After a long wait, Earth Defense Force 6 has finally arrived in the Western market. The game follows on from 2019’s Earth Defense Force 5, which was quite a significant step forward for the series. Is EDF 6 a similar leap forward, or is the long-running series now going stale?
To Save Our Mother Earth From Any Alien Attack
For those of you unfamiliar, the Earth Defense Force games are third-person PvE shooters that see the player facing off against thousands of giant insects, aliens, and robots in massive, madcap battles. The series is more comparable to the Dynasty Warriors games than anything else, both in gameplay and tone. Earth Defense Force stories tend to be camp sci-fi schlock (in a good way) and Earth Defense Force 6 may well be the series at its schlockiest.
I’m not going to reveal too much about the story in my review, because I think it’s one of Earth Defense Force 6’s more interesting elements. I was surprised to find myself enjoying the story in an active way, rather than just as background noise for bug slaying. It’s not exactly good, in fact it’s kind of a mess, but it’s so earnestly insane that I couldn’t help but get invested. The expanded narrative scope of EDF 6 lets us see new sides of the Earth Defense Force and the people it’s made up of, and I found that to be a lot of fun. I was always looking forward to the next narrative turn as I made my way through each mission.
Earth Defense Force 6’s goofy tone is a great asset. It helps tie all of the game’s whacky elements together. The combination of absurd weaponry, bizarre giant insects and aliens, and bombastic action works perfectly with a background of EDF 6’s bonkers narrative and on-the-nose dialogue. EDF 6’s visuals fit well too, with over-the-top explosive effects, massive blood splatters, and enemies exploding into pieces.
Earth Defense Force has never been a particularly graphically impressive series, but it uses its lower fidelity well and I think it works with the B-movie vibe of the series. EDF 5 made a nice enough graphical step forward, and EDF 6 looks pretty much identical. EDF 6 has a lot more visual variety though, with a huge amount of new enemy types with some really cool designs, and a few new locales that help keep things feeling fresh.
From Vicious Giant Insects Who Have Once Again Come Back
The new enemies and locales are a highlight of Earth Defense Force 6. These elements help keep things fresh over 140+ missions, which is the most missions of any EDF game to date. I’d love to talk more about some of the new enemies, but their reveal is such an exciting moment of EDF 6 that it would feel wrong to spoil it. There’s only one enemy type that I felt was a bit of a stinker, due to it having an effective invulnerability mechanic that slows down gameplay somewhat.
In addition to having the most missions of any EDF game, Earth Defense Force 6 also has the biggest variety of weapons and vehicles so far. This made finishing up a mission consistently exciting, as you get to peruse your drops. I always found something new and interesting to try out or an upgrade for a weapon I was already using. I mostly played as the Ranger class, and for the first time in the series, I found myself using a much bigger variety of weapons on my first playthrough, rather than sticking to a few reliable options.
The only caveat to the expanded amount of content is that, for story reasons, missions from EDF 5 are reused throughout the campaign, though with some variation. Some of EDF 6’s missions are repeated in the same way throughout. I didn’t find this to be much of a problem, especially with the variations changing up enemy types and mission flow, but it is something of a letdown versus all-new missions.
We’ll Unleash All Our Forces, We Won’t Cut Them Any Slack
The biggest, or at least most impactful, change in Earth Defense Force 6 is the overhaul of the game’s classes, particularly changes made to Ranger and Air Raider. EDF 6 adds new equipment slots which let you quickfire a grenade or other equipped item. You can carry these in addition to your main weapon, unlike previous EDF titles. It also moves some equipment around between classes, in order to make previously niche weapons much more usable.
The equipment you can carry depends on the class you choose to play as. Ranger gets a new backpack slot that can carry grenades, mines, and turrets. Air Raider gets a backpack slot too, one that can carry support equipment, like healing pylons and bunkers, and summonable drones. Wing Diver gets a new special slot that holds some of their more niche weapons, like the series favorite super weapons that charge independently without consuming their fuel gauge. Fencer, well they don’t get a new slot, but they do get some awesome new katana weapons that ended up being my favorite addition in Earth Defense Force 6.
Every class feels bigger and better than they did in EDF 5. The Ranger and Air Raider backpack slots definitely felt like the best changes. The Air Raider also gets a new weapon category that allows them to deploy a variety of attack drones that add a ton of offensive and defensive capability to their class, even in underground missions where they’ve typically struggled in previous games. Wing Diver still feels a bit undertuned in comparison, but their new independent equipment slot adds some flexibility and variety to their kit that makes them at least more fun to use than they were in EDF 5.
Despite spending most of my time playing Ranger, my go-to EDF class, I do think Fencer is the most fun to play by far. Whilst they’re definitely more difficult to get the hang of, and I’m still quite bad at using them, their moment-to-moment gameplay is just explosively fun. They’ve got great survivability, incredible mobility (maybe even more than Wing Diver), and some of the most fun weapons in the game. Their new katanas really are a game-changer. There’s nothing quite as fun as flying through the air, slicing and dicing through aliens. They’re just plain cool.
The EDF Deploys!
At first, I was worried that Earth Defense Force 6 was going to be more like EDF 5.1, given its visual similarity. The reuse of missions from EDF 5 certainly didn’t help ease that fear, but the more I played the more it became clear that EDF 6 is its own wonderful thing. That said, the game does still have some of the classic EDF annoyances. It’s still possible to get halfway through a mission only to realize you have the wrong equipment with you, especially on a first run-through with the new enemy types. There’s still some janky mission design too, in particular a run of missions early on that are plagued by far too many flying enemies. It can get a bit stagnant when these less exciting missions pop up.
Overall though, there is just an endless amount of fun to be had. The sheer amount of content makes this an easy sell for EDF veterans, and also a great starting point for newcomers given the expanded utility of the various classes. Though I will say I think playing EDF 5 first adds quite a bit to the enjoyment of the story, it isn’t essential though.
As usual for the series, Earth Defense Force 6 has four-player co-op play, which is where the game really shines. The game’s classic chaos and destruction is wonderfully enhanced when you have four super-soldiers blasting through the alien threat. I didn’t get much of a chance to test the multiplayer during the review period, but I did squeeze in a few missions on the day of writing and I’m confident in saying that the multiplayer is as fun and functional as ever.
Verdict
Earth Defense Force 6 is the series at its best. Taken together, the engaging narrative, expanded enemies and locales, and class changes push EDF 6 to new heights. With the most content of any EDF game to get through, I can easily recommend picking the game up. I’ve spent 44 hours with the game so far, and I’ll easily spend a few hundred more playing through the campaign again, alone and with friends, multiple times over. The fun never stops.
EARTH DEFENSE FORCE 6 IS HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
Enjoy Shooter titles in the anime style? Why not check out Neptunia Virtual Stars?
Many thanks go to D3 Publisher for a PlayStation 5 review code for this title.
A man described by critics as “pretty normal” and “memorable in the abstract”. He has committed his life to the consumption of anime and games, against the advice and wishes of his family and friends. Now writing about his passions, hopefully for your enjoyment.
