0 
0 Killsquad is a top-down action shooter developed and published by Novarama on July 16th 2019, for Steam. It’s available on PS4, PS5 and Xbox One beginning July 19th of this year.
Welcome To Killsquad
I haven’t played a twin-stick shooter with RPG elements in a while. My friends and I saw it announced for Playstation not so long ago and wanted to give it a try. So without further ado, let’s see what Killsquad is about.
Gameplay
In Killsquad, you play as one of 5 bounty hunters working for the Wahla Corporation; Troy the Gunslinger, Kosmo the Anarchist, Cass the Apostate, Zero the Sawbones, and Ekaar the Prodigy. Each Bounty Hunter has a unique set of 3 special skills.
Additionally, there are four factions you can level up; The Consortium, The Uprising, The Sentinels and The Unseen. By taking on contracts associated with these factions, you level them up. Levelling up these factions earn you titles, bonuses, buffs and emotes.
What Will You Find?
Taking orders from the character known as Momma, complete missions and earn credits and find Ambush Chests along the way. If you find a cosmetic during a level, you must finish the level to obtain it. Occasionally a little pyramid-shaped robot will run through the level. If you kill the robot before it disappears, it will net you some loot.
Each contract ranges from three tiers. These tiers are Recruit, Veteran, and Spec-Ops. Some contracts won’t unlock until you’ve completed another specific contract. Objectives range from escorting, defending, or simply killing a target. As you play, the Beastiary updates, so you can refer to it and find the best way (or elements to use) to kill an enemy.
However, besides the Boss healing back to full health and objectives restarting, there is no penalty for death during a level.
Enemies aren’t the only thing out to get you in Killsquad. Environmental hazards, such as a giant laser beam, meteors, and poisonous gas, are just some of the other dangers out to get you.
Ambush Chests & DNA Modifiers
Ambush Chests contain credits, technology materials, DNA and cosmetics (although rare).
Credits act as the in-game currency to buy things like guns, equipment and cosmetics from the store. The technology materials are for upgrading equipment. If you have any unwanted equipment, you can dismantle them to earn credits and parts.
DNA is for vending machines during missions. Finding these vending machines allows the player to buy ‘DNA Modifiers’; one gives you 1000 war health, 1000 shield, or heals you for 50% health.
Levelling Up, Upgrades, & Cores (Stick With Me, It’s Tricky!)
While your character has an overall level, the missions have a level of their own which reaches a maximum of 10 and resets once the mission ends. Each mission also has a Vektor level, which acts as this game’s power level. Your character’s Vektor level displays above their heads in the main menu. To understand the significance of the mission level, you have to understand the upgrades and their passive skills.
Each character has 8 Skills and ten Cores (with two more that are unlockable). To activate a skill, you have to spend Cores. Branching from these Skills are Upgrades. These upgrades have levels. Once you reach that level during a mission, they will passively activate. For example, if you become level 2 during a mission, your level 2 upgrades will become active. There are low-cost and high-cost upgrades, and you can’t buy high-cost upgrades without buying the low-cost ones first.
To enhance your Upgrades, you have to use TECs. As you have a limited amount, you must be decisive and choose the best skills and upgrades suited for your playstyle. Phew, that was a lot!
Graphics & Audio
The design of some of the levels was pretty good in Killsquad. Two favourites spring to mind; Wasteland 7A and a snow planet. Wasteland 7A had a firetruck-red environment, purple tusk-like growths, squishy flesh-like hills, purple flowers scattered about the ground, giant glowing red bulbs, and the occasional purple pincers protruding from the ground and waving.
The snow planet was a tundra with glowing azure vines and thorns wrapped around what looked like giant navy pinecones. Scattered across the area’s ground were blue flowers and giant crystals sprouting from the ground and spiny purple trees.
The boss designs also look great, and remind me of the creatures throughout the Borderlands series.
Audio-wise, there wasn’t much that caught my attention. Besides Momma, there isn’t much dialogue besides the player character’s one-liners or a few tidbits from the NPCs or enemy Bosses. I enjoyed the Metal Gear-like surprise sound when opening chests, but I got tired of Momma’s dialogue after a while.
There was a visual bug where text boxes would stay on-screen after exiting them, which got annoying at times.
Longevity
While I couldn’t say a precise amount of hours, Killsquad has plenty to do if you enjoy the game. Levelling up characters, upgrading gear, and replaying contracts take time and work. Times all of that by five and maybe more when accompanied by friends, you’re looking at sinking many hours into this game. Whether you do all of this or not, however, depends entirely on if the gameplay itself keeps you entertained.
Final Thoughts
Overall, Killsquad is, unfortunately, a miss for me. While it has a lot of contracts and upgrades for the player to work on, the gameplay isn’t engaging enough for me to want to. In my opinion, this game is better suited for a group rather than a single player.
Even so, I find the contracts dull and have no characters that keep me interested or entertained. Some of the boss fights felt lazy, like the Alpha Overseer. I just spun around and attacked it, and there was little else to this boss fight and in turn felt like a chore. The skill system also felt too complex, and I believe a simple skill tree would have been better.
The game isn’t bad. I can see its appeal, and it plays well. Conversely, I can see how someone may get bored quickly rinsing the same contracts and bosses without any particular goal.
I award Killsquad the Thumb Culture Silver Award.
If you liked this review, check out Tony C’s review of Frank And Drake for PS5.
Disclaimer: A code was received in order to write this review.
YouTube | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Discord | Podcast
About Author
