Have stealth games recently lost their touch recently? In gaming today, there is never a strong emphasis on thought provoking stealth gameplay, but rather combining stealth and action to create a new, dynamic genre. This was done with Thief, and sadly it didn’t work so well. The indie crowds have something up their sleeve and now Invisible Inc. has taken hold of many gamers with its dynamic turn based approach to stealth gameplay, but does this design work?
Invisible Inc. is set in the not so distant future, and guess what? Corporations rule the world. Not so good if you’re an underground network of spies trying to stay alive while being hunted down for crimes including espionage. Things go from bad to worse as the corporations finally discover Invisible Inc., forcing them into the open and on the run. With nothing more than a handful of agents and their primary AI on back up support, it’s only a matter of time before their resources run dry and they’re caught. It’s up to the player–known as the operator–to track down various leads, find new supplies, and discover the secret behind the sinister corporations.
It’s a neat little story that actually works around several major mechanics in the game. An open world where players can jet across and infiltrate various locations based on the player’s needs for their team during a time limit. So while playing against the clock, the pressure is on for the player to clear any records of Invisible Inc. and get them underground from the corporations. And you do that by stealing lots of s**t! It’s a nicely written and simple narrative, but one that allows the story to integrate into the game’s mechanics.
Invisible Inc. is visually stylized as a cell shaded cartoon, similar to Evil Genius. Itsc olourful, retro look creates an energetic and intense atmosphere throughout the game.
Invisible Inc. focuses on being a turn based stealth adventure. Handling a number of different agents, you are tasked with sneaking around and exploring various locations–From armories, treasuries, and corporate offices–in order to find items that will help Invisible Inc. take down those hunting them and survive. Using AP (action points) allows players to move, interact with objects, and perform deadly actions on their turn. Each turn will give the player a set amount of AP for their agents, and once they’re out, you’ll have to wait until the next turn. A turn is given to the agents and the NPCs who patrol the structures in the game world.
However, you can’t simply take things nice and slow, as the game will progressively become harder with each turn–bringing in tougher enemies and new obstacles, such as cameras to locate your agents in the field. It’s an exhilarating approach to a stealth game, as it really does increase the tension and pushes players to conduct every move with care. I was never a fan of turn based adventure games, as I normally found it irritating to be limited to move and perform certain actions. But Invisible Inc. has a certain charm to it that creates an intense stealth experience that’s refreshing, compared to a host of other stealth games.
I did enjoy the amount of choice the game gave to me, as it allows players to take full control of the path Invisible Inc. should take to achieve their goals. With a global map at your fingertips, you can choose from a number of missions that will benefit the agency by acquiring resources such as currency, upgrades, and new weapons. These missions will continually change after each completed or fail mission, so that the structure of the levels dynamically evolve as the game progresses. You could focus your efforts on rescuing captured agents, obtaining massive amounts of cash, or supplies and new equipment. You’ll never complete all the missions, which can be a rather annoying factor but one that does allow for reply value after completion or failure.
Invisible Inc. is an unforgiving experience, and one that introduces a great deal of stress as the difficulty progresses quickly within the span of one level–so you can’t waste any time. It’s a great way to engage players, but one that’s a little too tough on newbies. The game starts by being kind at first and introducing everything in a simple manner to understand, then it’ll start throwing you off the deep end without a clue. Examples include only being able to buy items within levels and not before or after a completed mission. You’re also never given an idea of where the goal or exit is, and in a turn based game, it can become quiet tedious and slow moving with plenty of room for error. Yet there are ways around this; such as the rewind feature. This action is a nice touch to new players that helps correct any mistakes. Hacking is also a great way to obtain information and map details. But often enough, you have to find out the small details by yourself, while the game explains other mechanics in great, overly long detail. The game also makes the hacking process a little too difficult after the first few missions, with counter software that’s too aggressive even at the beginning of the game.
The difficulty won’t help out the player’s stress levels, and the rewards are often not worth the risk considering that most upgrades and items are expensive to buy. So you’ll have to make a choice between highly skilled agents with little to no resources, or heavily equipped agents who move no more than three feet per round. I guess this can add a lot of tension and enjoyment to the game, but considering it has a short life span in total, you’ll never really appreciate it in one go.
The game is very engaging, if not a difficult. Even on the easiest difficulty can still be unreasonable.
Along with hacking there are other skills and items to use that will benefit players during their missions, such as cloaks and gadgets that cause damage to cameras or NPCs. I did find fault with how items can be only be purchased within a mission, never allowing you to plan or assess the mission beforehand. You can buy one item from a dealer during each mission, but this is more of a one off special item. It seems as though the game likes to make things difficult, but for a game that focuses on planning and strategy, it takes a fine element of that away by removing the choice to buy resources prior to a mission.
Invisible Inc. is a thoroughly engaging tactical espionage saga that does well to give plenty of choice to players, creates a design that implements the turn based structure well for a stealth game, and brings in simple RPG elements that keep you interested in building your team. However, I found its unbearable difficulty spikes, unfairness to new players, and odd design choices (The previously stated inability to buy items before missions) to be rather puzzling. That said: With these hiccups, I can highly recommend Invisible Inc. to those looking for a new kind of stealth game, different from the likes of Splinter Cell and Thief.