The Bureau: XCOM Declassified

This third person alien shooter game set in the midst of the Cold War era takes you back down memory lane and how!

Amidst Cold War apprehensions, a greater worry grips the American nation as a far more viscous and insidious enemy than communism worms its way into official secret bases. The Bureau puts you in control of William Carter, a government agent with a tragic past who is caught up in the events of an alien invasion. Carter and the rest of the newly formed XCOM agency try to hold the line against the aliens, while trying to keep the public in the dark to prevent any panic. The 1960’s America theme doesn’t look out of place with the old-school dialogue and cutting edge technology of that time.

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The crux of The Bureau lies in the combat missions, during which Carter and his team infiltrate alien strongholds. Battles occasionally offer moments of brilliance as you fire off a slew of powers and flank the aliens, but they are often frustrating. Frustrating because these otherworldly enemies take too long to kill, but thanks to the special vision mode, you are able to gauge exactly how many infiltrators are left on the scene.

What we particularly liked about the game is the fact that unlike traditional shooting games, this one demands you to regularly pull up a power wheel and set commands for you and your allies. The sad part being that you need to engage in the act regularly, without which your allies often end up making terrible decisions, and hence becoming a detriment to the mission. Also, the defeated squad members can bleed to death without prompt attention and the game demands the same attention from your allies as well. This sometimes becomes overtly boring and unnecessary, but it does increase your odds of getting the aliens. Armed with a number of interesting powers like lift, drone deployment, mind control, and turret placement, and working through the well-designed battlefields is fun. Slicing your way till the mid level of the game seems easy, but as you make your way through the proceeding levels — The Bureau becomes difficult and challenging.

The gameplay

The game’s structure somewhat resembles that of a typical XCOM strategy game. You spend some of your time in XCOM headquarters getting updates on recent global events before heading into the field and confronting the alien threat the planet faces. And this being an XCOM game, you don’t just go alone, but rather take two allies with you and issue them specific orders. Carter and his allies, move up the game, earning new abilities and improving old ones as they go forward. At first, you’re only healing fellow agents, ordering them to boost you with medical aids and performing critical strikes on outsiders. In time, however, you’re pulling healing drones out of thin air and temporarily convincing foes to become friends.

Lost in translation

Even though the game starts with a brilliant storyline and enticing graphics, it somehow loses its plot midway. Even worse, nothing from the HQ segments has a firm relationship with what you do in the game’s missions. In base world, research director Dr. Heinrich tells you to retrieve alien weapons so they can be studied and reproduced. But in mission world, you can pick up any alien weapon on the ground and use it immediately, without any study.

Verdict

The Bureau XCOM Declassified gives the alien-battling series a Mad Men makeover and a heap of extra action, but this jumble of half-baked ideas isn’t brilliant at anything. We suggest you rather concentrate on the next season of Mad Men.

From the October 2013 issue of FHM India.