Rising from the Ashes
Over the years many attempts have been made to emulate XCOM’s successful mix of action, strategy and base building. Even Marvel have a similar type of game in the pipe albeit with some major combat differences. Enter the original creator of XCOM Julian Gollop with a brand-new alien menace to eradicate off the face of the earth with his newest game Phoenix Point. While releasing in 2019 for Early Access on PC, PP has finally hit consoles and comes fully equipped with all available DLC, but has it been worth the wait?
If you’ve played the latter reboot of XCOM and its sequel then Phoenix Point will feel very familiar. It looks and functions very similarly in that players control a small group of soldiers in turn-based combat, while simultaneously building alliances, as well as a base. While there are differences to be sure, for instance Phoenix Point allows the player to free target enemies weak points which opens up combat so much but for the most part it functions like XCOM.
In Phoenix Point, instead of fighting an enemy that came from the stars this time the problem is more humans’ fault. A thawed permafrost leads to the release of the “Pandoravirus,” an illness causing living beings to mutate into horrible creatures. Like creatures attacking all over the planet, and after being overwhelmed the player must band together with various factions to push back the threat and save the globe. The world of Phoenix Point is quite interesting; but the use of its faction system is one of the games true highlights.
MSRP: $59.99
Platforms: PlayStation (reviewed), Xbox, PC
Price I’d Pay: $39.99
In Phoenix Point unlike XCOM, players do not have a shadow board of countries who are all feeding their coffers to help defeat the baddies. Instead, PP sees the players perform various missions for factions around the world. Each faction has their own skill/tech trees that are used to augment current tech or develop brand new weapons and vehicles. While they aren’t only used as a means to upgrade your arsenal, Factions also bring a lot of the narrative with them as well. New Jericho, Synedrion, and the Disciples of Anu each control various pockets around the world known as ‘havens’ The New Jericho folk think that the menace should be eradicated off the face of the earth, whereas the Synedrion function much like Star Trek’s Federation. They want to co-exist with the aliens and think that we can be stronger together. Lastly the cult like Disciples of Anu look at the mutations as a blessing; due to their belief that humanity’s evolution has stagnated. Wildly different opinions of course mean they will all offer the player wildly different mission types that will, more often than not come in conflict with one of the others.
Gaining reputation with one faction will invariably make one lose it with the others. It becomes a balancing act unless they know what they want from each group, mercifully Phoenix Point doesn’t lock out the option of accruing tech from a faction that may have been angered. Smartly it incorporates that into game play, so if I couldn’t work with them to get what I wanted; I could raid them and just take it by force. It’s an overall amazing system that pushes players into tense circumstances that will require them to sometimes think on their feet but more often than not will require some forethought into what their ultimate goal will be.
Combat in Phoenix Point is a breath of fresh air from the RNG laden affair that is XCOM. With Phoenix Point players won’t have to agonize over possibly missing a shot that has a 98% chance of success, instead if the crosshairs can find a target; so, will the bullets. Being able to ‘look down the sights’ of the gun will show two circles; the inside circle will land 50% of the shots while the outside will net 100%. This becomes invaluable when commanding the battlefield as soldiers can maim and slow their enemies by focusing on their legs. Have a giant monster with a bladed arm, focus fire on the blade and watch it fall harmlessly to the wayside. Since more often than not the Phoenix Point team is outnumbered when they arrive on the scene, it becomes important to be able to divide and conquer enemies. Is the combat difficult? Yes, it is, but not because of missing invisible dice rolls; when I made a mistake and had to start over it was because I made the wrong decision and that’s fair gameplay.
I enjoyed my time with Phoenix Point, it does enough brand-new things in the genre that kept my time fresh and interesting. While it’s not a perfect game, personally the lack of variety in enemy types really seemed lacking, which is odd because all of the DLC is included here. There were some slight frame drops in combat but nothing that destroyed the game (which is great news for those who checked out PP during early access), the game has come quite the long way since launch from what I’ve heard, and the final product is a solid one. While not all the included DLC will deeply change the game, it does give access to various weapons and some narrative levels which adds some replay ability. The changes that have been to the formula that was created for XCOM are welcome ones, and hopefully this isn’t just a one-off adventure into this universe.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.