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Terminator: Dark Fate - Defiance
Finally, a game that deserves the love of Terminator's fans.
A solid real-time strategy entry to the Terminator universe, then, with engaging gameplay and tense missions, but the story leaves a lot to be desired ... There's definitely a lot of micromanagement here, but if you get used to it, you'll be able to keep everything under control and shouldn't face insurmountable problems. Terminator Dark Fate: Defiance does a lot right and is definitely worth a look if you like real-time strategy and the Terminator franchise.
A very realistic RTS that will you suffer the war against the machines just like you image would be after watch the movies. [Recommended]
8
aitorsibo
Awesome strategy game. I really like the setting, modern and guerrilla warfare mixed with in a post-apocalyptic world. Aesthetically, it is pleasing and clear (missing HDR support). Gameplay-wise, I really like the units roster, its abilities/upgrades and the synergies between them. I thoroughly enjoy the resource-management throughout the campaign. From obtaining as much loot as possible from the battles you fight to earn money, to managing your army and setups as well as buying improvements and planning ahead. You need to keep consumed supplies in check as growing your army is not free, and you need to consider travel requirements. The duality between combat and campaign management reminded me of XCOM, which is quite a praise. I think it is really well executed within its AA scope. A top strategy RTS game, among my favourites.
7
JoanV
If you expect this game to be similar to World in Conflict from Massive Entertainment you are going to be vastly disappointed. I did that mistake and many others it's not a bad game but it's a matter of taste. The mission design is similar to solving puzzles you have to do exactly what the game expects you to do or else you will lose there is no real freedom of strategic choices. Units with RPG mechanics so it's like you throw a dice every time they open fire if you are in luck and the dice has a positive number then they will hit their target. Your troops in this game just love to throw their limited bullets like idiots and without doing any damage to the opponent so you have to constantly babysit them and tell them exactly of what they have to hit. There are very limited troops and resources at your disposal in every mission so you have to be very careful of not losing them.
8
horymury
This would have been a perfect 10 if not the lack of some quality of life implementation. The idea is great, the gameplay is very engaging, fun, well thought out, but here are the reasons I must substract 2 points from a perfect 10: - severe lack of tooltips! took me a while to understand that the weapons rankings is not your typical ranking like legendary, rare etc, but the weapon colors rather represent the type of weapon, aka the slot of the unit/vehicle on which it fits. Also, when picking up weapons from the ground, you don't get a full tooltip for the ground weapon, so you need to look it up theoretically on their encyclopedia, which is also lacking! So you have to look it online.This can come as a plus, but some weapons for the same vehicle/unit slot can be better vs infantry, others better vs vehicles, other mixed, which is actually a positive as that would mean that generally there aren't bad weapons and good weapons, you need to plan what that specific slot should be used for- but it would help to see all that on tootips also for weapons on the ground!! - lack of key combination for: * selecting all units at once * selecting all vehicles at once * selecting all infantry at once - grouping of units: there is support for grouping units with the classic ctrl + [0-9] keys combinations, but! there's a but: when you group some units under a control, they are not grouped on the units preview pane on the UI, they are listed in the same order as before. Which means that once you group some units in a control, it's not so easy to preview/select units which are not yet under a ctrl+n group. I would have loved to have something similar with eg the way rome 2 and most total war series do the grouping part, just separate the grouped units from the rest. - units highlight: * selected units on the units preview pane is not very well highlighted, so it's not so easy to see from the list of units which ones you currently have selected * the minimap: oh God the minimap is not great at all, many missions have neutral factions, your troops are visible on some sort of green, the neutral ones on some sort of blue, but they look so similar that it s sooo hard to discern your troops from the neutral ones! - troops driving the vehicle: there is absolutely no indication on the units preview pane who the funk is driving the vehicles! in this game, most unit types can drive regular vehicles .Many vehicles can transport other troops as well. You can see the transported troops whithin the vehicle on the units preview pane, but you cannot see what unit is driving! which can be a real nuisance, as eg for vehicles you bring to front you can assign dedicated tank/vehicle drivers, but for vehicles aquired during missions you mostly assign units like rangers/snipers etc as drivers, and you kinda need to know where to find them during fights! To quote Angry Joe, this game deservers a badass seal of approval - but it needs abit of work on the QOL part.

Terminator: Dark Fate - Defiance

Released On: 
Feb 21, 2024
Metascore
72
User score
Mixed or Average
6.0
My Score
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Metascore
72
64% Positive
9 Reviews
36% Mixed
5 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
  • All Reviews
  • Positive Reviews
  • Mixed Reviews
  • Negative Reviews
Feb 22, 2024
85
Softpedia
Terminator: Dark Fate – Defiance has a good real-time strategy core that is augmented by the mission design and the army management elements. The campaign features interesting situations and complex battles. The tactical pause makes it all accessible even for players who aren’t long-term fans of the RTS genre. The story and presentation do not match the game’s mechanics. Some secondary objectives and narrative choices are unclear until players actually interact with them. But Terminator: Dark Fate - Defiance uses the franchise well and delivers engaging battles.
Feb 25, 2024
82
Everyeye.it
The unexpected complexity of Terminator Dark Fate Defiance proves to be a key element in restoring dignity to the saga from which it draws inspiration, traditionally unlucky in its video game adaptations. The tie-in proposed by Slitherine stands out as an engaging and challenging adventure, confronting us with a substantial challenge and presenting hordes of well-armored and equipped enemies. Despite some obvious flaws, the large-scale management phases and the ability to influence the progress of the game based on the choices made give the game a surprising strategic depth. It is a production which, despite being small in size, stands out for its almost role-playing structure, without forgetting, and indeed enhancing, its strategic roots. The complexity of the battles should not discourage newbies, considering the presence of the "Story Mode" difficulty, while fans of the saga and real-time strategy games should undoubtedly give this title a chance, certainly the best videogame transposition of the franchise in years to this part.
User score
Mixed or Average
6.0
38% Positive
9 Ratings
38% Mixed
9 Ratings
25% Negative
6 Ratings
  • All Reviews
  • Positive Reviews
  • Mixed Reviews
  • Negative Reviews
Dec 12, 2024
10
Taunt2017
The bug fixes are out the game is amazing and the story is god tier. Everyone who expects a man of war will be disappointed this is not a man of war this is Terminator dark defience sit down whit a clean wiew and the story is just unbeatable
Feb 26, 2024
10
Pech_SOG
Fantastic game that captures the setting, scale, and scope of the lore. Awesome single player campaign with stratetic and tactical layers as well as persistent units you find, build up, and nurture across the campaign.
Mar 4, 2024
80
GamingBolt
Terminator: Dark Fate - Defiance is a strange game that doesn’t seem like it would be all that fun at a cursory glance. Dig deeper, however, and you’ll find that all of its smaller systems mingle together in a way that brings about one of the more fun and unique real-time strategy games out there.
Feb 19, 2024
80
Multiplayer.it
Terminator: Dark Fate – Defiance is one of the best Terminator experience to date. One of the few games to offer a faithful experience to the series.
Mar 5, 2024
70
SECTOR.sk
The war strategy from the world of terminators and machines that want to take over the world surpasses even the movies in some ways. On the other hand, it has ailments that spoil it all. Mainly The frustrating difficulty of the campaign will not please you.
Feb 27, 2024
70
Finger Guns
Taking on the Dark Fate universe with ease, Terminator: Dark Fate – Defiance offers a gritty, at times brutal, realistic RTS experience, with a standout campaign mode and wonderful immersion into the Terminator world. However, the skirmish and multiplayer modes are lacking the firepower to ignite a full resistance, coupled with some callous difficulty balancing. Even so, hope for humanity remains even in the darkest moments, and the future isn’t written yet, so let’s hope the developers can make their own fate by building on this excellent foundation.
Feb 28, 2024
50
IGN
Terminator: Dark Fate - Defiance is an RTS that tries its best to bring a vicious, dirty, gritty war between humans and machines to life. It delivers flashes of that promise in motion, but lets itself down with obnoxious missions designed around inconsistent rules. Couple that with a confused campaign structure and anemic multiplayer skirmishes, and this otherwise appealing idea tips into the better-left-unplayed pile.
See All 14 Critic Reviews
Jun 25, 2025
8
aitorsibo
Awesome strategy game. I really like the setting, modern and guerrilla warfare mixed with in a post-apocalyptic world. Aesthetically, it is pleasing and clear (missing HDR support). Gameplay-wise, I really like the units roster, its abilities/upgrades and the synergies between them. I thoroughly enjoy the resource-management throughout the campaign. From obtaining as much loot as possible from the battles you fight to earn money, to managing your army and setups as well as buying improvements and planning ahead. You need to keep consumed supplies in check as growing your army is not free, and you need to consider travel requirements. The duality between combat and campaign management reminded me of XCOM, which is quite a praise. I think it is really well executed within its AA scope. A top strategy RTS game, among my favourites.
Jun 10, 2025
7
JoanV
If you expect this game to be similar to World in Conflict from Massive Entertainment you are going to be vastly disappointed. I did that mistake and many others it's not a bad game but it's a matter of taste. The mission design is similar to solving puzzles you have to do exactly what the game expects you to do or else you will lose there is no real freedom of strategic choices. Units with RPG mechanics so it's like you throw a dice every time they open fire if you are in luck and the dice has a positive number then they will hit their target. Your troops in this game just love to throw their limited bullets like idiots and without doing any damage to the opponent so you have to constantly babysit them and tell them exactly of what they have to hit. There are very limited troops and resources at your disposal in every mission so you have to be very careful of not losing them.
Feb 28, 2024
6
Satomagio
1) Micromanagement is crazy in this game you have been warned If you are not fan of micromanagement don't even bother buying this 2) Enemy factions getting constant reinforcements just to make the game feel "competitive" such a cheap and lame game design 3) Your units don't know how to shoot in this game they spend all their bullets on targets with little accuracy feels like you have to command a group of useless people and you expect with some luck to hit their targets 3) Supply, manage, repeat again and again and again so tired of having to babysit every unit 4) It's a niche title trying to be hard for the sake of feeling hard developers want to please Dark souls fanboys. I prefer playing real RTS games
Jul 17, 2024
5
Audit
To be honest I would prefer a Command and Conquer strategy game in the Terminator universe and not a weird hardcore survival game with shooting mechanics based on luck and having to constant micromanage all my units, There are so many limitations in the gameplay of this game despite some good ideas. Game expects from you to have 20 hands be everywhere at the same time and give orders to every single unit plus having to fight enemy units coming from everywhere and having to look out for fuel and supplies. Sorry this is not exactly my cup of tea of what i call fun. Suppressing does not even exist in this game the enemies will always be accurate, Using smoke for cover is actually useless because it also makes your units inaccurate against enemy targets, This game was made for a small clique of try-hards that love save scumming and micromanaging it's not for the normal strategy players it feels like a slog. It's a shame could had been a lot more fun
Mar 5, 2024
1
KiotoWave
Very bad game. The story is okay, but everything else is very bad - camera, gameplay, balance and skulldugger
See All 24 User Reviews
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SummaryTerminator: Dark Fate - Defiance is a real-time strategy game based on the Terminator: Dark Fate universe that follows the war between humanity and Legion's synthetic intelligent machine network. In the single-player campaign, you take the role of a commander in the Founders, a force made up of the remnants of the US military and guide y... Read More
  • PC
Feb 21, 2024
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