Into the Breach: Advanced Edition, the major free update to our 2018 Ultimate Game of the Year (opens in new tab) is now live on Steam (opens in a new tab), and that means we can now have our eyes on the whole can keep. Brief description of everything that has changed.
Into the Breach (opens in new tab) is a mini-tactics game that pits a squad of powerful mechs against a relentless force of invading alien bugs. It’s developed by the makers of Fantastic FTL, and while it’s a very different feel, it’s built on the same building blocks of roguelike progression, complex interplay of abilities, and slow, edgy-munching tension. ” We gave it a 93% score in our review (opens in new tab), called it “the best-designed strategy”, and it promises to be even bigger and better with this update.
Here’s what you get:
major additions
- 5 new squads and 15 new squad achievements!
- 7 New Vek, 3 New Psions, and 10 New Boss Battles!
- 12 new missions and 3 new bonus mission targets!
- 4 new pilots and 10 new random pilot abilities!
- 39 new weapons and equipment!
- 2 new music tracks from composer Ben Prunty!
- Even more challenging difficulty mode, unfair mode!
- 7 new languages! (Arabic, Thai, Swedish, Korean, Traditional Chinese, Turkish and Latin American Spanish)
other changes
- Optional Content Toggle – If you want the base-game content experience, it’s possible to turn off all new content (enemies, pilot skills, etc.) in addition to balance changes.
- Weapon reactor use reduced – We wanted to encourage players to immediately try out the equipment they discovered, so we reduced the reactor power to equip most of the gear.
- store change – Since you can now quickly equip most weapons without the need for additional reactor cores, the prestige cost of purchasing weapons is increased by 1 and store options are limited in the first 2 islands.
- New Weapon Mechanic: KO Effect – Some weapons will trigger an additional effect if the primary target is hit by the attack.
- New Tile Mechanic: Cracking – Some weapons will crack the ground. If the tile is damaged again, it will break, destroying the tile and anything standing on it!
- New Status Effect: Boost – This will increase the damage of the next attack by 1. Highly effective for AoE attacks!
- Unlocking squad changes with coins – The cost of unlocking squads with coins has been reduced to account for additional squads.
Developer Subset Games also offered some tips for players who want to embrace the new Unfair mode, including that it’s designed “for veterans looking for even more of a challenge.” Much of this can be summed up as “losing as effectively as possible” and no, I’m not kidding:
- There will be many more situations where damage is unavoidable, so taking damage strategically will be more important – depending on the situation, it may be better to lose grid power, abandon the pilot, or fail the mission objective.
- Grid power gain has been doubled which means it is much easier to bounce back from the brink of defeat. Don’t give up after a few failures.
- There’s a limit to how many Weaks can spawn, so sometimes it’s more beneficial to quickly wipe out a few weak Weaks than to leave them alive.
In Violation: Enhanced Edition is a free update for all players. If you’re not already a player but think you might want to become one, Into the Breach is currently available for sale on Steam (opens in new tab) for $10/£8/€10. A mobile version is also available on Android and iOS devices, but unfortunately it’s reserved exclusively for Netflix subscribers—a disappointing (but, to be honest, maybe too tempting) bit of subscription-based exclusivity that will hopefully pass quickly. Will go
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