Howdy. Do you want XCOM? Do you just like the current and glorious MechWarrior Techniques sport? And most significantly, are you in any respect within the passage of time? In that case, then there’s somebody I’d such as you to satisfy.
That is Phantom Brigade, a turn-based ways sport that got here out final week. It’s a sport of two halves, one the place you command a squad of mechs on the battlefield, the opposite placing you accountable for strategic stuff like conquering enemy areas, managing pilots and upgrading/repairing your mechs.
These are all issues I really like and issues I’ll check out in even probably the most fundamental try at a turn-based sport. However Phantom Brigade is actually setting itself aside in a number of key methods.
First up, it appears superb. It’s received a really Digital On form of vibe occurring with its mech design (and animation, even), and I simply love how slick and funky the entire thing appears. Even the interface is superb, taking cues from video games like Infinite Legend, and displaying that simply because a sport is about technique doesn’t imply it additionally cant look good.
Subsequent, this isn’t strictly a turn-based ways sport. Like Damaged Traces, which I preferred and wrote about a number of years again, Phantom Brigade is kinda turn-based, in that you just positively get on a regular basis on the planet to line up your strikes, however the precise decision of these selections performs out in real-time.
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The story’s narrative basis is that you just and your crew of mech pilots have gotten maintain of a secret prototype weapon that permits you to see briefly into the longer term. Simply lengthy sufficient to see how far an enemy unit goes to maneuver within the subsequent 5 seconds, and what they’re going to do whereas they’re getting there. Handy!
It really works like…a video editor. The developer walkthrough under takes you thru it intimately, however the starting stage of every flip entails lining up a collection of actions on a timeline, on which you’re in a position to “scrub” backwards and forwards to see how all the pieces goes to go. When all the pieces is to your liking, you hit play execute and the entire collection of strikes performs out.
That may sound simple. For those who can see into the longer term, then you’ll be able to see what your opponent is doing, and you may merely react accordingly. However there’s problem and unpredictably inherent on this, since each time you shoot, or transfer, or come into bodily contact, or deploy a protect, these actions are timed, and play out throughout an animation sequence.
Combating sport followers may know the place that is going; it’s all nice seeing what your opponent is doing and establishing one thing to defeat or counter it, however should you get the timing unsuitable, then you definitely’re fucked.
You may also have observed from that video and gif that Phantom Brigade is, on account of this emphasis on timing, at all times transferring. There’s little or no extended use of canopy right here, the sport needs to make this extra of a dance than a gunfight. I’m very a lot into this at only a click-by-click degree, because it at all times offers me loads to do, even on turns the place it appears like not a lot is occurring.
The sport launched in Early Entry on the Epic Video games Retailer a few years in the past, which is after we first coated it, however has now reached model 1.0 standing and dropped on Steam as properly, wanting a little bit slicker and taking part in a little bit tighter within the course of.
This submit was initially written in 2020; it has been up to date after spending time with the 1.0 launch.
