During my time at E3, I was able to play a multiplayer demo of the upcoming PlayStation 4 port of Killing Floor 2. In the game, the objective is to clear several waves of enemies before taking on a boss. In between rounds, you can spend money that you gain killing enemies (called ‘Zed’) to upgrade your weapons, buy body armor and replenish your ammunition. I played as a Gunslinger, along with John Gibson (president of Tripwire Interactive), and two other individuals.
At the beginning of the round, I was dropped into the map and I found myself dual-wielding pistols. The enemies started to pour in from all directions for each wave, and it took teamwork to clear them. The graphics were clear and crisp, and the bloodstains on the snow stayed there after the fact. There are 22 points of dismemberment for enemies, and they are all displayed in great gory detail.
After the first round was completed, I upgraded my weapons with the money I gained, bought body armor and waited for the next round. As the subsequent rounds grew more and more intense, I ended up being given money from another teammate at one point (you can share money by flicking ‘up’ on the PS4 controller touchpad) to continually upgrade my weapons and to also buy a katana. Meleeing in this game is fun, though the main source of damage is clearly via your shooting weapon. Another feature is that you can recover your health on a timer every so often by injecting yourself. You can also attempt to hold the Zed back via soldering doors, and it works — but only for a time until they break back through. After the fourth round, we faced the boss… And we lost. But it was not due to the boss being cheap or unfair, but instead we just were not all good enough to clear the fight.
One of the most unique aspects of the Killing Floor 2 demo that I must mention is ‘Zed Time.’ At random times when you kill a Zed, the world will slow down around you for three seconds. This allows you to kill other Zeds around you quickly, or at least take a potshot or two at them. It’s a cool and often unexpected feature that I started to really take advantage of towards the end of the match. It is also a feature that separated this demo from shooting games that I have played in the recent past.
Overall, I had a blast playing the PS4 port of Killing Floor 2. This game is currently in Steam Early Access, with a release date scheduled in 2016 for Windows, Linux, and PlayStation 4.
All image are courtesy of Tripwire Interactive.
Have you played this game on Steam Early Access? Are you looking forward to the game on PlayStation 4? Let us know in the comments below!
