​Strange Brigade Review

By Kevin Mitchell  |  Posted: August 30, 2018

Called upon during the world's most desperate hours, the Strange Brigade uses their skills, immense weapon loadouts, and supernatural powers to combat the forces of evil. In their latest adventure, you are tasked with exploring 1930s Egypt to defeat the Witch Queen Seteki and her horde of undead mummies, giant scorpions, and pirate loyalists. Will our heroes prevail, or will the untold horrors from beyond the grave spread across the planet? Find out in the next exciting adventure of the Strange Brigade—or just keep reading this review.

At its heart, Strange Brigade is an online cooperative third-person shooter for up to four players, set across nine lengthy campaign missions spanning long-lost villages, desert pyramids, darkened tombs, lush valleys, and plundering (undead) pirate-infested caverns of the damned. The game's atmosphere, charm, and setting feel ripped straight out of classic adventure films and stories from the same period. I was immediately captivated by the presentation, which looks quite sharp and runs smoothly on an Xbox One X. The enthusiastic in-game narration from Glen McCready (whom you may recognize from Zombie Army Trilogy) does an outstanding job. I couldn't help but smile or chuckle at every little side comment, reaction to new enemy types, and his complete disgust for the sacred feline animals of ancient Egypt: cats.

Before launch, the game included four uniquely designed characters, each with their own personality and distinction. A fifth hero is being released free to those who pre-ordered or purchased the game within the first 30 days, and additional characters are planned for post-launch. Each character comes from a different part of the world, joined together by the need to vanquish the forces of evil. Professor Archimedes de Quincy, whom I played during my first playthrough, is an Oxford scholar and archaeologist (the Indiana Jones of the group), whereas Nalangu Rushida is a female Maasai warrior from Kenya. Although each character has a different primary weapon equipped at the start, they all share from the same pool. Only a small amount of weaponry is available at the beginning, broken up into three categories: primary, sidearm, and grenade.

Primary firearms provide a good range of different types depending on how you want to play, from submachine guns and shotguns to repeating rifles and semi-automatic rifles. Sidearms are quite basic and fit within the game's narrative, ranging from standard-issue pistols to an ultra-powerful Wesley revolver (designed after the Webley revolver). Each weapon has various stats, such as damage output, rate of fire, and accuracy, as well as reload time and ammunition capacity. Grenades come in different varieties, separated by damage output and blast radius. Primary weapons use ammunition that must be refilled frequently, whereas sidearms have an unlimited supply. Grenades can be used as often as you like but feature a cooldown timer. Molotov cocktails, my favorite grenade type, can light up dark caverns and set bumbling mummies ablaze but lack the sheer carnage of landmines or dynamite. There are also temporary "super" weapons purchased using gold during your adventure that disappear once depleted. There's something so satisfying about watching a dozen undead monsters burst into flames simultaneously, crawling along the ground in agony.

For the most part, semi and fully automatic weapons have abysmal recoil and accuracy, which comes into play when dealing with bosses. These powerful and massive enemies have certain glowing areas that must be shot multiple times to advance to the next phase. Add in waves of enemies and trying to dodge boss attacks simultaneously, and these encounters can be quite troublesome when playing solo.

New items can be purchased using gold collected during your adventure, which unlocks their use for all characters. This accounts for primaries, sidearms, and grenades, but unlocking new amulet powers is strictly tied to collecting relics in each level. But let's take a step back and discuss how gold collecting works in Strange Brigade when playing with others. Instead of sharing loot, each player gains precious gold from killing enemies (having the killing shot) and by opening/destroying crates and chests. Although you are all working toward the same goal, competition may arise over who can reach the chests first. In the end, raising the difficulty and increasing the spawn rate of enemies to max (something I don't recommend when playing alone) will increase the amount of gold you'll find. Not to mention every level is full of hidden rooms and passageways off the beaten track, making exploring every area well worth the effort.

With weapons being shared between all characters, the unique amulet powers truly separate each character from one another. As previously mentioned, I played through the campaign using the Professor first (who happens to have the uncanny ability to open hidden passageways marked with the Eye of Ra). His amulet powers range from summoning a swarm of scarabs that track their prey to summoning a bolt of lightning that travels through multiple foes, either killing them instantly or immobilizing them for a short time. On the other hand, Frank Fairburne can summon undead warriors to fight by his side, while Gracie Braithwaite can toss foes into others in the form of exploding missiles. Your amulet power is charged by collecting glowing blue orbs, or souls, from defeated monsters. Using your amulet, you can draw them toward you, although if you're playing cooperatively, other players may vie for the same souls, creating a tug-of-war effect. It's an intriguing mechanic that, along with not sharing gold, adds a bit of competitive spirit to a cooperative experience.

Ancient chests full of gold aren't the only things to find during your adventure, as levels have a set amount of hidden relics, gems, canopic jars (sacred Egyptian jars used to preserve its owner for the afterlife during mummification), and blue statues of cats (representing Bastet, the goddess of warfare). Gems are used to upgrade weapons, adding effects such as setting enemies on fire or letting your bullets ricochet around the environment. The cats are easier to find than the canopic jars, as you'll hear crying cat noises when they're nearby. If you happen to find all six in a level, you'll gain access to riches beyond your wildest dreams right before reaching the boss area. Throughout your adventure, you won't only be dealing with the undead army of Seteki—every locale is ripe with traps to avoid or use in your favor, and environmental and brain-teasing puzzles to solve. At one point, you may be triggering spinning blades that spring up from wooden structures, rolling fire, spike traps, and avoiding blades swinging from the ceiling. Usually, these can be easily avoided, but when getting swarmed—and you will be continuously swarmed—it's very easy to lose your bearings. Environments are also quite interactive, featuring metal torches that can drop fire on unsuspecting enemies, swinging logs, or barrels that explode spectacularly. However, these objects are only highlighted in red when aiming down the sight of your weapon.

Outside of the primary narrative game mode, Strange Brigade also features a horde mode and a score attack mode. Both are recommended to be played after completing the campaign, as you'll unlock new areas by completing campaign levels. The horde mode features replayable checkpoints once reached, so you don't have to start over from the first wave every time. The game does have a separate season pass that adds a three-part mini-campaign, new weapons, outfits, amulet powers, heroes, and more.

Simply Put

Strange Brigade is a robust online cooperative experience to play with friends and strangers alike. The presentation is hands-down one of the best experiences I've seen this year, from the visuals and level design to the game's music and sound effects. Also, I tip my hat to the talented Glen McCready, who continually narrates throughout the adventure. It's a shame that the characters don't have additional outfits or customization outside of weapon loadouts at launch, but with free and paid downloadable content in the future, Rebellion may be supporting this fun third-person shooter for quite some time.