Time of the Mutants

I'm perfectly fine with my console copy of Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair, but knowing that more of you are able to get ?into the bug-blasting shooter now that it's on PC makes me happy. And heck, I may double dip with the right sale (and by "may," I mean "definitely will").

The first DLC pack, the funnily-named Time of the Mutants, is out now on Steam with 26 "really, really, REALLY hard" levels. You see those ants? Those aren't your average giant ants. No sir. But tougher missions mean better rewards. ??Here's some Air Raider footage from YouTube user William Tr??elane:

The add-on pack is $11.99 ??normally, but until August 15, it's reduced by 20 percent to $9.59.

Mission Pack 1: Time of the Mutants [Steam]

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Kill 'em all

It's been long enough since that big list of supposed Steam games surfaced that I had forgotten Earth Defense Force 4.1 may or may not make it to PC. Well, it's happening, and we'll only need to wait a matter of days. The Steam release for San??dlot's bug-blasting co-op shooter is set for Monday, July 18.

According to D3 Publisher, there will be English/Japanese language support (including full audio), achievements, cloud saves, and online co-op. The game is going to cost $49.99 normally, but there's a 30 percent off launch-window ?discount planned. Fingers crossed the port is decent.

As I covered in my review of the PlayStation 4 version, EDF 4.1 is a great entry point for the kooky series. Here are some miscellaneous photos to help illustrate what ??it'?s about:

Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Sha??dow of New Despair [Steam]

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'Some new, some classic, all EXTREME!'

Lord knows I don't need a good reason to get back into Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair right now (too busy!), but I'm getting one anyw??ay in the form of 23 extra missions.

The game's second major DLC release, Mission Pack 2: Extreme Battle, is out now and it's free to claim during its first two weeks of availability on PlayStation Network. Go grab it from that link. The gesture is "a?? thank you to players for thei??r patience" with recent save-system issues.

After the two weeks are up, the add-on will cost $9.99, right in line with Mission Pack 1: Time of the Mutants (what glorious human being is respons??ible for naming the??se things?).

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The first DLC level pack is out

Unsurprisingly, Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair is getting extra missions post-release. The first DLC pack, Time of the Mutants, released this week on PlaySt??ation Network. It's $9.99 for 26 levels. A second?? pack, Extreme Battle, is forthcoming.

"Some of these missions come from Earth Defense Force 2025, some are brand-new, but they all have one thing in common: They're really, really, REALLY hard," reads the store descript??ion??.

XSEED streamed a portion of the DLC earlier today, and you can find the archive over here. It's the same old bugs, from what I saw, but they're colored differently, hit harder, and are likely an excellent source of high-end weapon drops. That's how it was in 2025, anyway.

One of my favorite multiplayer experiences in recent memory was playing EDF 4.1 online. I joined a random group of strangers and we stuck together for hours on end. As the night progressed, we got stronger as a team. More cohesive. Funnier, too. Everyone seemed to know exactly which of the approximately eig?ht hun?dred pre-set text messages to use and when. Such good times.

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The bugs are back in town

I'm happy Earth Defense Force continues to exist.

There's no shortage of modern video games in which your?? primary inter??action with the world is shooting things, but so few of them are lighthearted, charming, or funny. I don't need every game to strive for photorealism or masterful storytelling, you know?

Sometimes I just want to fire guns at hundreds of bugs, robots, an??d dragons until they explode, or knock down entire cities, building by building, with zero consequences. Sometimes I want to chant "EDF! EDF! EDF!" while somersaulting to victory.

Going into EDF 4.1, I wasn't sure what to expect other than 1080p and 60 frames per second. This is an enhanced version of Earth Defense Force 2025 (known as Earth Defense Force 4 in Japan) with new content, gamepl??ay tweaks, and improved visuals. It's not as much of an upgrade as I would have hoped -- particularly when it comes to the frame rate -- but it is my favorite title to date.

Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair (PlayStation 4)
Developer: Sandlot
Publisher: XSEED Games
Released: December 8, 2015 (NA) / February 12, 2016 (EU)
MSRP: $49.99

Some of tho??se enhancements are immediately apparent; others ??????????????????????????are hard to pin to down.

Visually, this is the best-looking, best-running Earth Defense Force I've played -- which is not to say it looks good or runs all that well by normal standards, mind you. Despite claims of a "steady" 60 frames per second, the game struggles to keep up with itself. Notic?eable dips are a common sight when too many Ravagers pile up near your character or when skyscrapers crumble.

The drop off usually isn't dramatic enough to be bothersome, but there were a handful of moments during my initial 15-hour-or-so run through the campaign where the frame rate briefly became?? a choppy, unmanageable mess. This is by no means new for the series, but it is a shame these problems persist on a current console like the PlayStation 4.

Thankfully, load times fare significantly better. They're quick. I often made it into levels before I even had a chance to finish reading the tips and tricks shown on the loading screen. Considering how many missions? there are (89 in single-player and split-screen; 98 in online co-op), that's a huge deal. These games are heavily built around players returning to levels countless times to earn more armor and cool weapons. No one wants to rack up literal hours of waiting to get into the action.

Generally speaking, EDF 4.1 feels like a remix. Developer Sandlot reused set pieces and story beats in its earlier games, and that doesn't change here. (Again, this is an enhanced version of 2025, which in turn borrowed from 2017, so it's to be ex?pected.) Remember fighting waves of red ants on a beach? Oh, ?you will.

You'll also take on spiders, bees, bipedal robots, and spaceships, all of varying color and form. The mission is always to kill everything (or simply survive until someone tells you the thing you're after can't be killed yet), but there's enough variety strung throughout the campaign that I rarely got bored.? The pacing is good, and few levels? outstayed their welcome.

That said, your results may vary depending on which class you choose (Ranger, Wing Diver, Air Raider, or Fencer), which weapons the random-number generator has blessed you with, and whether or not you're playing alone. The latter three classes are more specialized, but they have better options for getting across EDF's huge env??ironments -- whether it's flying, driving, or dashing -- and they possess some of the more entertaining toys. The Ranger is well-rounded, but he can get stale.

To that last point, these games are inherently more enjoyable with a friend (or up to three, if you're playing online). The classes are designed to complement each other, so it's most enjoyab?le with a mix of characters. The Air Raider, for instance, can buff others, lay down shields, and manually target enemy weak points for teammate?s' weaponry to lock onto.

As far as new foes go, there ?is one particular encounter worth highlighting. Sandlot has added a new kaiju enemy, Erginus, that spans multiple levels. Your superiors eventually figure out that normal bullets and missiles have no effect on the monster. Naturally, the only way to bring it down is to initiate an absurd Rock 'em Sock 'em Robots-style brawl. You get to take control of a slow-moving "walking fortress" mech and punch the gargantuan approximately three thousand times until it finally keels over. I should have known that was its one and only weakness.

A later mission raises the stakes with multiple mechs fending off against multiple Erginus. My first time through, everyone got tangled up in one corner of the map and I had to wait on the AI to die before I could even get within range to throw punches. The whole thing was a stupid, beautiful mess, which is exactly what I hope to find when I play Earth Defense Force.

And in case you were wondering, yes -- the mechs are carried in by choppers.

Tunnel levels and vehicles are some of my least favorite elements of this series, but both are better than ever here. New lighting effects make underground areas appear as if they are, in fact, set underground, and soldiers have lights on their weapons to compensate. The atmosphere now feels far more appropriate. I still find these levels to be uninteresting and quickly get annoyed w??hen insect bodies pile up and block my shots, but the majority of the game is set above ground.

As for vehicles, crucially, you can now see where you're aiming thanks to a laser sight. It's a total godsend. And I can't tell if the handling has been improved or it's merely my imagination, but for once, I? genuinely wanted to drive tanks whenever and wherever I could. It helps that one of them is shaped like a spid?er and can crawl on walls. Bring that one below the surface.

I also got the impression that there are more NPCs on the field compared to 2025. By pressing the DualShock 4 touchpad, you can place a marker on specific buildings, enemies, or locations. I was never sure if the AI was reacting to these commands or not (those weren't suggestions, people!), but being able to highlight targets? is a great feature for co-op play.

Insubordinate or not, more soldiers means more goofy dialog. The strange on-the-ground banter is spontaneous, hilarious, and rarely appropriate for the situation at hand. You can spur specific sayings using the touchpad. My personal favorite is a song that sounds an awful lot like the "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." One variation of the?? tune goes a little something like this:

"To save our mother Earth from any alien attack, from vicio?us giant insects? who have once again come back. We'll unleash all our forces, we won't cut them any slack. The EDF deploys!"

My troops have uttered those words no fewer than 50 times and they'll continue to sing on command if they kn??ow what's good for them. This is precisely the sort of silliness ??that makes these games endearing in spite of their technical flaws and lo-fi aesthetic.

In organizing my thoughts for this review, I realized I'm not ready to stop playing EDF 4.1. That's exciting, but also scary.

I don't typically stick with these games long enough to get deep into the higher difficulty settings. Reaching that point requires a lot of grinding and patience. Too much. But that's where you need ??to tread to earn the best, most interesting weapons. While part of me hates that the progression system isn't more respectful of our time, I understand the appeal of having something you can keep coming back to for hundre?ds of hours. There's comfort in that.

If I were to stick with a single installment going forward, this would be the one. Some of the upgrades fall short of expectations, and a good deal of the content is overly familiar at this point, but The Shadow of New Despair still represents the series at its best.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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EDF! EDF!

XSEED Games is serving up a double-shot of bug-killing action on December 8, simultaneously putting out both Earth Defense Force 4.1 and Earth Defense Force 2 in North America.

EDF 4.1, an expansion on last year's Earth Defense Force 2025 for PlayStation 4, vaunts improved visuals, smoother framerates, and? over 50 percent new content to help justify its $50 price tag.

Meanwhile, EDF 2 ($30) is a P?laySta??tion 2 title previously unreleased in North America that's been reworked for the PlayStation Vita with extras features, including new voiceover and online co-op.

There's currently no word on when exactly the games will be released in European markets?.

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But it is better

Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair is an enhanced and extended version of EDF 2025 adding more levels, including a giant mech versus monster fight, a fir??st for ?the series, though a majority of your time will be spent blowing up giant bugs on foot. Each class that is available has some small added abilities as well to enhance the experience, although mostly minor things such as being able to dodge roll through fences. 

I've been a fan of EDF since Xbox 360's Earth Defense Force 2017, and frame rate dips have been a constant in the series. XSEED Games hoped to remedy that with the PS4's Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair, but it has failed.

After a brief hands on with the game today on the show floor at E3, it was obvious that the frame rate issues persist, although not nearly as bad as before. Running at 1080p and targeting 60fps, I'd say I still saw dips to around 30fps -- if not lower -- during explosions when there were many bugs on the screen. As the game is already available in Japan, it is doubtful frame rate issues will be fixed for the localized version. That being said this is still the smoothest EDF&?nbsp;I've played,? as previous titles had some atrocious frame rate issues.

Still too early to tell if the added content and somewhat better frame rate are worth double dipping for, but fans of the series are used to it at this point and will prob??ably pick it up regardless. If you're new to the series, this is a good place to start, especially if you have a friend for split screen co-op.

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I bet you're recoiling in shock

In the course of covering videogames, sometimes you go into an appointment knowing exactly what's going to happen. You know precisely how the game will play and what the demo will be like -- everything's just crystal clear. That's how my first look at Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair on PS4 went. There sure are a lot of bugs, and oh bo??y, do you ever kill them.

Dropped off in the middle of a giant city, I was given ten minutes to defend Earth with my forces. Equipped with a machine gun and a rocket launcher, I set off to blow as many giant ants into rust-colored oblivion as I possibly could. Real talk: If the game kept track of this sort of thing, I may have done more damage than good. But, we're here to fulfill our exterminator super??hero fantasies, so let's not dwell on semantics.

Anyone that's familiar with the franchise won't be surprised to find out that The Shadow of New Despair isn't going to push the PS4 to its visual limitations. Right now, everything looks pretty rough, and I'd doubt it ever gets significantly better. Every asset in the game is just more jagged than we're used in 2014 (and the past several years), but that's to be expected with EDF. It's almost a calling card of sorts.

Another calling card is just how much cathartic, dumb fun it can be. Yep, good thing I killed those huge bugs so now I can go take care of the giant ants climbing on the skyscraper and then I can massacre this other group of them. Relentless, unceasing insect murdering. It's not for everyone, but it looks as if The Shadow of New Despair will be right up EDF fans' alley. And, that alley will probably house some bugs t?h??at needs blown up.

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