The Bearded Ladies, the team behind ‘Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden’, have opened up about how their upcoming title will evolve the RTS RPG genre when their game releases on PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One this December.

Since the release X-Com and the reboot of the series XCom: Enemy Unknown, the RTS and Turn Based Tactical genres has evolved, allowing for different approaches to how their games will play. From exploration to stealth to turn-based action through tactical combat gameplay; the games offer a plethora of experiences for fans to enjoy.

In order to change how fans play these types of games, The Bearded Ladies will be combining exploration, stealth gameplay, and world-building, all brought together by tactical combat gameplay throughout the world of Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden. Setting up ambushes, planning out real-time encounters ahead of combat and you’ll have the perfect reason to take on the adventures that await you in this upcoming tactical adventure game.

For those unfamiliar with Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden, you’ll take on the role of guiding a team of Stalkers, a band of hunter and gatherers who set out to explore the irradiated wastelands about you. You’ll collect scrap metal that you’ll use when you get back to the Ark, a safe haven your characters call home in their post-apocalypse world where madness ensues.

In the wasteland, you will utilize weapons, equipment, and various items you find in the wastelands to battle against the Ghouls that call the “Zone” home. As Stalkers, your characters will make do with whatever they can scavenge as they explore, watching for ambushes by the enemies that inhabit these lands.

You’ll explore through the Zone in real-time, meaning your team of three Stalkers will only go into turn-based tactical gameplay elements when combat starts. You’ll scavenge, gather and hunt down ancient artifacts, weapon parts and scrap alike before making it back to the Ark. But where the game shines is the time that you will spend outside of the Ark.

You will need to be alert and constantly on the lookout for a potential ambush in the making. Whether it’s in the wilds, the ruins of a city street, you will need to plan ahead as you keep your eyes out for the ring that appears around them, letting you see what direction they are looking and what their field of vision actually is.

The downside for you is not so obvious. Your flashlight, the way that you see and attempt to navigate the Zone can also be one of your worst enemies when danger is near. Enemies can see your light and they will use it to track you down. In order to really understand the game, however, you must think tactically, you must plan ahead using your real-time stealth mechanics.

After all, The Bearded Ladies are known for their work on the Hitman series when they were still at IO Interactive. This means setting up, planning, and preparing your team for the worst case scenario is entirely called for when you set out from the Ark. You may even want to take a second to listen to the dialogue of NPCs that your party will overhear as you explore.

Want to enter stealth? Shut off your light, go into stealth mode and skulk about. You’ll be harder to detect, harder to pinpoint and even find your team is better off split apart; tackling any situation that arises from any angle possible. But remember, silence is golden. Silenced weapons such as Selma’s pistol or Dux’s crossbow will be crucial as you seek to survive the zone.

You’ll want to isolate and eliminate priority targets, ensuring that you aren’t overwhelmed as your enemies push in on you while you explore. Using the third-person tactical grid will be of advantage to you as you can navigate your mutants across the grid, placing them behind cover and even setting up flanking positions so you can sneak attack an enemy from multiple positions.

But that’s not all you can do. You can mutate your mutants, making them more powerful every time they level up. You can make Dux even more powerful by allowing him to weaken your enemies through crippling strikes and range bonuses to his mutations, allowing him to be a lethal sniper. On the other hand you can make Bormin, your warthog by nature and badass by mutation, even more powerful by making him a tank through strengthening his Stoneskin ability.

You can even make it so he can rush into the fray, shotgun blasting while he dishes out devastating blows to those unlock foes that get caught in his path. But then, there is you. You can make yourself also more powerful, assigning active skills and passive bonuses in different ways to ensure you are able to reflect how you play with how you set your team up for when they are in the field.

You can make Bormin a tank that can resist taking tons of damage through his Stoneskin ability so that he can release noxious gasses when he’s hit to take down nearby foes or you can allow him to self-heal when needed be and rely just a bit more on the team. Don’t like the abilities you selected? Change them on the fly outside of combat and set your team up to be a devastating force to be reckoned with.

But remember, you aren’t the only thing out in the Zone. There are much deadlier things than you and it’s up to you to decide how you will approach every encounter, how well your team will survive and just how good of a scavenger you really are.

Just remember this. Dux will excel at taking down robotic foes so that you can harvest their parts. Just don’t damage the goods in the process when Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden launches on Dec. 4, 2018, for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

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About the Writer(s):

Dustin is our native console gamer, PlayStation and Nintendo reviewer who has an appetite for anything that crosses the borders from across the big pond. His interest in JRPG’s, Anime, Handheld Gaming, and Pizza is insatiable. His elitist attitude gives him direction, want, and a need for the hardest difficulties in games, which is fun to watch, and hilarity at its finest. You can find him over on Twitter or Facebook.