A War of Tiny Proportions
I stepped into basic training already impressed by the cute console-quality interface design, an improvement over the predecessor. Instead of controlling one character and swapping whenever I chose, Bug Heroes 2 stepped up the strategy by making me choose a team of two bugs per mission. If they die they are reborn at base, but the objective is to keep them alive with the food that periodically spawns scattered around the levels and use them to collect spare parts to upgrade your defenses. The selection of characters grows within a few missions to include all kinds of bugs and a few rodents. Since you can level your Heroes differently each mission, the variety is satisfying.
The world itself is well realized with a Honey, I Shrunk the Kids meets A Bug's Life style. Leaves sway and characters are sharp. With a simple tap on the yellow crosshair I could look down on my bug's world or look around at the wide world in front of me. Just holding my thumb on a blank spot on the screen made my little soldier run forward. Though controls of my partner were more limited than in the first SOCOM, I was able to tell them to stay, go, take the lead or follow, which proved integral when being mobbed by enemy ants. In cases like that it makes sense to keep your ranged specialist at a distance – or if you prefer playing as ranged, then this simple control makes it easy to send your melee fighter ahead. The squeaky cries of my hero and companion were not only helpful indicators of triumph or trouble, but were also hilarious. My emo black widow often bemoaned her penance, and my crab spider spoke with an accent.
As the war raged, I stacked coins which I used to buy my hero equipment for the battle, like better swords, shields and potions. After each battle I was rewarded with gems and upgrade points. Gems can be used to buy characters and scrolls, and upgrade points can be used to buy account upgrades that apply to all characters in all battles. The Bug Heroes 2 battle selection is robust, with four single player modes in addition to multiplayer. Missions have a variety of objectives from the basic defend the stash to elite unit challenges like killing two giant spiders. Campaign gives players one garden beetle and changes the rules; you gain spare parts over time instead of coins. Endless and Skirmish modes are self-explanatory each with multiple maps and options. The multiplayer also offered a lot of variety, but the challenge of finding a match made some of the modes pointless.
I didn't bug out. I went back to playing single player modes and intermittently checked for matches. I was happy, until my screen froze. No biggie, maybe I had a few background apps running. One hard restart later and I was back in the game. At last I was deep in the fray again, and it froze–again. And again. And again. This is with no apps running. Updates should fix this, but in the meantime it really "bugged" me, and even made me give up on being a hero for a little while, and none of the helium voices my minuscule soldiers could call me back. And what if I told you this was only the first annoying thing about it?
The second annoying thing revolved around the gems. I could earn them, or I could buy them with hard earned real world cash. I had to wonder if, in my multiplayer modes, I was being defeated not because of my relative noobishness, but because other players had simply caved and plunked down a few more bucks than I already shelled out. Fortunately for the game but unfortunately for me, I blame my inexperience more than anything else. While Bug Heroes 2 is not the most generous game when it comes to its premium in-game currency, it has a wealth of modes to play and characters to unlock, the graphics are crisp and the sound is fitting. For those who prefer multiplayer, the challenge of those modes is not corrupted by the few who may or may not buy gems.
Bug Heroes 2 is a solid game with a lot to offer. Multiple modes, account upgrades, and character leveling all add depth to the visually impressive experience of squishing armored bugs with other bugs. Unfortunately, I think the game may be buggy in a way Foursaken Media hadn't intended.
