Brainwash Gang has mostly created narrative-based games, including the black and white The Longest Road on Earth and the more mystical Grotto. The connection between their titles has been that each stars humanoid animals, even if the tone and art style are completely different. They have made some action games and a multiplayer fishing title before, but Friends vs Friends is their first time tackling a fully online first-person shooter.

A group of anthropomorphic animal friends decides to order trading cards from a possibly illegal website. At first, the gang just enjoys playing the intended card game itself. But one of them pulls out a gun, and they start killing each other for more cards. Despite having a grudge against each other, they all hang out at Cash’s Corner diner as friends relaxing until the next death match.

Friends vs Friends|Brainwash Gang|Raw Fury

Initially, there are four friends to choose from: the quick-jumping Moose Salto, laidback Duck Anderson, who can always heal at least one time per match, the accurate sharpshooter DJ Newtown, and Spike Remington, who deals extra damage with each hit. Additional characters are unlocked at set levels, for example, upon reaching level four, players will gain the new friend Stevie Gull. This seagull starts each match armed with the spruced-up Golden Boira handgun.

The characters are fully voiced, each with unique actors. The line delivery is not the best, but it does cause each hero to stand out. There isn’t much mistaking the surly working class jabs of Little Lars with the jockey slithers of DJ Newton. Oddly, there is no sound proximity, and enemies will deliver their lines as if they were the player character.

In total, there are ten true characters with unique powers. Players can also unlock skins which are essentially treated as clones or alternate characters, bringing the actual roster to 20 heroes. Skins are not obtained from leveling but instead from the “PalPrize” capsule toy machine outside the diner. At various player levels, tokens for this reward distributor are given. Possible prizes can also include player avatars or additional cards.

Deck building is the backbone of Friends vs Friends. A player’s deck must be a minimum of 25 cards and have a total score value of no more than 50. Individual cards include buffs, debuffs, traps, spawned projectiles, and even usable weapons. When a match starts, characters begin with six cards and draw an additional three cards each round. This is reduced in four-person matches to a four-card starter and drawing two each round. There is no upper hand limit, so someone could horde an 18-card hand and decimate their enemy in the final round.

Friends vs Friends|Brainwash Gang|Raw Fury

Additionally, this also results in decks that contain more than 25 cards, to be very detrimental. The more cards in a deck, the less likely someone will draw an actual useful one. This becomes especially problematic as cards are how players heal, change weapons, and have any sort of advantage or counter-act the enemy.

For each round, most characters can only use the Boira 9 handgun - a relatively stable sidepiece that holds a 12-round clip. Each shot deals an average of 13 damage - or lowered to 11 at long distance - which can kill most of the friend’s roster if all hits land since they only have 150 health (sans Donnie B., who is beefed up to 190 health). Other basic weapon cards include the Laika magnum that deals 35 damage but has a major kickback that lowers accuracy after each shot; the Boomstick shotgun that deals a massive amount of damage but is extremely slow to reload; and the Albatross 21 sniper rifle that can execute from super long ranges.

Within card packs is another possible weapon unlocks. These are the Brasshopper submachine gun, FK-82 assault rifle, Punch-R grenade launcher, Golden Boira that has a 16-round clip, and the Katana, which is the only means of melee fighting or deflecting bullets. However, since card rewards are fully random, it could be hours or even months before someone gets their hands on these weapons. If players happen to gain a duplicate card, it instead goes towards leveling up to make it extra potent.

Friends vs Friends|Brainwash Gang|Raw Fury

This means that matches of Friends vs Friends are wildly imbalanced. High-level players will have access to much stronger and more varied cards that can quickly overwhelm new players. This can become exponential when either two of these experienced players are a match made on one team or are even joining public games as a pre-made duo. Brainwash Gang seems convinced that good gunplay can beat out a powerful deck, but it still seems like a bad idea to lock off major battle mechanics from a chunk of the player base.

Unfortunately, the shooting and defense are actually one of the weak points of Friends vs Friends. There is not enough tactile or audio feedback to feel like enemies or even oneself is shot. Instead, there is heavy use of fly numbers, as commonly seen in RPGs. This causes a disconnection - more like slamming punching bags rather than actual characters.

Character movement is also a little bit sluggish and not super responsive. This seems to be purposeful so that cards that improve movement speed and reflexes feel even better. On the flip side, being subjected to a slowdown card or an enemy’s bullet time feels awful. There are no means of directly healing debuffs without the specific counterpart card, and one will just need to endure until the next round.

Matches can be played as either one-versus-one or two-versus-two. There is a matchmaking system - though the wait time will depend on region popularity and time of day. Players can also set up private games and fully pick their team set-up or all four guests can be assigned randomly.

Friends vs Friends|Brainwash Gang|Raw Fury

Friends vs Friends has two separate friend systems. Players can directly invite players from their Steam friend list to join into a party. There is also a specific Friends vs Friends code and invitation list. This hints that the game is intended to have some sort of cross-platform integration, as console versions are “coming soon”.

Lone players can also create bot matches, though this restricts the map choices to ones that have very few, if not any, terrain hazards. This is because the bots are a mix of incompetent and deadly. If a bot can spot a player, they can typically execute them with perfect computer precision. Instead, they often do not face the correct direction and will heavily defend a zone instead of trying to win. This can lead to bots franticly shooting at the floor or hiding in the corner.

What makes fights extremely tedious is the lack of a round-timer. So many cards are designed for defensive play - long-range rifles, auto-turrets, planting mines, and mattress barricades. Certain maps with single choke points encourage infinite turtling to the point that Friends vs Friends can turn into 15-minute or longer trench slogs.

Leveling up is an extremely slow grind in Friends vs Friends. Match winners are awarded a few hundred XP per match, while the loser will probably earn less than 80. This results in the strong advancing even further and the defeated continuing to suffer. So many important weapons and abilities are locked behind progression or pure random number generation.

Friends vs Friends|Brainwash Gang|Raw Fury

Friends vs Friends could solve this imbalance by having better onboarding - maybe include all weapons in the basic starter deck or always gain a strong universal card on level up. Right now, leveling has too many “empty” levels that dish out cosmetics or rely on people endlessly opening booster packs.

It feels like Brainwash Gang is chasing that gacha euphoria quickly found in single-player games like Genshin Impact and Fate/Grand Order. Opening up booster packs or inserting coins into the PalPrize is filled with gusto and really exhilarating for a few seconds. But once the hype subsides, players may be filled with dread as the discovered cards are near worthless.

The progression and loot mechanics may be an attempt to prolong player engagement. Outside of the upfront cost of $9.99 - which is not adjusted for low-income Steam regions - Friends vs Friends has no further monetization systems. No one can pay to win and instead must subject him or herself to grinding to find better items.

Friends vs Friends|Brainwash Gang|Raw Fury

Still, most of these frustrations are only in the public game modes. Friends vs Friends, as the name implies, can be great fun as a purely private brawl between good friends that know each other’s playstyles. It would have been nice if the game had some means of split screen or use with Parsec to entice local matches. For now, everyone will need to own their own copy of the game.

Friends vs Friends has a good foundation and concepts that could make for a quirky shooter. But it needs many further patches that change combat balance, progression, and an introduction of new features and modes. Currently, this feels like an Early Access game, which needs additional work. Those with three or more friends who are interested should consider purchasing multiple copies or hold off on Friends vs Friends entirely.

Friends vs Friends

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