Okay... Windows Phone developers 10tons have produced some fantastic games for Windows Phone 8 devices. You have King Oddball, Tennis to the Face and now you can add Boom Brigade 2 to the list.
Boom Brigade 2 is a tower defense, top down shooter where you have to defend your bunker from invading aliens. The game has thirty missions, a collection of bonus survival missions and a handful of upgrades to keep you busy. As always with 10tons games, graphics and animations are top notch and Boom Brigade 2 comes in as another great addition to the Windows Phone gaming library.
The main menu for Boom Brigade 2 has options to view the help screens, play the game and access "more stuff" that includes gaming options, profiles, credits, more games from 10tons, a Xenopedia (reference section for the aliens you will face) and 10tons Facebook and Twitter pages.
Game options cover sound/music levels and player profiles allow you to set up multiple profiles for Boom Brigade 2 to avoid you losing your progress when a friend wants to play.
In tapping the play button from the main menu, you'll be sent to the missions screen which has four chapters of missions that progressively unlock as you complete the previous missions. You also have an assortment of survival missions that become available as you make your way through the primary missions. You can also view your Boom Brigade 2 achievements from the missions screen.
The game screen is laid out fairly simple with your ranking and wave number across the top of the screen. Somewhere on the screen is your bunker and your troops (varies in number) weapons range is illustrated by a green circle around each soldier. You move your soldiers by tapping on them and drawing a movement line. Any alien that comes within that green circle is fired upon automatically. Different weapons have different fire rates, damage level and effective ranges. At the start of each mission you'll have the option to equip each soldier with whatever arms are available. The further you advance in the game, the more weapons choices you'll have.
Boom Brigade 2 goes beyond a tower defense game in that the aliens will attack your troops. Hence the need to keep your soldiers moving around, staying out of reach of the alien's attack. Otherwise the aliens will gobble up your troops in no time. Health meters will appear above both the soldiers and bunker to give you an idea how bad it's getting.
The goal is simple, destroy the alien invaders and protect your base. Each mission has multiple waves of attacks you'll need to survive and periodically boosts will parachute in to give your soldiers an edge. You have boosts that will explode and take out any aliens in the vicinity, health boosts to heal your injured soldiers, artillery barrages to wipe out the aliens, and repair boosts for your bunker. The game ends when either all your troops get devoured by aliens or your bunker is destroyed. Levels start off slow but quickly quicken in pace. By the time you get to the fourth mission you'll begin to wonder how it could get any worse but it will.
Quick item of note with the survival missions is that there is a tactical button that appears in the bottom left corner of the battlefield. In tapping this button, the aliens are frozen in time and you can draw out movements for your troops to follow. It allows you to be more tactical in your actions than responsive when the aliens can't be paused.
Graphic and animations are fantastic (especially when the base blows up), game play is fast paced, and with thirty (all re-playable) missions plus survival missions there's plenty of gaming to be had. All totaled, Boom Brigade 2 is great way to pass the time and a fine addition to the Windows Phone 8 gaming library.
There is a free trial version available for Boom Brigade 2 and the full version is currently running $2.49. You can find it all here in the Windows Phone Store.
Oh... and if you prefer things on a larger screen there is a Windows 8 version of Boom Brigade 2 ($3.49) that you can find here in the Windows Store.
