Recent reviews by Talvert

Writing this review to say that the game was a lot of fun when I played it a long time ago, just had an update, and works just fine. Some reviews here might be out of date.

I had fun playing the game, but the other criticisms in other reviews are completely valid. Balance is definitely off, to the point that last game I played, I won every battle, including bosses, in the first turn. How, you ask? Infinite combo. There's a card, Time Loop, that makes a copy of every card that you play and puts it on top of your deck. There's also a card, Haste, that gives you one energy and draws you two cards. Normally, these cards are removed from the deck when you use them, but Time Loop keeps putting Haste on the top of the deck *before* you draw cards, meaning you immediately draw a copy of Haste and whatever the next card is. You have infinite energy and can win however you want to. If you keep a small deck, then it's not hard to get this every opening hand if you have the cards.

This was a blast to me, as being extremely OP in what's supposed to be a difficult genre gives me dopamine, but it's pure cheese. It's just a perfect example of how off the balance is in the game. Granted, this is also the dev's first and only game, and like I said, I had a lot of fun playing it. You just have to know what to expect before jumping in.

Edit: After thinking about it, I realized I didn't really say anything *positive* in my review. One thing I feel like this game does well is the enemies you face and how their abilities affect you differently. Got a huge deck? Spectre Knight is going to be hard to take down if the Enchant Weapons card is at the bottom. Got a small deck? Well, ooze is going to hurt when he dissolves the few you do have. It does make it to where you have to come at each enemy differently. Unless, of course, you can kill everything in the first turn.

Free game is definitely worth it, but I wish they bundled the DLCs for one price.

EDIT: As promised, changing the review after reading the patch notes. Haven't had time to verify, but they at least listed the bugs as patched. Leaving the review for posterity, though.

The quick rundown is that this is a great game, but you can tell they rushed it out before Gears: Tactics came out. Like everyone else has reviewed here, this is only a "Not Recommended" until the devs fix the bugs. As soon as the bugs are gone, this will immediately be switched to "Recommended." Really, it's more of a message to the devs at this point.

As far as what makes this game good, the entirety of the gameplay is now more streamlined, making missions go by much more quickly. The meat of the game is still the same old XCom, but the little tweaks give it a unique niche. First, the breach mechanic is nicely implemented. It gives the introduction to an encounter a breath of fresh air, and it acts like an expedient and simultaneous turn one, while also giving you a chance to use group-wide buffs and alter your battle plan to take advantage of the different ways to attack. Team composition plays heavily into this, which feeds into another strong suit of the game. While the different operatives don't have as many perks and levels to gain as the old classes in the previous games, they have been diversified and fleshed out in different ways, clearly designed to hold different niches in your team, depending on what you need for that mission. Need someone who can guarantee a hit on a breach and lock down a problematic enemy? Torque is your woman. Having missions where there are too many enemies and you can't help but get shot? make sure to bring Terminal and Cherub for their team support options. Facing a lot of androids? Patchwork makes quick work of them. Having teams that synergize well is also a strong suit, with complementary abilities, as well as generous action economy from most items not even using an action, able to completely turn the tide during an overwhelming encounter. The geoscape is replaced with a simpler city map, and it reverts to the first XCom where multiple missions are handed out to you at the same time, and you have to choose where your support goes while minimizing unrest across the whole city. There's still research, albeit a simplified version that only requires time, elerium, and maybe an agent or two to help speed it along. Training is very similar to how psionics were developed and strengthened in XCom 2, except now it grants bonuses and new abilities to any agent. Similarly, Spec Ops is basically the away missions in War of the Chosen, with the agent being unavailable for a period of time, but an effect is granted on mission success.

I've spoken nothing but positively about the game so far, so why the negative review? Simply put, the game is a buggy mess. I'll run down the major ones that I've noticed or have heard mentioned, as well as workarounds here. Again, as soon as they're patched, this will get stricken from the review and the game will be a hearty "Recommend." First, the inventory bugs. It seems to be activated when swapping out epic weapons, variants of different types of weapons that also grant an added ability, such as Banish, a once-per-mission ability on an assault rifle that basically allows you to keep firing until either the enemy is dead or you have to reload. Apparently, switching the weapons can cause your base weapons to bug out, either duplicating or completely disappearing. Along with that, it can also affect the entire inventory of an operative, making each and every equipped item vanish. This renders the operative completely unusable, as you can't send them on a mission without weapons or armor, and there isn't a way in game to get a replacement basic weapon or armor. The workaround is through a mod or the debug menu, both of which can be looked up, but even with those fixes, sometimes, the tech level of the replacement items don't match your actual tech level, and certain items that disappear are hidden items, like the gremlins on the techs. You also need to know how to replace those items if certain characters are the ones affected by the bug. It also makes no sense from a design point, because you can't replace or upgrade these items, so why are the abilities tied to a hidden item instead of simply to the operative? After all that, the minor medkit doubling bug is merely an afterthought and not even a bother.

Beyond that, the game does freeze quite often at reinforcement spawns. I've not had too much of an issue there, as a quick reload usually solves the problem, but I have heard that a lot of ironman games end up becoming unplayable from it. Cherub is known to have a glitch if he gets all his kinetic charges, is behind cover, and then activates guard, his movement acts like he is completely surrounded and unable to move. Not sure of an exact workaround there, because it's only gamebreaking if you need to evac, but it is annoying, none-the-less. You can probably use Torque's pull ability or Shelter's swap to still maneuver him, so if you're really worried about the glitch, those are ways to not cause it to completely screw you over. There's also a random visual glitch where some units float about three feet in the air or an archon flies to a space out of the map, but they are visual glitches and don't affect gameplay, except for a laugh as someone takes cover and floats completely above it.

To sum it all up, it's a great XCom experience when it isn't a buggy mess. Once it (hopefully) gets patched, it's easily worth full price. Until then, though, you probably want to wait unless you have the patience to deal with what the bugs throw at you.

Very much a merging of FTL with a Sid Meyer's Pirates feel.

First and foremost, I got this game on extreme discount. Definitely worth it for the price I paid, but I'd also say it's worth the $10, too. A lot of the reviews are taking issue with the micro-transactions, and while it's a fair point, none of those are necessary to winning or even doing well at the game, as long as you can create some basic strategies and have a decent understanding of what you need in your deck.

My pros for the game are that it's actually a fun battler and a good time waster. Pulling off a strategy feels nice, and the AI is *sometimes* capable of doing the same to you, forcing you to be quick on your feet to respond. The EX challenges are a nice way to spice up difficulty, although some are basically a free bonus, as the time limit and HQ durability challenges are easily mitigated if you know how to play. Settling on a strategy is great, and there are several ways to go differently, although some are definitely better and more viable than others. Also, while the art isn't the reason I played the game, the artwork is very well done for the most part.

My cons are that upgrading the cards are annoying and grindy, especially in the early game, when rub p just isn't that common, and to top it off, several cards, even those that require seals, upgrade into objectively inferior cards. Definitely a feels bad moment when you use a seal stone that you've grinded a lot of cash for, just to get a card that you're never going to use, and on top of that, the "mini-game" to level up the cards is just simply annoying. The AI is also mostly garbage and gets by on the same strategy of using cards that you can't gain access to unless you pay for the DLC packs, and the cards simply play a unit that gives them mana then it comes into pay and when it dies. It's literally just them getting a mana advantage to play better units than you can. That's not strategy as much as it's a handicap, and while I don't think the microtransactions are worth an automatic downvote, completionists aren't going to be able to unlock every card simply for that fact, and not being able to use cards that the AI repeatedly uses against you is lame.

Other points of interest is that they did away with the multiplayer, but you can still gain access to the victory packs at the end of the game.

Overall, the game is fun and worth a play. Just don't play it in public.

I got it in a bundle, but if I paid full price for it, I'd be content. A single run-through is quick enough, and there are some fun elements to upgrading your teams and going through different strategies to see what works the best for what's thrown at you. A little too random in how it assigns upgrades for my taste, but it wasn't over the top annoying. My only sincere gripe is that they don't show you what upgrades in a path do before you're able to select that upgrade, so it's a bit annoying in deciding to take an upgrade or save the points. Still, a solid 8/10.

Not a bad dive into a rogue-like RPG. Difficulty isn't too bad, as long as you don't go full speed ahead without any prep, but it feels like you can never get the basic materials in near a sufficient quantity for actual crafting. The only time I did, they all were used in a story mission. Still, enjoyable enough so far, especially if you catch it on a sale.

I got it on sale, and I got my money's worth, but I wasn't able to finish it. Once you get your winning strategy, it becomes a rotation of skills to use, and really nothing else. Trying out the different robots and finding the strategy was fun, but after mid-game, the game felt like a bit of a chore. Would still recommend to pick up on a sale.