Monster Attack

Monster Attack for PlayStation 2 is the European release of Sandlot's 2003 Japanese action shooter, SIMPLE 2000 Series Vol. 31: The Chikyū Bōeigun. Published in Europe by Agetec in February 2004, it is the first game in the Earth Defense Force series. The campaign casts the player as a soldier answering an alien assault on Earth, where huge unidentified craft release giant creatures into city streets and the surviving defence forces must fight back.

Played from a third-person perspective, Monster Attack PS2 sends one infantry fighter into broad combat zones filled with swarming enemies and invading machines. Missions revolve around eliminating the immediate threat, from gigantic ant-like creatures to UFOs, robots and towering monsters, while the escalating invasion supplies ever larger targets. It is a direct, mission-based shooter built around movement, aiming and choosing the right tool for a chaotic battlefield rather than a character-driven adventure.

Before deploying, the player selects weapons from an arsenal that grows beyond 100 options. Conventional firearms and heavier equipment give the basic soldier markedly different ways to approach an encounter, and weapons need reloading even when their ammunition supply is otherwise unlimited. Pickups left by defeated enemies can improve the soldier's durability and expand the available armament, giving repeated missions a practical progression loop as tougher equipment becomes available for harder battles.

The PS2 game also makes the invasion feel larger by allowing the soldier to use military vehicles. Tanks and helicopters are among the machines that can be brought into the fight, changing how a mission is approached when they are available. Destructible city scenery reinforces the scale of each encounter: the same streets used for a close-range skirmish can become the setting for a battle against aerial invaders or a much larger creature.

Monster Attack offers two-player local play, with both cooperative and competitive options. Its Japanese original was a low-priced SIMPLE 2000 Series title from D3 Publisher, but the concept established the foundation for the long-running Earth Defense Force line: a lone ground soldier, outsized alien attackers, a large weapon selection and spectacle-driven battles. For PlayStation 2 players, it is the starting point of Sandlot's EDF series and the predecessor to the European sequel Global Defence Force.