Neighbors: Suburban Warfare (Early Access)

What would life be like without the neighbour who flaunts his expensive car and fancy new pool? With a curt nod and a fake smile, deep down you want to smash it all up. It's a funny coincidence that I mention this because that's exactly what Neighbors: Suburban Warfare is all about in a nutshell. But it doesn't stop there, of course we're going to demolish that home's furnishings too, be it the TV, oven, and washing machine to win the battle and claim dominance over the street.

The game from Invisible Walls is currently in Early Access on Steam and therefore this review is also based on a version of the game that is under development. We're promised significantly more game modes, characters, and new crazy weapons in the future, but as it stands what we have is a multiplayer game where each team consists of four players and the main goal is to get into the neighbour's garden, force your way into their house, and destroy a minimum of four objects to win the match. It may sound simple, but it's not, and it's chaotic from start to finish with an unusually twisted slapstick flavour. True to the genre, we have a character gallery of fighters to choose from, where each neighbour has a unique ability and different traits along with a class-specific weapon, with some lending themselves more to attack and others to defence.

In the version I tested, there are eight neighbours to choose from; Kevin, with his slingshot and duck-hook, causes mischief and can get around fortresses like no other; Doreen is an older lady and former boxer who can grow in size via special abilities and thunder forward and hand out uppercuts; Louie, who loves pyrotechnics, can set off remote-controlled explosive charges or throw firecrackers that dazzle the opponent; P.A., wearing a circus costume, rolls around in a cannon but can also launch himself into the air and hit the ground like a comet for splash damage; Innocent Mary-Jean specialises in stealth and can unlock doors or reveal enemy positions by radar; Chad has both biceps and an apron while wielding a vacuum cleaner in close combat when he's not changing direction and shooting with it; Gramps is an old man with a hat and suspenders who can bandage his team mates but also revive them when they fall in battle; Kim, in a motorbike suit, can both throw his wrench as a weapon but also repair the house, in addition to constructing a homemade tower that deals damage. The neighbour's special abilities can only be used sparingly with an associated timer and all characters can be levelled up to unlock new perks and skins.

I soon identified myself as Kevin, a character inspired by Home Alone and Dennis the Menace, which matched my play style and how annoying I was as a child. A smaller character who scurries around like a weasel and can get over any obstacle. Before the game starts, the team gets to choose their house, with different entrances and floor plans. Once the match starts, everyone does their best to collect money for themselves by knocking out opponents, but at the same time, through team spirit, by heading for specific resource boxes in neutral locations outside the houses where the contents are used to purchase upgrades on home turf, allowing the team to buy more advanced attack and defence options, which usually means that both teams rush towards the resource boxes on the map directly. The box must be smashed and the contents carried back to base, but they can also be thrown around.

Specific tools must be purchased from the shop to start demolishing the neighbour's fence and house, there are different levels of items that are differently effective. A hammer or saw will not do as much damage to the neighbour's property as a sledgehammer or jackhammer. At the same time, the team has to defend its own property and buy barricades to place over gates and windows, or electrified fences, bear traps, turrets that shoot baseballs, or bouncy boards that throw your neighbour into the woods. It's a fairly simple model and gameplay at the moment, but it creates a constant dynamic of attacking and defending against the neighbouring team while you have to watch out for a varying array of traps and angry neighbours as you try to make inroads yourself. The game also features short breaks where day turns to night, allowing the neighbourhood to recover, repair damage, strategize, set up new defences, and browse weapons in the shop to get you back on your feet. If you attempt to use this period to get a jump on the opposition, there's a little pug that instantly kills anyone it attacks while guarding the yard during this short night, so you should wait until dawn before trying to evict the neighbour again.

Of course, the real fun comes when you upgrade your shop and can buy the more crazy contraptions that are delivered by proxy and thrown into your plot - where you or your fellow player can pick up the special weapon. A personal favourite is the Seagull-130 Gunbird, which makes fun of the classic killstreak from Call of Duty. You erect a small control table and remotely control a seagull fuelled with laxative that sprays high-speed poop as gunfire or eggs as bombs. You can also activate a van called Drive By that swoops in and runs over the entire enemy team while performing repeated doughnuts.

The playfully light-hearted and rivalrous approach to the game is hard not to like, and the neighbours to choose from allows you to find a personal favourite or to vary your role and play style. The design breathes Team Fortress 2 and Cartoon Network in the 60s style where the game uses Unreal Engine, which looks great. However, there is a lack of both levels and game modes today, even if the matches that are played are intense in terms of design, layout, and absurd weapons. It helps if you can communicate, but the game is clever enough to constantly alert you to what's going on, both when your own team has entered the neighbouring house, or when your own house is under attack. Seeing the full ambition of the game when the content isn't finalised is difficult, but so far they've managed to create an experience that stands out in tone and design from competing titles. It will be fun to see how the developer progresses in its odd but comical four versus four experience that I can nevertheless recommend already today for a switch up from the ordinary.