OK let’s talk about into the breach
I’m not sure about it so far! I’m pretty sure I’m gonna clear it on my first run. Subsets design mentality is a little too minimalist for my tastes (being like one notch beyond that of Klei) and FTL made up for that by being such a delightful mess at all times; this feels a little too much like the game is giving me one option most of the time and I either see it or don’t, like Nu-XCom.
Haven’t played this yet, but their artwork sure has gotten better since FTL at a minimum
I just cleared the first 1.5 islands and I am loving this game so far. I had really high expectations after FTL, but this has exceeded them.
When it comes to strategy games, there’s a certain level of complexity that tickles my brain enough to be satisfying, but doesn’t go so far as to feel like work. I remember Tim referring to this as “brain candy” on the Insert Credit podcast. Into the Breach hits that brain candy spot perfectly. It helps that the game allows you to undo movements and gives you one full-turn redo per match. The fact that it’s relatively forgiving in this way really cuts down on the unnecessary stress that games like this can sometimes evoke.
The worldbuilding in this game is slight but very fun:
yeah I just cleared it on the first run!
it’s very good, it’s not invisible inc level fantastic maybe, I’m a little concerned it being almost closer to a puzzle game than a strategy game will limit replayability for me, but I do like what it’s doing a lot
maybe a case of “the actual gameplay loop is near-perfect, but the structure isn’t quite what it could be” like with galak-z, maybe too soon to say
I’m not sure whether it was actually an inspiration, but it reminds me of Hearthstone. Mostly consists of straightforward resolution of situations with the occasional tricky moment or inspired play. More advanced play involves getting prepared for what may happen later and balancing priorities, but that’s not strictly needed to do reasonably well.
yeah, I’m noticing that design philosophy more and more often in small-scale 1v1 strategy games that I’d otherwise be really into, and I think it’s a liiiiiiiiiiiiiittle cheap in practice?
will think more on this
gonna venture, additionally, that being closer to bejeweled than to xcom in the starting point of your design works better for a puzzle quest or a clash of heroes than it does for a roguelike
because while I obviously shouldn’t write it off on the basis of it being easy to finish, I’m not sure that encouraging me to try a different playstyle by unlocking it between successful runs isn’t the worst possible system; it feels like choosing a handicap at that point.
I’ll try simply never playing it on less than Hard (haven’t actually played it yet, my impressions were from watching someone’s prerelease stream)
Also of all the obvious tabletop design influences in recent games of this scope, this is very close to being trivially modelled by a physical prototype; it’s just a matter of making the enemy API more predictable.
I haven’t played any of the unlockable teams yet, but I thought FTL used this system of unlockable playstyles very well. Most of the ships in FTL didn’t feel at all like handicaps to me. For the most part, they felt like viable alternatives that explored different aspects of the game’s systems. I had a blast with the mantis ship that was all about crew teleportation and eschewed weapons. I’m hoping that Into the Breach’s teams work in a similar way. I’ve heard pre-release discussion that made it sound like they do.
yeah I think the difference there is down to “turn based strategy with very finite ruleset” vs. “wild and crazy quasi-realtime messy thing” – the former is (for me) a lot easier to achieve mastery in, whereas the latter feels more like a ride; of course I want to try different rides!
n.b. That I’m one of the only people I know who didn’t find the final boss of FTL to be an unreasonable difficulty spike because I was too lousy at the game to get there regularly, which obviously made it more replayable for me!
I too beat it my first try on normal, but I only did the minimum number of islands. I assume if you do more islands it’s more difficult (or at least there are more decisions for you to potentially screw up)?
I agree w/ OSB that this game feels like brain candy to me. I’m currently really enjoying it, although I’m unsure of the staying power.
To its credit, I tried out the first unlockable group and found it played pretty differently from the starting one. I think I’m fine with “choosing a handicap”, especially if that handicap confers a different playstyle. That’s exactly how Crawl’s race & class system works (although they’re all unlocked from the start).
Crawl’s classes are unlocked from the start, and it’s virtually impossible that someone would see even 20% of the content in Crawl before having had ample opportunity to try them out and see which they enjoy the most and so on. I think that’s a significant difference. Running this one is sort of trivialized by comparison, and there’s not really a lot of variance in terms of score attacks, so the loadouts are there purely to extend the game as an end in themselves. It’s not awful.
Y’know, Crawl might be the best game ever made. Which is funny because it may also be the only good open source game.
I lost my first game on normal - I lost it very badly, in fact. I didn’t fully understand the power grid mechanic, so I ended up wasting lots of energy slamming giant insects into buildings because that is totally rad.
I’m playing again on easy. So far, two perfect islands. I’m looking forward to unlocking more mechs.
My favorite moment so far was taking down a boss Vek with 6 health in 1 turn. First, I just hit it with the artillery (boring). Next, I flanked it on both sides then attacked it point blank to slam it into both mechs on either side. Didn’t lose any pilots either! Very proud of this and the image of a tank mech and a punchy mech just bouncing this big insect back and forth is really pleasing.
Giving the Artillery mech the bonus that it doesn’t harm buildings is probably the single best point I’ve spent, so far. Can do a lot of weird maneuvering that way. I have also very much enjoyed using the artillery to push my own mechs around occasionally.
Taking it slow with this game (as with all games) and enjoying it in 20 minute bursts.
I mean, yeah, you’re right. My ideal is not having unlocks in roguelikes at all 
I think this one takes the cake for completely inscrutable thread title.
I figured, y’know, kaiju, pacific rim…
Hey so the faction that just drops smoke everywhere is very difficult to play well. Why is it the cheapest unlock? I can’t count the number of times I unwittingly blocked myself with my own smoke.
I tried to end the game after the third island because I could tell the enemies were getting stronger faster than I was. I probably should have invested in extra smoke damage sooner, because its hard to get any damage out with that team.
Fittingly, I died on the last screen because I couldn’t attack from anywhere due to all the smoke. Maybe I shouldn’t have taken the item that lets you put 5 smoke down one time per fight. I used it as sort of a get-out-of-jail-free card, but uh it had some side effects that I was bad at considering!
My next run was with the laser + rammer team, and that went so much better. That team just shits out damage and is way more straight-forward. I got a pilot with armor, so my rammer doesn’t hurt himself anymore. It’s nuts.
I’m having a lot of fun with this game. I do share the sentiment that Felix has, though. It feels a bit too solvable, or like there’s not enough freedom in approaching any given situation. I think it would be perfect if there were one or two more systems: something like the hacking overlay from Invisible Inc, or something more to manage in a multi-turn context.
Oh my GOD
