Broforce! You can’t simply speak its name, it has to be growled out from the back of a throat ravaged by too many cigars and too much whiskey. The very mention of Broforce causes aliens to look for simpler worlds to conquer and terrorists to convert to conscientious objection. The sheer manly waves of unbridled machismo radiating from the heroes of Broforce cause women to leave their men and men to say “No, I can’t hold this against you, I’d do the same. Would it be too weird if I watched?” Broforce!
Broforce is a 2D run & gun action-fest starring some familiar (but hopefully not so familiar as to be copyright-infringing) characters based on 80s and 90s movie heroes. It’s currently in development and trying to get on to Steam via Greenlight, but there’s a lengthy demo available for either in-browser play or download. You can probably save yourself some reading by downloading the demo and having an utter blast destroying everything that moves in giant gouts of pixelated explodey-gore, but if you need persuading then here’s a whole load of words explaining why-
The prototype is pure unfiltered awesome. You start off as one of a selection of heroes, each with their own attack and special weapon, and tear through the levels wreaking carnage on both everything that moves and the terrain it stands on. You start off with a selection of four characters available, and rescuing guys in the levels not only grants an extra life but also contributes to unlocking more characters in the roster. The character you play at level’s start is random, but when you die or free a hostage (which also adds an extra life to each level’s starting count of one) you change to someone else. This forces you to learn everyone’s abilities and constantly switch up your play style as you go. Every single member of Broforce is ridiculously overpowered but they also die with one hit, so it balances out. They’ll be doing a lot more killing than dying, though, due to the incredible effectiveness of their arsenal and the crazy amount of screen-shaking explosives stored carelessly throughout each level. Every single part of Broforce seems designed to feel as awesome as possible, and even the somewhat too easy early levels are crammed full to bursting with hazards to destroy in all their pixely glory. The easiness doesn’t last long, however, and while still only a demo/prototype the current version of Broforce has a surprisingly large number of levels available. As a bonus, it doesn’t do that annoying demo trick where a boss shows up and a splash screen tells you how great it will be to fight it in the full version. Nope, you get to have your full roster of 10 (or so. I hate to admit I lost count) action heroes smeared into a fine paste by giant flying rocket-spewing terrain destroying death tank.
Broforce is currently in development for “End 2013”. There’s plenty of work left to be done adding more terrain, characters, explosions, vehicles, and level types before it sees release, but the current version already feels fantastically satisfying. If you’ve ever loved a single 80s action flick you owe it to yourself to download the demo and start terminating terrorist scum with the extreme level of prejudice that only the Broforce can apply.
