Info about Earthfall:

Official game description:
When the Earth falls to an extra-terrestrial invasion, humanity becomes an endangered species. Earthfall is a four-player cooperative shooter that challenges players to survive hordes of ruthless alien drones and their inscrutable masters.  
Traverse the Pacific Northwest with friends or AI teammates in a desperate guerilla war against an invading extraterrestrial force. Fight against the ever-changing horde and save what’s left of humanity.  
Utilize futuristic weaponry, upgrade deployable barricades with fire or electricity, control mounted turrets, and battle through 15 levels of story-driven co-operative play.  
*   Hardcore Co-op -- Drop in, drop out, and engage in classic four-player co-operative gunplay inspired by the greatest co-op games of our time.  
*   Death from Above -- Fight the horde, a procedurally generated alien menace that makes every gameplay session tense, exciting, fresh, and utterly lethal.  
*   Well-Armed Allies -- Battle through an alien invasion using advanced weaponry, constructible defenses, and printable guns.
**When the world ends, the fight begins!**

Release date: 12 Jul, 2018

Categories: First-Person Shooter, Cooperative Multiplayer, Horde Shooter, Character Progression, Base Building, Crafting, Procedural Generation, Single-player Story


- Hardware Profile: No data
Feature extractions:
- Community Price: No data
- Playtime Metrics: No data
- Time-to-fun: No data
- Player Archetypes: No data


Below are summaries of things people say about the game per category.
Each point is assigned a weight that represents how often it is mentioned across all reviews.
What players like:
- Enjoyable Co-op Experience (weight 0.94): Players generally find the game enjoyable, especially when playing with friends. The co-op experience is highlighted as a major positive, contributing to overall satisfaction and replayability.
- Left 4 Dead Spiritual Successor (weight 0.72): The game is frequently compared to Left 4 Dead, often seen as a spiritual successor or a modern take on its formula. Players appreciate the familiar gameplay loop but note the unique alien enemies and additional mechanics.
- Innovative Gameplay Mechanics (weight 0.44): The game introduces several innovative mechanics, such as deployable barricades, mountable turrets, and 3D weapon printers. These features add strategic depth and distinguish it from similar titles.
- Solid Gunplay and Weapon Variety (weight 0.24): Players appreciate the solid gunplay and diverse weapon selection. The weapons feel well-balanced, and the game avoids excessive reskins, offering a good variety of distinct firearms and melee options.
- Excellent Invasion/Horde Mode (weight 0.22): The 'Invasion' (Horde) mode is a significant highlight, often considered superior to the campaign. It provides an engaging survival experience with larger areas and is a popular way to increase kill counts.
- Varied and Replayable Maps (weight 0.19): The game features a variety of well-designed and inventive maps across different environments. These maps are considered highly replayable and contribute to the game's overall appeal.
- Unique 3D Weapon Printer (weight 0.15): The 3D weapon printing system is a standout feature, allowing players to continuously print new weapons with full magazines without resource cost. This adds a unique strategic element to gameplay.
- Unique Alien Designs (weight 0.09): The game features unique and fascinating alien designs, with distinct appearances and audio cues. This contributes to the game's atmosphere and enemy variety.
- Simplified Chinese Localization (weight 0.09): The game offers official Simplified Chinese localization, which is a positive point for Chinese-speaking players.

Common complaints:
- Poor AI bot performance (weight 0.76): Player-controlled bots exhibit extremely poor AI, often making detrimental decisions such as ignoring commands, failing to revive teammates, wasting resources, and getting stuck. This significantly hinders gameplay, especially on higher difficulties, making solo play frustrating and nearly impossible.
- Unpolished core gameplay mechanics (weight 0.74): The game suffers from unpolished core mechanics, including clunky melee combat, unsatisfying gunplay with poor feedback, and mediocre animations. These issues contribute to a general feeling of a rushed or unfinished product, impacting the overall gameplay experience.
- Lack of content and updates (weight 0.6): A significant lack of content, including few maps, limited replayability, and no meaningful progression systems, makes the game feel unfinished. The absence of ongoing developer updates further exacerbates concerns about its long-term viability and value.
- Inferior to Left 4 Dead (weight 0.52): The game is frequently compared to Left 4 Dead, often unfavorably. Players feel it lacks the polish, content, and overall quality of L4D, appearing as a less refined copy rather than a strong alternative.
- Technical issues and optimization (weight 0.36): The game experiences various technical issues, including crashes, performance drops, and poor optimization. These problems lead to a less smooth and enjoyable experience, with high system requirements for the visual quality offered.
- Weak story and character (weight 0.27): The game's narrative is largely forgettable or non-existent, with uninteresting characters. This contributes to a quickly boring experience, as there's little motivation or depth beyond the initial gameplay.
- Low player count (weight 0.22): The game has a very low player count, making it difficult to find online matches. This forces players to rely on the problematic AI bots or play with friends, limiting the multiplayer experience.
- No modding or Workshop support (weight 0.18): The absence of Workshop support or modding capabilities is a significant drawback for players. This limits community-driven content and customization, which is often a key factor in the longevity of co-op shooters.
- Unbalanced progression and difficulty (weight 0.14): The game's progression and difficulty balancing are flawed. Unlocking skills feels unrewarding due to demanding conditions and underwhelming perks, while overall difficulty can be inconsistent.
- Overpriced for content (weight 0.12): Many players feel the game is overpriced for the content and quality it offers. Given its perceived shortcomings and comparisons to other titles, the full price is considered unjustified.

Gameplay feedback:
- Diverse Gameplay Modes (weight 0.63): The game features two primary modes: a story-driven campaign with objectives like defending points and reaching escape zones, and an 'Invasion' horde mode. Both modes involve intense wave-based combat against aliens, with players utilizing defenses and scavenging for resources.
- Challenging Difficulty Curve (weight 0.24): The game offers a wide range of difficulty settings, from easy to 'Overwhelming,' with higher difficulties presenting a significant challenge. Players note that the game is easy to learn but difficult to master, requiring strategic thinking.
- Dual Progression Systems (weight 0.15): The game incorporates a progression system with two main unlock paths: one for cosmetic items via experience and levels, and another for permanent perks and passive abilities unlocked through achievements and challenges.
- Ample Map Content (weight 0.12): The game features a substantial amount of content, including 11 campaign missions and 5 Invasion mode maps. Each mission can take a considerable amount of time to complete, offering a decent playtime.
- Team Revive Mechanic (weight 0.09): Teamwork is crucial as players can be downed or captured by enemies, requiring teammates to revive or rescue them. This emphasizes the cooperative nature of the game.
- Action-Oriented, Minimal Lore (weight 0.09): The game prioritizes action over narrative, offering a minimal story and lacking collectibles or deep lore. It does not introduce significant innovations to the genre.
- Subtle Lore Elements (weight 0.07): While the game has a minimal story, it includes bits of lore delivered through character interactions and achievements, adding some background to the world.
- ADS and Downed Combat (weight 0.06): The game features an aim-down-sights (ADS) mechanic for weapons. Additionally, players can still use a handgun to defend themselves if downed.

Performance notes:
- Reasonable system requirements (weight 0.12): The game's system requirements are considered decent, with detailed specifications provided for various performance tiers. VRAM and general CPU/GPU usage appear to be within reasonable limits for the reported settings.
- Game fails to boot (weight 0.03): A small number of players reported being unable to boot the game at all. This critical issue, while not widespread, prevents affected users from playing.
- Requires stable internet (weight 0.02): Players noted that a stable and fast internet connection is beneficial for the game experience, implying online features or real-time data transfer are important.

Recommendations:
- Buy on sale, not full price (weight 0.97): Many players recommend purchasing the game only when it's on sale, as they feel the full price is not justified. The game is seen as a good value at a discounted price, especially for casual play with friends.
- Best played with friends (weight 0.64): The game is highly recommended for co-op play with friends, with many reviewers stating it's not worth playing solo or with bots. The multiplayer experience is highlighted as the primary source of enjoyment.
- Afterfall mod recommended (weight 0.06): The 'Afterfall' mod is strongly recommended by players, suggesting it significantly improves the gameplay experience. This indicates potential issues with the base game that the mod addresses.
- Backup game saves (weight 0.03): One reviewer specifically advises players to back up their game saves, implying potential issues with save data integrity.
- Keybinding suggestions (weight 0.03): A specific suggestion was made to rebind the 'shove' action to a side button or the scroll wheel, indicating a potential usability issue with default keybindings.
- Suggests new game modes (weight 0.03): A suggestion was made to split the game into distinct 'survival mode' and 'build and defend' modes, indicating a desire for more varied gameplay options.
- Evokes nostalgia (weight 0.02): The game evokes a sense of nostalgia for some players, suggesting it successfully captures the feel of older co-op shooters.

Other player notes:
- Future content and development (weight 0.39): Players are optimistic about the game's future, acknowledging its Early Access status and expecting significant content additions and improvements over time. The current price is seen as acceptable given the promise of future development.
- Cosmetic DLCs and skins (weight 0.13): Players discuss the availability of DLCs for cosmetic items like weapon and character skins, noting that these are visible to all players. There's also an expectation for more such customization options in the future.
- Affordable price point (weight 0.09): The game's price, especially when on sale, is frequently highlighted as a positive aspect. Many reviewers purchased it at a low cost, which contributes to their satisfaction.
- Developer communication and feedback (weight 0.08): Players hope the developers will actively listen to community feedback and provide updated development plans. There's some dissatisfaction regarding developer communication.
- Game save path specified (weight 0.04): The default save path for the game is provided, which is useful technical information for players.
- Longer maps, more tasks (weight 0.03): A specific suggestion was made to increase the length of maps and add more objectives or tasks within them to enhance gameplay.
- High difficulty requires teamwork (weight 0.03): The game's difficulty on higher settings requires coordinated teamwork and a good understanding of mechanics, indicating a challenging experience for some.
- Uses peer-to-peer matchmaking (weight 0.03): The game utilizes a peer-to-peer matchmaking system, which is a technical detail noted by players.
- Workable game size (weight 0.02): The game's installation size is considered manageable by a reviewer.
- Rated for teens and adults (weight 0.02): The game is categorized as suitable for teens and adults.
- Character skin resemblance noted (weight 0.02): A specific observation about a character skin's resemblance to another character was made.
- Last update date noted (weight 0.02): A specific date for the last update was mentioned, indicating a potential concern about development activity.
- DLC could harm multiplayer (weight 0.02): Developers believe selling additional content as DLC could negatively impact the multiplayer player base.
- Not built on Unity (weight 0.02): A reviewer noted that the game is not developed using the Unity engine.
- Optimization patch incoming (weight 0.02): An optimization patch was in preparation for release, indicating ongoing technical improvements.

Emotions:
- Disappointment (weight 0.26): Players expressed disappointment primarily due to the game's perceived abandonment by developers, leading to a lack of new content, updates, and a dwindling player base. This resulted in issues like difficulty finding online matches, repetitive gameplay, and a general feeling of the game being unpolished and inferior to similar titles like Left 4 Dead 2.
- Frustration (weight 0.24): Frustration stemmed from various technical and gameplay issues, including poor AI behavior in bots, connection problems, game-breaking bugs, and optimization issues. Players also found the combat mechanics unsatisfying, experienced difficulty with game settings not saving, and were annoyed by the low player count making online matchmaking difficult.
- Satisfaction (weight 0.23): Satisfaction was largely driven by the game's enjoyable gameplay, particularly its successful implementation of Left 4 Dead-inspired mechanics and co-op experience. Players appreciated the graphics, weapon variety, strategic elements, and features like the 3D printer, finding the game fun and a good alternative to similar titles despite its negative reception.
- Hope (weight 0.08): Hope was centered on the anticipation of future updates, new content, and an increase in the player base. Players expressed a desire for more maps, workshop support, and general improvements to the game's polish and optimization.
- Excitement (weight 0.07): Excitement was generated by the game's overall quality, engaging gameplay, and specific features like the Invasion mode, barricades, and stim shots. Players enjoyed the fast-paced action and the tense, exciting moments experienced at higher difficulties.
- Anger (weight 0.03): Anger was directed at the developers for releasing an unoptimized and seemingly unfinished game, along with poor design choices and a failure to address player feedback. Specific issues like unfixable mouse sensitivity and annoying character voice lines also contributed to this emotion.
- Enjoyment (weight 0.03): Enjoyment was a direct result of the fun gameplay experience, particularly in online multiplayer, and the satisfaction derived from defeating aliens.
- Optimism (weight 0.02): Optimism was tied to the game's future potential and the belief in its continued development and improvement.
- Surprise (weight 0.01): Players expressed surprise when the game exceeded their expectations, especially given negative reviews or preconceived notions about its quality.
- Boredom (weight 0.01): Boredom arose from the game's uninteresting story and repetitive gameplay, particularly when playing solo after completing the main campaigns.
- Challenge (weight 0.01): Players felt challenged by the game's high difficulty and the continuous onslaught of enemies.
- Sadness (weight 0): Sadness was linked to the game's perceived failure, particularly in comparison to its inspirations.
- Confusion (weight 0): Confusion stemmed from the mixed reviews the game received, making it difficult for players to gauge its quality.
- Appreciation (weight 0): Players showed appreciation for the efforts made by the developers.
- Skepticism (weight 0): Skepticism was directed towards the game's long-term future and potential for improvement.
- Amusement (weight 0): Amusement was specifically caused by some of the unique alien designs within the game.
- Acceptance (weight 0): Players expressed acceptance of minor FPS issues, acknowledging them as part of the Early Access experience.
- Concern (weight 0): Concern was raised regarding the game's demanding system requirements, particularly for players with lower-end PCs.}