Earth Defence Force: World Brothers review | PC, PS4, Switch
31Earth Defence Force is a series I’ve always struggled to take seriously, although that’s probably been the point from the beginning. A franchise about an elite special military unit designed to fight legions of giant insects and robots is hardly Oscar-winning stuff, and yet the developers have always known this, and now seem to be leaning into it with relish for Earth Defence Force: World Brothers.
Originally, EDF was created as part of the Simple Series in the PlayStation 2 era. A stable of games built on lower budgets, most of the Simple Series never saw a release in the West. EDF is one of the few that did, alongside Onechanbara, a franchise best known for being about bikini-clad anime girls killing zombies with katanas. Earth Defence Force went the other way, attempting to inject some realism into its inherently silly premise. This has seen mixed results, to be fair.
One area that suffers heavily from samey-ness is the “comedy”. It’s incredibly self-aware, with characters openly discussing the soundtrack, acknowledging that it’s a video game, even discussing the phases of a boss fight as they’re happening. This raised a smile at first, but soon became a little rote. Likewise, the one-liners uttered by the characters tickled me until I realised everyone only has about half a dozen lines and they repeat over and over again. I can also see some people finding ways to be offended by the racial stereotypes of some of the characters, which honestly feels a little like something from a 90s cartoon.
Adjust your expectations accordingly, and there’s a lot to like here. Low detail, destructible environments and good old fashioned blasting make for some great family fun, while the overall feel of Earth Defence Force: World Brothers should tide over the franchise fans until the arrival of EDF 6 later in the year.
Review code provided by publisher.
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