Game Description
In XenoShyft: Onslaught, players take on the role of a Commander in the NorTec Corporation. You're tasked with defending the NorTec base as wave after wave of horrific aliens attempt to destroy it and end NorTec's strip mining operation in this beautifully illustrated, base defense, deck-building game.
XenoShyft is a game for 1 to 4 players, with each player controlling one of the divisions of the NorTec military: The Science Labs, Med Bay, Armory, Weapon's Research, Barracks and Command Center. Each of these divisions represents one part of the overall NorTec base with their own unique abilities, and it is your job as Commander of these divisions to protect the base while its field operations are completed.
"One of the most fun co-op games I have played in a long time!" - Tom Vasel (The Dice Tower)
"The enemies are just monstrous and difficult!" - Rodney Smith (Watch it Played)
Gameplay Features
1 - 4 players - Single player compatible, fully cooperative cross-platform gameplay.
Strong focus on coordination and strategic planning - to overcome the game's intense difficulty players will need to work together.
Cross platform multiplayer: Play with your friends cross-platform - iOS, Android, PC, Mac, it doesn't matter!
Base-Defense with deck-building elements
Incredible art - Illustrated by three amazing artists, XenoShyft features beautiful and consistent art. All of which creates one cohesive and frightening universe.
Inventive and exciting armor and weapon upgrade cards - You'll need to outfit your troops with the best equipment if you hope to survive.
You and your teammates will have to work together to survive the continuous onslaught of powerful alien threats and horrors – the goal of the mission is not to wipe out these threats, it is merely to outlast them!
Survive through nine rounds of combat with these horrors and the base will have succeeded in its mission, and you and your allies will have survived to fight another day!
Announcements
Version 1.7.3 is out!
Hello, NorTec Commanders!
We've just released another update to your command interface, which will hopefully alleviate a few more issues you've encountered during your operations.
Remember you may
Version 1.8.4 is out!
Hello commanders,
Your command interface has just received a few of updates with improvements and fixes, here are the full notes:
Version 1.8.2
Improvements
Installation and download sizes for the
Version 1.8.1 is out!
Hello commanders,
Your command interface has just received a couple of updates with improvements and fixes, here are the full notes:
Version 1.8
NorTec Elite Review
Many cards from the NorTec Elit
Version 1.7.2 is out!
Hello NorTec Commanders!
We've just released an emergency update to your command interface, which will hopefully alleviate some issues you've encountered during your operations.
Remember you may co
Version 1.7.2 is out!
Hello NorTec Commanders!
We've just released an emergency update to your command interface, which will hopefully alleviate some issues you've encountered during your operations.
Remember you may co
Version 1.7.3 is out!
Hello, NorTec Commanders!
We've just released another update to your command interface, which will hopefully alleviate a few more issues you've encountered during your operations.
Remember you may
Version 1.8.4 is out!
Hello commanders,
Your command interface has just received a few of updates with improvements and fixes, here are the full notes:
Version 1.8.2
Improvements
Installation and download sizes for the
Version 1.8.5 is out!
Hello commanders,
Your command interface has just received a bug-fixing update, here's the list:
Version 1.8.5
Fixes:
Squashed a long-standing nasty bug that would prevent players from playing car
Version 1.8.1 is out!
Hello commanders,
Your command interface has just received a couple of updates with improvements and fixes, here are the full notes:
Version 1.8
NorTec Elite Review
Many cards from the NorTec Elit
Version 1.8.5 is out!
Hello commanders,
Your command interface has just received a bug-fixing update, here's the list:
Version 1.8.5
Fixes:
Squashed a long-standing nasty bug that would prevent players from playing car
No. of Reviews: 20
Review 1
Purchased!
I have played XenoShyft before as a physical board game and I was really excited
to have it on PC. I bought the game and all the expansions, loaded the game, and
started playing. I was immediately frustrated by the game's UI. At first I
didn't go through the tutorial because I already knew how to play so I figured
it would be easy enough to figure out the UI as I went. Most of the acquiring
phase was easy enough to figure out, but I did have a little trouble trying to
figure out when to double-click versus single-click to use my division ability.
Then I got into the combat phase... and for the life of me I can not make sense
of using cards' damage prevention abilities. It did not make logical sense of
when to use a card that said "Prevent the next X damage to a troop", because
sometimes the damage was prevented, and other times my troops just died even
though they should have been shielded. There was not a clear indicator of which
"Done" button was responding to an enemy's "Reveal" ability and which was
signaling that I was done preparing for combat.
After trying to struggle through a game I thought that maybe it would just make
more sense if I went through the tutorial so I could get a better sense of how
the UI worked. I loaded up the tutorial and got through the acquire phase and
back to combat. Then as I followed the tutorial's suggestions and played the
cards when prompted the damage prevention card that I played when the tutorial
told me to play it was ignored and my troop died anyway. Then the tutorial
soft-locked because the Ranger with the equipment ability I was supposed to use
was dead and I couldn't activate the ability that I was supposed to play.
I was really looking forward to playing a digital version of a game I really
enjoy playing, but I was met with frustrating UI that rendered the game
unplayable. I really enjoy playing XenoShyft as a tabletop game, but won't
recommend picking it up for digital media unless the UI gets cleaned up
Review 2
Purchased!
Unforgiving, but every win feels like it was earned. Newbies will find it very
difficult until they start to understand the various synergies on offer with
division, troops, abilities and when to pop them.
It'd be nice if it was cross platform with the mobile app versions too.
Interface is a bit clunky, but it feels like the desire was to stop misclicks.
Take a little time over what you are doing.
This is a direct translation of the board game. I have to say it's nice to play
this without the long set up times! Artwork is excellent on the closeups, if
macabre. This also has the advantage of making sure newbies aren't accidentally
breaking any of the game rules, or may expose them to actions and play orders
they never realised playing the board game version. I personally thought the
rule "book" that came with the physical board game was cr@p, leaving us
shrugging several times and just going with whatever we *thought* they meant.
The PC/mobile app versions will set you straight.
All in all, if you'd like a tricky deck builder that requires a bit of brain
matter, then you could do a lot worse than grab this. Stay away if you have no
attention span and/or expect the game to treat you like a special snowflake and
let you win everytime.
Review 3
Purchased!
I love this game play the tabletop thought i would try this out, pretty cheap
all in all
I know I haven't played long and this is still enjoyable for me however Dev's
have since abandoned it it seems, no post since 2016
cons:
buggy, Tends to not let you advance sometimes to the next turn, gotta close the
whole game down and reopen it and hope it works if you reload your save
little clunky when your first clicking around but once you get used to it not
terrible
Pro:
seems like a good adaptation to the board game, when it works Its can be great
fun
all in all if they ever fix the freezing buggy problem, I would change this
review to if you like board games play it, if you just want a game you can play
with a couple friends and try a challenging yet fun game hell even play by
yourself and it changes often, its a great game but alas for now I'd just
recommend getting the Board game off Amazon or something
ps. I have tagged this game as buggy hopefully a few more will follow suit so
its up there
Edit: a good long time later and I can say, I have actually played through a
game, 3 even without it freezing or being a buggy mess, so perhaps they fixed!
Review 4
Purchased!
Awesome
Review 5
Purchased!
I really enjoyed this title. It was originally a board game, and is about
defending your base from attacks by alien creatures. Each game consists of nine
waves, in which you can drop up to four soldiers to reveal and fight four
aliens, one by one. Hopefully, you've chosen the right soldiers to defend your
base, and equipped them in a way that plays to their strengths. Additionally,
there are "instant" cards that can be played in the middle of the wave to
bolster your soldiers in the heat of the moment. The game can be played
cooperatively with one of many factions, each of which specialize in a
particular field. The weapons division can gets it's hands on weapons cheaper
and eventually deal more damage, where the armor division can grab armor cheaper
and eventually get more defense out of it. I enjoyed trying to win with each
faction, and feel that both the NorTec Elite and Hive expansions added a great
amount of replayability to the game. The tense feeling as each card is flipped
is very memorable, and good planning is usually rewarded.
Review 6
Purchased!
This is actually amazing.
We really enjoyed the board game, and this is just like the board game except I
can zoom in on the cards and read them better.
There doesn't appear to be a thriving online community to play this with, but as
long as you would like to go solo or only plan on playing with your friends, you
are good to go.
Review 7
Purchased!
There's no in game resolution option. It's nearly impossible to see anything.
The controls are also pretty ass.
Review 8
Purchased!
I wanted to like this game, but I did not.
The interface is very clunky. And the balance is tight enough that mis-clicks or
mis-applied abilities can ruin a game. The multiplayer is empty. The 9 rounds it
takes to play through to a victory ends up feeling like a real slog. And you
will have to hit a "Done" button like 20-30 times a turn. It is ridiculous.
As near as I can tell the game is easier the more divisions (players) you
have... and when playing single player you can control up to 4 players. So, set
yourself up with multiple divisions, then really overpower around two lanes in
the early game by using all the cards from all the players on just those two
lanes.... and leave the other lanes utterly empty. Your base will take damage in
that first round, but you can take it.
Once you have built up your super lanes, then on round 2 you can overload your
remaining lanes, and then you just sort of coast through the rest of the game.
It is annoying to play as 4 players solo, however, because each player has it's
own hand of cards with interrupts and abilities.... and you will need to either
remember what everyone has or cycle through them all every time something
important happens.
So, then the game has a simple strategy that makes it not very hard. You are
repeating the same strategy solo. The interface makes playing this strategy
clunky. You can't play with other people cause there aren't other people playing
this. And then you have to wonder, is this even fun?
Simple but grindy.... was not fun for me. Sadly I can't recommend.
Review 9
Purchased!
I have played about 10 rounds solo and have only made it to Wave 3 Round7 once.
At the end of round 7 there were 2 enemies left but the game kept on spawning
enemy cards and dealing damage to the base till it was destroyed.
The only way I have been able to make progress is by using the science lab and
loads of grenades. Every card and ability counts. I am playing on easy with 20
hitpoints for the base. I would not consider this easy.
I do enjoy the intensity and the close combat of this game even though the odds
are heavily stacked against the player.
Review 10
Purchased!
The most frustrating game ever but for some strange reason I cant stop playing
Review 11
Purchased!
I love that so many board/card games are being given digital versions these
days, but this is the kind of release that mars the trend.
To address my low playtime, my issues with this game are not related to the
actual game mechanics of XenoShyft, but rather the technical and design choices
made for this digital version.
First off, there isn't even an exit button on the main menu (that I could see),
so you have to ALT+F4 to exit if you're playing in fullscreen. (This is
incorrect, as pointed out by a comment in my review. I somehow missed the button
in the lower-left corner of the main menu).
The options menu contains no video settings whatsoever, leaving you with no
resolution settings. The only thing you can change is whether you want to play
in windowed mode or fullscreen, selectable only before you start the game in
what appears to be the default Unity popup, Playing in fullscreen results in a
square shaped view area with nothing using the left and right sides of your
monitor. UI that could be placed in this area is instead crammed in the top and
bottom of the screen, which means you have to pan around constantly, even when
zoomed out.
Speaking of zooming, it's incredibly slow and requires several full mousewheel
turns to get close to the cards. I thought adjusting the zoom sensitivity
setting in the options would alleviate this, but it barely made a difference. I
have a Logitech mouse with a free-spinning toggle on the wheel that's useful
when you're reading documents with many pages. Scrolling up 40 pages or so this
way takes a few seconds. It takes about the same amount of time just to zoom in
this way in XenoShyft.
When you want to pan, you have to click an area outside of the playing field and
drag the view (the way you would do it on a touchscreen with your finger). If
you click on some cards this way, it will instead show you a zoomed in view of
the card. But it won't do this on some other cards (like generic Militia cards).
I could have dealt with all of that, annoying as it is, but the real dealbreaker
is that sometimes pieces of the UI do not respond, breaking the game by not
allowing you to advance to the next phase of the game.
The game was clearly ported from a mobile version and it shows all over the
product from the nonexistent resolution options, to the unresponsive and
cluttered UI, to the awkward panning and zooming controls.
The tutorial does a good job at teaching you the rules of the game, but is done
through a slow and annoying "AI" voice that reads to you and cannot be disabled.
At least I know how to play if I decide to purchase the physical card game.
It's a shame because the underlying game seems fun. As it currently stands, I
can't recommend it until the developers fix a lot of these issues, which really
seems like they'd have to redo a large part of the game.
Review 12
Purchased!
The interface for this game is very frustrating. There are many card effects
that are supposed to be about careful planning where getting things in the right
order maters a lot. But sometimes it's not at all clear where you need to click
so often a single missed click can completely derail your plans with no undo
function. If it was really great below that interface it might be fun all the
same but the deck builder game itself is pretty bland.
Review 13
Purchased!
I am playing this game for the first time in 2023, and I love it. I have seen a
lot of previous reviewers mention the amount of bugs and/or issues they have run
into, but that has not been my experience. The game is fun, challenging, and
stable. I encourage more people to give this game a shot. This is mostly a solo
game though, so if you're looking for a multiplayer experience, there does not
seem to be a very large community of active players.
Review 14
Purchased!
Edit: Played a couple of 3 player games on the recent April 12th patch. It's
still a fun core game, but the glitches and game issues make it too frustrating.
This game is hard, and requires every resource to be used effectively. If you
can't use something because of a game glitch, it pretty much kills the
enjoyment.
So the game itself is great. I'm a veteran of tabletop and electronic card games
of a similar nature, although I never played the tabletop version of Xenoshyft.
The mechanics were easy to understand and pick up, and the card selection and
balance seemed fine.
The reason I'm currently not recommending this game is due to the myriad game
breaking bugs that we found in only about 4 hours of gameplay. After a patch or
update, I will gladly re-review this game.
We had the following happen:
* Milita couldn't be played to an empty space on the board. When I discarded him
at the end of the round, it also discarded a surviving stormtrooper. This can be
a pretty huge swing in a game like this. Our assumption is that some sort of
internal "card ID" got mixed up, and the game though the stormtrooper and the
militia were the same card.
* To go along with the game getting confused, playing with one of the expansion
powers (Grafting Lab), the tier 2 ability lets you bring back a card from the
discard pile into your hand. It was a crapshoot what would happen when I would
use the ability. Sometimes I would get 1 card, sometimes I would get all of the
cards, and at least 2 or 3 times my TEAMMATE got the cards. This did not
adversely effect the game since he could play on my cards, but bizarre
nonetheless
* We had tons of bizarre issues playing cards on other people's lanes. On death
effects like the vindicator armor weren't usable if they were played on another
lane. We also had troops discarded at the end of combat we had placed in another
player's lane for no discenible reason.
* The biggest, and gamebreaking-est of them all happened to us twice. We were in
the 7th or 8th wave, and while we had both clicked done on a reveal phase (2
green check marks), the game wouldn't advance us to to the draw phase. We tried
several things to 'jump start it', like both unchecking, one person leaving the
game. It just wouldn't go forward. Very very frustrating after spending 30
minutes working towards the finale.
The UI is serviceable, but could use some help
* Why is your resource (Xenostathem) not indicated with the icon instead of the
text. Pretty minor, but they have pretty icons for everything, I had to
literally ask my buddy in the first game where on the screen my total resources
were.
* Should give you a checkbox for 'auto pass' if you don't have anything else you
can do in a turn, or if you and your teammates know you won't have much impact
on their lane.
* I was constantly double clicking when I should be single clicking to use
abilities, and it could be confusing what state you were in. The text seemed to
blend into the background a lot. I wouldn't mind some more highlighting around
the 'Done' button, or other text that tells you you need to do something before
you continue.
Review 15
Purchased!
find it fun but hard solo game when using 1 lane
Review 16
Purchased!
I play this solo. It's a fun port of a co-op, deck building, alien killing board
game where all the players have a lane that they have to defend by using yellow
crystals to buy troops and upgrades. That's pretty much it. If you're solo, you
can play a single lane or multiple. Lanes can help each other by using the cards
in their hand.
It's difficult. Your troops will pretty much always lose if you let them trade
with the aliens, so you have to be smart and use instant use items/armor and
player/troop abilities to negate their huge advantage. Some player abilities are
better than others (science > barracks). Some aliens have devastating reveal
effects that you need to deal with or die.
Can't speak for the multi or the Dreadmire expansion, but this is a fun, easy to
learn, board game port. I like the Starship Trooper vibe of the card art and the
music is not bad either.
Might be better on your phone though?
Review 17
Purchased!
5 min. to learn.
15 min. per play.
5 hours of play to accumulate 20-something defeats
<1 lane hard solo mode, have yet to drag friends into this>.
Would still start it up to try it again.
It is a nicely contained package and doesn't need more of anything.
Review 18
Purchased!
After the first game i do not know what is a bigger treat aliens or the UI.
After first game i made to the 9 wave and just skip because i do not care if i
lose or win. Whoever designed the UI should be fired and if he does not work for
the company should be hired and fired again. This would be a good game and even
worth buying if the UI would be fixed(or rather redesigned from scratch).
Review 19
Purchased!
I enjoy the physical version as well as the digital version for solo play. Can't
speak to online multi, but pass n play works just fine. Some small things, like
having to hit undo to edit some kinds of troops deployments and too many clicks
for certain things are present, but they're not bad.
The game is hard. I got the complete edition, and the hive expansion makes it...
much harder. The new enemies make surviving really difficult. I do not recommend
using that one, personally. Psychogenics adds some powerful abilities to your
side too, and I recommend not using it if you don't use the hive expansion since
it would shift the OPness in your favor, not as much though. Does little to
offset hive expansion, but would offset base enemies too much.
In short, it's a nifty adaption of the boardgame, I like it. The effects, voice
over, and such are all well done, no complaints. The game is fun and tough. Good
to kill an hour or so. It's always fun to get two shield swarms in one lane with
no firearm powerups and be like "welp this is my fuckin fault for not giving one
of my guys a damage upgrade." Things like that, it's like dark souls; the
balance is near perfect, and if you don't play well you will be punished. Love
it.
Review 20
Purchased!
Was having a good time with this game until I attempted to play multiplayer.
Could not get passed the login screen. If you are interested in the multiplayer
for this game (which seems like the main draw), i would suggest skipping this
one.