Low Ceilings
HIGH The intuitive control scheme and well-acted voiceovers.
LOW Everything else.
WTF The “mouse pointer” can exit the Switch screen’s boundary…
Warhammer 40,000: Dakka Squadron is, to my knowledge, the first attempt at making an air combat-based game around the uber-popular IP from Games Workshop. That makes the fact that I struggled to find anything good to put in the “HIGH” section all the more heartbreaking. While I was willing to let many of the production shortcomings slide during my first couple of hours, that enthusiasm was on shaky legs to begin with. Simply put, it seems like one of those titles that expects a player’s enjoyment to come mostly from their appreciation of the license itself, as there isn’t much here without it.
Dakka Squadron starts off rough, with a notable lack of any prelude introducing the player to a conflict entangling several orc clans in aerial combat. Then, the rudimentary (and I’m being very generous here) menu presents a few hand-drawn representatives of said clans, and we get to pick one while comparing stats like armor strength, hull capacity, speed, and more.
What follows is an even simpler “map” screen where we are shown the galaxy over which we’ll strive to assert dominion, but at that point, only one of the planets is open for visits. We then click on it and move to the mission preparation screen. Dakka‘s lighthearted approach and punky aesthetics were the only impressions I had at that point, with no further idea of what was to come.
I have to go on record here and state that a good story is only marginally important to me when it comes to videogames, especially with action-focused titles. So, no amount of poor menu design or absence of flair in presentation can discourage me before I’ve tasted the gameplay. It was the same in this case — I shrugged past the low-rent intros shenanigans and eagerly pressed the “start mission” button. I was promised aerial combat in the game’s trailer, and I wouldn’t leave without it. However, I also understand that many would’ve correctly discerned that this title was not worth their time before getting as far as I did. The opening bits of this game are that bad.
Regardless, those who make it to the first stage will be pleasantly surprised by the control scheme. It’s super intuitive and snappy — we use the left stick to fly in any direction and press it to bump into other aerial or ground-bound fools, while the right stick is for savvy “Top Gun” maneuvers like barrel rolls and speed boosters.
When on a mission, there are two semi-circles (one yellow and one red) positioned to the left and right of the screen centers, and these serve as intuitive indicators of our plane’s “health” and gas meters, with the latter being used for everything right stick-related. We use the bumpers to shoot and one of the face buttons (the “A” button on the Switch) to lock onto a target. If it’s a mobile target, Dakka will show another circle in front, indicating where we should aim to make up for the bullets’ drop rate. I appreciate that inclusion!
So, the control scheme is easy to get into and find enjoyment with, and I feel comfortable in saying that it’s Dakka Squadron‘s undisputable stroke of genius. Mere minutes after starting, I felt like I knew everything there was to know about pulling off cool moves and dealing swift kills across the skies, and I wasn’t wrong.
As for Dakka Squadron’s selection of planes, they follow a wacky philosophy of being heavily WWII-inspired, but with healthy sprinkles and infusions of popular sci-fi settings, making them look both familiar and tantalizing to try. Plus, they differ in stats (like endurance, speed, and firepower) and usually come with a special power or two, like being able to drop bombs, fire off a lethal burst of bullets, or raise an energy shield. Before initiating a mission, we can visit the hangar and select from a growing list of planes as we unlock them in the story (though there aren’t that many of them to pick from), and a friendly member of our clan will even lay out a briefing on a particular plane’s pros and cons.
“Cool!”, I thought, as these types of old-school flight titles are too few and too far between these days. That excitement didn’t last long, though.
Yeah, this game is ugly. The planes seem like they use assets from several generations ago, and everything else looks like a brownish or dark-yellowish smudge, not counting the snow levels, whose mountains look like someone dropped scoops of vanilla ice cream on the ground.
Things get infinitely worse within low-ceiling arenas, where planes are practically guaranteed to suffer collision damage as a result of the camera blocking the view or becoming disoriented when locking in on the wrong target. This was exacerbated by the bizarrely small objective markers — they are so freakin’ tiny that I never ceased wondering how the devs could have possibly thought they were fine for the Switch?!? Worse, we have to use a mouse cursor on menus and awkwardly steer it with an analog stick when we could’ve (and should’ve) used the touch controls!
However, I’m one of those who’s willing to look past such things as long as the gameplay makes up for them. If I get hooked on some mechanics, there’s a better-than-average chance I’ll become enamored with the title and proceed to celebrate it despite any rough edges. Yet, the gameplay — Dakka Squadron‘s last chance at redemption — is where it let me down for good.
The gameplay here is basic. There’s no better word for it.
There are too few planes to pick from, too few types of enemies to shoot at, the bosses are way too bullet-spongey. The difficulty bounces between boring-but-easy and hectic-but-nigh-impossible without warning.
To be fair, most of my frustrations stemmed from picking a plane that was ill-suited for a particular mission. For instance, bombing missions are easy if the player uses an aircraft that can drop bombs, yet one would never know which type of mission was next due to the poor presentation and (I repeat) bizarrely small mission objective markers.
Further, when things got too crowded in Dakka Squadron, the framerate plummeted and the orcs in my clan would shout at me to find respite using the same few voice lines every time. This consisted of pulling back into a corner, lowering my speed and waiting 10 seconds or so for the plane’s armor to automatically regenerate. Doing this repeatedly is a drag, and there are no health pick-ups or weapon upgrades. There are no “advanced” tricks to master, and the samey nature of missions resulted in me shedding my last kernel of enthusiasm.
As such, every time I got excited after unlocking a new type of plane, the game would remind me that, hey, this is not that type of game. There’s nothing to get excited about here!
Dakka Squadron is an underachieving, poorly optimized title that looks incredibly outdated and bravely carries on without offering anything in the way of substance to compensate for it. The control scheme is honestly great, but what good is having such a nice control scheme if there’s nothing worthwhile to apply it to?!
Rating: 4 out of 10
Disclosures: This game was developed and published by Phosphor Games and REDDEERGAMES SP. Z O.O. It is currently available on PC, PS4/5, XBO/X/S and Switch. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Switch Lite. Approximately 4 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was not completed. There are no multiplayer modes.
Parents: This game has received a T from the ESRB and contains Blood and Violence. Although there isn’t anything particularly offputting about seeing orc-piloted planes bumping into each other after which one of them disintegrates, I still wouldn’t let kids play this one.
Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.
Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: All dialogue in this game is shown via textboxes and fairly well-acted voiceovers, so they’re easy to keep track of, even mid-fight. However, playing on the Switch Lite, I found the objective markers to be incredibly difficult to read, as was the mission select screen. The menus in this game are in dire need of optimization for a handheld device.
Remappable Controls: This game doesn’t offer a controller diagram and the controls are not remappable. The controls are displayed at all times at the screen’s corners (i.e., on the Switch, the “R” button is for shooting, the “X” button is for special attack, the left stick is for piloting the aircraft, while the right stick is for adjusting its speed and aerial maneuvers).
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Just played the demo on PC. Significantly less rough, pixelated and ugly, but still not fun. Mouse controls are horrendous.