Having built out our basic command structure, this week we wanted to focus on the gameplay of our tactical battles. From the beginning Rads & Relics has had two main sources of inspiration: XCOM and Into the Breach. Both are turn-based tactics games, but they approach the genre from very different perspectives.

XCOM is notoriously punishing. Usually, you are outmanned and outgunned. It is not uncommon to lose your soldiers, especially in the early game. More importantly, for our discussion, it is also random. Each shot you take has a chance to hit and does variable damage. You don’t know what the enemies are going to do until they take their turn. This randomness is one of the core things that I love about the game. Sometimes you miss your 99% shot and need to scramble to recover. Sometimes you’re praying that the enemy doesn’t attack your sniper just this one round. And sometimes, you hit that 5% shot that saves the entire mission.

Into the Breach is also difficult, but in a very different manner. There is still randomness in the map, the enemies, and the objectives, but it plays much more like a puzzle. You know what the enemies are going to do and you want to move them, your mechs, or the world to suit your goals. You can undo your movements, you can reset the turn (although only once per battle), and you can try and logic out the best path towards victory [1].

We’re still working out how to capture the best of both worlds, so in the meantime we’ve built both. We’ve built two different playgrounds that allow you to play with characters/rulesets that resemble both XCOM and Into the Breach. We’ll be continuing to playtest with both and find places that it might make sense to cross over, merge mechanics, or introduce other aspects from other games.

State of the Game

  • Progress this week: We’ve built a ton of mechanics to support the different battle types.
    • Abilities with a chance to hit (such as a rifle shot)
    • Cover mechanics: You’ll have a lower chance to hit enemies behind cover
    • Enemy Intent: Depending on the AI, the enemy may indicate what it is going to do next, allowing you to plan your moves
    • Terrain Holes: If there’s a hole in the terrain you can push enemies into it for an instant kill.
    • Improved UI for character selection and information
  • Upcoming: We’re pretty happy with the core engine and the basic gameplay. So we’re going to take a week off of gameplay to focus on everything else that goes into the game
    • UI theming and general improvements
    • Battle effects and animations

[1] More recently, I’ve been playing Tactical Breach Wizards, which takes this even further, allowing unlimited rewinds within a turn. It’s a great game, and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who’s in the market for a tactics game.