After trying out the demo for Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War!, I knew that I not only wanted the full experience of enlisting in the Mobile Infantry, but I knew I had what it took. My months of service smashing the Terminids in Helldivers II gave me the skill set, bravery, and drive needed to apply myself elsewhere, and where better than bringing the fight to another Bug menace across the galaxy?
Let’s just say my hype was pretty well earned. Developers Auroch Digital put in work with another big sci-fi property in Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun, a game I loved with a sequel on the way later this year. Anything Dotemu touches lately turns to gold – Absolum, Marvel Cosmic Invasion, Metal Slug Tactics, Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound, Streets of Rage 4, and more. It was pretty safe to say that, especially with its retro first-person shooter vibes, Starship Troopers was in good hands.
To my surprise, the whole game is framed with a fourth-wall tickle. Ultimate Bug War! is the recruitment tool of the future, just like America’s Armyand Call of Duty before it. The promise is, not only will Ultimate Bug War! get you in the right mindset to crush the Bugs and test your mettle in the most realistic war simulation ever seen, but top scorers are contacted by a recruiter for the Mobile Infantry (MI) wing of the Federal Armed Services of the United Citizens Federation to learn how they can truly do their part for humanity and become a full-fledged Citizen of the Federation, the apparent highest honor for a serving human.
This is where all of the game’s themes hit hardest. The game itself is a relatively straight, solid sci-fi military shooter, but the framing around it gives Ultimate Bug War! some needed juice. Actor Casper Van Dien reprises his role of Johnny Rico from the 1997 film, now a General and less one eye if that eyepatch isn’t just for show. He’s joined by the “real-world” counterpart for the playable character Major Samantha “Sammy” Dietz, played by Charlotta Mohlin, where the two engage the audience with weapons-grade propaganda for the Federation. Ultimate Bug War! is Sammy’s story, an inspirational tale of heroics, revenge, and unmitigated violence against Bugs because, as we’re told again and again, the only good Bug is a dead Bug.
*salutes*
Even as a newly enlisted Private, you’re more than capable of making good on that notion. Sammy is fast and able to use a wide, albeit ultimately somewhat limited, array of Mobile Infantry weaponry. You can sprint to your heart’s content, replenishing your stamina in a literal second so you can keep bringing the fight to the Bugs. I found my favorite way to get around the game’s relatively expansive maps besides the Razorback mech was bunny hopping and Sammy’s seemingly infinite lungs made that possible. You also have a variety of tactical supports you can call in like various airstrikes, ordnance, and an always equipped supply drop for quick ammo, health, and randomized weapons for you. Just find the corresponding portable radio around the world and help is a button press away. It’s like Amazon Prime for murder.
Ultimate Bug War! sacrifices a little diversity for lore and thematic accuracy when it comes to guns. Over a third of the 14 are from the Morita family of Mobile Infantry weaponry. No doubt the Morita Mk 1 assault rifle is iconic to sci-fi fans, a gun that I swear Halo‘s also iconic assault rifle was based off of and itself was at least partially influenced by the pulse rifle from the Alien franchise. It’s punchy and a mainstay of your loadout, but it starts to become a little samey when the other weapons you find in the field are the Morita Carbine, Morita Hawkeye, Morita XXX, and later on the Morita II upgrade, all variants and differently kitted-out takes on the Mk 1 mother weapon. There’s a traditional pump-action shotgun and the very good E-pulse energy weapon that comes in rifle and heavy variants that help break up the monotony, not to mention the invaluable Hatchet light machine gun that I usually replaced my Moritas with when possible (sorry, Morita, but you don’t have a 120-round drum mag).
There’s also this BFG (Bug Fragging Gun) that looks like a prototype for the Space Marine bolter
Sammy’s got other tricks too. She can “taunt” at fellow MI to get them to follow her by saluting them, gnashing her fist into the palm of her hand, or pointing forward. Doing this gets the grunt to toss you some Morita ammo as well. She spits out a voice line too, including the famous Johnny Rico line from the end of the first movie, “Come on, you apes! You wanna live forever?!” You can melee with a knife which is surprisingly effective. Three stabs can down a Warrior Bug and also stunlock them a bit so they can’t retaliate if you’re fast enough.
Sammy as a character is nothing to write home about, but services the game’s themes well enough. She’s overly enthused to destroy any and all Bugs to a nearly genocidal degree, a model recruit for the MI who’s obedient, sycophantic, and single-minded in her purpose. After the first mission, she’s given a reason to become more blindly berserk in her application of violence with a revenge plot becoming the main motivation.
This can be commentary on the militaristic mindset and how people are fed messaging to fit a narrative to dehumanize their enemy (much easier here given that they’re literal aliens) so they’re angry, primed, and ready to fight without question, all pre-existing moral and ethical considerations void as long as the enemy is dead and bloodied in front of them. It’s up to you to catch and engage with those threads, up to and including ignoring or taking them at face value, but I think that would betray the concept to a moderate degree.
Sammy’s voice actress for the in-game segments, Elsie Lovelock, killed her performance, conveying the drama and camp quite well. There’s moments where she’s screaming and overcome with emotion, and you can tell her heart is fully in it.
The game is all in on excessive blood and gore
For the Bugs, their variety is kept intriguing enough throughout the playthrough. Warriors are the bread and butter of all forces with their evolved form, the aggressive and striped Tiger, proving difficult to handle unless you have a shotgun. Aphids and Archers are long range, but fragile acid spitter Bugs that can wear down your health and armor which doesn’t regenerate in this game except up to 25 health if you fall below it. One swipe from a Warrior does 25 damage on Trooper difficulty though so it’s nothing to depend on–remember to call in supply drops often. Then you have flying Bugs like the Hopper, and big tanky boys with the Centurion and Tanker, all of which are deadly when mixed into bigger groups. Other enemies show themselves near the end of the campaign, but I shan’t spoil those.
For the first time ever, you can commit galactic treason by playing as a Bug in one of five missions that you unlock as you play through the human missions. Really, they’re simulations run by the Federation so you can learn how to think like a Bug, specifically the big bad Assassin Bug that causes Sammy extreme sorrow early on in the human missions. They’re fun, giving you the opportunity to do to the MI what they’ve been doing to Sammy and her pals the whole game. It’s more strategic too, requiring you to find Bug nests to summon other Bugs, command them to attack, switch between forms to handle different situations, and bring abject horror to key MI locations in order to topple their grip around the galaxy, for science of course. The cutscenes with a Federation scientist between each mission are entertaining as well.
I was very pleased to learn through the credits that Brian David Gilbert, one of the funniest people YouTube has afforded us in the last decade, and his partner Karen Han wrote the live-action segments. You can tell–if you’ve watched any of his work, especially on Polygon’s Unraveled series, the wink-and-nod tone of the satire is palpable and familiar. I also think he might’ve sung the very patriotic song that plays over the credits, but can’t confirm. Writer Grant Stewart also contributed to these segments and wrote the plot for the game itself.
It makes for top-notch satire just like the original film. With the world the way it is, feeling like we’re always on the verge of another draft for a senseless war, not to mention being force-fed state messaging on a variety of global topics including from official government social media accounts using memes and video game clips, perhaps it hits a little too close to home. For me, it shows just how far we haven’t come. The satire of the 1997 film was often mistaken by critics and viewers as genuine fascist, jingoistic rhetoric without a single tongue in cheek, and nowadays people have a tendency to flat-out ignore, excuse, or sterilize real-life genuine fascist rhetoric as good or at least unharmful. Your mileage may vary, but Ultimate Bug War! almost felt surreal at times despite its far-future setting, but that’s what helps make good satire.
Servicepeople streaming games to a young, impressionable, recruitable audience? Very on the nose
The human missions lasted around seven hours for me with the Bug missions adding another hour-ish to that, all on the default Trooper difficulty. Not a long play by any means, but there’s replayability to it in the form of finding very hidden secrets in each human mission (I only found two of them on my initial playthrough). They unlock game modifiers similar to Halo‘s skulls which is nice, giving you more incentive to look in every nook and cranny, but with the big, open maps relative to what you’d expect from a game like this, it’s a needle-in-a-haystack situation. Have fun!
One thing that I did find curious is the mixture of art styles. MI models are 2D pixelated just like most everything was in Boltgun, but all the Bugs are 3D models. It wasn’t distracting to me, but definitely formed more questions in my head than if they would have been consistent with models. If anything, it’s a more unique take on the retro, boomer shooter look, but it’s been a bone of contention for some and I get why.
Ultimate Bug War! links your normal look sensitivity to your aiming one which proves to be hard to get used to. Whether you notice it or not, almost every FPS out there tunes down your sensitivity when looking down your sights or through a scope so you can be more precise. Not this game–you turn just as fast while aiming as you do when looking around normally. Separate sensitivity sliders for looking and aiming would be nice to see in a future patch!
No one is too young to serve and do their part!
It’s worth noting that this game digitally is going to cost $25, which is about the maximum I’d personally comfortably pay for the amount of content on offer. The game is quite fun if a bit repetitive. Pretty much all missions take on the same general structure with similar objectives and map layout, but being able to beat this entire game in one day should raise eyebrows for the pickier purchaser. Again, if you’re a secret chaser or fall in love with the game enough to iterate on its action for better scores and speeds through levels, each and every dollar will be justified I’m sure. For the casual purchaser, heed this warning and maybe wait for a sale if you want the value of your money to go further. You can also just play the same demo on Steam I did a month ago and see if it’s for you while understanding that it represents roughly a tenth of the total game.
With all this in mind, it’s easy to recommend Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War! to certain people who likely have big overlaps. Liked Boltgun and want a similar game? Get it. Enjoy the lore and campy, violent satire of the Starship Troopers universe? Buy it. Like FPSs, especially the more classically-aligned ones? Procure it. It’s really that simple. Unfortunately, it’s a little harder to recommend outside of those constraints without more caveats, but I will say a purchase linked to Dotemu has never steered me wrong yet, and Auroch Digital as a dev is currently hurtling on that same trajectory.
Ultimately, Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War! bets big and differently on production and wins. The concepts and framing are what make it unique and enhance the game as a total package. The game itself is very fun and solid, but doesn’t advance the genre in terms of gameplay or mechanics, it’s just other stuff done very well. I’d stay here and talk with y’all more, but I can hear Federation police at my door for not giving this simulation a shining, perfect endorsement so that’s all from me. Go do your part!
Ultimately, Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War! bets big and differently on production and wins. The concepts and framing are what make it unique and enhance the game as a total package.
After trying out the demo for Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War!, I knew that I not only wanted the full experience of enlisting in the Mobile Infantry, but I knew I had what it took. My months of service smashing the Terminids in Helldivers II gave me the skill set, bravery, and drive needed to apply myself elsewhere, and where better than bringing the fight to another Bug menace across the galaxy?
Let’s just say my hype was pretty well earned. Developers Auroch Digital put in work with another big sci-fi property in Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun, a game I loved with a sequel on the way later this year. Anything Dotemu touches lately turns to gold – Absolum, Marvel Cosmic Invasion, Metal Slug Tactics, Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound, Streets of Rage 4, and more. It was pretty safe to say that, especially with its retro first-person shooter vibes, Starship Troopers was in good hands.
To my surprise, the whole game is framed with a fourth-wall tickle. Ultimate Bug War! is the recruitment tool of the future, just like America’s Armyand Call of Duty before it. The promise is, not only will Ultimate Bug War! get you in the right mindset to crush the Bugs and test your mettle in the most realistic war simulation ever seen, but top scorers are contacted by a recruiter for the Mobile Infantry (MI) wing of the Federal Armed Services of the United Citizens Federation to learn how they can truly do their part for humanity and become a full-fledged Citizen of the Federation, the apparent highest honor for a serving human.
This is where all of the game’s themes hit hardest. The game itself is a relatively straight, solid sci-fi military shooter, but the framing around it gives Ultimate Bug War! some needed juice. Actor Casper Van Dien reprises his role of Johnny Rico from the 1997 film, now a General and less one eye if that eyepatch isn’t just for show. He’s joined by the “real-world” counterpart for the playable character Major Samantha “Sammy” Dietz, played by Charlotta Mohlin, where the two engage the audience with weapons-grade propaganda for the Federation. Ultimate Bug War! is Sammy’s story, an inspirational tale of heroics, revenge, and unmitigated violence against Bugs because, as we’re told again and again, the only good Bug is a dead Bug.
*salutes*
Even as a newly enlisted Private, you’re more than capable of making good on that notion. Sammy is fast and able to use a wide, albeit ultimately somewhat limited, array of Mobile Infantry weaponry. You can sprint to your heart’s content, replenishing your stamina in a literal second so you can keep bringing the fight to the Bugs. I found my favorite way to get around the game’s relatively expansive maps besides the Razorback mech was bunny hopping and Sammy’s seemingly infinite lungs made that possible. You also have a variety of tactical supports you can call in like various airstrikes, ordnance, and an always equipped supply drop for quick ammo, health, and randomized weapons for you. Just find the corresponding portable radio around the world and help is a button press away. It’s like Amazon Prime for murder.
Ultimate Bug War! sacrifices a little diversity for lore and thematic accuracy when it comes to guns. Over a third of the 14 are from the Morita family of Mobile Infantry weaponry. No doubt the Morita Mk 1 assault rifle is iconic to sci-fi fans, a gun that I swear Halo‘s also iconic assault rifle was based off of and itself was at least partially influenced by the pulse rifle from the Alien franchise. It’s punchy and a mainstay of your loadout, but it starts to become a little samey when the other weapons you find in the field are the Morita Carbine, Morita Hawkeye, Morita XXX, and later on the Morita II upgrade, all variants and differently kitted-out takes on the Mk 1 mother weapon. There’s a traditional pump-action shotgun and the very good E-pulse energy weapon that comes in rifle and heavy variants that help break up the monotony, not to mention the invaluable Hatchet light machine gun that I usually replaced my Moritas with when possible (sorry, Morita, but you don’t have a 120-round drum mag).
There’s also this BFG (Bug Fragging Gun) that looks like a prototype for the Space Marine bolter
Sammy’s got other tricks too. She can “taunt” at fellow MI to get them to follow her by saluting them, gnashing her fist into the palm of her hand, or pointing forward. Doing this gets the grunt to toss you some Morita ammo as well. She spits out a voice line too, including the famous Johnny Rico line from the end of the first movie, “Come on, you apes! You wanna live forever?!” You can melee with a knife which is surprisingly effective. Three stabs can down a Warrior Bug and also stunlock them a bit so they can’t retaliate if you’re fast enough.
Sammy as a character is nothing to write home about, but services the game’s themes well enough. She’s overly enthused to destroy any and all Bugs to a nearly genocidal degree, a model recruit for the MI who’s obedient, sycophantic, and single-minded in her purpose. After the first mission, she’s given a reason to become more blindly berserk in her application of violence with a revenge plot becoming the main motivation.
This can be commentary on the militaristic mindset and how people are fed messaging to fit a narrative to dehumanize their enemy (much easier here given that they’re literal aliens) so they’re angry, primed, and ready to fight without question, all pre-existing moral and ethical considerations void as long as the enemy is dead and bloodied in front of them. It’s up to you to catch and engage with those threads, up to and including ignoring or taking them at face value, but I think that would betray the concept to a moderate degree.
Sammy’s voice actress for the in-game segments, Elsie Lovelock, killed her performance, conveying the drama and camp quite well. There’s moments where she’s screaming and overcome with emotion, and you can tell her heart is fully in it.
The game is all in on excessive blood and gore
For the Bugs, their variety is kept intriguing enough throughout the playthrough. Warriors are the bread and butter of all forces with their evolved form, the aggressive and striped Tiger, proving difficult to handle unless you have a shotgun. Aphids and Archers are long range, but fragile acid spitter Bugs that can wear down your health and armor which doesn’t regenerate in this game except up to 25 health if you fall below it. One swipe from a Warrior does 25 damage on Trooper difficulty though so it’s nothing to depend on–remember to call in supply drops often. Then you have flying Bugs like the Hopper, and big tanky boys with the Centurion and Tanker, all of which are deadly when mixed into bigger groups. Other enemies show themselves near the end of the campaign, but I shan’t spoil those.
For the first time ever, you can commit galactic treason by playing as a Bug in one of five missions that you unlock as you play through the human missions. Really, they’re simulations run by the Federation so you can learn how to think like a Bug, specifically the big bad Assassin Bug that causes Sammy extreme sorrow early on in the human missions. They’re fun, giving you the opportunity to do to the MI what they’ve been doing to Sammy and her pals the whole game. It’s more strategic too, requiring you to find Bug nests to summon other Bugs, command them to attack, switch between forms to handle different situations, and bring abject horror to key MI locations in order to topple their grip around the galaxy, for science of course. The cutscenes with a Federation scientist between each mission are entertaining as well.
I was very pleased to learn through the credits that Brian David Gilbert, one of the funniest people YouTube has afforded us in the last decade, and his partner Karen Han wrote the live-action segments. You can tell–if you’ve watched any of his work, especially on Polygon’s Unraveled series, the wink-and-nod tone of the satire is palpable and familiar. I also think he might’ve sung the very patriotic song that plays over the credits, but can’t confirm. Writer Grant Stewart also contributed to these segments and wrote the plot for the game itself.
It makes for top-notch satire just like the original film. With the world the way it is, feeling like we’re always on the verge of another draft for a senseless war, not to mention being force-fed state messaging on a variety of global topics including from official government social media accounts using memes and video game clips, perhaps it hits a little too close to home. For me, it shows just how far we haven’t come. The satire of the 1997 film was often mistaken by critics and viewers as genuine fascist, jingoistic rhetoric without a single tongue in cheek, and nowadays people have a tendency to flat-out ignore, excuse, or sterilize real-life genuine fascist rhetoric as good or at least unharmful. Your mileage may vary, but Ultimate Bug War! almost felt surreal at times despite its far-future setting, but that’s what helps make good satire.
Servicepeople streaming games to a young, impressionable, recruitable audience? Very on the nose
The human missions lasted around seven hours for me with the Bug missions adding another hour-ish to that, all on the default Trooper difficulty. Not a long play by any means, but there’s replayability to it in the form of finding very hidden secrets in each human mission (I only found two of them on my initial playthrough). They unlock game modifiers similar to Halo‘s skulls which is nice, giving you more incentive to look in every nook and cranny, but with the big, open maps relative to what you’d expect from a game like this, it’s a needle-in-a-haystack situation. Have fun!
One thing that I did find curious is the mixture of art styles. MI models are 2D pixelated just like most everything was in Boltgun, but all the Bugs are 3D models. It wasn’t distracting to me, but definitely formed more questions in my head than if they would have been consistent with models. If anything, it’s a more unique take on the retro, boomer shooter look, but it’s been a bone of contention for some and I get why.
Ultimate Bug War! links your normal look sensitivity to your aiming one which proves to be hard to get used to. Whether you notice it or not, almost every FPS out there tunes down your sensitivity when looking down your sights or through a scope so you can be more precise. Not this game–you turn just as fast while aiming as you do when looking around normally. Separate sensitivity sliders for looking and aiming would be nice to see in a future patch!
No one is too young to serve and do their part!
It’s worth noting that this game digitally is going to cost $25, which is about the maximum I’d personally comfortably pay for the amount of content on offer. The game is quite fun if a bit repetitive. Pretty much all missions take on the same general structure with similar objectives and map layout, but being able to beat this entire game in one day should raise eyebrows for the pickier purchaser. Again, if you’re a secret chaser or fall in love with the game enough to iterate on its action for better scores and speeds through levels, each and every dollar will be justified I’m sure. For the casual purchaser, heed this warning and maybe wait for a sale if you want the value of your money to go further. You can also just play the same demo on Steam I did a month ago and see if it’s for you while understanding that it represents roughly a tenth of the total game.
With all this in mind, it’s easy to recommend Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War! to certain people who likely have big overlaps. Liked Boltgun and want a similar game? Get it. Enjoy the lore and campy, violent satire of the Starship Troopers universe? Buy it. Like FPSs, especially the more classically-aligned ones? Procure it. It’s really that simple. Unfortunately, it’s a little harder to recommend outside of those constraints without more caveats, but I will say a purchase linked to Dotemu has never steered me wrong yet, and Auroch Digital as a dev is currently hurtling on that same trajectory.
Ultimately, Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War! bets big and differently on production and wins. The concepts and framing are what make it unique and enhance the game as a total package. The game itself is very fun and solid, but doesn’t advance the genre in terms of gameplay or mechanics, it’s just other stuff done very well. I’d stay here and talk with y’all more, but I can hear Federation police at my door for not giving this simulation a shining, perfect endorsement so that’s all from me. Go do your part!
by David Rodriguez
