Gundam Breaker Beta Test Impressions

First of all, thanks to Bossjoe for pointing out to me that the Gundam Breaker beta was out. After spending just a bit of time with the game over the weekend, here are some quick impressions.

Historically speaking, Gundam games have had a tendency to suck. The main problem is, most games just can’t quite get ‘the feeling’ of piloting one of these 10 metre giant robots quite right. We have games like Battle Operation where the MS feel really heavy and grounded. In other games like Unicorn, the controls almost feel too responsive, being ultra twitchy, almost like flying a fighter jet. Gundam Breaker opts for the more grounded approach, albeit as a game that doesn’t try to take the whole genre too seriously, much like Gundam Musou.

There are 5 missions or so in the Beta, of which I played the first 2. You can either play solo, or co-op up to four people. The first mission pits you as a GM against various Zeon MS in a jungle-type, possibly Jaburo. The mission layout reminds me of something like Phantasy Star Online or Diablo dungeon crawler type games – basically you destroy all the enemies in a fixed arena before moving to the next area. Repeat until you reach the final boss of the mission.

If a cross between Diablo and Gundam Musou sounds good to you, you’ll feel right at home playing Gundam Breaker

From my short time with the game and watching various videos on YouTube, is that there doesn’t seem to be any real difference between the various suits. Whether you’re piloting a Not-GM or a Not-Freedom, melee moves seem to be extremely similar, if not identical, with the main differences being the stats you gain from the various parts you’ve decided to mash onto your Suit.

Speaking of parts, each component of each suit (head, arms, legs, weapons, backpack etc) has a rarity rating up to 10 stars, with rarer parts granting better stats and damage than their more common counterparts. Certain parts also grant special moves, like Freedom’s wings letting you use it’s Plasma Cannon attack. Part drops seem to be entirely random, so expect a lot of grinding if you want to acquire an entire set for a single MS.

I guess you could say the customization element is the progression system for the game then. Instead of that Epic Chest Plate of the Whale, you’ll be searching for that elusive Sinaju Chest Part. You’ll be completing more missions to acquire better and rarer phat loots which lets you defeat the raid boss (the PG Gundam) so that you can then show off to your friends online in co-op mode. The whole painting aspect is pretty cool as well. Even though you can’t paint each part individually (you can only change the four or so primary colours of the suit), I can see being able to test out colour schemes in real time pretty useful for any Gunpla Builders out there.

For the control scheme, there are two types of basic attacks mapped to Square and Triangle. The game automatically decides whether the attack is a shooting or melee attack, depending on how close you are to your target. Unfortunately, it seems targeting is automatic , which can be a problem when the game decides that the Dom at long range is more important than the horde of Zaku’s trying to smash your face in at close range.

Circle lets you peform various actions which you can select using the D-Pad, such as healing yourself, using head vulcans, or performing a launching beam saber slash. You can customize these in the VR Hangar in between missions.

What I really disliked about the controls is the delay when jumping. Jump and dash are also assigned to the same button (X), except dash is performed by pressing a direction along with X, causing unintentional dashes while trying to jump. At this stage though, jumping doesn’t seem to give any tactical advantage, with the terrain of most stages being relatively flat, and there’s no unique moveset while being airborne either. Furthermore, it seems melee is a far more efficient way of dispatching the basic foes as opposed to shooting, making the game feel like Gundam Musou all over again.

I think your enjoyment of Gundam Breaker will entirely depend on what your expectations are going in. If you’re looking for a good ‘serious’ Gundam game, go play EXVS. But if a Gundam themed co-op dungeon crawler with the likes Diablo or Phantasy Star Online sounds appealing to you, then Gundam Breaker might just be worth a shot when it comes out in June.

Then again, the entire game may just be a cash-in promotion for Bandai’s plamo kit line.

Random Gameplay Footage

Note: These videos weren’t recorded by me.