

"What a glorious thing it is to slowly, painstakingly, silently transform an area patrolled by half a dozen rock-hard baddies into one that's just got one or two suddenly highly vulnerable guys left standing," Alec wrote. Mutant Year Zero switches between real-time and turn-based depending on whether we're in combat or not, so we'll sneak around, scout targets, set up ambushes, and, if you're me (which I think only applies to me?) try to salvage mistakes. XCOM is an obvious comparison and inspiration for the game, but that misses the importance of stealth. I foolishly did not heed this, and only now there's a demo do I see oh god he's so right. Our Alec gushed plenty of praise in his Mutant Year Zero review. Off we go out into the wastes of the Zone as a pair of Stalkers (yes, the terminology is familiar), pigman Bormin and duckfella Dux, to scavenge supplies and- no, look, we're the good scavengers, okay, not like those bad scavengers who are also just trying to survive. Mutant Year Zero's set a few centuries into the future, where the world is trashed by reasons long-since forgotten and civilisation clings on in one settlement surrounded by hordes of scavenging mutantmen. For folks who were already Stalking around the Zone, hey, a new challenge mode with leaderboards launched this week too. It's a bit XCOM-meets-S.T.A.L.K.E.R.-meets-Howard The Duck-meets-Hitman, and really quite a bit good. All and sundry are now invited to try out 2018's delightful tactics 'em up for free, sneaking and shooting through the post-apocalyptic wasteland full of mutants and oddities in the game's opening stages. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, engages in turn-based tactical combat like a duck, and is free to look at like a duck, it must be a demo for Mutant Year Zero: Road To Eden.
