Game Info: Girls Frontline

Developed By: MicaTeam

Published By: Digital Sky

Released: May 8, 2018 (English version, multiple territories)

Available On: Android/iOS (Google Play and Apple App Store)

Genre: Strategy RPG

ESRB Rating: Teen (Mild Sexual Content, Cartoon Violence, Mild Profanity/Crude Humor, Mild Suggestive Themes, and occasional scenes of mild horror)

Number of Players: Single-player

Price: Free-to-Play (in-game transactions) Note: All content in this review is generally based on the English client, though covers the basic gameplay and most content of the others. It was played on a Windows PC via the Bluestacks emulator; any specific control or technical issues concerning that will be noted as appropriate.



Ever since "Kantai Collection" popularized making ships into cute girls and making a gacha game based on the premise, a flood of "follow the leader" games have been made, and this review will cover one of the better ones, which make actual military and civilian firearms into cute girl android soldiers in a gacha game. Gacha games are games based on the "gacha" model, based on a term referring to type of capsule toy vending machine in Japan. Games of this nature adapt the mechanics of these chance-based toy machines to a digital format, in a manner similar to loot boxes since they encourage spending real money, but it's usually possible (if somewhat more tedious) to acquire all collectible items in-game through dedicated play. The story of Girls Frontline is set in an alternate universe post-apocalyptic WWIII, where over 90% of humanity perished. Now, androids called "Tactical Dolls" have been refurbished from civilian uses for military applications in various organizations, especially by the one you are a new commander in, the private military corporation Griffon and Kruyger. Your rivals and the chief antagonists are Sangvis Ferri, a rival PMC gone rogue whose T-Dolls threw off their moral restraints against killing innocents and others in general without orders, murdered their human overseers, and now will threaten a large if vaguely defined part of Eurasia if it wasn't for Griffon and Kruyger working to contain the threat. While the story starts off simple, it snowballs into an emotional tale of war and explores themes of freedom and free will in artificial beings, for good or ill, at least if you follow the story. Outside of the main story plot, it is a rather charming and quite silly android girl raising simulator. It's also loaded with all sorts of obscure and interesting trivia concerning military history, to the point many T-Doll weapons can be identified as certain real-world designs (Lee-Enfield's gun is based on the No.4 Mk.1 Enfield used in WWII, hers being a sniper specific derivative variant). Even their uniforms contain a lot of references to military history (MP40 looks like a WWII German tank officer, though her red armband has the Nazi swastika absent), among other neat little references to the firearms industry. It even has shoutouts to other military games and franchises, with a large portion of the fun being if you can identify all the shoutouts and firearm lore.

Highlights: Strong Points: Easy to learn and play gacha-style strategy RPG that can be quite fun to play if you are dedicated to long term play

Weak Points: Occasional stability issues regarding controls; can be tedious for those who don't want to master its metagame aspects

Moral Warnings: Very minor references to alcohol consumption (most are in the context of historical references); some quite revealing female outfits (especially if the game decensoring code is applied); some cutscenes can be rather violent looking; mild occasional swearing; the romance aspect of the game has a potential for polygamous relationships even though it's in the context of traditional marriage otherwise The gameplay of Girls Frontline can be divided into three parts: a strategy RPG game, a raising simulation, and a metagame that optimizes T-Dolls for long term usefulness. The S-RPG part is much like any other turn-based strategy game, in which units need to be optimized for optimal performance in order to fulfill objectives, and their success is largely dependent on how well they have been equipped and how well you move them to capture nodes on battle maps to complete objectives, which often include taking down bosses, holding certain nodes for several turns, and hostage rescue missions. The raising simulation aspect takes place outside the combat sections. When not in combat, T-Dolls live in dorms that can be accessorized with different looks and furniture bought with tokens or acquired as special rewards. Additional costumes and gifts to raise the affection the T-Dolls have for you can also be obtained and high affection ratings can increase combat performance, and well-decorated dormitories can boost affection gain as well as provide for special scenes. Certain facilities to boost abilities can be leveled up alongside the dorms to provide further boosts to combat abilities as well. The metagame aspect is the long-term customization of combat echelons to be able to do all sorts of missions efficiently in the long term. Certain unit formations are quite effective for certain situations, some units specialize night over day missions, and some have niche abilities that are only useful in certain situations. Overall, while any player can pick up Girls Frontline and enjoy themselves, career players will certainly want to master the metagame, especially if they wish to win unique rewards for occasionally hosted special events on the server offering unique challenges and rewards, such as T-Dolls that cannot be manufactured or obtained in regular play. The game itself is free but does have in-game transactions to purchase gems to acquire resources and expand certain T-Doll and equipment limits. The game is quite generous handing out resources for completing daily and weekly missions, though, and the developers are quite generous with compensation bonuses for maintenance periods. While drop rates for certain T-Dolls and equipment can be rare, the drop rates are rather fair compared to many other games using the gacha model, with occasional boosted chance events provided by the developers on occasion to make things easier. Graphically, the game is a medley of contrasts. All cutscenes and story events use a slightly rough, darkened anime style with realistically proportioned characters. The gameplay sections, by contrast, use a super deformed, cutesy anime style with bright colors, while character portraits use the colors and shading of the latter while maintaining the realism of the former. Overall, it helps with the mood whiplash the rather serious plot can generate while most of the rest of the game has an adorable "chibi" look in most gameplay scenes. Aside from a few animation goofs (some were purposely retained by the developers because they were funny), all art looks smooth and well drawn, though gun enthusiasts may be irked to see occasional minor rendering errors for guns in both portraits and gameplay mode if they have a sharp eye for details. The sound is again a whipsaw of charming, gentle music, like the idyllic and peaceful theme that plays in the Dorms where your T-Dolls stay in-between missions, and the intense, techno styled battle themes, like the boss battle theme "Black Out." These contrasting themes again help enhance the mood whiplash between the laid-back, non-combat sections, and the gritty, serious story sections. Sound effects are quite good, with many being very accurate to the guns (the M1 Garand even has the distinctive clip "ping" it became famous for), and if one chooses to use the voice-overs (Japanese by default on the English server), most are pleasing on the ear, though some like IDW's can be pretty grating (to the point it's something of an official meme acknowledged by the developers).