Recent reviews by TheAngryPeanut

If you've played the first one, you will like this one. It's short on content right now but will surely give you entertainment for about 10-15 hours. The whole experience has been really smooth, the loading is a lot shorter than the first one and it just feels much more quick and snappy. You can notice that the developers knew what they did this time around and it really shows.

There are some obvious flaws of course. The item placement and slot snapping are not finely tuned, you often grab something else instead of what you wanted. There are some bugs where your body bugs around, melts into a pool on the floor while your hands stay the same. There are also some memory issues inside your base where your equipment might be on the wrong place, ammunition tend to float around in the air instead of keeping itself inside the boxes. But these aren't gamebreakers, just mild and annoying bugs. There is one bug when you climb the ladders in which you can glitch and get thrown away in high speeds, resulting in death. This is the worst of the bugs, make sure to save when going climbing.
Otherwise, they've really freshen-up the gameplay. Ammo boxes work like a charm with easier and better usability. The sound design is on point, it's just so darn good. The enemies have better AI and the newer design both make them easier to spot in the darkness and just looks way cooler. Also, the death animations for them are just so gosh darn cool, they melt into the atmosphere. The choice to expand on the store and customizability are just the most logical and sane thing they could have done; the different backpacks and weapons vests are a really welcome addition to the game.

All around, it's everything you could hope for in a sequel. I'm going to follow this game with great interest going forward.

This is the kind of game that have a natural progression systems without all the flashing, casino-like rewards. It's very much like a Rouge-like without the nonsensical die -respawn stronger - repeat, style. You get your stuff and you earn it by going further into the harder zones and bringing back your hard earned loot for which you sell at the store. You buy better weapons and go even further. Rinse and repeat.
It's a great gameloop that hooks you right away. And the looting is just the most satisfying thing.

I'll start right of. This game demands allot of you. Especially time, effort and patience.
They are billions is a Survival RTS game set in the distant future of our world where overpopulation have led to the demise of the human race. What is left of this scant civilisation is a great city ruled over by a dictator with a mind set to re-populate the earth again. You are the general of this dictator and off you go to re-conquer the earth.

What made me buy this game was the unique setting it promised. A Survival RTS with heavy focus on tower defense was something I've never encountered. The game delivers upon these promised settings with vigor as you get to build your city while trying to stave of the ever-eminent danger of the zombies. If one zombie slips through your defenses and starts to maul your hastily raised tents, you are pretty much done for. The disease spreads like a wildfire and multiplies before your very eyes as you realize that there is nothing you can do. All that hard work crumbles and you have to start over. And no matter of quick saves or manual saves can rescue that effort, they've removed that feature for you.
This creates a tension in the game in which you need to be ever vigilant and ever on the look-out for potential harbingers. But as you progress and become adapt at the rules of the game the tension eases off and you get to fully explore what the building mechanics have in for you. And they are somewhat underwhelming.
In the campaign you earn science-points and army-points when you complete a mission. These points is used for spending on upgrades to your civilization, very much like other RTS games. What this game does different from the others though is the underwhelming pace you get to choose upgrades. This is where I find my first real difficulty in terms of enjoyment since many upgrades are extremely expensive and not that great. It's about one upgrade per mission. I had to complete at least 6 missions to get to spend it on an upgrade that somewhat changed the game-play to a more enjoyable setting.

As you progress the game varies between brilliant and unfair. Some missions are brutally hard while others are really nice and evenly challenging. And we shan't name the missions in where you get to control a single hero-character, these missions are a dread of boredom since your character can only do one thing. Attack. No special powers, no fun effects except from some grenades here-and-there which you can use. These missions as I said are extremely boring but essential since they give you more science-points than a regular mission. I recommend to listen to something in the background while you do this.
Army points are also a necessary currency since you use it on smaller missions in where you don't establish settlements. Instead you hire mercenaries and blockades to repel a set number of zombies in a horde. These missions are fun at the beginning since you can differ between some few tactics, but the biggest flaw with this is that there's only one tactic that works. Hire only mercenaries, blockades are useless.
In the end of my 40-hour play-through, the saving grace is the traditional RTS game-play. Its a blast trying to prepare your settlements from incoming hordes and to continue your expansion. But as i said in the beginning, this game demands allot from you. You will fail and you will try again. Sometimes over and over again until you find the right tactic. It's game-play that demands trial-and-error which makes the game suck up more time from you than what you may be prepared to sacrifice. But to succeed in that regard gets you a really satisfying feeling in the end and sometimes, that's worth the hassle.

+Fun RTS mixed with survival and preparation
+Cool setting with a defined world and artwork
+A good challenge for someone with time
- A bad challenge for someone with little patience
- Sound design could get better actors and spatial work
- Excruciatingly slow progress system

7/10 - A good time-passer but nothing of great value.