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Feature: Two thirds of these games are about dwarves or pharaohs.
Since the Steam Game Festival: Summer Edition has so many demos in it, we've all run off to harvest our own little crop to recommend, picking different genres as our guiding principle. As ever, though, the concept of "genre" has tripped me up like a rake in the dark, and left me flailing to define what connects the six games below. I guess, if there's…
Feature: Do you trust me?
I like to use Have You Played to highlight games that are interesting, even if they don't always meet the mark. Phantom Doctrine is a flawed tactics game, true, but it has a very fun premise.
Feature: Separating the chaff grenades from the wheat... grenades
It’s a bit tricky to knock together a list of the best upcoming stealth games, because it’s a bit tricky to say what a stealth game even is anymore. Stealth is more frequently looking like a playstyle or bulletpoint rather than the crux of an entire game. Even the best stealth games in recent memory - yer Invisible Incs, Ian Hitmans, Alien: Isolations - have all…
Feature: Saddle up
Video: 8 cowboy games to play on PC while everyone else plays Red Dead Redemption 2
Red Dead Redemption 2 was made by five million people working nine day weeks, but does it have a duck that collects your discarded throwing knives? Actually, I don’t know, as it’s not on PC. But a game that does feature a magic duck, and can be played on your home computer, is the lovely Luckslinger. It’s one of eight delightful cowboy ‘em ups that…
Feature: Stinker tailor soldier spy
Everything I'd read about Phantom Doctrine excited me. Unravelling Cold War conspiracies in a spy-flavoured XCOM was an enthralling elevator pitch, and the details seemed to back up that promise. Yes, you can brainwash enemy agents and yes, your enemy can do the same. Yes, there's an emphasis on stealth and deception, employed on both a strategic management layer and through tactical turn-based missions that…
Phantom Doctrine trailer exposes the big conspiracy of how it works
After cutting their teeth on turn-based tactical action with 2015's demonic cowboy 'em up Hard West, CreativeForge Games will fight through Cold War conspiracies in Phantom Doctrine, as a new trailer lays out. We've explained Phantom Doctrine in previews but, if a picture is worth a thousand words (and I've no reason to doubt the idiom), these three minutes of 60fps video are worth almost…
I don't know if it's cheerier or far more grim for an XCOM-ish turn-based tactical game to be set against the very real backdrop of the planet-ashing Cold War rather than a humanity-mulching alien invasion, but I look forward to finding out in Phantom Doctrine. Developers CreativeForge Games, who you might remember from their 'XCOM/Jagged Alliance but demonic cowboys' game Hard West, today announced plans…
One of those there 'E3 trailers' introduces the XCOM-ish tactical action and Cold War setting of Phantom Doctrine, the espionage 'em up which pleased our dearly-departed Adam (RPS In Peace) when he played a preview version last year. Take turn-based tactical infiltration, wrap it in a big conspiracy unravelled with the help of that ol' trusty corkboard covered cards, pins, and string, and developers CreativeForge…
Feature: (Under)cover-based
Phantom Doctrine is a game of 'ifs' and 'buts'. I would have completed my mission without being spotted if one of my agents hadn't been compromised but the fact that she turned on me and I managed to neutralise her at least means the enemy has played their hand and she can't do any further damage. Now, even though our cover is blown, if we…
Feature: Make your own Manchurian Candidate
XCOM-like tactical espionage thriller Phantom Doctrine was my Gamescom highlight
At first glance, Phantom Doctrine [Steam page] looks an awful lot like a Cold War flavoured XCOM. That's quite an exciting prospect and the closer I looked, the more exciting it became. There are agents instead of aliens, and some novel infiltration and reconnaissance systems, but everything from the UI to the cover system is immediately familiar. The tactical missions are hiding unexpected twists though,…
Feature: Scratch that XCOM or Jagged Alliance itch.
Much has been made of how Hard West [official site] is XCOM-with-cowboys, but if anything it's more like Jagged Alliance. With cowboys. Demon cowboys, yes, but really they're just cowboys with horns and a flame effect. Point is, this isn't a game about gradually building up a super-squad and a grandiose base in order to take down an almighty, otherworldly threat, but about a small…
Hard West [official site] looks interesting, taking XCOM-ish turn-based tacticalising into the supernatural Weird West. I dig XCOM and I dig the Weird West so yes, thank you. It had been lined up to begin rootin' and tootin' next Wednesday, but developers CreativeForge Games have decided to push it back a fortnight. They could've launched next week, they say, but think a little extra polish…
