My feelings are mixed on this game. However, if I were asked by someone drawn to this game by the X-COM comparison in the description whether it was a good buy or not, I would tell them to pass. Why?

Combat in Enemy feels like a conglomoration of stripped down mechanics from XCOM. There is no surpression mechanic, but there is 'Morale'. For some reason important, information such as telling the player exactly what they are improving when they level a character is also absent. For example: A player wants to increase the ranged skill of a character. Telling the player that every point they put into said skill increases their chance to hit by a "moderate" amount is totally worthless. What is "moderate"? 10%? 50%? It's like this for every skill and every weapon.

It is impossible to telll how skills and weapons synergize with one another and how much damage you're going to be putting out at your level. The same goes for armor. There is an entire shop dedicated to armor and there are is only two types of armor that seems to actually offer protection despite dozens of options to choose from.

Combat itself is extremely bland. There doesn't seem to be any sort of critical hit chance, nor are there any abilities that are unique to any class or character. The Platformer class plays identically to the Action class if you put points into the correct skill. Not to mention that there really isn't a whole lot to do in combat itself. You either can attack or you move, like checkers. There is no flanking mechanic, no 'real' cover mechanic, no surpression, no interesting abilities that allow you to control enemies, no nothing.

There is a poorly implemented version of 'overwatch', however it's pretty much worthless.

This is all really dissapointing because at it's core ENEMY has some really cool ideas. It's totally bizzarre to me why the devs didn't design some sort of cover mechanic in a game with voxel based destruction. It's totally bizzare to me how they have something like fire propagation but don't have something equally cool for the other elements.

I get that this is sort of supposed to be a Tactical Turn Based Roguelike and it's supposed to be touch. However, Roguelikes are also supposed to offer opportunity, choice and encourage experimentation. There should be at least 3 or 4 ways around every enemy in a roguelike, the cost and avaliability of those choices combined with limited resources make roguelikes fun to play. You may lose horribly, but at least you learned something.

Not so with Enemy. It all boils down to playing the Line of Sight game from a FPS mentality rather than a TBS one and hoping something doesn't pop out of the fog of war and kill you instantly.

So to wrap this review up: If playing roguelikes and games with a cut down version of the XCOM's combat than Enemy is sure to meet you about 1/3rd of the way there.

My feelings are mixed on this game. However, if I were asked by someone drawn to this game by the X-COM comparison in the description whether it was a good buy or not, I would tell them to pass. Why? Combat in Enemy feels like a conglomoration of stripped down mechanics from XCOM. There is no surpression mechanic, but there is 'Morale'. For some reason important, information such as telling the player exactly what they are improving when they level a character is also absent. For example: A player wants to increase the ranged skill of a character. Telling the player that every point they put into said skill increases their chance to hit by a "moderate" amount is totally worthless. What is "moderate"? 10%? 50%? It's like this for every skill and every weapon. It is impossible to telll how skills and weapons synergize with one another and how much damage you're going to be putting out at your level. The same goes for armor. There is an entire shop dedicated to armor and there are is only two types of armor that seems to actually offer protection despite dozens of options to choose from. Combat itself is extremely bland. There doesn't seem to be any sort of critical hit chance, nor are there any abilities that are unique to any class or character. The Platformer class plays identically to the Action class if you put points into the correct skill. Not to mention that there really isn't a whole lot to do in combat itself. You either can attack or you move, like checkers. There is no flanking mechanic, no 'real' cover mechanic, no surpression, no interesting abilities that allow you to control enemies, no nothing. There is a poorly implemented version of 'overwatch', however it's pretty much worthless. This is all really dissapointing because at it's core ENEMY has some really cool ideas. It's totally bizzarre to me why the devs didn't design some sort of cover mechanic in a game with voxel based destruction. It's totally bizzare to me how they have something like fire propagation but don't have something equally cool for the other elements. I get that this is sort of supposed to be a Tactical Turn Based Roguelike and it's supposed to be touch. However, Roguelikes are also supposed to offer opportunity, choice and encourage experimentation. There should be at least 3 or 4 ways around every enemy in a roguelike, the cost and avaliability of those choices combined with limited resources make roguelikes fun to play. You may lose horribly, but at least you learned something. Not so with Enemy. It all boils down to playing the Line of Sight game from a FPS mentality rather than a TBS one and hoping something doesn't pop out of the fog of war and kill you instantly. So to wrap this review up: If playing roguelikes and games with a cut down version of the XCOM's combat than Enemy is sure to meet you about 1/3rd of the way there.