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Decades later, original XCOM creator Julian Gollop is still making strategy games. His new studio, Snapshot Games, has already released three strategy games of varying themes and crunchiness, with the most recent being an adaptation of the Frosthaven board game.
Today, August 26, the studio's launching Chip 'n Clawz vs. The Brainoids, an action strategy game that's taken some cues from Pikmin and, in my eyes, carries a bit of Ratchet and Clank energy. Gollop says he wants to try new things in the strategy space in hopes of making these games "more accessible and immersive," and Chip 'n Clawz is a step in that direction.
In an interview with GamesRadar+, Gollop explains that Chip 'n Clawz started with a 2020 prototype that was shelved while Snapshot worked on Phoenix Point. The "core vision" of the game has remained largely the same ever since: "How to make an interesting multiplayer game which has elements of strategy and action, and you can play a match in six minutes or so."
Chip 'n Clawz sports a full single-player campaign with co-op support (and a friend's pass feature that lets you share a copy of the game) as well as online multiplayer. Gollop reckons there's "quite a lot" even for solo players, but says it's "even a little bit better if you play it co-op with a friend."
This is a fairly big change for Gollop and Snapshot's style. It's deliberately cute and cartoonish, avoiding the dark or dreary. "It's not a turn-based game, that's for sure," he says. "So that is a bit different. Obviously, we're doing a new audience. We're also exploring something new as a cross-platform release. We're releasing on Xbox and PlayStation 5 simultaneously, which is also great. So it's a more console-friendly title. That's obviously something that we're aiming to do. Plays great with a controller.
"And so to that extent, it fulfills my kind of longer-term ambition to make strategy games more accessible and immersive. That's one thing that I call Chip n' Clawz. It's an immersive strategy game since, yes, you do play as a character with a very typical third-person action control scheme and camera, but it's still very much a kind of real-time strategy game."
With a nod to games like Pikmin, Brutal Legend, and some of his earlier games like Magic and Mayhem, Gollop says you can split your play style – or, in co-op, your responsibilities – between action on the frontlines or commands from the rear. It's a "time economy-based game," and "you will not be able to succeed without the minions," but various modifiers and upgrades support different balances of action or strategy in gameplay.
Gollop hopes this style may be more approachable for fans outside the bubble of hardcore strategy fans. "I think, with the traditional strategy genre, especially if you look at RTS games, they are obviously still very popular," he says.
"You know, there's a huge community that plays Age of Empires, Age of Empires 2, for example. And there are recent releases, like Tempest Rising. There are attempts to sort of make new games, but they're still very much stuck in the very similar gameplay as the old games. And there is obviously an audience for it, but there isn't that much innovation in this sort of real-time strategy game mechanics and gameplay."
Part of the game was influenced by Gollop's experience playing games with his kids. He saw a dearth of splitscreen games and wanted to make something that could capture that co-op magic. But more than anything, he just can't quit strategy games.
I asked how he feels about being known as Mr. XCOM after all this time. He reckons it's "awesome," even if it can come with some pressure and expectations. He stresses, "I quite often want to do something different and interesting, and I will continue to do so."
We also discussed what keeps him coming back to the strategy genre. "It's great with experimentation," he begins. "There are often different, multiple paths to solve your objectives. There are multiple strategies. That's why it's a strategy game. It's very, very rarely about solving a puzzle in one specific way, which I think is cool. And you have a bit of a power feeling to it, that you are masterminding and coordinating a larger force.
"But I also appreciate the fact that your control is never perfect over the environment or the system. You always have to respond to changes in the battlefield, tactical landscape, so to speak. So I guess that's it. I obviously do appreciate and play other genres of game too. But yes, I think when it comes to creating games, this is where my heart lies."
To fans worried that Chip 'n Clawz signifies the end of hardcore, crunchy strategy games from Gollop, he says, "I wouldn't draw that conclusion, no. You know, let's wait and see. And I have to say that the other project that we're currently working on in the studio is Frosthaven, by the way, the digital incarnation of the board game. So we certainly want to continue with larger strategy games. But all I can say in the moment is, yeah, wait and see. I don't think you'll be disappointed in the future."
