Review: Necromunda: Underhive Wars

This game is such a beautiful mess and I loved it - although I may be a bit biased due to external factors.

Alright, let's start with the downs. The game is an XCOM-like (although you control the gangers in first person, which is a surprising change but I like it). You have your experience, inventory management, base management, all the good stuff. The graphics are underwhelming, but no biggie. They completely avoided facial animations with every character in the campaign wearing a gas mask - a nice hack. However, the AI is just atrocious. I played through the campaign and a couple of custom missions - so far easy to normal - and the AI fighters trip over themselves every time. They sometimes shoot you, they sometimes run away, they sometimes do both, use items randomly, etc. This is the single biggest drawback.

Now, for the ups. The visuals - from the backgrounds, the loading screens, the maps, and the gangers themselves - are gorgeous. Grimdark seeps from every corner. 

Now this would not have been enough to keep me playing after the campaign. I created a custom gang, played a few missions. The issue is that the story campaign has you switching around gangs and unable to form any attachments. The custom campaign, on the other hand, has 0 story.

But... and this is a big but... the game had its uses outside of the campaign. I realized that the gangers can be fully customized Barbie-style. I picked an all girl gang. I have a little girl. You see where this is going. If not, then let me tell you that we had a wonderful time dressing up the girls in wildly colorful costumes and giving them names. I sometimes regaled her with highly censored versions of the gang's exploits - who scored most in a mission, who carried away the most barrels and whatnot. And finally, I painted miniatures based on the costumes she created. 

I highly recommend this to any Warhammer dads.