Was Kaiju Wars Worth It?

Sometimes you’re Godzilla smashing up the city, but in this case we’re the public servants trying to keep from getting smashed! Was Kaiju Wars worth it?

Full disclosure: We received a review code for the Nintendo Switch version of this game. Rest assured that this will not affect the quality or candor of our review.

Background

Kaiju are coming, and you have to stop them. You can toss fighters and tanks at them, but realistically it’ll take a miracle…or some kind of scientific breakthrough to stop them. 

Kaiju generally travel in a predictable path and you’ll whittle them down while working toward a win condition. You can’t kill them, but you can deal some damage and slow them down. The vehicles you throw at them will of course get destroyed, but part of the strategy is in setting up hazards or impediments for the kaiju as they progress. Sure, a missile launcher does more damage, but that tank will reduce the kaiju’s movement speed when it steps on it. 

What does Kaiju Wars do well?

There’s clearly a lot of love for the format. Missions get tense because kaiju can hone in on the location of your scientist, who will then need to evacuate to another lab. While they’re evacuating, you don’t earn money or breakthrough points, so you need to be efficient with your movements.

The kaiju have different abilities, so it doesn’t feel like you’re facing the same one each time. You’ll run into stages where the monsters come back for more, mutate, or you’ll be attacked on multiple fronts. The card system means a stage doesn’t necessarily play out the same way every time, but don’t expect RNG to be your friend, especially on hard mode. Monsters also have their own cards, so they aren’t just a static menace on the battlefield.

The soundtrack is very appropriate, though I’ll admit that Burrowing Menace was the only track that really stuck with me after playing the game.

What could Kaiju Wars do better?

The color choice is very stark on some stages; see the above screenshot. I initially played on my Switch lite, but I could hardly read the text. I restarted the game to play on a docked switch and while it was better on a big screen, it was still tiny.

I would have loved the ability to rotate the map, especially when picking evac routes or planning my defense.

Was Kaiju Wars fun?

I enjoyed the premise. I’d like to see a sequel with more across the board: more features, more monsters, etc. It’s important to emphasize that this is more like a chess puzzle with a few random elements.

Is Kaiju Wars good value?

This title goes for $20 on the eShop. There’s replayability in the form of extra missions and difficulties, as well as challenges with leaderboards. It’s not as short as HowLongToBeat would suggest.

Who is this game for?

Conceptually, Kaiju Wars similar to Into the Breach. If you’ve ever sat through a monster movie and wished that you were the humans, then this title was made just for you. 

As I mentioned above, this is like a puzzle game – you’re trying to stall until you get your win condition. I understand the genre convention, but I would have preferred taking it down using my units.

Was Kaiju Wars worth it?

Plenty of games let you fight giant monsters, but this game has a unique niche within the space. If you’ve just watched a Godzilla movie and want to scratch that urge to send some monsters packing, this is a good simulator for that. A lot of love clearly went into this game.

Despite having Wars in the title, I must reemphasize, this is more Advance Wars, not Super Robot Wars. If you aren’t into the tactical aspect then this likely won’t appeal to you. However, if you enjoy the idea of using your wits to save your city from monsters then Kaiju Wars is worth it.

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