

Often you start the map out in Concealment mode, and can move through the map unseen by the aliens. Balancing the rush against the clock with keeping your squad alive and not just running into a death trap is a great challenge, if at times a little stressful.Īdding to the tactical flavor are some new game features. Whether that's rescuing civilians, blowing up an enemy base, or getting to an enemy data bank before it self-destructs, there's often some sort of primary or secondary objective that makes your life even harder. Even the Sectoids from the first game take a high priority on my kill list, however, since they can reanimate the dead and take over your squad's mind.Īlongside the increased enemy variety is an increased sense of panic at the rest of the challenges. Oh, but here's another one that can create shields around multiple foes making them all way harder to kill.

There's an enemy that splits into multiple versions of itself.

You learn to tread carefully and start making a kill-priority list very early on. You want to throw stuff, or savescum, or anything but pay that horrible price.Įnemy variety is almost overwhelming at times. It gets players much more heavily invested in their squad, and when someone you've given a nickname to and developed into a truly unique snowflake bites the dust? Well it sucks. When a soldier reaches a certain rank, even more options are opened up, and you can spend tons of time fine-tuning each soldier.

This was severely lacking in XCOM, massively expanded in "Enemy Within" and has reached critical mass in XCOM 2. If you like customization options, they are here in abundance, from language and voice options, to props like sunglasses and baseball caps, to facial hair and scars. I have way too much fun customizing my soldiers.
