The Killing Floor

The zombies are back only this time they're not zombies, they're more like creepy lab experiments with zombie-like tendencies. Lately I’ve been playing a lot of Killing Floor which I picked up last year during the steam sale and hadn’t really gotten into playing it until lately. A friend of mine and I were looking for a co-op shooter to play and the horror theme of Killing Floor seemed right up our alley.

The game has an interesting story but it’s not at the forefront; it’s more hidden through dialogue in the objective gametype maps. From what I understand, you and your friends play as the military dropped into hostile areas around England and its countryside, with the sole task of cleaning up failed military cloning experiments, and you can't leave until they’ve all been dealt with.

There’s a ton of maps to play on—either in-game or community created—and they're all fairly open allowing you to adapt to situations and waves differently. For example: bottlenecking weak enemies that can swarm you at a choke point or using large open areas to more easily kite and kill the larger and stronger “Zeds” safely.

When you start the game it comes off as being a lot harder than it really is and it’s because the game has a slight learning curve. Most times when you play a horde-mode game they're slightly more forgiving with the early waves and Killing Floor is no different. But for a new player you won't realize how much damage and how easily the zeds can kill you. Add in the fact that their attacks slow you down, so getting caught in a crowd of even the weakest enemies can mean a quick death. Once you get a hang of the game and its controls, you learn how to kite and kill your enemies while at least attempting to keep them at arm's reach.

Killing Floor also has a class system with perks. They all have their own strengths and weapons, but that doesn't mean if you were playing as a commando you couldn't use a weapon that's good for a demolitionist. The only sideeffect to doing so is that it would just deal less damage because class perks increase damage and capacity while reducing overall weapon costs. Speaking of costs, the game rewards you for kills with cash and a bounty at the end of each round, which you then spend on better weapons, ammo, and body armor, all of which are pretty much necessary if you want to survive till the end.

Now the game has a wide variety of enemies. There’s clots, which are basically cannon fodder and only dangerous if there's a whole lot of them. Then there's gorefast which are a little bigger and angrier than a clot, and also weild a massive sword for an arm. There's also bloats which are massive bloated corpses that puke acid on you; stalkers which are invisible naked women; crawler's, a man spider hybrid that’s straight out of my nightmares; and husks, giant men with a rocket launchers for a hand. There's also sirens which are horrifying women in straitjackets who do a giant AOE scream attack; scrakes which are psychotic men who run at you with a chainsaw and lastly the two toughest enemies: Fleshpounds and Patriarchs.

Now Fleshpounds are these walking behemoths with metal fused to their bodies and giant spiked clubs at the end of each arm. They also have these massive glowing lights in their chest which lets you know there mood. Yellow means all good and red means I am to murder you and everything you love. Once the light turns red, they get increased movement and attack speed and if you don't kill them quick enough they can easily kill a group. Last but definitely not least is the Patriarch. Now the patriarch is the final boss who you fight in a bonus wave after you’ve been to each level. He’s definitely nothing to laugh at; you have to work as a team if you want even a hope of taking him down. He has a massive health bar and invisibility. He's also equipped with a chain gun and a rocket launcher that can kill you in one shot. He’s also the smartest of the enemies. Once you’ve weakened him he'll run away and hide to regain his health and come after you again, so you have to actively hunt him down or else he is nearly impossible to kill. He’ll pick you off one by one making it even harder to kill him in the end.

Killing Floor has seen a lot of love from the community over the years and has a cult following. I was surprised when I logged into it to see how many servers and active players there were. I’ve never started a game and had it just be me and my friend till the end, which surprised me considering the game is fairly old. Another cool note is that they do holiday updates, like for example: as of Yesterday (October 16th, 2014) and on until the 3rd of November, there’s a Halloween event where they reskin the enemies in festive and horrifying outfits. The same goes for Christmas and honestly it’s worth checking out around the holidays because nothing says Christmas cheer like blowing Santa's head clean off. If you’re looking for a shooter to play with a bunch of friends and battle back hordes of mutated freaks, look no further than Killing Floor! It’s on sale on steam now all the way to the 30th of October. There’s also a sequel on the way but there isn’t much info on it just yet, just a couple screen shots and some teaser footage.