Achtung! Cthulhu Tactics Review: Beware of Deep Horrors

Written by Matt

Set against a backdrop of Nazis in WWII and the Cthulhu mythos, being in a post XCOM era, Achtung! Cthulhu Tactics (A!CT) has all the components of a great game. However, we’re treated to a neutered version of what the game could have been. Auroch Digital has based this game off of Modiphius’ Achtung! Cthulhu IP, which started off as a Kickstarter tabletop-gaming success. With tabletop gaming, you have a vast network of rules and nuances that can add variety to a gaming session. Warning! This has not translated well to the video game medium.

You play as a 4-person Allied squad of Nazi hunters in an alternate WWII timeline. Your mission is to stop the Cult of the Black Sun before they harness and unleash ancient and unspeakable horrors to turn the tide of war. Your team consists of typical military personnel with a little bit extra, like having their own dark powers to combat the enemy’s advance. This is where any kind of personality ends. Even though you can earn skill points to advance their talents, there is no character depth or anything in the line of getting to know these characters. This is a real shame considering they are the only people you’ll ever get in your squad. XCOM lets you recruit more soldiers because they are expendable, so it made sense that you didn’t care about those grunts. This does not have permadeath, so you’ll be spending a lot of time not getting to know your team.

Thankfully, your characters can’t die, but they can end up being incapacitated. This alleviates some of the frustration of the disappointing cover system. Your character is either in cover or not at all; there is no partial cover and no indication of how exposed they are. The AI enforces this system due to the enemy not really prioritizing targets. At one point I had all of my guys exposed and was skipping my turn just so the enemy could incapacitate my squad (achievement hunting). The AI spent five turns just moving three enemies from cover to cover, not once firing on my team. Cover or not, there was no feeling of threat while playing, which diminishes need for strategy.

Another RPG feature this game lacks is gear. Considering the mystery and mythos, you’d think we would get some cool gear. Instead, you get a few items after certain missions (like standard guns or mods), but it’s hardly enough. This is another comparison with XCOM that falls short. In XCOM, you have the in-between base building aspect that allows you to research new technology to use in the field. Achtung! merely gives us mission after mission with no alternate activities interspersed (except for side missions). Having missions exclusively is great for a more narrative based game, keeping the story linear and maintaining your focus. This concept is not utilized well though, as there is also a lack of interesting story advancements.

There are a number of features this game got right though. Instead of being limited to performing only one or two actions per turn, each character has 12 Action Points to spend on various functions. My winged occult lady was able to shoot 3 times in one turn due to the low AP cost of her weapon. My shotgun dude could squeeze off two blasts, or could move a little bit, shoot, and then move again. The freedom in how you spend your turn is refreshing and allows for varying tactics. Another nice feature is the Momentum System, which allows for even more actions per turn. Each time your team performs an attack or special ability successfully, you gain momentum. Momentum allows you to perform a free-action, sometimes multiple times. With the occult lady, you could move a few squares and take two shots, using up your 12 AP. Then, you can spend 3 Momentum to use her special dark power and then another point to fire off her sidearm. This made me feel like my squad was powerful and that the four of them could possibly take down this regime.

There is a decent stress mechanic present which can unnerve your agents and cause them to act erratically (though I’m not sure why it’s not a thematic Sanity stat). I also enjoyed the voice acting and little one-liners my characters would make in the field. The movement and directional line-of-sight were also handled well. Navigating the action bar was smooth and the tool-tips were helpful. These are polished aspects of the game that make slogging through the drab and uninspired settings a little more bearable. That being said, the environments and enemy types are not varied enough to make encounters memorable. I was also underwhelmed by the heavy emphasis on fighting humans instead of deep horrors.

I know the majority of this review made it sound like I did not enjoy this game. While I didn’t love it, Achtung! Cthulhu Tactics is a decent entry in the turn-based tactical strategy arena. The game could borrow more from the successful XCOM franchise to lend more variety to the gameplay, but overall it can stand on its own. It’s a bit shorter than other tactical games, and the absence of permadeath actually allows for a more casual approach to the genre, making it great for newcomers.

5 out of 10

Pros

  • Ability Points and Momentum System
  • Controls and UI
  • Setting
  • Good Entry Point to Genre

Cons

  • Cover System
  • Shallow Story and Characters
  • Lacks Meaningful Gear and Progression
  • Environmental and Character Variety

Achtung! Cthulhu Tactics was developed by Auroch Digital and published by Ripstone. It is currently available on PC and PS4, and will soon be on X1 and NS as well. The game was provided to us for review on X1. If you’d like to see more of Achtung! Cthulhu Tactics, check out the publisher’s official site.

 

Here at GBG we use a rating method that you are more than likely familiar with – a scale of 1 to 10. For clarification, we intend on using the entire scale: 1-4 is something you should probably avoid paying for; 5-7 is something that is worth playing, but probably not at full price; 8-10 is a great title that you can feel confident about buying. If you have any questions or comments about how we rate a game, please let us know.

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