Gearing up for PAX in less than 24 hours – I found myself locking and loading camera equipment like a guerrilla force heading out for battle. That makes the pure OVER9000 of “Broforce” quite an adventure of wacky Linux gaming hijinks and bloodshed all the more applicable.
‘You’re getting into bullets, pecs, explosions, biceps, fire, and CAPSLOCK.’
With developer Free Lives brand-spanking new 2017 update that looks and sounds like one of Mr. Torgue’s wet dreams, you know what you’re getting into right out of the gate.
What’s that, you may wonder? You’re getting into bullets, pecs, explosions, biceps, fire, and CAPSLOCK. With characters obvious avatars of action and sci fi movie icons, their names have all been a-BRO-privately changed to something more suitable and less lawsuit inviting.
Names like “Bronan the Barbarian”, “The Boondock Bros”, “Ellen Ripbro” …I could just keep going because the names are THAT perfect.
The game itself is simple: Kill. Everything. Okay, so maybe it’s not JUST killing everything, after all there’s a certain degree of pageantry involved.
But not much.
In contrast to the cinematic and trailer styles, the game itself is a collection of blocky pixels straight out of an 80’s arcade game.
With an inability to take itself seriously that rivals the Adult Swim show Metalocalypse, “Broforce” refuses to pull punches or cheap jokes to combine in a megaton detonation of every American action movie ever made. A side-scrolling action platformer with bullets and ‘MURICA, this 8 bit throwback is a wildly entertaining brofist of respect to both old school gaming and the high octane glory of action cinema.
You work your way through 15 zones with extreme prejudice, running and gunning solo or with a co-op group of up to 4 players.
The co-op function works both locally or online, so whether you’re looking to hook up with some bros for a house party or find some new bros online, you’re golden like a sunset made of patriotism, freedom, body odor and gasoline fumes.
A game which not only allows but celebrates collateral damage is the perfect thing to tuck into after a long day doing pretty much anything else. Irreverent humor of the game aside, the gameplay itself is solid, with simple mechanics taking you from one task to the next.
No matter how you look at it, there’s more than a few good options to choose from until this year’s Penny Arcade Expo drops its cache of PC gaming, Linux friendly material for the masses to enjoy!
What Linux games do you want to see from PAX 2017? Reply below, bro.