There are two ways to approach a game like Marauders. You can jump in with pals, guns blazing, lighting up rooms with a torrent of bullets. Or you can take it a little slower, play solo, and experience the feeling of your heart trying to claw its way out of your chest.
Marauders can be a riotous blast or it can be one of the most tense gaming experiences you’ve ever played. Here’s our impressions after playing a little of the Early Access release.
Hunting and Being Hunted
In Marauders you play a, you guessed it, Marauder. You’re out there hunting and scavenging for the supplies you need in order to level up, complete missions, trade for items, and generally become stronger.
The catch is that many other players are also doing the same and chances are they’re faster than you, better than you, and often more organised than you. Marauders is a game where you’re going to die – a lot. You’re hunting them for their loot, they’re hunting you for yours. It’s the circle of life but instead of lions you’ve got bullets.
Each level is split up into three parts. The first will see you on your spaceship approaching a base, the second places you on that base for a bit of scavenging and killing, the third puts you back on your spaceship to make your escape.
During each of these phases you can be attacked or can go on the offensive. When in space you’ll see other ships approaching the same base you are, it’s possible to smash their defences or even board their ships to take their loot before the mission even begins, but it’s on foot where the meat of the game takes place.
Each dieselpunk level is full of AI enemies and the occasional other human who are all out for one thing – your blood. Every kill is a chance for some great loot and a bit of XP. At the very least a kill means one threat removed.
Achieve your goals and make it back to your spaceship and you’ll be back into space, heading for an exit location. Fail, and your corpse is left to be looted – losing you everything you had on you. Ouch.
When it works it’s absolutely compelling stuff. Playing solo can be utterly tense, each corner might mean your death or wealth beyond measure. When in a group, things get a little more chaotic as you work together to strip a level of its goodies. The feeling of getting in, getting a few kills, gathering a bit of loot, then escaping is a high many games chase and few succeed at. By having a real risk of loss the game makes every action impactful and every tiny bit of loot a victory.
Diesel Powered
What helps it all tie together is the feel of the game, it’s a grimy, gritty world and the sound design and visuals all pour that feeling into you. It’s a universe where diesel fumes permeate every single moment as you sneak around half-disassembled mechanical creations and trade damage over mining equipment. At times it can feel like you’re lost in a giant Kwik-Fit, engine oil and all.
The guns play into this theme too. Maybe slick, smooth, well-crafted guns exist somewhere in it but so far I’ve only encountered ramshackle creations that perfectly fit with its theme. This is an alternate universe 1990s where the Great War didn’t end, even with a sci-fi backdrop you’re dealing with gun-oil coated weapons that can be moments away from breakdown. The gunplay feels exactly how you would want it to, every bullet feels powerful both when you shoot and when you’ve been shot.
The Exquisite Feeling of Failure
As mentioned above, Marauders is a game where you’ll be dying. A stray bullet, an enemy sneaking up behind you, an unseen opponent ransacking your ship. Death hits hard and hits often and when you die everything you were holding is gone.
What makes this something to be treasured rather than despised is how it forces you to adapt. From your loadout to how you play, the threat of loss is always with you, so you choose to play in a way that will offset that as best you can.
Maybe you want to tool up, big armour and your best guns – get them before they get you. Maybe you decide you just want to take a pistol and a bag to try and make the sting of death a little easier to bear. Maybe you have a good start to a mission and decide to head home with what you’ve got instead of risking it all. Maybe you become a stealth expert. Maybe, maybe, maybe.
It’s this threat, omnipresent and at times stifling, that’s the making of Marauders. It makes you evaluate every action, trying to anticipate both the game and other players. You are going to die in this game – that’s a given – but it’s how you approach the prospect of that death that will determine how much you get from the game.
What’s Next for Marauders?
There’s plenty incoming for Marauders, including new weapons, attachments, cosmetics, and more. The team over at Small Impact Games have shown off their Early Access Roadmap – take a look above – so you can see how much they’re planning to pack into the game.
A few technical issues aside (this is Early Access, after all), Marauders is shaping up to be something special, and a game that I’ll be keeping my eye on throughout the upcoming months to see how it develops.
Check out Marauders on our Store
If you’ve decided to jump into the brutal dystopian universe of Marauders, head over to our shop to grab a great deal today. The universe of Marauders may be tough but with our prices, buying the game isn’t.
