Part 2 (May 2024) · #1 of 4 in that tierWatch the moment (1:29:37)
Into the Breach
- Developed by
- Subset Games
- Published by
- Subset Games
$14.99
Control powerful mechs from the future to defeat an alien threat. Each attempt to save the world presents a new randomly generated challenge in this turn-based strategy game.
Consensus
S84.1/100
Steam players94.2% positiveVery Positive22,443 reviews
Metacritic ↗90/100Users: 7.8/10
VG Insights estimate ↗≈557K copies · ≈$5.9M gross
What creators say
Ranked Aug 2024 · #7 of 10 in that tierWatch the moment (0:53:42)
Ranked Mar 2024 · #9 of 9 in that tierListen to the episode
Scored 8.31/10 · tier derived from the score
Ranked Dec 2019 · #1 of 2 in that tierWatch the moment (0:28:18)
Ranked Apr 2023 · #16 of 22 in that tierWatch the moment (2:03:54)
Ranked Apr 2025 · #2 of 9 in that tierListen to the episode
What players say
A turn-based tactics roguelite from Subset Games (makers of FTL) where you pilot a squad of three mechs on tiny 8x8 grids to protect city buildings from insectoid Vek, with every enemy attack telegraphed in advance.
Into the Breach is treated as a modern classic of the tactics and roguelite space. Critics gave it a Metacritic score of 90 on PC (89 on Switch), and it won Best Strategy Game at The Game Awards 2018, among other awards. Steam players agree, with about 94% positive across roughly 22,400 reviews (Very Positive). The praise centres on perfect-information combat, compact puzzle-like turns and squad variety. The main dissent is from players who find it more of a rigid puzzle game than a tactics game, and from those who still feel unavoidable spawn RNG can doom a run. It is not early access or abandoned. The free Advanced Edition update shipped in July 2022 alongside the Netflix mobile release, and players still ask for more content or a sequel.
Players love
- Enemy attacks are telegraphed, so there are no hit-chance rolls. Losses feel like your own mistakes, which reviewers often contrast with XCOM.
- Each turn is a self-contained micro-puzzle: pushing, pulling, blocking spawns and redirecting attacks, with depth coming from very simple rules.
- Protecting the Power Grid (city buildings) rather than just killing everything is a fresh objective that changes how you evaluate every move.
- Large variety of mech squads, pilots and weapon upgrades. Each squad teaches a different way to think about the game, and squad achievements hint at how to play them.
- Short runs and short battles (roughly 10-15 minutes each) make it easy to pick up and put down, and it works well on Steam Deck and with a gamepad.
- Economy of design: small maps, no filler, clean pixel art and a well-regarded soundtrack by Ben Prunty.
- Difficulty ramps gradually, with Easy through Unfair settings, so players report steadily improving on squads that once beat them.
- Runs are short enough that a blunder costs about 3 hours rather than a 15-hour XCOM-style campaign.
Common complaints
- Some players say it plays like a rigid puzzle game rather than a tactical one, with the board state mattering more than player choice.
- Enemy spawn positions and targeting can create situations that feel unwinnable without grid damage, especially on the first turn of a mission or in the final island.
- Losing a run discards upgrades. Some players find the penalty harsh when a poor upgrade choice only shows up an hour later.
- Missions share the same core puzzle despite varied objectives, and some players report repetitiveness after a while.
- The tutorial is thin and the legibility of threats and solutions is hard for newcomers, who often need external guides.
- The unlock system (squads and pilots tied to achievements) is criticised by some as an FTL-style chore.
- Steep difficulty: several negative reviewers say even Normal wipes them out repeatedly and the game is not for players who dislike punishing roguelikes.
- Legibility of puzzles is hard: players struggle to tell whether a bad board needs a tradeoff or was set up wrong at the start.
Can feel tedious
- Restarting entire runs after a late failure, with upgrades lost.
- Unlocking squads and pilots via achievements, which some find grindy.
- Having to spend minutes planning single turns, which can feel like homework to people expecting a relaxed strategy game.
- Learning curve where players feel they are being punished for not knowing enemy behaviour yet.
- Once mechanics are 'solved', some reviewers feel runs become a repeated puzzle with the same base and little novelty.
What's unique
- Fully deterministic combat with visible enemy intentions: a tactics game built like a chess puzzle.
- Health bar is the city Power Grid, so victory means damage mitigation rather than total elimination.
- Time-travel framing: losing a run sends a chosen pilot back into a new timeline with their experience, giving a light meta-progression.
- Enemy and environmental interactions such as water, ice, fire and mountains are central, and enemies can kill or block each other.
- 8x8 boards and five-turn missions give it a compactness unlike XCOM-style or Fire Emblem-style tactics games.
Players want
- Players keep asking for more content or a sequel, and several recent Steam reviewers say they return hoping for an update.
- Better onboarding or in-game explanation of mechanics and enemy behaviour.
- Some want more flexible undo, for example allowing a turn reset when it is the last unit's action.
- More build and upgrade variety, and more map or mission variety, to reduce repetition.
- Reduced luck in spawn placement, or more tools to recover from a bad spawn.
Summarised from Steam reviews and community discussion.
Steam tags
StrategyTurn-Based StrategyIndiePixel GraphicsTurn-Based TacticsMechsRogue-likeTurn-BasedPuzzleRogue-lite
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Tier list Part 2 (2024)
Into the Breach is a turn-based, board-centric tactics roguelike from the makers of FTL, where you control a small squad of mechs to defend cities from monsters. Mechanics are extremely simple, but the strategic depth is huge, to the point of spending many minutes on a single turn. He is blown away by how well designed it is and sees it as a staple of turn-based games. He places it in S tier and considers it better than FTL, possibly above Balatro.
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