Earth Defense Force 6 is released recently. I havesome interest in Earth Defense Force game since I watch someone play it on Youtube.In fact, I already have Earth Defense Force 4.1 on my Steam’s library. Butbefore I jump to the 4th game. I want to test the 2nd game first: Sandlot’s EarthDefense Force 2 Portable (2011) on PSP.
There’s some good titlescreen, also informative because this screen portrays the premise prettyaccurately which is: player takes role on human special soldier againstinvading giant ants and spider. So…
Warning: If youhave Myrmecophobia or Arachnophobia,you definitely must not play this game.
Anyway, the game is nottranslated to English. But I don’t need to worry about that because there’s noway a game about killing giant insects from outer space, has complicated textor instruction, right? For example, in this main menu: upper menu is “New Game”and lower menu is “Load Game”. See? The language barrier is not that big ofdeal.
There’s prologue after Ienter my name. With this image alone, you probably can guess the story, right?Basically, bunch of UFO drops giant insects on earth and they attack humans.
However, world peace returnedwith the help of EDF. In 2018, EDF is re-established and on the same yearspecial force of Pale Wing is formed.
In 2019, emergency situationoccurs. There’s urgent message from UK. It says “Throng of giant insects appearin London”. The last line says “The earth was already polluted…”
I don’t know the meaning ofthe last line. Everyone knows earth is polluted by those schmucks who don’tcare about ecology or whatnot. So, the inclusion of giant insects makes thepollution problem worse, somehow. Perhaps their feces (where they get aftereating people) will add more methane gas released to atmosphere besides fromCow’s emission. We can’t let that happen! We have to safe the earth and that’swhat being in EDF is all about!
Now, I have to deal withthese menus. They remind me of room setup in . Here’s the menus: The garage is start the mission.Armory is equipment setup. Meeting room is save game. Server room is settingoption. Command control room is multiplayer menu. Lobby is exit to main menu.These menus are not bad. As for 3 lines of word from top to bottom: Character’shealth (hitpoints), weapon acquired, and mission completion rate. There are 2numbers on each stats because there’s separated stats for each class: groundtroop and pale wing that I mentioned before.
You can change your class inequipment setup. For now, I stick being the boring vanilla ground troop. Myinitial arsenal is assault rifle and bazooka.
Selecting “starting mission”or the game calls it “sortie”, brings you the available mission then you get tochoose the difficulty. Next mission is unlocked after finishing the previousmission. The harder the difficulty you get the better weapon you can get.However, weapon drop is a chance and not guaranteed to get. I won’t push myluck from get go so I choose the normal difficulty.
So, the prologue is right.London is swarmed with giant alien ant. I hope museum ship HMS Belfast is fine.If you comment “Haha! Japanese is weird to think that alien is in form of giantant”, I have to rebuke you right there.
InVigilante 8: 2nd Offense (PSX)...
Here’s giant alien ant (thatcan shoot laser) in Vigilante 8: 2nd Offense on Playstation 1. I mentioned it a bit inwhen I review Cloverfield. I’m certain this combat vehicle game ismade by an American company: Luxoflux Corp. There’s theory that beforegrey small men that we all know, American’s concept about alien or creaturefrom outer space is giant ant. Or Flatwood Monster. I don’t have solid proof ofthat other than this screenshot. Maybe you can find the evidence of giant antas alien in very old American movie. By you, I mean me personally.
Regardless, I believe theconcept of giant alien ant is the basis of Warhammer 40K’s Tyranid races,Starcraft’s Zergs or even Xenomorph. Anyway, back to London’s crisis in EDF2 Portable…
I’m located in the middle ofthe bridge and there’s some big distance between me and the alien swam. Thebasic strategy is: use Bazooka as main attack method. When there’s ant thatclose to me, I use the assault rifle so I don’t get hit by bazooka’s explosion.Kind of like strategy for Soldier in Team Fortress 2.
The control is D-pad to moveforward or backward and turn left or right. Square to fire my weapon. Cross tojump. Circle to switch between weapon. As for triangle…to fire upward slightly.Not sure what it’s for since my aim is automatically change depend on enemy oncrosshair. Start button to pause the game and bring the pause menu. Selectbutton to enter/exit vehicle, like a tank besides me. I know what you think.“Why not use the tank?”. I’ll do that very soon.
Meanwhile…
I tested the first EDF withtitle: Simple 2000 Series Vol. 31 The Chikyuu Boueigun. As you know (or not),Simple 2000 series is a series of simple game released in PS 2, usuallyexclusive in Japan. While Simple 1500 series is games for PS 1. The premise ofthis Simple 1500 or 2000 series, usually a game with simple concept and can bedescribed as B-grade quality. The series ranges from Mahjong, Reversi, or otherboard game. But then there’s: The Sniper, Oneechanbara, The Maid and MachineGun, and The Chikyuu Boueigun which become EDF we know and love. I might tryThe Maid and Machine Gun in future because I love machine gun and the maid partis just a bit extra to me. I mean personally I’m not so crazy into maids eventhough I see lots of them in Azur Lane. I feel they’re just ok. Not goabove that.
Anyway, the menus are muchsimpler in this first instalment because -you know- the game still in Simple2000 series so it’s supposed to be kept simple. I like that they add otherclass “Pale Wing” in EDF 2 which considered pretty complex addition andcertainly set apart from the prequel simple game.
Both The Chikyuu Boueigun andEDF 2 starts with a level with swarm of giant ant and tank besides me. Also,the uniform for the ground soldier looks similar to what Ultraman’s colleagueswear. You know? Those people who talk around Ultraman person, and fighting giganticmonster uselessly either with weak laser gun or futuristic yet uselessaircraft. I feel dumb to be associated with those guys. Anyway, back to EDF 2.
The tank’s cannon iscertainly more powerful than the bazooka. It deals more damage and createsbigger explosion. I like seeing ants fly high because they’re blown by myexplosion. The radar is pretty helpful. Red dot represents enemies. Green dotrepresent item that you can pick up. It ranges from healing item, armor thatcan increase your maximum health after completing mission and the mostimportant: new weapon! As for white dot. It represents civilians. There’s nopenalty for civilian casualty so you might as well as ignore them. I mean look.They’re in the way of my giant insect eradication. It’s their damn fault to bein there
I accidentally destroyed myown tank because I shot an ant very close to my tank. But I can defeat thoseants with my bazooka just fine. Here comes the very crucial part: collectingthe loot. I’ll be kicked to the base nigh immediately after killing allenemies. I have to let some of them alive, so I have enough time to collectthese loots. I wish I can run faster. I can hear their breath behind me. It’snot pleasant to hear.
I fell down from the bridgebut luckily Thames River is only stomach-height. Otherwise, I will be drowned.Skimming through ant swarm, is already bad experience. So, I defeat all enemiesand mission cleared. However, no fanfare to mark the mission is over. Only oldhorror movie’s music can be heard here. I’m extremely disappointed.
Demoman_mvm_loot_common03.wav.Look at those loots! Unfortunately, I can’t read some of them. I know armoritems that I mentioned before which increases my maximum health aftersuccessful mission.
One of the loots is slightlystronger bazooka than the initial ones. Not bad.
Here you can see thespecification stats of highlighted weapon. From top to bottom: Ammo capacity, firerate (projectile/second), attack power, reload time (second), explosion range,accuracy, and lastly projectile range. Then there’s bit of trivia below thespecification stats.
It goes without saying thatyou should read information even the description bit, of any acquired loot thatyou get.
Next mission is pretty muchthe same with first mission but this time the mission takes place in flat land.No bridge that I can destroy to cut-off the swarm’s path temporarily. Civilianscan’t be harmed by my weapon but they block my projectile. So, move away,portly gentleman!
There’s only handful of thoseants. Time to focus on gathering the loot. I don’t have ability to sprint but Ican roll sideway though. It’s done by tilting analog either left or right. Orby pressing jump while running sideway (holding L or R button). No front orback dodge roll for me in this game.
The map for next mission isso spacious. I bet 2 Olympic Stadiums can fit into this map.
Sandlot thoughtfully put ahover bike for this map. It travels pretty quick but the aim is iffy. If I moveforward, the bike will lean forward thus the aim becomes too low. If I movebackward, the bike will lean backward thus the aim becomes too high. I likemotorcycle in Jungle Strike, but this bike is too tedious for combat. My tips:just use it as fast transportation, dismount at combat area, and use yourinfantry weapon. Kind of like dragoon in Napoleonic era. Besides the machinegun on the bike is not so powerful.
I accidentally destroy abuilding and it falls like made of matchsticks. Demoman_sf12_badmagic11.wav
There’s still long distanceto next giant swarm so I have time to shoot civilian. Don’t worry. He backs upafter fall for a while. I thought my gun is normal M-16. But apparently not.It’s M-16 that can only damage giant ants and barely harm a human.
I destroy another building.I’m sorry! It’s not my fault that the hit detection for this rocket is quitedemanding. You can’t hit those giant freaking ants in their scuttling legbecause it doesn’t have hit spot. You have to hit the projectile in theirtorso. I mean sure, it’s quite believable that the legs are so thin that ignoremy rocket. Maybe. But if their legs were included as viable hit spot, my gameexperience would feel much better. I’m just saying.
Eventually, I can finish themission and I have enough time to destroy this utility pole which also falldown like made of matchsticks. What’s wrong with this town? Am I tasked withsaving gigantic town project made of matchsticks which designated as new UK’stourist spot? I don’t think it’s worth to defend for. Let alone giant ants, asingle spark of fire can destroy this whole tourism spot!
I get this unique version ofthe assault rifle. It has very significant smaller bullet capacity of 10bullets compared the original assault rifle: 120 bullets. However. it has more attackpower: 65. Meanwhile the original assault rifle is 10 damage power. Here’s thecalculation. The original assault rifle has total power: 120 x 10 = 1,200points. Meanwhile the modified version has total power: 10 x 65 = 650 points.Mathematically, this rifle has 54% power of the original rifle. But I feel likeI’m into weapon that has significant damage than bigger bullet capacity. I meansure, I have to reload often but each bullet counts bigger to kill enemies.Also make them dead faster.
I notice the correct geographic shape of Indonesia archipelago. This game deserves extra credit from me.
On next level, I try todestroy a house by ramming my tank and it doesn’t work. Soldier_sf13_magic_reac03.wav
I know that I shouldn’tfooling around while there is large group of enemies within my radar. But Ihave no idea where they are. They don’t actively attack me or anything. Maybe Ihave to go closer to them first.
So, I have to hit thatgigantic ant hill to trigger these winged ants. I think this tank is notsuitable to deal with flying enemies. I can move the cannon by moving analogstick. But it’s more efficient to deal with them by foot than using tank.
I got this multiple rocketlauncher from previous mission. Actually, it’s weaker than the single rocketlauncher even though it launches homing missile.
However, the strong assaultrifle shows its prowess here. Since the projectile of rifle is faster than thehoming missile, the assault rifle is more accurate. Should you want to test aweapon, you should carry a reliable one in case the tested weapon sucks.
I get another variant ofassault rifle. This one has double the capacity but half the power of theoriginal. Big no for me. I stick with the powerful one.
Because I have more weaponry,I dare myself to replay level 2 with Hard difficulty. Even though over 50% ofthe weapons are unreliable. Or at least not to my liking.
You probably think that Ishould play next levels to get more suitable weapon. But you see, I’mimpatience bastard. I like to push my luck to finish a hard mission andeventually get much stronger weapon.
Oh whoops! I blow myself withmy bazooka. It goes without saying that the more powerful the bazooka, the moredamage I take if I hit myself with it.
I find this weapon. It’s on“Special” category. Let me see. So, this weapon called Reverser M1. It spraysnanomachine that can heal teammates and vehicle but I can’t use it to healmyself. Also, the ammo is limited and I can’t reload it to refill its ammo.This weapon will be good for multiplayer. But I play the game solo mode asalways.
I dare myself to replay thelevel 2 in Hard difficulty. I think AS-18D is saving my life because I can killenemy faster with it and destroy a tree in process. Sometime, having morepowerful gun is better than gun with larger capacity.
Engineer_mvm_loot_rare04.wav.I got some Sniper Rifle (SNR-227) and shotgun (SG-5). If you wonder why I canfind these guns from dead giant ants, probably those ants ate their owner alongwith them (unintendedly) and somehow they’re still in good condition even afterstored within ant’s digestion for hours.
I try replay the first levelin hard difficulty and I’m not doing good. Maybe I’m too reckless and jump intoThames River to collect loot too soon and I get overwhelmed pretty instantly.That’s not me in the middle of dodge roll, by the way. One of those antsheadbutt me so hard that I fly ridiculously. Embarrassing! Let’s try again.
Medic_mvm_loot_godlike01.wav.I get more loot this time around! I get more loots in first level probablybecause there’s more enemies than in 2nd level. So, I can say that 2nd level iseasier than first one even though there’s bridge that you can cut off to secureyour position temporarily.
One of loot that I got isthis bazooka that can fire 3 rockets at once. SO FREAKING AWESOME! I don’t carehow or why this bazooka can fire 3 rockets with Contra-ish pattern (onestraight and 2 diagonal sides. I’m just glad I got it. I don’t think I needtank anymore. Why use single cannon when you can fire 3 rockets at once? To behonest, the rockets travel slower while the tank’s cannon produce biggerexplosion (than 1 rocket). But I’m feeling it. I keep using this crazy bazookaand I love it.
As expected from shotgun.It’s powerful in close range. Too powerful even as I kill giant ants just with1 shot. Giant ants are pushover compared to Tyranids or Zergs but you get hurtbadly if you get surrounded by them.
I’m getting absorbed intothis high-risk high-reward replay. In this occasion, I just want to show youthe healing item. It’s called EDF Aid Kit which resembles delicious cannedfood.
More loots later…
I’m eager for powerful weaponduring this mission replay. But I didn’t expect I can find flamethrower and myheart fill with utmost joy although it resembles super soaker! Pyro_laughevil02.wav.wav
There’s the humongous antnest. You can hit it from this starter point if you have thesuitable weapon. This is where weapon’s range comes into play crucially.Bazooka has enough range for this task but I currently use the one with slowprojectile. So, it takes some times to trigger the winged ants. Also. Hello,Shirou Emiya! Can you and blue Saber help me here? No? Ok, then.
After killing ants forstronger weapons…
Fine, I have to move on tonext mission. Unlike in previous missions, this one takes place in indoor area.I feel like an idiot to take sniper rifle to this narrow place.
Then I test this grenadelauncher and I hit myself with it because there’s so little space around here.Enemies in Medium difficulty can barely hurt me but my grenade sure can defeatme. Now I feel like complete idiot. Demoman_negativevocalization04.wav
After hitting retry option…
I was stupid to bring sniperrifle in this tunnel but I can show you how to use the scope. It’s done tiltinganalog joystick up. There’s only 1 zoom in view. Every sniper rifle hasspecific degree of zoom view. You can see the zoom capability from the weaponrymenu.
The tunnel leads torelatively spacious cavern. I try using the grenade launcher but I get hit byit, again! But it doesn’t matter. I already kill all the ants. The gamegenerously call it win even though my health reaches zero after finish themission.
Next mission takes place inoutdoor again. But this time it’s night time and it doesn’t change the gameplay at all.In this occasion, I use the sniper bazooka! It deals very high damage andcreates larger explosion, with the cost of ammo capacity that only 1 rocket. Italso has scope! Although the zoom view is not that far.
This mission is bit strange.Initially, there’s only me and panicking civilians. After some time, hugeexplosion happens! Demoman_specialcompleted11.wav
This probably adaptation ofthat scene in Independence Day, where huge UFO blasting huge laser.
Then small flying saucersappear and attack me. I try to use this chopper that parked near Buckinghampalace but it won’t fly. Fly, you stupid junk!
Forget that stupid trash! Ican deal with these flying saucers myself. There’s also tank, indicated by greydot on radar. But as we know, tank is not suitable to deal with flying enemies.On the other hand, this sniper rifle is excellent against these UFOs. You maynot understand how sniper rifle is good in this situation. I forget to tell youthat this sniper rifle has rapid fire rate. It resembles the automatic sniperrifle in Terminator 3 - War of the Machines. This sniper rifle may havesame function with the limited-magazine-yet-powerful assault rifle but thissniper rifle has scope. Besides it has higher level. Generally, higher levelweapon is stronger than the lower level weapon.
Next mission takes place insame spot as level 1. But this time the enemies are that giant robot with verylong legs like the one in H.G. Wells’ “The War of The Worlds” book, instead ofgiant ants. I can aim at one of them from distance but sadly can’t hit thembecause this sniper rifle’s range is too short.
By the time they’re within mysniper rifle’s range, they already bombard me and the bridge that I am on. Iinstinctively sing “London bridge is falling down” even though this is not theLondon bridge. Even though I don’t look good in this moment, their bombardmentdeals little damage to me because the difficulty is Medium.
The other weapon that I carryis another Grenade Launcher and it’s practically useless here! I can only hitthe enemy in the body and they ignore explosion on their long legs. Why I keepusing useless grenade launcher? I used to be pretty adept at Demoman in TeamFortress 2. That’s probably the reason? On the other note, I like the greensmoke coming out of the grenade so you know where it lands.
Correction: Every grenade launcher or hand grenade has 2 type of detonation: impact and time. Impact type grenade will immediately explode when hit enemies or ground. I consider this one is the best. Time type grenade will explode after some time (depends on time detonation data on weapon information). I try using time based grenade launcher when i'm about to get surrounded and it works quite well although i have to wait for a while. I don't have to worry to hit myself when i throw grenade on to approaching giant ants while walking backward unlike when using bazooka.
I replay this same missionwith Hard difficulty. This time, I carry the sniper bazooka and it works muchbetter than the snipe rifle. But I still keep the rifle for when they are tooclose for my bazooka.
Then I replay anothermission…
Finally, I can use thechopper. To fly I have to press jump button rapidly. So dumb. Moreover, I havethe same aim problem like with hover bike. My aim becomes too high if I flybackward and my aim becomes too low if I fly forward. Though, I manage to fellsome UFOs with the goddamn chopper.
A weapon box got stuck on thehouse? No problem! Just destroy the house. No penalty for any collateral damageas long as the mission completed. Sorry! I get easily distracted with loothunting. Let’s move on to next stage, then.
It’s the same long leg robotas before. But this time, they’re rampaging in the middle of city so you can’tcasually snipe them from afar like before. Although the civilians can provideyou with distraction so you have little bit of time to snipe the enemiessafely.
For the 10th level, we getfirst encounter of giant spiders. If you have arachnophobia, you better playthe game up until 9th level only for your mental health’s sake.
The difference with giantspider compared to giant ant, they spit web. Some giant ants sometime pause fora while and then fire acid from their butt abdomen while the rests ofthem are eager to headbutt me. As for giant spiders, they’re more freakingaggressive. They want to get close to me while spitting web at the same time. Isee one of them hopping which ant can’t do. Fortunately, this is mediumdifficulty and I get this stronger multiple rocket launcher from harddifficulty mission. I should be fine.
I’m done showing you 10missions. But before finishing this article, I like to show you the Pale Wingclass which is more or less Wing Diver in EDF 4.1. With purple skirt and brownhair, this Pale Wing soldier reminds me of Yuna from Final Fantasy X.Pale wing has Plasma launcher which is equivalent to ground soldier’s bazooka.The difference is the projectile is more futuristic looking. Also, Pale Wingdon’t get stuck in reloading animation when the ammo is depleted. Instead, thepale wing energy bar on right side, will be drained.
Another Pale Wing’s initialweapon is this Rapier that can shoot around you in short range and it dealsheavy damage. Plus, it doesn’t consume energy much. Rapier is the bestshort-range weapon hands down.
The most important thing asPale Wing, you can fly around by holding jump button. Kind of like thechopper’s control but way better. Naturally, flying will drain the Pale Wingenergy bar. There’s so much benefit of being Pale Wing such as: no reloadanimation, best short-range weapon, and ability to fly around. Kind of wonderwhy you choose ground soldier over Pale Wing. Ground soldier’s advantages areable to use vehicles and have bigger health. But those are kind of moot.
After some loots later…
Pale Wing’s weapons drain theenergy bar except for this plasma grenade but it takes time to charge new one.Unlike conventional hand grenade that use by ground soldier, this plasmagrenade is weird. It travels pretty slowly and eventually creates big powerfulexplosion when it touches ground or any enemy. Because it’s slow as molasses,it’s unreliable weapon. I only use it as secondary weapon
If you think bazooka thatfire 3-way rockets, is ridiculous, how about this Ixion 5Way that fires 5-wayplasma balls? It’s pretty funny yet useful weapon although the projectiledoesn’t explode like rocket.
I also got laser sniper riflebut it drains my energy too inefficiently.
This Ixion weapon is veryludicrous. It fires a jumble of laser that surprisingly inaccurate. Even whenthey hit enemies, the damage power is unsatisfyingly low.
On the other hand, I have focusedversion of Rapier. It deals very high damage but within concentrated area. Justso you know that during Hard difficulty missions, I still using the firstRapier and surprisingly it works very well. Ok time to stop.
You probably know thatSandlot’s Earth Defense Force 2 Portable (2011) is pretty fun game. It’s pastthe simple version of itself by including Pale Wing class, WLAN multiplayermode, and wild variety of weapons. The control also simple. The auto-aim isquite troublesome though. If the enemy is on the ground, the auto aim is fine.But when enemy is flying or crawling on the side of building or cave, the aimcan be wild. I don’t think the other shoot button won’t help in that situation.This game should support keyboard + mouse for the best aim however it’sreleased in PSP. Using analog to aim seems the simple solution. But the problemis analog and direction pad are located on the same side, which is left side.It will be awkward to control. So manual aim is no go and we must accept theauto aim as it is. The health is kind of useless stats because as long as youkeep distance with enemies, you’re fine. There’s some occasion enemies useranged attack but that’s about 35% part of overall battle. When enemies surroundyou, you most likely defeated instantly with barely chance to recover. I canconclude collecting armor to raise maximum health is not that important. On theother hand, obtaining stronger and more useful weapon are the main key tosuccess in this game. Although some of weapons are not so suitable, downrightbad, or just entirely joke. The weapon drop is entirely random but I’m downwith that. The homing missile’s accuracy is fairly bad because it can’t turnsharply as needed to reach enemy at certain angle. The enemy’s ai is simple.The giant insects will approach you in swarms. But some of them hasintelligence to flank you. As for the tall robots and flying saucers, they willapproach you within some distance so they have better aim at you. But luckily,their shooting is not 100% accurate. There’s some miss on it. Plus, you candodge roll to avoid their bombardment. I’m still thinking giant insects are lotharder to deal because of their sheer number. The most useful vehicle is tankbecause its cannon can create powerful and big explosion, excellent for dealingswarm of enemies. Hover bike and chopper are pretty much useless except forfaster travel. Most mission use same map and can make the gameplay feelsrepetitive. However, missions last relatively short, either you dominateenemies easily or enemies defeat you easily. There's fun to be had when i destroy buildings and gun down civilian. The music kinds of bland and oftenobscured with radio message contains mostly people cry for panic with littlebit of gunfire sound and also the voice of your higher ups tells you aboutworldwide situation regarding the aliens or current mission situation.Obviously, the voices are in Japanese. I can only understand “Help me!”, “Don’tcome near me”, or “Open fire!”
I can’t give recommendation to Earth DefenseForce 2 Portable (2011). Why do you want to play it other than to satiatecuriosity of older iteration of the game series? It goes without saying thatyou should play Earth Defense Force 4.1 instead. It’s easily accessible throughSteam or other gaming platform. Plus, it has English translation. Also, it’simprovement over the 2nd EDF. If you’re willing to listen, I have some kind ofsuggestions to improve this game. Like money reward upon successful missionthat you can use to purchase various upgrade such as health, movement speed, orPale Wing energy bar. Getting weapon randomly to make your character stronger,can be tiring and monotonous. Then there’s special equipment, accessories,trinket, or whatever you call that small extra equipment. When wearing it, itwill boost your specific stats like extra damage when using Rapier type weaponor extra bullet capacity on bazooka. You can obtain it from random drop on deadenemies. I don’t know whether this kind of improvements implemented in EDF 6.I hope so.
