When we first played the mission, we thought the commander's calls to fall back and to retreat were totally ironic, and that we the players were powerful enough to save the day. Our hubris was met with a series of sudden, and stunning defeats, before we finally realized that the only thing we could do before this metal monstrosity's awesome power, was turn tail and run.
That's right, EDF puts you in the genuine position of having to just survive and wait for the air force to hit the enemy with everything its got. All you can do is hide from the roving bands of Hectors- the highly dangerous bipedal mechas- and do whatever you can to stall the fortress. Throughout this you're hearing stories about how other, better funded, EDF branches have already taken down their fortresses-- it's clear that your tooth and nail defense won't even be the first to win a fight, even while everything is being flattened around you.
Another great mission is your first encounter with shield bearers, giant crawling robots that sport "shield screens", which defend anything underneath them from attack. Naturally, only infantry are small enough to penetrate the shield and attack the shield bearers directly, so you go straight to work against the first unguarded shield bearer- an easy and exciting victory. This victory soon turns to horror as the invaders exercise the reality of their plan, keeping Hectors underneath the shieldbearers.
In this particular mission, the Hectors are geared up with machine guns, meaning that they are entirely deadly at close range-- but to defeat them, you have to get into close range due to the shields. It's a great strategic catch 22, and makes for an excellent battle. Add on to this the fact that the air force refuses to call off their air strikes, illustrating a disconnect in communications between the army and air force- leaving you, the ground troops, caught between a crossfire of friendly airstrikes, and harassing assaults from the Hectors.
EDF is filled with stuff like this, scenarios built from the ground up to make you feel like a hero fighting against insurmountable odds.
Conclusion
While EDF has some faults in the menus- mostly just being a bit confusing and, for whatever reason, the equipment screen getting steadily framier the more missions you play in a row- any negative criticism I could earnestly level at it is totally outpaced by the legitimately enrapturing experience it offers the player. This is easily the best co-op game I've played, and one of the best games released in the current console generation. EDF 4.1 is a must buy if you have friends you can play it with, and is absolutely delightful in every way.
"Our forces have now dwindled and we pull back to regroup,
The enemy has multiplied and formed a massive group,
We better beat these bugs before we're all turned to soup,
The EDF deploys!"
