It was a close one, but I’m pretty darn excited to see Steam Squad meet its Kickstarter goal of $50K. I just love the art direction on this game. I’m not sure exactly how to describe it. Sort of a comic book, Russian-style? It’s very soft, pastel-ish? I need to brush up on my art history, but it looks great.
Turn-based squad games have been my thing for years now. Started with Soldiers At War, which I think could have followed Fallout to bigger things, but it disappeared. That was a fun game. You take a GI squad of about six men, which was historically-inaccurate integrated (my favorite squad leader was African American), and progress through several WW2 missions. It was highly tactical: set up fire-lanes, flank, maneuver, ambush. The best part wasn’t the action, but looting dead Wehrmacht corpses. You end up with a lot of potato mashers and eventually, the biggest prize: a German assault rifle!
There was the original Fallout, which was a bit RPG and bit turn-based. The main thing I remember about the game is you can temporarily increase your stamina or dexterity by sleeping with prostitutes.
And the best turn-based game ever: Jagged Alliance 2. You hire an oddball group of mercenaries to free a fictional island nation from a crazy dictatoress. Each mercenary has unique skills and personalities. Some guys refuse to work with others, some become better if they work with a guy they enjoy working with, some guys just want to be alone. Game has tons of cool weapons, some unexpected sci-fi, but most of all, it’s funny as hell. Check out some of these great lines from the game. JA also had a prostitute component, but instead of increasing your traits at climax, you get a happy face that winks at you.
Steam Squad looks great, the concept is interesting, don’t think it’ll have prostitutes, but can’t wait to see it launch.