It’s been far too long since we’ve been graced by the gorgeous pixel art style of a Metal Slug game, almost twenty years in fact. Does Metal Slug Tactics scratch the itch of the titular run-and-gun franchise despite being a turn-based tactics game? Well, yes and no.
Metal Slug Tactics
Developer: Leikir Studio
Price: $24.99
Platform: Switch, PC (reviewed), PlayStation and Xbox
MonsterVine was supplied with a Steam code for review
Plot wise, as is typical of any Metal Slug game, General Morden (leader of the rebel army) is back (again) and it’s up to the Peregrine Falcons Squad to take him out. Compared to a traditional Metal Slug game, there’s actually a shocking amount of dialog here as you get mission reports at every stage and some humorous radio banter throughout; but we’re not here to talk, we’ve got goons to shoot.
Taking what was a fast-paced, action game and slowing it down to turn-based seems like an insane pivot that wouldn’t work for the franchise, but it somehow manages to work here. With its new tactics style, you wouldn’t be at fault for wanting to compare it to something like an XCOM, where you’re slowly hunkering behind cover and meticulously planning your assault forward, but playing that way is a quick way to lose here. Instead, Metal Slug Tactics opts for incorporating its run-and-gun roots by encouraging you to throw yourself into a fight, where sometimes putting yourself in the middle of a crowd is beneficial to hiding behind cover and waiting. You see, the further you move in this game the more dodge and adrenaline you’ll earn; dodge is used to minimize damage from enemy attacks so if you have four dodge points and an enemy hits you for four damage, it’ll even out, while adrenaline powers your abilities. So recklessly running and gunning in this game is kind of encouraged in a weird way, and while it takes a minute too unlearn playing this like a traditional tactics game, once it clicks you’ll realize the tactics angle is still there, but just in other ways.
You see, you could just run into a spot and open fire on some enemies like normal, but if you’re smart, you’ll instead line up your characters to synchronize attacks and potentially wipe out whole groups of enemies in a single turn. Attacking an enemy who’s within the attack range of an ally will trigger that character to also attack, which could then trigger another ally to attack. And that’s when Metal Slug Tactics really starts to click, as you run into the thick of enemy groups and position your characters to all synchronize their attacks to take out multiple enemies in a single turn.
All of this is, for better or worse, wrapped up in a rogue-like package. If you’re like me, rogue-like fatigue is starting to creep in, and there were moments where I wondered how much better this game would be as a traditional tactics game. Each run starts with you starting in the first region, a desert, and once clearing that you can choose between three others: a jungle, Egyptian tombs, or a bustling city. Interestingly enough, you could just skip the tombs or jungle and go straight to the city which is the final area but you’d be missing out on collecting loot and leveling up your characters by doing so. Each region is also comprised of a variety of missions and mission types, that ask you how you want to spend your time in that zone; a mission might reward you with valuable XP, gold or most importantly a refill of ammo because yes, your units do have a finite amount of ammo for their special guns. Missions also range from simple “kill everyone”, to escort missions or mini boss fights. It’s important to plan out your time in a region however, since you’re only allowed to take on three missions before the region’s boss shows up and you have to take them out before moving on to the next region. These boss fights are a real treat as you’re thrown against these massive mechanical monsters and the game’s gorgeous pixel-art really shines.
When not in a mission, there’s a surprising amount of customization you can do for each of the nine characters you can acquire in the game. Everyone has their own distinct playstyle and weapon toolset, along with a series of loadouts you can unlock for each character. On top of that, you’ll be able to customize each character’s weapons with a variety of modifiers like changing the shape of a grenade’s AOE splash, to ignoring an enemy’s cover and also add new active or passive abilities on a character. This is all to say that there’s a lot of ways to kit out your squad when you take them on a run.
The Final Word
Your appreciation of Metal Slug Tactics is really going to hinge on how open you are to its genre change, and it being a rogue-like on top of that. Get over that hurdle and you’re in for a good time.
– MonsterVine Rating: 3.5 out of 5 – Fair
