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PaperclipPerfector  5d ago (text post)   2923 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for January 9, 2026

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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@atelier I can't find a detailed review either, so it's up in the air if I've written one.

The TLDR is that Phoenix Point is incredibly mid. It's just teetering on the edge of worth playing.

The main issue is wasted potential. The ideas behind the mechanics are excellent, it's a simulationist approach, closer to the original XCOM than the new crop, but in 3D.

I particularly enjoy the ballistic simulation, since the RNG simplification of XCOM always slightly annoyed me.

But that's really all it has going for it. The gameplay was grindy, often unfun. The content didn't feel as diverse or interesting as XCOM. The story was so-so.

The balancing wasn't great, but don't listen to me on that now, because the devs implemented a community patch by a group of popular modders that redid the progression. I've seen people claim it's much better.

I'd say I like idea of Phoenix Point much more than actually playing it. I was an obsessive before release, but Julian over-promised and under delivered.

Thanks! I appreciate this review! I saw there was a demo so I'll give that a try. The other review makes it sound like something I'm looking for while this dampens my excitement so I'll give the demo a try and skip it or wait for a sale.

I think for some games the magic comes from learning it or the way it did something and once that's passed the magic is really hard to recreate. Tough position to try to rekindle.

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