This is a great title for what it is with a fair asking price. While not being as deep as some might have expected or wanted the surface level mechanics of the game create a believable and fun Starship Troopers experience. The Voice Acting is perfectly cheesy and over the top as is expected and for the most part the game hits all the right highs that one would expect.
Unfortunately this experience is also hindered by a laundry list of bugs and features that seem half baked at best. The most notable of which being larger enemy types (Tank bugs mainly) have AI that struggles to navigate even open areas on the map. This leads to awkward scenarios where a Tank Bug is unable to attack your troops and just stands still waiting to be killed.

The base game of Medieval 2 Total war is my second favorite in the series. Pair that with the best mods and extra campaigns the series has to offer it is my personal favorite total war game. None of the others have grasped me as much as this one.

Third Age Total war 10/10
The elder scrolls total war 8/10
plenty of historical mods that allow you to go from the 200's to the 1400's all containing variations of the high quality base game mechanics

This is by far one of the most bland RPGs I have played. There are nearly no new concepts to add to the genre and combine that with the overall SEVERE lack of polish and promised features I cannot recommend the game. Entire mechanics that were discussed during development have been cut from the game without any mention of it.

If I had to describe the positives of this game I would have to say just buy something like the outer worlds or fallout 4. You will get essentially the same experience but in a game that is actually finished and doesn't have blaring flaws that ruin the experience. Don't buy at full price and definetly don't buy at anything less than a 50% discount.


If you don't have hardware better than the recommended requirements I have to DOUBLE down on not recommending that you buy the game.
RECOMMENDED:
Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
OS: Windows 10
Processor: Intel Core i7-4790 or AMD Ryzen 3 3200G
Memory: 12 GB RAM
Graphics: GTX 1060 6GB / GTX 1660 Super or Radeon RX 590
DirectX: Version 12
Storage: 70 GB available space
Additional Notes: SSD recommended

Honestly the devs deserve credit for creating a moderately fun title despite what their managers forced them to release. The game doesn't even feel half finished and the only polish you will find is in the main story quests.

Quick Edit: I was very negative in the original review but I want to reinforce the good parts of the game really fast. The Fleet battles are fun and interesting (up until you get titan) where positioning of your ship relative to enemies really matters. In addition the grind up to a point is actually enjoyable because the core gameplay loop is relatively enjoyable. Flying around doing repetetive missions and killing the same sets of enemies is fun purely because the combat and ship variety are what carry the game.

Welp. I finally purchased this game. I would give it a Meh. To sum it up this game has a decent single player campaign that is definetly worth 8 - 10 bucks but past that there is really no reason to keep playing. The "4x" elements are insanely barebones and the game is rife with issues from high levels of micromanagment to broken fleet ai.

You will spend most of your time enjoying the grind to get to the Dreadnaught ships or the TITAN ships but in all honesty the Titan was the least satisfying ship to fly. It felt like it was a poor community made mod and did not feel satisfying when I unlocked it. It is so broken as a ship that you won't even be able to hear your light weapons firing because the ship is too large for the camera to be close enough for the sounds to actually be processed. In addition all of the other ships in the game have actual turret mounts that give you an idea of the firing arcs of your turrets but the Titan just doesn't. It is just flat textures with bullets and missiles appearing out of nowhere. The upside of this is that the ship is so powerful that it doesn't matter if you cannot figure out what is going on because you will hardly ever have your shields penetrated. Essentially the last 5 or so hours of the storyline I was just cruising around in this massive ship just melting any foes that got in my way.

Unfortunately the game is mechanically barebones and really doesn't make for an enjoyable strategy game. I recommend playing this as an RPG first and foremost and then expand your territories in between missions for fun little fights that you can enjoy doing before you get to the point of being OP.

I don't really see myself returning to this title ever for the freeroam modes, to purchase the DLC or for the post campaign "conquer the map" scenario. The grind just is too much for that. Every planet you conquer has a massive fleet battle that you have to participate in where the AI factions bring in roughly 100k worth of fleet power to counter your conquering while you are stuck with a measly 40k for most of the game due to the crazy low fleet capacity. You are only allowed to have about 35k max fleet cap without conquering stations which would be fine if the stations actually gave you more than just 2k fleet capacity. For reference the mainline cruisers are about 2.3k fleet capacity so what ends up happening is you just hit a softcap for fleet cap where you can only field 2 24k fleets while all the other AI factions on the map seemingly have an unlimited number of fleet cap so they will have 3-4 15k patrol stacks that are just a headache to kill more than anything else. The grind is there for the grinds sake.

I understand that this is a game well loved by everybody but it just didn't click with me. It was truly a slog to play through the 12 hours that I did where I would play an hour or two once every month or so until I finally realized I am never going to enjoy the game.

Movement feels floaty. Guns aren't really satisfying. Enemy types are REALLY boring despite being so varied. The first 2 or so hours rocked until I realized the entire game was going to just be Enter room -> clear room -> kill boss (or miniboss) on repeat forever