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The Riftbreaker: Heart of the Swamp (2024) Impressions

Even the plants on Galatea 37 are trying to kill you now…

Returning to the The Riftbreaker for the fourth time, I’m forever impressed at how EXOR Studios has continued to expand and refine its hybrid base-building, supply-line managing, research- and loot-driven, isometric hack-and-slash, twin-stick shooter. If you critique each element in isolation, they’re not as developed or balanced as the games they draw inspiration from, but The Riftbreaker’s priority is always giving you the tools you need to have fun – something far too many developers seem to actively discourage these days.

My excuse for investing another 20 hours into The Riftbreaker was the recently released Heart of the Swamp expansion (which arrived on console at few months after PC), with a ton of free content for the base game including a new swamp biome, new creatures, new research options, new structures to manage waterlogged environments, and massive new defensive towers and base-shields that’ll be put to good use before the end of the new story campaign. That said, The Riftbreaker is nothing if not formulaic when it comes to mission design and progression; so you’re primarily getting more tools to overcome a few new challenges, to complete a familiar job – assess and defeat a new threat to the Galatea 37 mission.

The Heart of the Swamp expansion kicks off only once you’ve investigated potential Titanium, Uranium, and Palladium deposits to begin constructing the Rift Station back to Earth, with yet another mysterious meteorite crashing in the headquarter region. This time it’s giant mushroom spores, which leads Ashley and Mr Riggs to a massive flowering mushroom “tree”, invaded by a myriad of parasitic creatures and thorn vines draining its remarkable sap. Despite the new setting, events follow a familiar rhythm: investigate the organism while defending your outposts from waves of enemies, travel to the source of the threat to try wipe it out, then engage in a chaotic hold-out finale.

The biggest challenge introduced in the Heart of the Swamp expansion – if you accept insanely hostile plant life and rapidly regrowing thorn thickets are typical of Galatea 37 – is establishing and sustaining several outposts on isolated patches of solid ground around the base of the giant mushroom. The saturated air makes renewable power generation difficult, while natural gas vents, Carbonium, and Ironium deposits are also scattered across small islands. The swarms of parasites you fend off come in waves, with self-replicating horrors emerging later, and that lack of space is a serious impediment to a solid defence. Of course, The Riftbreaker excels at giving you a myriad of tools for the job and, even if some are clearly optimal, you can hack together your own solution to just about any problem – be that through quantity or quality.

I’d recommend anyone starting this expansion ensure they have large Carbonium and Ironium outposts set up to cover basic construction costs remotely, but you can establish mines alongside research outposts with some planning. In addition to utilising existing structures like Energy Pylons to transmit power between outposts, there’s a fresh selection of land-based, floating, and pipe-mounted defensive towers – including massive piercing towers and cluster munition towers – that allow you to build defensive lines in the swampy water. If you explore thoroughly early on, you’ll also discover a source of sap that can be converted in plasma; a novel solution to construct advanced buildings and base shields, buying you much needed time to destroy the massive swarms in the finale that shredded my base and framerate in equal measure.

It’s admittedly familiar fare at this point, three years and two expansions since launch, but Heart of the Swamp is another solid addition to The Riftbreaker. It offers another excuse to explore more of Galatea 37’s hostile biomes; expand and upgrade my existing outposts; research more of the sprawling tech tree for new buildings and higher-tier gear crafting; and engage in more visually spectacular base-defence events. It’s a fantastic hybrid of genres that deserves to be more successful than it is, and I strongly recommend you pick it up if any of this looks exciting. With the “Complete Edition” on storefronts, this looks to be the last paid expansion, but there’ still the promise of online co-op in the future that could make a great game an incredible one.

The Riftbreaker: Heart of the Swamp was played on Xbox Series S|X using a code provided to gameblur by the publisher. It is also available on PC and PS5.

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