Men Are the Expendable Gender, indeed.
Operation: Matriarchy (or Velian [Велиан]) is a sci-fi themed First-Person Shooter made by Russia's Buka Entertainment.
Set in the future of 2350, after mankind colonialized most planets surrounding Earth, humanity went into war with an alien race from Planet Velia, with humans winning the battle and claiming Planet Velia as their territory.
Seven years later, all communications with the human colonists on Planet Velia were lost. A viral outbreak triggered by the Velians in a last-ditch attempt to wipe out humans, the Velian virus strangely infects only the women, forcefully converting them into half-human, half-Velian killing machines who proceeds to wipe out everyone in sight.
Like every sci-fi themed FPS, it's up to the player, a sole Space Marine and Earth Federation sergeant, to investigate the outbreak.
The game's initial 2005 release is derided for being partially note incomplete and glitchy as hell, with damaged music files and soundbytes that plays static. An unofficial fan-made patch was created a couple years later to "fix" the game, with a completed version finally made available in 2009.
Operation: Matriarchy (the completed version) contain examples of:
- All There in the Manual: None of the plot is conveyed in the game itself; this isn't helped by the game's rather wonky Russian-to-English translation. Even the ending is a Gainax Ending. Bits and pieces can be put together from the loading screen tips, but on the whole all you're told is that you're a space marine that's woken up to find their ship being invaded by female alien hybrids.
- Arm Cannon: The standard, recurring ex-human-female-turned-half-Velian soldier mooks uses organic cannons grafted to their arms as their weapon.
- Blade Below the Shoulder: Most of the human-Velian creatures have organic blades, if they don't have cannons already. Get too close and they'll slash you up.
- Body Horror: Most of the alien monsters, thanks to either being mutated by Velian virus (for the women) or forcefully converted into half-machines (for the men). The human flesh is still visible on most of them. Special mention goes to the Dirod-Fourhand, a set of limbs fused together into a cross that walks around like a spider.
- Body of Bodies: The huge Dirod-Ballhand enemies are multiple human bodies fused into a single entity, where according to the game manuals they have "13 - 20 hearts, 8 brains and duplicate critical organs"
- Close-Range Combatant: The human-Velian hybrids has a ninja-like unit (who's even called "Ninja" in-game) who attacks exclusively using her arm and leg-blades. She's insanely fast however and is far deadlier than common mooks with ranged weaponry.
- Cyborg: The male human colonists of Planet Velia (those who didn't die in the initial takeover) are all subjected to becoming half-mechanical bio-weapons, thanks to Unwilling Roboticisation.
- Dilating Door: Most of the automated doors on Planet Velia are round and opens up from it's center.
- Elite Mooks: Velian Light Golems, enemies roughly the same size as the player but are equipped with long-range, heavy-duty flamethrowers and are expert shots with it. The loading screen before their debut level even warns the player "be careful when approaching" said enemy type.
- Emergency Weapon: Your default weapon you start off with is the Hawk-Claw, the standard-issue dagger which solely deals close-range attacks. It's surprisingly effective in taking down early enemies with a couple of stabs, but you'll keep it sheathed after the first two levels where enemies starts coming in larger amounts and you have access to different firearms.
- Fire-Breathing Weapon:
- The Velian Light Golems have these instead of the usual Arm Cannon.
- Flamethrower drones. Exactly What It Says on the Tin.
- On the player's side, you can collect a Velian Flamethrower later in the game.
- Gendercide: The virus that infected the colony on Velia somehow only affects women by converting them into bio-weapons before making them massacre the remaining populations.
- Giant Mook:
- The Dirod-class enemies are huge. And soaks up plenty of hits before going down.
- Heavy Experimental Golems, tank-sized enemies and the largest of the Golem-class mooks.
- The Goomba: Velian Technician Drones, those low-level, poorly-armored mooks who shows up in the first few stages in large numbers and dies in a few quick slashes. The game describes them as "hardly willing to fight unless cornered".
- Great Offscreen War: The human-Velian conflict takes place seven years before the game's events, and is not shown. You fight their constructs instead.
- Grenade Launcher: One of the last weapons you can get, the Inferna 35K-class Grenade Launcher. Which is great, because said stage introduces the Heavy Experimental Golem.
- Human Weapon: What the colonists of Planet Velia amounts to, after being infected by Velian genes and controlled by the Velians into attacking everything in sight.
- Invisible Aliens: The Velians, those aliens responsible for the viral outbreak, remains unseen the entire game. Most of what's visible are human-women infected with Velian genes and mindlessly attacking everything in sight, although one could assume the Velians are reptilian in nature (given how the victims appears).
- Meat Moss: While the entrance and higher levels of the Velian colony appears normal, as you progress further into the colony's core (presumably point zero of the outbreak) you'd realize most of the interior walls corridors are now covered in a flesh-like resin. And more often than not, the levels resembles the internal organs of some gigantic, unknown eldritch organism...
- Men Are the Expendable Gender: Zig-zagged with the fate of Planet Velia's colonists population. The outbreak sees most of the men killed, while the women are all infected and turned to bio-weapons. But as a result, a good chunk of the game's onscreen enemies (over 60% of them) you spend the levels shooting left and right are blatantly women.
- Mooks, but no Bosses: Despite having a colourful variety of enemies abound, there isn't a single boss in the game. It's last stage simply ends with you exiting the Velian base.
- Muzzle Flashlight: Several shootout scenes occurs in basements and darkened interiors, where gunfire is your only source of illumination.
- Pinball Projectile: The Velian biomass launcher fires bouncing green energy blasts that thankfully you're immune against.
- Powered Armor: You can obtain armored suits equipped with various weapons in a few areas, like the subway and hangar, which increases firepower and allows you to mow down assorted abominations easily. Though unfortunately you'll inevitably need to ditch them (if they're not destroyed by monsters along the way) to enter doorways and corridors too narrow for said armor to cross.
- Power Pincers: Velian drones (converted from what used to be the colony's male population) have mechanical, three-pronged pincers grafted to their arms, which they'll use to attack from close range.
- Shoulder Cannon: The second Spider Golem-type mook introduced has an organic cannon growing out her left shoulder, in contrast to most enemies having weapons grafted to their limbs. Her arms are instead claws made to aim the cannon.
- Spider People: The Velian Spider Golem enemies are human-cyborg creatures on mechanical spider legs.
- Spider Tank: On the other hand, there's the Heavy Experimental Golem, tank-sized enemies on mechanical legs. Despite their sizes their head and shoulders are still human-sized.
- Stealth Sequel: The protagonist of this game, Paul Armstrong, was previously mentioned in the ending of Kreed: Battle for Savitar, another Russian sci-fi themed FPS dealing with alien infestations, and the two games are likely set in the same universe.
- Unwilling Roboticisation: While the women on Planet Velia were organically converted, the men - those who didn't die in the takeover - were instead forcefully grafted with cybernetics from the colony, with you constantly facing half-human, half-machines programmed to attack you on sight.
- Was Once a Man: On both fronts; the women were biologically converted into mindless Velian soldiers, while the men (who didn't die in the original conflict) were forcefully turned into organic-mechanical drones.
