Full Review of the Game

[MiniRambo97]

I have been playing a fair bit of this game recently and so far I have thoroughly enjoyed my experience. It is quite a bit of fun, with rather interesting talent trees as well as multiclassing for your characters (particularly given the Xcom strategy RPG format) and there are an array of fairly deep systems here. However, as is sometimes the case with games like these, there is a bit of a learning curve and with it being in early access there is some issues with the game.

I initially meant to post this to the Steam Reviews itself but opted to leave this here, not only due to character limit but it would be a lot more digestible here I feel. Ordinarily I don't go so lengthy into such things but I absolutely have been loving this game since I got it and with the devs openly responding to feedback I wanted to give a more thorough and productive stream of feedback as opposed to my initial kind of frustrated venting in my former post. It is very long, I probably could done a lot more saying a lot less but got a bit carried away XD, but here is a collection of thoughts I had of things I love and don't love so much about this game :)

Positives:

-One of the biggest things I appreciate about this game is the field of view cone with built in line segments that does absolute wonders for helping me identify properly how the FOV of the patrols may be circumvented and how to maneuver my runners in order to slip past them unnoticed. Maybe an auditory circle or two around them to indicate the range of hearing for sprinting/sneaking could be tweaked into there but I have found this visual mechanic not only aesthetically pleasing but exceptionally helpful, removing a lot of guesswork that can prove frustrating in similar games like Xcom 2. And the way it differentiates between sightlines obstructed by full or half cover in different ways, allowing you to be in the FOV of a guard but crouched and still hidden, is just brilliant and I cannot sing its praises high enough.

-Following off the first pro of this the fact that all the AI don’t become immediately alerted the second one of you is spotted is simply a breath of fresh air, this and the aforementioned are what initially drew me to this game and I have been loving these two mechanics. It’s realistic but in a way that is a boon to the player as opposed to some cumbersome, awkward obstacle that you have to finagle around and struggle to understand or implement. I would like to see potentially a mechanic with specific enemies, or just enemies when they are under specific statuses (like the Suspicious or Unaware) where they are ‘Reporting’ when they spot a body or even an intruder to the Sec AI and if you don’t silence them everyone switches to Suspicious and drek starts to get real dicey but even as is I simply love it.

-The Leverage system in this game is just a chef’s kiss to the recipe. I absolutely love that having more contacts with favors, or even not, gives me actual gameplay advantages even if I may have to fork over a bit of money or call in a few favors for it. And there are different layers of Contacts that offer different fields of advantages providing a lot of complexity and diversity to how you tackle each mission as well as some Legwork options that actually allow you to unlock new infiltration points of entry or different Leverage options. It’s a fantastic system and while I would like to see bit more diversity in the range of Leverage bonuses of different varieties this is a positively stellar system with a vast potential I am confident the devs will see nurtured properly. It very much reminds me of Shadowrun and I absolutely adore this system. Though I would find it amusing if there are some situational, percentage based Leverage options where maybe you try to pay someone off on the inside (with Legwork or not maybe) to give you an advantage that could be quite strong but there is a chance they take your money and say, “LMAO XD get rotated idiot” and double dip by selling your crew out for an extra pay day and all of a sudden you’re up drek creek without a paddle and ya gotta slot and run to get ♥♥♥♥ done or get out of dodge. Then maybe even follow up missions of tracking the snitch down and paying them a visit where you either blackmail or just frag them.

-The Contacts in this game actually feel valuable as Contacts. Whether it’s offering better gear, cybernetics, different options for Leverage or helping to throw off Headhunters and such the Contacts in this game actually feel like you need them but also that they need you as well in the form of obligations and other jobs they may need you to take that if not done will negatively impact them and thus you and your relationship with them. It feels like a truly symbiotic relationship born of necessity of course but strengthened by Trust with actual, quantifiable/material boons to it beyond ‘they like you’ or they just give you discounts on stuff. Even with the Influence Limit Breaks allowing you to gain more money for missions from them for a time or access to higher grade weapons and gear, whatever your fancy. I do wish there was a bit more direct actions you could take with them, using them to put out a word you are looking for a Hacker or a specific type of contact or gear or whatever the case may be and maybe their success is influence by their stats or your Trust and such with them, maybe they get you what you need but they may have had a hard time finding it so you owe them an Obligation in return or some such. Which it does in certain situations it seems like but so far it seems like only scripted scenarios in my playthrough so far. Even so if it was left just as it is I think it’s still a pretty solid system and I have enjoyed it quite a bit.


-The AI in this game is surprisingly thorough in their patrols and they also seem to be able to mix up their patrol patterns on occasion as well. When they are suspicious they can be fairly unpredictable however I found this to be a delightfully refreshing addition to the game. Not only does it challenge you to be thoughtful in your approach but it gives you prediction tools to help you monitor where they are going with their movements, although in some few instances they may not always show it accurately. It differentiates itself quite a bit from the standard AI patrols I have seen in many other games where there are usually large, obvious gaps in patrols and it almost feels lazy. This, in contrast, feels quite a bit more involved and makes stealth (whenever you choose to implement it of course) a lot more engaging to play with though it is easy to sometimes forget about a prior patrol you passed by en route to expose you leading to some interesting, if not amusing, situations. Though I have some gripes about the Sec AI’s effects on these instances which I’ll touch on later.

-The Retry Turn function is extremely helpful in many of these missions and I greatly appreciate being able to Retry a turn if I made some massive or forgot about a specific guard or patrol while distracted by whatever plans I had implemented for that specific turn. Or sometimes even as just a mulligan when my entire team finds new and innovative ways to absolutely screw themselves on attack rolls that would make Alec Baldwin look like a perfectionist. Just another brilliant quality of life mechanic that makes playing the game so much more enjoyable.

-Having the ability to Yield or Delay an Action in each turn with how the Initiative Turn Order functions in this game has got to be one of my favorite things in strategy rpg gaming period. Especially when it concerns stealth runs this is just such a useful and immersive function that really gets me feeling in the game itself. I absolutely love this and it shows the attention to detail of the devs to implement a feature like this.

-I haven’t much dabbled in multi classing as of yet but the fact I can do so and diversify my crews, tailoring them into specific combat/stealth/utility roles is a positively lovely addition to the game. And I find it unique and interesting that some of these roles actually have cybernetic prerequisites that make logical sense of their role to be able to function. It takes a lot of the feeling of being restricted with the, so far for me, limited crew members I have at my disposal. Although one stinging caveat to this is that there isn’t really a confirm prompt when you go to select a multi class and I have accidentally multi classed into a role I did not want a couple times and had to reload my save or, if I haven’t saved in a while, use a token to respec from my Simstream Trainer and go through re-allocating all their points again which is fairly annoying. Not the biggest deal in the world but it could certainly with at least a Press to Confirm prompt.


-Initially I was a bit worried that there wouldn’t be much content to this game but, although there is some repetition of maps (which is to be expected of an Indie game that is early access) it definitely has quite a bit of flavor and variety in the types of missions and the ways you are able to approach these missions. For a game at this price this definitely is worth, already, every penny I’ve spent on it and more. And there are all sorts of lovely little flourishes like seeing your crew in the safehouse (though some idle animations would definitely give a more homey vibe with this, maybe even some flavor text interactions that kinda just pop up, even conversation prompts potentially that you could participate in or skip to build relationships with one another) and the ease of access to change and mix up loadouts in the mission prep window the game has a lot of love and care put into it and it definitely shows how hard they have been working on this and continue to do. But I will be here typing all day if I were to point out every little thing I love about this game, suffice to say this is already a solid 7/10 experience for me and I have no doubts when it will only continue to improve that experience over time.

[MiniRambo97]

Negatives:

-The Sec AI can be downright oppressive at points. The passive tick on Normal (where I’ve played most) doesn’t seem like much but with 2 ticks per turn plus any use of Lures or diversions that attract to pull guards away that can quickly escalate the Security Level. Which may not be the worst but it does start you off with the sense of having to rush, if you want to keep your SL low (particularly for a secondary objective) since it’s only a matter of time before you lose that SL secondary objective. And with how good the AI patrols are (which is a good thing) it is extremely difficult if not sometimes impossible not to use a plethora of diversionary measures to displace or lure guards to their deaths in concealed locations which will often force you to up that SL score. It makes it seem like it wants you to stealth but also rush that stealth considerably and it often leads to disaster. I think an incremental Sec AI passive generation would be preferable, each level either increasing the rate of passive Security Tallies or having the chance to potentially increase per Security Level or even per disturbance/suspicious activity in higher difficulties.

-The secondary objectives are clearly randomly generated, which is perfectly fine. But when it asks you to sleuth across an entire facility full of guards, bio scanner fields, motion sensors and cameras with less than 2 Security level or deal with 15+ soldiers in under 7 rounds (with the first round often being wasted as you get your guys into position) it begins to feel quite cheeky in a bad way. Especially considering the rewards for these side objectives isn’t, at least to me thus far, all that appealing. If you’re lucky you may get a favor for the objective but even then with the extreme difficulty of some of these secondaries, due to the random generation, that is nowhere near worth the headache and expert execution such objectives would require. But 20% Influence and 10 Blue NBS cubes for completing an entire mission (which means extracting as well) with less than 4 Sec Level in under 8 turns? Client can either pony up something substantial or get bent as far as I’m concerned. Ain’t putting my crew in stretchers for influence to use as a discount or some drek. I think those extreme secondaries are fine, as long as the reward matches the demand of the task and those demands are realistic (that is to say possible) in the first place as sometimes they simply are not.

-The economy is harsh, which I have no problem with on paper, but it can take some things a bit too far. Running a mission with all paydata collected just to be able to afford two sets of armor that is only marginally better than what I am currently running is what I like to call ‘a waste of good eddies’. Paying 16-30k for miniscule accuracy and recoil reduction mods seems a bit much considering each job generally pays about 170k in my experience, and can go lower or higher depending on the mission and number of objectives. I think some of the prices are fair but some of it can go with some tweaking, either with your payouts or the prices of certain goods compared to what they offer. A 5% bonus in protection for your armor is not worth 106k from the market. I also think a wider range of pay, even if only by like 25% lower for some and 25% higher for others or whatnot would give a bit more consideration for what jobs to take or not. Maybe 50% or more over for multi stage jobs, especially considering you may wind up throwing down as much as 50k in leverage out of pocket or in the form of favors (which blunts the cost of course) for jobs that don’t pay super well in my opinion, granted there is substantial paydata that can make a killing on top of the job. Especially some of the combat jobs that are arduous paying no more than a standard stealth op, the only reason to take those is to curry favor with specific contacts it seems and I just tell them to get bent myself, and then I bend them over myself when they want me to do said combat mission with only 3 guys to the 21 goons and have the audacity to ask me to do it in under 7 turns for 1% Trust bonus with them. No thanks, get rotated.

-Heat is a bit of a problem and one that I both have a poor understanding of and don’t think is consistent either. One mission I get 8 Heat generation for a mission that got to Sec Level 9 and the next I get 10 Heat generation for a mission that didn’t go even a whole tally over Sec Level 5. But I also don’t think I fully understand how the Heat mechanic functions and I also have only just started building my Counter-Intel center to try to mitigate that, as I’ve been sitting on 90+ Heat for the last few play sessions, and my apprehension of letting missions expire for fear of harming relationships with contacts hasn’t helped that. I think overall some more work can be done on this to better communicate the effects of the Heat on Stress levels of your crew and other listed effects would be appreciated. Maybe even a weekly pop up that shows the effects of it, if at all relevant, to better understand how it is affecting your gameplay. But so far it hasn’t significantly impacted my gameplay as of yet so this is a bit more of a nit pick at the moment than anything else.

-A more minor complaint I have is the way Debuffs/Buffs appear on the field. Mostly the Debuffs, it doesn’t seem super clear when a character of yours is getting debuffed by an enemy. I mean the camera switches to them and then a purple circle goes off around the character model but I think it could certainly go with a flashing of the text of what the ability is and maybe additional texts flowing underneath it of what the debuffed stats are.

-Another minor complaint is that a mission will show you what you get for not completing it but doesn’t seem to show you what will happen if you do not complete it. And with the game instilling you with the knowledge that not completing missions you may upset a contact in some way it kinda left me anxious to refuse jobs and let them pass over. I think a small tab in the mission info of the backlash or consequences, however you want to term it, should you decline or let the mission pass over would be helpful in determining whether the pay, the risk and such of a job is worth the reward or if it’s more worth just taking a little hit to your cred with a contact and let it pass.

-Loading and Saving of the game are very easy to confuse together and I have on multiple occasions screwed myself over accidently saving when I meant to load or loading when I meant to save. I think it would definitely benefit from a Hold to Save/Hold to Load confirmation for like 2-3 seconds. Yes I understand it may be a bit of inconvenience but that would have saved me multiple times as I realized the moment I hit the confirm button that I had clicked the wrong function and now kinda ♥♥♥♥♥♥ myself. Maybe a little more visual differential between the two, even as simple as a different color for the outline of the text boxes, might be good as well. You also can’t seem to change the key bindings for those two functions which I think would also help as well.

-Another nitpick is that if something happens after your last character’s turn and there are several AI after them and they spot a character you didn’t anticipate them doing and you want to pause and Retry the turn or maybe a combat encounter is going badly and you are losing, decide to try to restart the mission or at least Retry that turn and such you have to wait until every one of the AI are done with their turn before you can even open the Options menu you can’t do so because the Skip AI Action is the same button prompt for opening the Options menu and you cannot seem to rebind either of these controls. And, though I’ve only had it happen once, when the game seemed to freeze on an AI turn I was unable to try reloading the game because I could open the options menu and was forced to ALT+F4 out of the game. Not a major issue but definitely one that, at the moment, can be quite frustrating.