REVIEW: Fortified

People often refer to the Pulp era of science fiction as the early years of film from the 1920s leading up to World War 2, but many see the true golden age as what followed after the war. With movie releases in the 1950s such as The Day the Earth Stood Still, It Came from Outer Space and War of the Worlds to name a few, it is from this era of cardboard mutants, all strings attached flying saucers, and crumpled up paper landslides that Fortified clearly takes its inspiration.

Toronto-based indie developer Clapfoot, previously known for making mobile and PC titles, have jumped onto consoles with a game that screams at you with loud, camp cutscenes, stereotypical 50s sci-fi heroes and of course, tin can Martians, which are literally tin can Martians.

Fortified is a tower defence game with elements of real-time strategy, RPG style progression and plenty of third-person shooting for good measure. You will have to defend your base, a rocket, from the onslaught of Martians whose only goal is to invade, kill and destroy you. After that, well that is anyone’s guess.

You have a number of options when the game starts. These include solo play, hosting your own co-op game and online quickmatch for getting straight into the action. Once your preferred mode of play is chosen, you are met with a character selection screen which shows all of the playable characters and your current experience level with each.

The early levels introduce you to building your fortifications which is a seamless and easy process. You will also meet the many buckets, I mean Martians, that try to mow you down. You can sell structures between waves for no loss which is helpful if you’re struggling with your cash levels in the later waves and need to sturdy up a position. Enemies will attack from 3 levels of height, with enemies such as ground walking spider drones and Cybermen lookalikes. Low flying metal balls called Invaders take the middle, with your full-on UFO Exterminators and flying saucers at the highest level. All enemies can be attacked from the structures you build or with your choice of upgraded loadout weapons.

There are 4 playable characters to choose from in Fortified. To make the most of the game and to fully complete the game’s list of Xbox Achievements, you will need to play as everyone. All are distinct from each other with unique characteristics, weapons, structures and special abilities.

The 4 Heroes are as follows:

The Captain – a military leader who excels in commanding troops on the battlefield. With his unique ability to call in artillery strikes, and buffing the health of all allies, The Captain is all about fire power as he has access to more fire weapons and units than all other heroes.

The Rocket Scientist – a fast moving and hard hitting explosives expert, she will use her long range ordinance to take out enemies from afar. With a jetpack on her back and infinite ammo, the Rocket Scientist’s unique ability is powerful and makes her feel like the perfect flying backup for when times get busy.

The Spaceman – an adventurer and space cowboy who can control the attacking speed of most Martians by slowing them down with his arsenal of freezing structures. When activated, the Spaceman will use his special ability to float around and ice any Martians who get too close. A great, suppressive character that compliments all others.

Finally, The Agent – a secretive spy equipped with the deadliest of weapons and structures for taking out the largest enemies. A damage boosting overkill special makes him the type of guy you need when the enemies are everywhere.

Character progression is accomplished by gaining experience points from leveling up. This gives you the option to buy the weapons and structures from what you have unlocked so far. A great little inclusion is the chance to respec your upgrades at any time, so if you’re struggling on a certain map, head back to your armoury and rebuild your character in a matter of seconds. With all characters having their own mix of abilities and weapons, each feels unique to the other and some will be suited for certain scenarios better than others.

The campaign starts with the appropriately named Green Street, which acts as the game’s basic training level. Here you will learn the basics of placing structures and infantry whilst protecting your rocket from a rather easy wave of the budget film tin cans coming at you from straight ahead. As you proceed through the following levels, Fortified’s difficulty creeps up rapidly. Even on the easiest difficulty setting, some of the earlier missions took a couple of attempts to complete due to a mix of enemies coming at you from multiple routes and the addition of multiple rockets to defend, followed by a mix of larger, meaner Martian beasties.

After a few tries, the maps do become much easier, as there is no alternation in the order the enemies come from. This will affect the games replayability, but with the fact that you will need to put in a good 30-40 hours to do everything, enjoy the multiplayer and unlock all achievements, for its price you can’t really go wrong.

There are 12 maps in total to complete in Fortified’s campaign, with each feeling quite unique to the next. For those who don’t quite know what to expect, there will be a few surprises along the way which will keep you from getting too complacent. Also included are 3 invasion maps which really are the same as the campaign offerings if only slightly reimagined for the Invasion game type.

Invasion is a more frantic, fast paced version of what the campaign offers. With its smaller map variants, more enemies, more bosses and other difficulty modifiers, Invasion offers an alternative but repetitive game type. Although playable solo, I would recommend you keep this for playing with friends over Xbox Live. It only takes a matter of waves until there are more enemies than you are capable of handling, even for the more experienced base defenders like myself.

If I was to bring up any concerns or pointers for the future, it would be for more Invasion options and maps. I would have liked to have been able to choose the difficulty modifiers available instead of always being stuck with whatever the game throws at you. With only 3 small map variants, this is just not enough for Invasion to keep any longevity.

Fortified comes even more alive in its multiplayer, with a choice between hosting private or open lobbies and jumping straight into an ongoing match. The online portion of the game offers a slightly varied style of play compared to the campaign. Enemies are tougher and you can only have four loadout structures as opposed to the single player’s six. Finding a team and working together to place your defences to complement each other is a must, as acting as a lone wolf will not get you very far here.

Summary

To summarize, Clapfoot have made a great quality game with little noticeable bugs in the 15 hours or so I spent playing the game. If you enjoyed Horde mode in Gears of War, as well as the atmosphere and goof of Fallout: New Vegas’ Old World Blues DLC, then you will find Fortified a very enjoyable game, and once again, Unreal Engine 4 shows what it is capable of when in the hands of a competent developer.

Overall, I found Fortified to be a very fun, frantic and enjoyable experience, made all the better with a team of up to 4 players destroying everything that the golden age of Pulp sci-fi can throw at you. With its smooth gameplay, comic book cutscenes and pleasing graphics, Fortified will keep you coming back time and time again, and gives you plenty of game for your money.