My squad is hanging precariously from a suspension rope in a warehouse window. The resistance group is conducting a nasty experiment in this warehouse.

Each entry point has its pros and cons. I assign Cherub, a human-alien hybrid, to the most dangerous entry point. His massive shield should protect him from return fire. I assign the godmother, a shotgun-wielding badass, to the breach point where she is mobile. Assign the medic to the safest entrance and the psychic alien warrior Verge to the last entrance. A big button invites me to 'BREACH'. Take a deep breath and see what happens.

XCOM: Chimera Squad remains classic XCOM. Gather resources on strategic maps, unlock technology, and dive into turn-based tactical battles to secure objectives and defeat the Resistance threat. But the world has changed. The Advent Wars have ended. Humans, aliens, and hybrids have reached an uneasy peace. They coexist in City 31, but there are also restless groups trying to carry on the legacy of the Advent War. The Chimera Squad is a special force to neutralize such resistance movements and maintain peace.

There is no world map here. The game focuses purely on the nine districts of City 31. You must manage the level of unrest in each district in order to keep the city's anarchy low. When the city's anarchy bar reaches its maximum, the game is over. To save the city, you must investigate each of the three resistance groups one by one. Take on missions, gather information, research new equipment, uncover the identity of each group's leader, and defeat them in a climactic final mission. Don't be fooled by the small size of the game, this is still a long and sturdy tactics game.

The missions, however, are much shorter than XCOM fans may be familiar with. Some are only a few rooms crawling with enemies. The key mission is a chain of three rooms to clear, each with a "breakthrough" phase that places troops at various entrances. That's why the troops are hanging on ropes outside the old warehouse.

The breakthrough phase is chaotic. One by one, my four-man squad smashes through their assigned windows. And time slows to a crawl. The camera shifts to an over-the-shoulder viewpoint, and the main suspect, Cherub, takes aim. The camera has a blurry fisheye filter that doesn't allow me to see the layout of the room, but I can switch focus between enemies and choose what I want to finish off. I tab between enemies to see what class they are. There is a turret, which will surely damage my squad over time. There are a couple of androids, which are easy to take out, but they self-destruct and do damage to a significant area.

Then I see the purifiers. Purifiers must die. He's just a guy with a flamethrower, but when fighting on a room scale, the area of effect attack is massive. The longer the flames linger, the more nightmarish the movement becomes. Also, the first jets can cause explosive barrels to explode, and the entire squad can be covered in flames and acid in a chain reaction.

Instead of shooting, he orders the cherubs to take cover.You cannot create your own character in the Chimera Squad; each of the 11 heroes has a unique ability. Each functions as a separate class: the gunman, familiar from XCOM 2; the medic with his healing drone; the shotgun maniac. Others, like Muton's Axiom, beat people up and sometimes go berserk during missions.

This approach sacrifices one of XCOM's best features: the ability to name soldiers and bond with them throughout the campaign. There are advantages, however. Each character has a voice. The story unfolds in a cartoon subplot that efficiently organizes the stakes and portrays the new world order well with humor and personality. There is also a sense of tension. Some of the hybrids on your team may have fought on the alien side in the Advent War against humanity. The events of XCOM 2 haunt City 31 throughout.

Cherub's ability to hunker down is amazing. He draws all enemy fire, renders them harmless with his shield, and spares his teammates from the threat of return fire. Next up is my strongest man, the psionic verge. Instead of shooting, he uses his mind to bring the purifier out of cover. Suspended in mid-air, he is an easy target for his other two teammates, who execute him before the battle even begins.

The breach phase was frustrating at first; I'm used to being more battlefield aware in XCOM, but Chimera Squad intentionally blindsides you into the breach, a completely different dynamic than in XCOM 2. That game is all about advancing efficiently across a large map and positioning yourself appropriately. You have to manage your odds and control the situation as much as possible. The Chimera squad throws scenarios at you and shouts "catch."

The entry phase is to eliminate the key enemy. Once that is done, the squad automatically moves to cover and the traditional XCOM fight begins. In most cases, the squad wisely moves into cover, but this is another point where the game takes away tactical options. Once I learned to relax my shoulders and let the game flow, I liked it much better, but in Chimera Squad I was always a victim of circumstance.

Things turned around when the heroes leveled up and their unique talents came online. There are some tasty combos to unlock. My medic has the amazing ability to give his teammates free actions. He's great with Verge, who pulls enemies into the psychic web one by one and zaps them in the brain for surefire damage, and in XCOM's world of probability, those two or three points of chip damage are worth gold. Brilliantly, he can brain-zap everyone, and then the medic can throw a free action at him to brain-zap everyone again. These are XCOM Chimera's finest moments, designing team combos that can wipe out an entire room in just a few turns.

I like Hero a lot, but XCOM doesn't have much room for experimentation. I wish the heroes' powerful unique skills were already unlocked so that I could quickly switch between them and play with combos. The game at least removed the health pool race of XCOM 2, which required leveling up armor and weapons to keep up with the enemy's ever-expanding health bar, which is great in XCOM 2, but stabilizing the health pool and damage output would have allowed inexperienced heroes can be replaced at will.

The strategic layer of the game is also surprisingly involved. There is no base building, but there is a need to research technology, buy gadgets, and gather three resources (Elerium, information, and dollars). I miss the cool visual armor and weapon upgrades of traditional XCOM. Without them, the strategic layers feel like abstract number crunching. Field teams can (and should) be deployed in city districts. These are like XCOM satellites. They reduce insecurity and provide resources so you can buy radical flashbangs for your squad. Apart from that, they can also deploy squad members to special operations. This sounds exciting, but it is just another way to rake in resources. Without the construction of bases and the lavish staging of XCOM 2, everything feels like an administrative screen.

That said, it's an interesting game of tactics, a curious experiment in XCOM, and a neat setting that I'd like to explore more. The price is also excellent. This is not exactly Budget XCOM, but an attempt to rework the rules of the series into a smarter experience. I could imagine a more elegant, streamlined version of Chimera Squad, but I still felt the familiar emotions of elation when a combo was set up and annoyance when a shot missed 90 percent of the time. If anything, it inspired me to start the XCOM 2 campaign again.