John Carpenter's Toxic Commando Review

Player(s): 1
Extra Features: Online Co-op (2-4), Add-On Content

I’m sure we all have our favorite John Carpenter movies. With me, it’s hard to pick since I enjoy nearly everything he is involved in. During Summer Game Fest 2023, it was announced that John Carpenter was teaming up with Focus Entertainment and Saber Interactive for Toxic Commando’s development. John was in charge of the game’s story and musical score. It’s so very easy to see his influence in this game. John Carpenter’s Toxic Commando is a first-person online shooter developed by Saber Interactive and it’s easy to see their influence as well. If you’re a fan of Saber’s World War Z, this game has that same type of feel to it.

The Sludge God was released during an experiment to harness energy from the Earth’s Core. The Sludge God poisons the Earth’s soil, which turns mankind into zombies. Humanity’s only hope lies with a team of mercenaries that have been assembled by scientists. The mercenaries plan to stop the Sludge God and the zombies and save the world. And that’s where you come in! You get to pick between one of the game’s four main characters and set out on missions with different objectives.

Toxic Commando can be played either online (with up to four other players) or you can play the game by yourself with three other AI teammates. Honestly, this game has a very strong single player. Sure, you’ll run into issues with the AI teammates (as usual with single player for an online game) but it’s overall pretty solid. The game always has to be online no matter how you play. This seems to be a growing flaw with many multiplayer shooters over the past few years. The game has no true “offline mode”.

The game has an intro chapter and then it brings you to the game’s base camp where you can load up on guns and choose your character’s class. All four characters are basically just skins aside from their voices. Classes and weapons are what set you apart from your other teammates for the most part. Class types, weapons and your player can all be leveled up. Along with leveling up, weapons have additional parts that can be purchased to increase their attributes. You can equip a primary weapon and a side weapon. During the campaign, extra weapons can be found and you’ll be able to pick up a third (power) weapon. Unlike the other weapons, power weapon ammo cannot be replenished at ammo crates.

The Class system is divided into four main groups – Operator, Defender, Medic and Strike. The Operator gets control over the allied drone that follows the team around. The drone can be used to launch Area of Effect (AoE) damage and the Operator is also the team mechanic. The Defender is the tank of the team that can form a barrier dome around the team that shields them from projectiles and damages zombies that enter the barrier. The Medic is your standard healer that can perform a healing field to heal the team. They are also the only class type that can self-revive without an item. The Strike is the assault type. Strike can launch explosives at the enemies and have high ammunition capacity. All class types have their own unique skill tree that can be leveled up by gaining skill points through leveling up your character. Skill points can be swapped instantly if you are unhappy with the current skill tree progression, so you can’t get stuck with a bad leveling path.

After choosing your gear, you get to go through one of the game’s eight campaign stages. The stages all have some good variety in them. Zombie hordes will attack your team constantly while performing objectives. You’ll also run into more powerful enemies such as a type of brute and other more powerful enemies. Your team will have the option to use a vehicle. The vehicles in this game are great! Each vehicle has its own unique uses. You can drive a truck that can haul around items in the back of it, an armored vehicle with a turret among other types. Each vehicle has a winch that you can use to pull open locked doors and vehicles to gain access to hidden valuables inside. Each stage has a number of hidden areas with pickups to find and weapons to gain. There are also a number of locked chests along with mortars, turrets, stage traps that require a “spare parts” item in order to open/activate them.

For the most part, each stage is all about performing objectives while battling zombie hordes until you reach the big standoff at the end. Some stages offer a bit more variety such as one stage where you have to carry around a device that forms a barrier that protects your team from the dangerous infection all around the area. Some stages actually require a vehicle in order to advance (mainly for opening areas with a winch). Stages have some really big maps to tread through. It really pays to have a vehicle when exploring them.

Even though the game has a strong single player, the AI teammates can weigh down the experience. The AI is actually really good for helping out while out on the field for the most part (better than most single player online games). One flaw lies in the brute enemy that can grab your character and beat the character down until death. When a brute grabbed my character, there was about a 50/50 chance whether the AI would help in freeing my character. Overall help can be a big issue with the AI teammates. During the big standoff at the end of each stage, the AI seems to never help out by controlling a turret. They will simply stand beside an active turret or mortar and use their peashooter weapons to fend off against hordes. I found it was best to carry around a revival item as well since the AI could not always be counted on to revive my character – it can be argued that normal humans would be the same way also though! All of the AI flaws can be overcome once you know how to work around it though – similar to World War Z’s single player problems.

You can feel the John Carpenter presence throughout the game. There are hidden little Easter eggs that reference some of his movies. The characters feel like they are taken out of a John Carpenter movie. They are all well played by their voice actors and very distinguished. It wouldn’t have a John Carpenter presence without his unique music either and this game definitely has his style of music present. The overall story is decent enough. Each stage has its own intro and outro cutscene that supports the main plot.

Whether you buy John Carpenter’s Toxic Commando to play online or offline, you can’t go wrong. If you liked the single player in World War Z (like I did), I think you’ll really like this game’s single player mode as well. The game has the same overall feel of World War Z for the most part. It gives you satisfaction through constant leveling up whether you are victorious or suffering defeat in each stage. Besides the faulty AI teammates, the main thing I found lacking is that the game has no other modes besides the campaign. With some extra DLC, this game could be just as good as World War Z. I’m really hoping that Toxic Commando gains a cult following like World War Z to where Saber will keep supporting it for a few more years. For a value price game, it has a lot to offer!

The Good:
+ Tons of weapons to choose from
+ Good leveling system similar to World War Z
+ So much replay value

The Bad:
- No other mode besides the campaign
- The game must always be online
- AI teammate problems here and there