Strange Brigade Offers Co-Op Slaying Fun

I recently upgraded my graphics card and received three free games as part of an AMD promotion.  Having not heard of two of the games in the package, I was very skeptical about the quality of these bonus games.  The first game I decided to check out was Strange Brigade.  Strange Brigade is a third-person co-op shooter that feels inspired by games like Left 4 Dead and the Tomb Raider series.  Not only are you slaying huge hordes of mummies and skeletons, but you're also using your noggin to solve various puzzles scattered around the map.  That might seem like a bit of a strange combination, but it works well in the campaign mode of the game (probably not so well in the multiplayer, but I'll get to that).

Nalangu on an early level.  Amulet is charged!

Strange Brigade follows the four members of a 1930's supernatural investigative team.  They travel the globe in their oddly homey blimp solving the mysteries associated with various phenomena.  The four members offer a cast of diverse characters to play--Dr. de Quincey is a dashing academic type; Frank Fairburne is a grizzled veteran; Gracie Braithwaite is the brash engineer; and Nalangu Rashida is an African specialist in the spirit world.  Similar to Left 4 Dead, each character seems to specialize in a specific type of weapon (although I'm pretty sure that you can swap out to any weapons that you prefer)--de Quincey and Nalangu start off armed with rapid firing submachine guns/semi-automatic rifles, Gracie seems to be the shotgun specialist, and Frank is the sharpshooter who is armed with a long range rifle.  The story follows the brigade as they travel to Egypt to discover the fate of an archaeologist who had disappeared under mysterious circumstances that appear to be linked to the resurrection of an evil, demonic, Egyptian lady pharaoh.

Pros:

--Indiana Jones-esque/1930's setting and feel.  Each new mission is debriefed in the form of a grainy, black and white faux newsreel.  Missions are doled out by a mysterious "Lady I" over an old-timey radio aboard the brigade's fancy, floating airship base.  The weapons that players use also have a distinct (but definitely not historically accurate) antique type of feel.

--To compliment the 1930's feel, your missions are narrated by a voice that sounds like it came straight out of a radio serial.  Often the narration has a sort of cheesy, over-the-top feeling that is almost cringeworthy, but helps lend the perfect air to each mission.

--Beautiful maps.  Each setting looks amazing--whether you're traversing a lush, valley or a dark, tomb, there are a dazzling array of details to take in.  It's very cool to just look around the map and think about how you're possibly going to end up at a much higher or lower area--somehow you always do though.

--There's more than just shooting.  Every time you kill an enemy they drop a small, floating blue orb that is some sort of magic.  Each character wields a magical amulet that can absorb this magic and store it up for a powerful magic attack.  There's a bit of strategy in deciding when and how to best utilize your amulet.

--Character variety.  Each character can wield the weapons that you want them to, but they also have access to unique amulet powers.  These amulet powers are specific to that character and can be unlocked through discovering and completing relic sets (I will get to that).  Each character has 4 different powers that they can choose from.  Those powers can be useful for things like crowd control or quickly eliminating groups of enemies.  I played as Nalangu and her amulet powers included a fiery, leaping melee attack that could wipe out a group of enemies in an area; a tether-like attack that allows her to attach an electric beam to an enemy and then wipe out any enemies that cross the beam (it's sort of a weird one, but can be useful for running around and taking out a bunch of lesser enemies); a wave of ice that freezes enemies in a straight line and makes them brittle; and a push-back attack that knocks groups of enemies down.  Amulet powers can be easily switched and adapted for different situations--for example, mummies are very flammable but skeletons are not, so it's generally a good idea to swap out abilities based on the enemy type.  Each character is equipped with a main weapon, a sidearm (a pistol or revolver), and a grenade.  All of those items can be swapped with purchasable upgrades.

--Exploration.  Each map features a number of puzzles and locked/hidden rooms that encourage players to do more than just blast their way through to the end.  The benefit of completing these puzzles is that you can find treasure chests that can contain gold or special gems that can be slotted into your weapons to give them extra abilities.  Finding gold is useful because it can be used between missions to unlock new, more powerful weapons.  There are also special relic chests that contain special items that are part of a set.  When these sets are completed, players are granted a "skill point" that can be used to unlock new amulet powers.

--Collectibles.  There are special hidden items that are present throughout each level; finding them all can be quite challenging.  There are six magical cat statues (of the goddess Bast--an Egyptian cat deity) and four canopic jars on each level.  The cat statues aren't especially difficult to find on most levels as there is an audio cue of meowing that plays when you are in the vicinity of the items (on some later levels there is a lot of narration/character talking so it can be easy to miss the cues), but the canopic jars are very well hidden.  Since most levels are highly detailed and massively sprawling, picking out a tiny, turquoise canopic jar is tough.  I think I managed to find 3/4 jars on maybe one or two maps.  Finding all the cat statues will unlock a special door at the end of each level that contains a bunch of gold and a golden cat statue.  Since I didn't manage to find all the jars on any level, I have no idea what finding the jars does (I'm guessing skill points).  There are also letters and magazines with game related lore that can be collected.

--Strategic planning.  Certain areas feature a timed lock mechanism that see you fighting huge hordes of enemies.  These large areas also feature sets of traps that can be shot and utilized when needed--there are spike traps, fire traps, blade traps, so many traps!  One interesting feature of these traps is that they can only be used a certain number of times before they lock.  You really have to plan for the ideal time to pop a trap and slay a big group of enemies--you also have to be careful because inadvertently shooting a trap trigger means that you've wasted a charge of a trap.

--Puzzles.  The concept of putting puzzles into a shooter might seem very odd.  The reality is that these puzzles are really easy to solve.  Most of them require simple attention to detail--there might be sets of hieroglyphs hidden in a certain room, you have to find those glyphs and then shoot the correct pattern on a magical door to unlock it.  The puzzles might be easy, but you do only get three tries to solve most of them (which is plenty--really, they aren't hard).  The most difficult puzzles to solve were the mosaic puzzles that have tiles that rotate in a specific pattern when shot.  Even those puzzles could be trial-and-error'd to success.

--Multiple game modes.  Most players will probably start off with the single player campaign which is story based.  Once players have progressed through the story a bit, they can unlock two other game modes--horde mode and score attack mode.  Horde mode is a wave based challenge that increases with difficulty as players defeat each wave.  Score attack is a timed mode that challenges players to slay enemies as quickly as possible and earn points for utilizing special attacks and traps.

--Single player or co-op play.  The campaign and all game modes support 1-4 players.  Story mode seems to be more oriented toward single players while horde mode would definitely be more fun with multiple players.

--Ran like a charm for me.  No crashes, no bugs, no issues!

Cons:

--Most enemies are slow and easy to defeat.  There are a variety of enemy types and the boss type of enemies are tougher, but 90% of the time I felt like the pied piper of mummies--I would just run around the map with a huge string of lumbering corpses trailing me.  Unlike Left 4 Dead, there aren't enemies that make you change tactics to deal with them.

--Not a ton of challenge.  Puzzles are easy, most enemies are easy to defeat (FYI--I started on the default difficulty but there are other difficulty settings.  You can even opt to force the maximum number of enemies--basically making the game populate enemies as if 4 people were playing) and even the boss fights weren't particularly challenging.  I think I died two times total--and I wouldn't exactly classify myself as someone who has any special ability at shooters.

--Multiplayer needs some tweaking.  Although I haven't played the multiplayer, one of the big complaints on the forums is that gold is not equally doled out in multiplayer mode and often each match becomes a race to see who can find chests first as opposed to actual cooperative play.  The devs should definitely rethink this mechanic if they want to encourage true co-op play.  It sounds like the best plan for multiplayer is to play with friends and not to choose "random match,"

--DLC, DLC, and more DLC.  There are new weapons that can be purchased, three new characters, and a recently rolled out (part 1 of 3) new set of campaign missions.  Holy cash grab Batman!  Of course you could always opt for the $34.99 season pass...

--Overpriced.  The game is pretty and I had fun, but I finished the campaign at around 12 hours.  I messed around a bit with horde mode and score attack, but I don't really see the the game as being worth the $49.99 price tag.  If I hadn't have gotten it for "free" as part of a promotion I definitely wouldn't have paid that much for it.  I highly recommend waiting until it starts to be offered at a sale price.

I would recommend Strange Brigade to those who don't see themselves as traditional shooter-types--it would be great for those who are looking for an entry level shooter that provides some challenge, but will still allow them to feel a sense of accomplishment or for those who want some exploration and light puzzle solving sprinkled in.  It's beautiful and very detailed, but is currently overpriced for the amount of content that players get.

TL;DR

Recommended for:

--Gamers looking for an entry-level type of shooter

--Players who like some exploration and puzzle solving on top of their shooting

--Players with fat wallets.

--Players looking for a game to play with their non-gamer-ish significant other.

--Players who have friends they can play with.

Not recommended for:

--Hardcore shooter fans.  It's not hard enough for your leetness.  BLOPS4 just came out.

--Players wanting to multiplayer with random peeps (it's a mess--read above).

--Gamers on a budget.  It's currently overpriced--wait until a sale.