Xenopurge

Sometimes a game can just land the first time you take a look at it. It’s like you instantly know you’re going to love it and have a great time even when it may not be in one of your favourite genres. This was the case as soon as I laid eyes on Xenopurge, and as an auto battler, strategy roguelites are hit and miss for me; I didn’t care; I was in. Were my instincts right though? Well, thankfully on this occasion they were spot on. 

As part of M.A.C.E. (Mercer’s Advanced Combat Enterprises), the player takes control of a commander whose responsibilities lie in issuing commands remotely to a squad of elite soldiers. The aim is to purge the world of Xenos, an alien race that’s threatening human existence and needs to be stopped at all costs. This is achieved by sending out orders to the team through a computer system and a series of TV screens. Shown through a first perspective, you’ll interact with different screens to get the relevant information and issue commands to the squad. These can range from collecting stashes and packages, laying down turrets, and initiating health packs, just to name a few. 

The start of a run is very reminiscent of Slay the Spire. A randomly generated map is presented filled with multiple paths, missions, shops and upgrades. Get to the end of the map to finish your run and reap the rewards. Because of the multiple paths, you can make each run different and unique; only engaging with certain elements gives plenty of variety, which is welcome, especially when things do eventually become a little stale. 

I found the upgrades to be quite interesting. There were the expected gun and armour options, but alongside them were the chances to increase a soldier’s speed, accuracy and melee strength. There is also the opportunity to add new commands to the system, so the power can be gained to throw frag grenades, instruct a soldier to move to a specific room or use a more potent health pack. 

Some thought has also been put into the soldiers themselves, and I appreciated that they were not all the same, each with their own individuality through personal attack styles and movements. This is labelled as the soldiers logic: some will charge at an enemy while shooting, some will stand their ground while attacking and some will fall back to a safe distance before shooting. These can be changed during a run to fit the situation I found myself in, and with up to four soldiers per team, there’s some room to mix and match different logics. 

As you progress through the game, other squads will eventually become available to you. At the moment there are four included, but more could be on the way as the game develops. Each new squad brings new systems to the game and also brings different commands. When I unlocked the second squad, they were able to ping the location of Xenos on the map, so you had a better understanding of their movements and location. They also brought the option to lay turrets and mines, which became extremely helpful. 

When it comes to the missions themselves, these are laid out on one of the screens, and only two rooms are shown at the start. Each person and Xeno are represented by dots on the screen with the soldiers set path visible.  As the squad explore more of the compact areas, more of the map becomes visible, which led me many times into trepidation, wondering what was around the next corner. As the Xenos only become visible when they are close to a soldier, it became quite tense, and there were many times when a squad member turned a corner only for them to be ambushed by a group of Xenos. This tension never left, thanks to the randomly generated rooms. Even when I was at a stage when I felt I could anticipate things, I was still on the edge of my seat. 

Xenos come in 45-second waves through spawn points. At the start of a run, there will only be one, but as you progress, these spawn points become more numerous; by the end missions, there could be three or four. As each mission goes on, the groups of Xenos enlarge, risking overpowering your squad. So there is a time element here, as if you take too long to explore and complete your objectives, you do run the risk of being overwhelmed. This can be circumvented at the start of each mission by choosing to group soldiers together or let them explore on their own. This does depend on the mission objective, though, as I found grouping soldiers together wasn’t always the best idea. 

The objectives in the missions can vary depending on what you choose on the overview map. There are a multitude of options, including finding and destroying hives, escorting VIPs, finding intel, and picking up and delivering packages. Each brings their own problems; VIPs are incredibly slow and can be attacked easily, the soldier carrying the package can’t melee, and picking up intel takes time. This brings another strategy to the game, as I found myself planning ahead; should I leave the VIP in the room until the end, or should I bring him with me? Should I leave the package until I’ve found the extraction point and then instruct a soldier to pick it up and extract them? It made for some interesting sessions, mixing and matching strategies, some of which worked and some of which didn’t. 

A big element of the game is unlocking new equipment and guns, which can be achieved through the game’s promotion system. Successful missions and runs earn promotion points, and every 1,000 points reached earns a promotion and new goodies to use in future runs. These could be new guns, armour, commands or tools. There are also challenges to complete, though these are pretty simple, as all that has to be done is to use a highlighted item for a set number of times to complete. Though achieving them will unlock even more items for you to use in future runs. 

The visual design of Xenopurge brings everything together in such a beautiful way. With a design that’s clearly been inspired by 1980s action/sci-fi films, the graphics successfully pull off this retro look perfectly; from the CRT screens and scan lines to the slight green filter, it oozes its inspirations, and it’s glorious. The game’s biggest hook, that everything happens in this remote office, is brought to life amazingly well, with the areas surrounding the screens visualised to make it busy, and it pulls it off well, as I did feel like I was in that remote office trying to bring my squad home safely. It gets better with the way the action is shown too, with the mission maps depicted with this retro neon green, with all the other screens in a similar style and fonts. Traptic Studios hard work and effort really come through, setting the atmosphere perfectly and giving the game such originality that it’s impossible to ignore.

Sound design is also high quality, with clunky keyboard usage when commands are being sent, system noises that feel at home of the era, great effects for gunfire, equipment setup, metal sliding doors, and synth-styled music that doesn’t grate and only aids the atmosphere and tension. Soldiers communicate over the radio, and it’s a very satisfying effect, with calls such as “it seems a little too quiet” and “all clear, sir” to responses to the commands such as “yes, sir”, “confirmed” or “on it”. You will be able to experience their pain too when being attacked or close to death, with more and more panic falling into their speech, sometimes ending with some blood-curdling screams. 

As this is releasing in early access, there are a plentiful amount of small issues that do need some attention. The biggest issue was in using commands, mostly the extraction command, as if the soldiers encountered Xenos on the way to the extraction point, after defeating them, they would just sit there, and you’d have to re-issue the command. In some instances when I grouped soldiers together and I instructed one to collect a stash, the other would carry on exploring, leaving them open. Sometimes, though, the other soldier would stay. 

The interface can also be slightly clunky and difficult to understand, especially during the first few runs in the game. This comes to a head when things start to go south in a mission and you have to navigate a series of menus quickly before the situation becomes dire. The names of some of the commands also aided in this, with confusing names, I wasn’t sure what they did or whether I’d picked the right one, and only experimenting helped me in this understanding. There is a robust tutorial at the start, but it still failed to pass some relevant information on to me. 

Although there’s a variety of missions, they do start to become a little stale after a while, and I soon had ones I avoided over others, as they had become too repetitive, and the promotion system, while a worthy addition, was completed quite early on, leaving me with no more unlockables or promotion incentives. But as I say, this is releasing in early access, and I have seen the developers tease new additions, mechanics and fixes to the game, so I am confident these issues will be addressed in the future.