Tiny Troopers Review – Tiny Can Still Pack A Punch

Captain Camper had the pleasure of bumping into the people over at Iceberg Interactive during his time at the EuroGamer Expo and they gave him a code for their recently released iOS title, Tiny Troopers. Captain Camper sits down with the PC version and gives his thoughts in the below Tiny Troopers Review.

Tiny Troopers Review

I wasn’t really expecting much, I mean how good could an iOS port be on the PC? However, after playing for 2 hours straight without any breaks, I realized that despite its iOS roots Tiny Troopers has a lot to offer. The basic premise of the game is a point and click shooter where players use basic tactics to kill enemies while avoiding heavy fire. A WASD option is available, however I didn’t notice this until about level 15, but I’m sure it would be a lot more familiar for fans of regular PC controls. I would never have guessed the game was a port to PC, the controls are fluid and after the first or second mission, they become second nature.

The combat is obviously the primary focus of Tiny Troopers and it doesn’t disappoint for a second. You begin fighting against basic enemy infantry with basic weapons and soldiers. After a few levels you gain access to more weapons and specialist soldiers, each bringing their own combat elements to each mission. You have access to Grenades, Rocket Launchers and Air Strikes, each of which can be purchased during missions via Command Points and Airdrops, or you can start with a decent selection of ammo by purchasing a Specialist Soldier. Although the basic combat mechanics would be quite mundane in themselves, the variety of enemies adds a great depth of strategy to the title. Players come up against basic infantry, snipers, bunkers, tanks and more. Each requiring a slightly different approach to defeat.

For such a basic title Tiny Troopers does feature a variety of added elements to give it more depth, with one of the main being exploration. Most of the maps are quite large, taking 5-10 minutes to complete if you have the right tools. But other than clearing out enemy soldiers and reducing structures to rubble, there’s a number of collectibles scattered across every map. Some of the collectibles offer you Command Points, a currency of sorts that players can spend on airdrops during missions or ammo and buffs between operations. Other collectibles offer you Medals. Medals are the main area of progression as they’re the only item that offer permanent benefits. Sadly most of these benefits are passive effects or extra ammunition, neither of which really change the game experience that much. I would have liked a few more customization options, maybe even the ability to enhance the appearance of your soldiers, but sadly no luck there.

Your soldiers progress individually through missions but it’s not really clear what benefits this has. I would assume basic stat improvements such as increase hit-points and damage, but again this doesn’t have any drastic change on the game-play. That is until you accidentally run into a minefield and wipe your entire squad out, forcing your next attempt to be made with rookie rank soldiers. It’s pretty obvious after that, ranking your soldiers up definitely helps.

I thoroughly enjoyed practically every aspect of Tiny Troopers with the exception of the sound effects. The sounds of the explosions and weapons are great, creating ear piercing booms as you launch your rocket into a bunker, but the soldiers are a different story. If my eyes were closed I would assume Tiny Troopers consisted of a group of preadolescence kids running around a warzone. The high-pitched voices and repeated phrases definitely retract from the experience, although the homage to the Aliens franchise was a nice touch. “Game over man, it’s game over”.

Overall Tiny Troopers offers plenty of boom for your buck. Currently priced at $9.99 on Steam, it’s one of those titles you could easily sink a few hours into. There’s a good amount of replay-ability thanks to the end-of-mission ratings and difficulty settings, and there’s something quite special about the drive to get at least one soldier to survive the entire campaign.