Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium (Game)

Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium

GAME » on December 21, 2023

Android (Platform)iPhone (Platform)PC (Platform)

Sequel to the original GFL with a more turn-based tactical focus.

Made with several updates including more 3D models instead of the chibi 2D models from the original game, more focus on strategy and unit placement a la XCOM instead of Echelons full of gun girls. The sequel is not meant to replace the first Girls' Frontline, but to run alongside it.

Plot

Set in Eastern Europe in 2074, about 10 years after the main story of Girls' Frontline. Griffin and Kryuger has been dismantled by the government who felt it had become too powerful, but the Commander continues to lead their Tactical Dolls (T-Dolls, or just "Dolls") while chasing bounties aboard their mobile base, known as Elmo. As they undertake a delivery mission in the contaminated zone, they are attacked by an unknown force who tries to seize their cargo, which contains a mysterious girl capable of firing powerful lasers with the "box" that contains her. As the Commander retakes the cargo and continues to their destination, they soon discover that they were hired by a group linked to their old subordinate, Kalina (Character), and have been dragged back into a conspiracy involving powerful ancient relics and a conspiracy involving the girl in the box that could save the world, or use her for further destruction.

Characters

The player POV character is "The Commander," whose name and gender are chosen near the start of the game, but is assumed to be the same Commander from the previous game. The Dolls that they meet are mostly copies of various T-Dolls from the first game, but several have chosen to take on more human names and personalities. For example: OTs-14 is now Groza and the Commander's loyal adjutant. G36 (Character) is now Centaureissi and appears more maid-like. UMP9 (Character) is now Lenna who works for Kalina's organization.

The Commander will find themselves going up against a wide variety of enemies in different stages. Some are other soldiers, security forces, or PMC members. Others are monsters known as ELIDs that have succumbed to ELID radiation and become mutated in grotesque ways. And others are specialized Dolls or other robots that oppose the Commander for various reasons. There are also boss monsters and mechanical enemies who take up several squares on the grid by themselves and have a much larger pool of health, and will require some more planning or attack strength to defeat without suffering total losses.

Gameplay

As stated above, combat is more turn-based in this game than the previous one. Commanders select up to 4 (sometimes 5) Dolls to take the field at a time, and move them around a square grid. Though most standard stages will give the Commander the goal of eliminating all enemies on the field within a set number of turns, or a specific boss enemy, there are stages with different conditions for victory, such as moving all allied Dolls to a specific grid on the field to "escape" the area, escorting a neutral ally to an evacuation point, or surviving a certain number of turns without being completely wiped out.

Cover and Defense

Every character on the field also has a "Stability Index" which is represented by a white shield with a number under it next to their health bar. The Stability Index functions as an armor that slightly resists damage, and when combined with proper use of cover, can heavily mitigate incoming fire. However, when Stability hits 0, the character's armor collapses and they can only rely on the inherited cover of walls or surfaces they hide behind, or otherwise take full damage from enemies positioned behind their cover or who use melee attacks that ignore such cover. In addition, every character (ally and enemy alike) has a "Phase Weakness," where hitting them with a specific type of attack or element will deal 10% extra damage to their HP and at least 2 extra Stability damage. Most enemies will eventually recover their Stability when they hit 0 (if they are not killed before then), while allied units usually need a Doll's supporting skill to rebuild their own Stability Index.

On the field, there are multiple types of cover that allies and enemies alike can use on top of their Stability Index to mitigate damage from incoming attacks.

Full-body cover and solid half-body cover: 35% damage reduction, and cannot be destroyed or easily crossed.
Half-body cover that can be vaulted over: 30% damage reduction, cannot be destroyed but can be easily crossed.
Half-body cover that is destructible: 25% damage reduction, can be destroyed by certain skills.
Vulnerable half-cover: 20% damage reduction, can be destroyed by certain skills and multiple attacks.

Some special types of cover, like pipes or gas lines, will explode after one turn and deal damage to anyone hiding behind them if struck.

Equipment and Skills

Every Doll has a basic attack with their equipped weapon, a Passive Skill that can support their allies or their own attacks, and up to 3 unique Active Skills that may require spending points from what the game calls a "Confectance Index." Some skills require a certain amount of Confectance points to be launched, while others don't need any, but have a cooldown that prevents them from being used consecutively until a certain number of turns have passed. The Confectance Index can be refilled during combat with allied Dolls' support skills or taking cover without using a skill.

Every Doll has a specific weapon type that they prefer, though the Commander can equip them with different weapons within that type. Weapon attributes generally fall into the following categories:

Light Ammo (Handguns and Sub-Machineguns)
Medium Ammo (Assault Rifles)
Heavy Ammo (Rifles and Machineguns)
Shotgun Ammo
Melee (Blades) * Unlike others listed here, Melee damage inherently ignores Stability armor when dealing damage.

Phase (Elemental) Damage usually relies on Dolls using Active Skills to apply it along with their normal damage attacks. Phase Damage falls along these categories:

Burn
Corrosion
Hydro
Freeze
Electric

Development

GFL2 was announced on May 15, 2020, alongside Project Neural Cloud (Game) and the (now-cancelled) spinoff Glitch Land. A 3D model of HK416 (Character) and a silhouette of OTs-14 were shown as part of a teaser for the game. The game received a first closed beta test between June 29-July 3 2021, and a second from October 18-31 that same year. A third closed beta, titled “Spark Test”, was held between July 20-August 3, 2023. In an August 2023 interview, Producer Yuzhong estimated that the expended budget spent on the game was over 100 million RMB (over 13.7 million USD, or 12.8 million EUR at the time), and explained that the visual direction of the game was inspired by the game Code Vein (Game).

The fourth beta test and first open beta, named “Gravitation Test”, took place from September 28 to October 12, 2023 on Android and PC. CN servers opened for all platforms on December 21, 2023, with story missions up to chapter 6 made available. It was later announced that a global version would be released about a year later, on December 3, 2024, but the story and characters available to the players of this version would lag behind that of the original Chinese version.

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