Game #1178: X-Squad

 Bang bang, you're dead.

 Before we start... as I was searching for X-Squad's cover, I came across the one for the Japanese release, X-Fire, and it turns out... the Japanese localization removed most clothes from the two girls and white-washed Judd in order to sell it overseas. Interesting! And, sadly, that might be the most interesting thing about X-Squad.

 I love the early PS2 game look, so I decided to gave this launch game a try. And... well, it looks the part. For whatever reason, the main character, Ash, looks very anime, with a Tekken Paul Phoenix-type grey hair. He looks dumb and sticks out like a sore thumb among any other character in the game.

 As for the game itself, it's a third-person shooter in which you can issue orders to your squad. In theory, it's not too bad, and at first, the game isn't half bad. Issuing commands to your teammates is kind of a chore since you have to toggle a real-time menu, issue the order(Recon, Stay, Follow) and the pick either All/Maya/Melissa/Judd. It's really unfortunate, because having to make two choices per order takes valuable time in which enemies can cream you. 

 Part of what makes the game so promising at first is that some mechanics are kinda neat. Every mission rewards you with points, which you can then spend in weapons or consumables, and then equip this equipment on your various party members. As a matter of fact, you should have at least another character, besides you, carrying something else besides the basic gun, unless you want to get stuck on Stage 4's boss.

 I quit the game midway through, because it simply got too unfair. For, y'see, the game is FILLED with surprise enemy attacks. Many times, even if you know they are coming, it's impossible to shoot them before they shoot you. And if your shield is gone, it's entirely possible, and all too frequent, to die, EVEN though you have a full health bar, from a single shotgun blast. A single shotgun blast you sometimes couldn't possibly react to. And every stage has few checkpoints, so dying means retreading a lot of old grown. And dying to such cheap design choices over and over again made it insufferable to replay long segments just to get another chance at the cheap enemy encounter.

 I was amassing points to buy the really good stuff, so I had my entire team wielding the basic pistol. Then came level 4 boss, a team of 5 enemies, and they have shields, so they don't get hitstunned. And there's a guy with a rocket launcher that kills you in one shot. And your teammates are idiotic. I retried this fight more times than I'd like to admit. I almost quit the game. I did, however, abandon it in the next level, as the bad design choices just frustrated me too much.

 And, y'know, cheap enemy placement would be one thing, but your teammates are super dumb. Your best bet is to order them to scout ahead, have them tank enemy fire, and then come out and shoot the enemies yourself. Assuming they don't get stuck on the environment. Because they are idiots.

 But worst of all, the auto-aim is terrible. Sometimes it won't lock onto enemies for whatever reason, other times you'll lose the lock, and you'll never understand why. And it's funny, 'cause environments are filled with explosive barrels, but the lock-on system, while faulty, is also very aggressive, so you won't be able to aim towards the barrels!

 X-Squad is bad. Very bad. It looks like a PS2 game, but plays like a very dated PS1 game. Is it the worst game ever? It isn't, but it's poorly designed.

 3.0