XCOM®: Chimera Squad

Я вообще давний фанат серии XCOM, купил эту часть сразу на релизе, но она у меня почему-то долго висела в библиотеке нетронутой...сейчас уже и не вспомню, почему. В итоге решил наконец заценить, и, честно говоря, затянуло с головой. Сейчас уже почти дошел до конца второго акта, так что картинка сложилась. Если вкратце - играть интересно, особенно на предпоследней сложности, драйв есть. Но надо понимать, что это вообще не тот уровень, что был в первой или второй части. По контенту и сюжету тут ну максимум 2 из 10, хотя по ценнику это в принципе было ожидаемо, так что без претензий. Главная проблема в том, что игра ощущается очень сырой. Такое чувство, что разработчики её выпустили и просто забили на патчи. Критические баги вылезают постоянно и реально портят кайф. Например: [b]1. Интерфейс-невидимка: [/b] Периодически у выбранного персонажа просто пропадает всё меню управления. Приходится вручную искать его на карте, кликать заново, чтобы кнопки вернулись. [b]2. Визуальные глюки: [/b] В каждом бою кто-то из бойцов обязательно «телепортируется» куда-то за край карты во время хода, а потом прилетает обратно. Выглядит дико, и то, что это до сих пор не поправили, прям показатель пофигизма разрабов. [b]3. Кривое управление: [/b] Нажимаешь стрельбу, а игра почему-то решает, что ты ткнул в соседнюю клетку. В итоге персонаж вместо выстрела из укрытия несется через всё поле, чтобы встать вплотную к какому-нибудь бугаю и получить по голове. [b]4. Меню экипировки: [/b] Чтобы просто зайти в оснащение персонажа, иногда приходится прокликивать по несколько раз, интерфейс тупит. [b] 5. Информативность: [/b] По противникам, баффам и дебаффам инфы очень мало, всё показано как-то через одно место. В общем, проект неплохой и затягивает, но техническое состояние - это тихий ужас. Видно, что на фиксы просто махнули рукой.

After xcom 2, this is just a massive disappointment.

pour le peu que j'ai joué HORRIBLE, histoire et dialogue cringe surement écrit par un bouffon de 22 ans sans amis et sans vie sociable, gameplay médiocre qui ressemble peut à un xcom

This game suuuuucks it lacks all the charm of xcom. the named dei group of characters are soooo boring, you arent the commander you are nothing, theres no base building the whole game is the breach mechanic. marvel midnight suns a mid game with a card mechanic is a better xcom

While this is not XCOM 3 it is fun, scaled down to policing a city after XCOM 2 your agents have unique abilities that make for some fun combinations the encounters keep the combat very fast paced and make the game have some re-playability. it is impossible to get all trophies on one play through as you will get random characters and some missions are different depending on the order you conduct them. I can see why some people were slighty disappointed but this was a fun story with some interesting mechanics i just wish there was more.

Unironically prefer it to Xcom 2, actual characters that are interesting, unique setting, unique powersets... it's fun.

Why Do Turn-Based Strategy Games Still Struggle With Replayability? I’ve been playing turn-based strategy games for most of my life. It all started with Laser Squad on the ZX Spectrum, then X-COM on early PCs, and later XCOM: Enemy Unknown, which still stands as my personal gold standard. But despite all the years and technical improvements, I keep running into the same issue: Most turn-based games just don’t have enough replayability or mission variety. Some games (Warhammer 40K: Mechanicus comes to mind) have a great setting, but character development feels flat. Others offer deep progression systems—but every mission ends up feeling the same. And some tell a great story, but only allow one way to play it. No real freedom. One recent letdown for me was XCOM: Chimera Squad. Amazing concept: post-invasion Earth, aliens and humans living together, political tensions, secret ops... It could’ve been brilliant. But it forced a set cast of characters on me. I couldn’t build my own team, define my own squad dynamics, or create my own strategies. That sense of ownership just wasn’t there. But Maybe That’s the Nature of the Genre? It’s a tough balance. Do we want a handcrafted story? Or freedom to shape our own? Games like Company of Heroes (real-time, not turn-based, but still relevant) show how powerful narrative campaigns can be. Each mission feels like a movie. But once you finish the campaign, there’s not much reason to go back. Strategy games often force a choice between story and freedom. You rarely get both. Here’s What I Think Could Be Better I don’t think it has to be either/or. What I’d love to see is a game that gives us a few predefined characters—with strong personalities and backstories—but lets us choose their skills, evolve their traits, and shape their relationships. Let us build part of the team ourselves too. Give us that mix of crafted and emergent storytelling. And here’s where it gets interesting: What if the game tracked our key decisions and generated a summary at the end? Not just a stats screen, but a short movie, a written story, or even an AI-narrated recap of what happened. Who lived. Who died. What decisions were made. That would make each playthrough truly feel like an adventure. With modern AI and deep language models, this kind of personalized storytelling isn’t science fiction anymore—it’s actually possible. It just needs the right team to build it.

In less than 5 hours of gameplay I've seen a character glitch out and teleport across the map then suddenly the camera jerks away and when you scroll back they're back in the place they're supposed to be at least 50 times, without the slightest exaggeration. AT LEAST 50. It happens like every 3rd time you move a character. No way the devs haven't encountered this bug but based off the fact that it's still in the game after years I have to assume they just don't care. And who was the genius that decided that EVERY SINGLE MISSION would end with an evac now? What ever happened to clearing all the enemies and winning? Now every mission ends with endless reinforcements every single round until you walk your squad to the evac point and leave. And they didn't even think about the reinforcement spawn locations for a single second. One time I got a map where there was a wall with a window, a 10 foot gap then a door, then another 10 foot gap to a second window. Both windows were reinforcement spawns, and the door was the evac. Just completely nonsensical, both mechanically and realistically. Seriously, what's going on outside that wall? Just two lines of 50 enemies queued up on either side giving a polite nod to my squad as they walk out? I also hate that squad death was just straight up removed from the game. Losing all your HP just means you need a little pat on the back, and if you don't get it then it's literally game over. Mechanically and tonally dumb as hell.

TLDR: I got this game for nearly free and I still feel like I got ripped off. -Is this a great struggle about 'your men' that you get invested in and strive to keep alive? No. You're babysitting the cringe, unserious, endlessly quippy, insufferable, 'quirky' OCs of the inept developers and they cannot die. -Is this the highly anticipated, baited sequel that we've been waiting for since XCOM 2? No. Let's play cop in a single city instead. -Tell an engaging story with cinematics multiple years after such technology was proven possible? No. Cheap out with infantile, comic-style still images.