John Carpenter's Toxic Commando – Game Review

John Carpenter's Toxic Commando was first introduced at Summer Game Fest, a collaborative development between filmmaker John Carpenter and Saber Interactive, the development team behind the success of World War Z and Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 .

Since that reveal, Toxic Commando has garnered attention from the gaming community, not only because of the name John Carpenter, a legend of horror films and synthwave music deeply rooted in American culture of the 1980s, but also because of the co-op zombie gameplay style already quite familiar from Saber Interactive's World War Z.

So, will John Carpenter's Toxic Commando live up to the expectations of the gaming community?

Let's explore this further with tipsplay.net in the following article!

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A FUSSY, SPECTACULAR EXPERIENCE!

John Carpenter's Toxic Commando is set in a fictional future where a mad scientist has unleashed an entity called the 'Sludge God' and quickly turned the people around him into… zombies!

Players take on the role of one of four reluctant mercenaries and join the fight to defeat the Sludge God and save the world.

Overall, from the very first moments of gameplay, John Carpenter's Toxic Commando does a great job of delivering intense clashes, with thousands of zombies flooding the screen and attacking the player—something Saber Interactive has done very well in World War Z and Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 , thanks to its Swarm Engine.

The game also made good use of this strength in its levels, most notably the first two levels: The Drop and Church of the Damned, where most objectives are designed in a tower defense style, forcing players to directly confront hordes of zombies constantly attacking, creating dramatic confrontations accompanied by incredibly spectacular and beautiful visuals!

Another highlight of John Carpenter's Toxic Commando lies in its semi-open world level design. In each level, in addition to the main mission, players can complete numerous side missions scattered throughout the map. These objectives will provide players with additional equipment, vehicles, or upgrades, making the final confrontation more manageable.

Speaking of vehicles, the game also places several vehicles on the map for players to use for traveling between locations. Overall, this feature saves a considerable amount of time during travel, and each vehicle also has one or two special abilities for players to use, such as a machine gun turret or flamethrower, which are quite useful for the final missions of each level.

The only problem with these vehicles is that they consume a lot of fuel and are also quite prone to breakdowns, forcing players to constantly run around the map searching for gas and maintaining them when attacked by zombies.

Furthermore, the game also features four character classes for players to choose from, each with a unique skill. For example, the Strike class can create energy beams to 'clear' large areas of monsters, while the Medic class heals teammates. Each character class can also be upgraded to gain additional support effects, which are quite useful when you want to conquer more difficult levels.

Overall, John Carpenter's Toxic Commando doesn't offer particularly innovative gameplay ideas, but the game's high concentration of zombies, coupled with its gameplay design that emphasizes communication and mutual support, makes it especially fun when played with friends. Each level becomes not just a survival challenge but also a dramatic display of strategic coordination.

Furthermore, another aspect that the writer quite liked about the game is the extremely detailed weapon customization system; each accessory on the gun can be equipped with a different look, allowing players to mix and match many different colors and patterns on the same gun.

Each level is not only a survival challenge but also a dramatic display of strategic coordination.

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DIFFICULT TO RETAIN PLAYERS

While John Carpenter's Toxic Commando offers a very satisfying zombie-shooting experience, with cinematic sequences featuring hundreds, or even thousands, of undead attacking you, the game struggles to keep players engaged after they've completed the first installment.

The core problem here is that John Carpenter's Toxic Commando is a 100% online game, heavily reliant on players replaying the game multiple times. However, the game completely falls short in this area; the repetitive challenges and missions, along with the rewards designed to incentivize players to "grind," lack substance. This leaves the experience after completing the game feeling dull and uninteresting.

Starting with the levels, instead of expanding the game world with new areas, the game seems to revolve around recycling 2-3 maps throughout the storyline, only changing the quest lines and objectives. As a result, the levels in the game all look quite similar, lacking many unique features for players to discover.

Furthermore, when it comes to in-game content, the number of skills, weapons, and upgrades available so far is still too limited, leaving little room for players to experiment with or mix different playstyles.

The most striking example is that the game only has three secondary weapons to use, or the medical gear section only has one item to choose from. Therefore, the variety of weapons in the game is still quite limited, not offering many choices for players to experiment with.

Regarding cosmetic items, one positive aspect is that almost everything in the game can be unlocked through grinding; however, the trade-off is that the number of cosmetic items is quite limited and not diverse or appealing enough to entice players to put in the effort to collect them.

Not to mention the Prestige mechanic, which allows players to discard all the equipment they've painstakingly collected, resetting their weapon's level to 1, just to exchange it for a dynamic weapon skin. For me, using Prestige just to get skins is a waste of time and not very enjoyable when you see the weapon you spent so much time optimizing get completely lost in an instant.

Overall, at the moment, the content of John Carpenter's Toxic Commando is still very limited; the game looks more like an 'early access' version than a finished product.

Although Saber Interactive has announced a schedule for releasing new content every three months, with such a slow release pace, the game will struggle to retain players until the next update.

Overall, at the moment, the content for John Carpenter's Toxic Commando is still very limited; the game looks more like an early access version than a finished product.