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MENACE

MENACE Game Cover
92%Game Brain Score
story, gameplay
grinding, stability
92% User Score Based on 6,379 reviews

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MENACE Game Cover

About

MENACE is a single player survival role playing game with fantasy, romance, dark fantasy and science fiction themes. It was developed by Overhype Studios and was released on February 5, 2026. It received very positive reviews from players.

Lead a strike force against an alien threat in this turn-based tactical RPG from the developers of Battle Brothers. Answer distress calls across different worlds, train and equip infantry, deploy tanks and mechs, and plan and execute missions in detailed turn-based battles.

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MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
MENACE screenshot
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92%
Audience ScoreBased on 6,379 reviews
story346 positive mentions
grinding53 negative mentions
  • Deep and satisfying turn-based tactical combat with strong emphasis on cover and suppression mechanics.
  • Extensive customization and strategic choices for squad leaders, infantry squads, and vehicles.
  • High quality audio and voice acting, with distinct personalities for squad leaders enhancing immersion.
  • Game is already stable and polished for early access with active developer support and regular updates.
  • Replayability is strong due to procedural missions, various enemy factions, and different tactical styles.
  • Meaningful resource and supply management adds strategic depth and makes gear choices important.
  • Early access content is limited with repetitive mission types and lack of story depth, leaving the strategic layer shallow.
  • Enemy AI is often described as passive, flawed or cheating with unfair knowledge of player positions and weapon ranges.
  • The supply and progression system is sometimes frustrating, penalizing promotion and limiting how much equipment can be brought.
  • Limited variety in maps and environments leads to repetitive combat scenarios, and lack of indoor or urban missions.
  • Certain mechanics such as armor, off-map support (OCI), and faction interactions feel underdeveloped or unbalanced.
  • The story and narrative elements are minimal and need more development to enhance player engagement.
  • story
    3,470 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The story in Menace is currently minimal and underdeveloped, featuring a few cutscenes and limited narrative depth that mainly serves as a backdrop for the tactical gameplay. While the lore and character personalities offer potential and some engaging moments, the overarching plot feels disjointed and sparse, with many players expressing a desire for more meaningful story missions, world-building, and faction interactions. The game's early access status means much of the story content and strategic layer remain incomplete, but the foundation promises growth in narrative detail alongside the already satisfying combat mechanics.

    • “Great game, its immersive (already with so much more scope to expand) progressive (at a good level that makes you feel as though you are constantly moving forward but not in a way that missions become nugatory early on) and very reminiscent of a lot of the best bits about xcom.”
    • “From mission to mission i will change loadouts, and set-ups to best combat each situation.”
    • “The story is good.”
    • “The story is extremely bland.”
    • “Take my advice and do not read story texts, they are so badly written it's almost cringe!”
    • “The core gameplay is heavily focused around the tactical missions, with ship intermission kept to a simple minimum. There is nothing going on outside of missions which is such a letdown considering the very cool cinematic at the start. The story, however, is weak, the characters are weaker, and the game is missing pretty significant parts of artwork and storyline, as well as quite a lot of polish.”
  • gameplay
    1,880 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Menace offers a deeply tactical and rewarding turn-based gameplay experience, emphasizing squad customization, cover, suppression, and combined arms mechanics without an overwatch system. Its combat mechanics are praised for realism and strategic depth, with a compelling gameplay loop that encourages planning, adaptation, and experimentation, though some aspects like the supply system, AI behavior, and tutorialization need refinement. While the current early access version is content-light and may feel repetitive over time, the core gameplay foundation is solid, immersive, and enjoyable for fans of strategy and tactical games.

    • “The core gameplay loop is brilliant and incredibly fun, combining intense combat, clever squad mechanics, and a wonderfully gritty atmosphere that rewards strategic and tactical play.”
    • “Menace offers a deep and challenging turn-based tactical gameplay experience with complex mechanics like suppression, morale, cover, and combined arms tactics, making each decision meaningful and engaging.”
    • “The gameplay loop is highly satisfying and addictive, featuring customizable squads and vehicles, dynamic missions with varied objectives, and an innovative suppression mechanic that encourages aggressive and thoughtful play.”
    • “The tutorial explains very little, leaving many mechanics unclear unless you figure them out through trial and error.”
    • “The 'at edge of line of sight' gameplay that I've seen on a consistent basis is extremely boring to do and to watch.”
    • “There's something here, and I want to like this game so bad because the general idea of it is awesome and something I would enjoy, but oh my god is this not fun to play at all right now, just a complete cesspool of unbalanced, unfair, obscure or hard to understand mechanics that create a situation where winning doesn't even feel rewarding (both mentally and in game), it's so painful, just completely awful, and then even if you win you get basically no rewards, so if you ace a mission, maybe you buy a new gun for one unit, if you take any losses at all then you're permanently on the backfoot with no real way to recover because you never have anything to recover with, it feels like the game is designed to not let you win.”
  • graphics
    393 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's graphics are widely praised for their detailed, gritty, and immersive sci-fi aesthetic heavily inspired by the "Aliens" franchise, featuring high-quality models, animations, and atmospheric effects that enhance tactical gameplay. Visuals combine solid, well-optimized graphics suitable even for low-end PCs with excellent sound design and voice acting, creating a cohesive and engaging battlefield experience. While some note minor rough edges, inconsistent art styles in UI elements, and occasional performance issues, overall the graphics are considered a strong highlight that significantly contributes to the game's appeal.

    • “This is great, I love the gameplay loop, the strategy, the aesthetic, the audio and Scott Buckley's soundtrack.”
    • “The gritty, full 3D industrial sci-fi aesthetic is pure perfection: detailed mechs and powered armor that look functional and brutal, atmospheric biomes like snowy outposts, jungle-choked planets, and derelict colonies, plus destructible environments that feel raw, lived-in, and oppressively dangerous.”
    • “The graphics are sharp, atmospheric, and enhance tactical readability without sacrificing immersion.”
    • “I have had 5-6 hard freezes, overheating graphics cards and driver straight up turning off when playing this game.”
    • “After patch 5 I tried to turn the graphics settings down and turn on upscaling for my rig, it froze, made a loud screeching noise in my headphones and then toggled my audio driver to start playing through my monitor's sound system.”
    • “The weather effects and such are poorly done, in my opinion, everything just has a massive white-screen haze over everything, looks horrible, washes out the colors and overall graphics, takes away all of the contrast.”
  • music
    151 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's music is generally praised for its strong atmosphere, fitting the grimdark sci-fi setting and enhancing combat intensity, with standout tracks for factions like the pirates. However, many users note the limited variety and repetitive nature of the soundtrack, which can become monotonous during extended play sessions, suggesting a need for more diverse and ambient tracks. Overall, while the music is high-quality and well-produced, expanding the soundtrack would greatly improve the audio experience.

    • “The soundtrack is also excellent and contributes well to the game's often ominous, tense atmosphere while appropriately highlighting triumphs in a very tight, cohesive way.”
    • “The grimdark sci-fi universe they created for this game is dope, and the OST is perfection!”
    • “Other highlights for me are music - main menu one is a chef's kiss - as well as squad leaders' writing and chatter.”
    • “The music is very repetitive and can become pretty bland pretty quickly.”
    • “The soundtrack(s) is incredibly basic with I think only a handful only in the game.”
    • “The music that is there is serviceable, until you hit hour 20, and you notice how same-ey and kind of generic it all sounds.”
  • replayability
    142 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game offers strong replayability driven by procedural mission generation, varied squad leader abilities, extensive customization, and roguelite elements, allowing for numerous tactical approaches. While some note the current content feels limited or somewhat repetitive, ongoing updates and planned expansions are expected to enhance depth and infinite replay value akin to the developer’s previous title, Battle Brothers. Overall, it is highly replayable even in early access, with promising potential for even greater longevity as more content and features are added.

    • “The squad customization system and equipment variety allow for lots of experimentation, the procedural generation adds potentially hundreds of hours of replay value, and the variety between factions and their constant escalation in capabilities means the player can never get too comfortable with one set of tactics or equipment.”
    • “Great tactical game with endless replayability and that's only with just the basic early access launch product, can't wait to see where we go next!”
    • “The missions themselves are procedurally generated and part of a sequence of three to four for a given planet, which, with the enemy variety at the moment, makes for a highly replayable experience, especially combined with the equipment one can find at the black market and the manner in which squad leader selection can be varied by run.”
    • “So far it doesn't feel very replayable due to minimal content, making things repetitive; it is still good for a couple of playthroughs.”
    • “Lack of replayability comes from a clearly defined meta with heavy vehicles and necessary squad items, resulting in a general lack of variety.”
    • “The game is surprisingly linear in gameplay progression, leaving doubts about where the replay value would come from.”
  • optimization
    100 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game generally runs smoothly with solid performance on a range of hardware, including older GPUs and even the Steam Deck, featuring fast load times and minimal crashes or bugs. However, some users report occasional stuttering, instability during specific scenarios, and frame rate drops on dense maps, indicating room for further optimization, especially as the game is still in early access. Overall, the optimization is promising but could benefit from targeted improvements to ensure consistent performance across all settings and missions.

    • “For early access, it's shockingly polished: rock-solid performance, timely updates, and a killer community with guides for us mortals.”
    • “Performance is rock solid, load times are fast, visuals are sharp, destruction feels weighty, and sound design sells the chaos beautifully.”
    • “My PC specs are just an R5 3600 and RX7600, the game puts almost max settings and it runs smoothly at 60 fps in 1080p.”
    • “Currently we just have NVGs and similar accessories that buff one squad's performance alone.”
    • “The tactics and gameplay are solid, presentation is solid bar a few unfinished assets (early access can't be upset about that). Missions are pretty solid and it does not really feel that repetitive, I'd like to give the devs some kudos for the sound design, guns are punchy and explosions are booming. Some voice lines can get stale but again it's not that much of a con. At the moment, performance is pretty lacking with some hefty loading stutters when swapping menus and particle effects kinda drag it down a bit fluidity-wise.”
    • “This game is very poorly optimized.”
  • humor
    96 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's humor is widely praised for its witty, dark, and campy tone, delivered through unique and entertaining squad leader voice lines that add personality and levity to tactical gameplay. While some find the humor irresistibly funny and the character banter a highlight, others note occasional cringey or repetitive moments, especially with certain factions like pirates. Overall, the humor complements the gritty setting with a playful, tongue-in-cheek style that many players find highly enjoyable and memorable.

    • “The characters are played serious with a little humor, and the squad leaders reliably give interesting barks in combat.”
    • “Voice lines are great, each marine leader has personality and the pirates are hilarious.”
    • “Squad leaders feel unique and have fun dynamics reacting to the battlefield and each other; the storytelling part of the game is quite interesting and funny.”
    • “Now in terms of setting, I was very much taken aback when you get this phenomenal cinematic that feels very gritty and dark, only to fight pirates who speak in the least serious and completely unfunny dialogue I've heard in a while. I honestly think the right course of action would be to replace every single line from the pirates and make them talk like they're actually in a gunfight and dying.”
    • “But not funny.”
  • atmosphere
    82 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's atmosphere is widely praised for its gritty, immersive sci-fi setting, enhanced by detailed visuals, strong sound design, and fitting music that creates tension and intensity. The voiced squad banter, environmental design, and tactical combat further deepen the sense of immersion, evoking comparisons to classic tactical shooters like XCOM and Jagged Alliance. Overall, the atmosphere effectively blends dark, brutal themes with moments of humor and thoughtful storytelling, making it a standout aspect that significantly elevates the gameplay experience.

    • “Menace is a promising tactical sci-fi RPG that already has a strong foundation: intense combat, clever squad mechanics, and a wonderfully gritty atmosphere.”
    • “The gritty, full 3D industrial sci-fi aesthetic is pure perfection: detailed mechs and powered armor that look functional and brutal, atmospheric biomes like snowy outposts, jungle-choked planets, and derelict colonies, plus destructible environments that feel raw, lived-in, and oppressively dangerous.”
    • “On a serious note though, this game is impressively immersive via the atmospheric attention to detail they've put into the world, the sounds, all of the effects (splatter effects, ricochets, blasts, weapon firing) and I don't just mean the visuals, this game sounds really great too.”
    • “My bigger issue is with the setting and atmosphere.”
    • “Menace is great with deep and well thought out mechanics and very few bugs but is a little light on content due to its current early access state and has a tone and atmosphere that can be a bit inconsistent.”
    • “Could definitely use a rework of the squad leader portraits to match the overall ambience of the atmosphere.”
  • grinding
    56 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Grinding in the game is often described as tedious and repetitive, especially in the early stages where progress can feel slow and frustrating. While some appreciate the deep and deliberate progression system reminiscent of games like Battle Brothers, many find the combat loop and economy require excessive farming that diminishes enjoyment. Strategic gameplay can be overshadowed by encounters with overly cautious AI and the need to grind for better gear, making the experience feel like a chore for those not invested in the niche design.

    • “Fighting large battles is fun and not tedious to manage.”
    • “You'll need a second life for grinding.”
    • “Ten might be better; it doesn't take away from the tactical need and management of the squad's action points, but isn't as tedious.”
    • “The entire gameplay loop feels hollow and lifeless, a lot of equipment feels more like clutter and barter items rather than anything remotely useful, most of the operational bonuses aren't useful, missions feel tedious and result in you having to flush out enemies hiding in the map corners. Playing the game in general just feels like a chore.”
    • “The AI have map hacks in this game, which means it knows at all times where the player units are, if it's being spotted, what's the weapon range of the player, their visual range, etc. This is not a matter of the players being bad and blaming the AI, the behavior is extremely obvious, it has been reported by hundreds of players in the forum and it's just not fun to play against because the AI never engages the player. It will at all times try to stay out of the spot/shooting range of the player, making the player pursue the enemy units around the map and engagements only happen once the AI completely runs out of space to run away, which is extremely tedious.”
    • “Beyond that the equipment you can purchase between operations is mostly randomized. In theory, this increases replayability but in reality this means you end up just grinding through missions to get the components you want.”
  • stability
    48 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game demonstrates solid stability for an early access title, running smoothly with few crashes and glitches, though some minor bugs and placeholder content persist. Performance is generally stable across platforms, including Steam Deck, with occasional issues related to pathing, UI, and rare freezes mostly tied to hardware compatibility. Overall, it is well-polished and enjoyable despite early access limitations.

    • “The early access version is very stable and relatively bug free.”
    • “Surprisingly, at launch it is largely bug free, doing what it tries to do very well despite being an early access release, and generally even makes frustrating gameplay scenarios fun to tackle.”
    • “Runs great (even on my Steam Deck) and I have not experienced any crashes over my 30-ish hours.”
    • “I have had 5-6 hard freezes, overheating graphics cards and driver straight up turning off when playing this game.”
    • “And there were just so many bugs and glitches.”
    • “Stuck yesterday in a buggy mission, rescue civilians, surrounded by pirates.”
  • emotional
    23 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game offers moments of emotional connection, primarily through squad leaders’ personalities and interactions, but overall lacks a compelling story and meaningful emotional weight in gameplay decisions and character losses. While some players find it heartwarming and reminiscent of classic tactical games like XCOM, others feel the emotional engagement is underdeveloped due to opaque RPG mechanics, expendable units, and a weak narrative drive. Enhancing emotional investment in characters and consequences could significantly deepen the experience.

    • “The whole thing feels like a heartfelt love letter to classic sci-fi action and horror.”
    • “Hearing your stealth guys barely speaking from exhaustion while your rambo-like soldier is celebrating his 9th squad wipe and sort of scaring the more timid marine specialist he's with is so dang heartwarming.”
    • “Their emotional state matters and can be the difference between a resounding victory or absolute bloodbath.”
  • character development
    16 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The character development in the game is highly praised for its distinct, well-designed squad leaders with unique personalities, backgrounds, and specialized roles, supported by excellent voice acting and detailed customization options. The interactions, dialogue, and diversity in character tech trees add depth and keep the experience engaging over time. While already strong, reviewers see potential for even more memorable character growth with future enhancements.

    • “Character design is great with diverse backgrounds and motivations; the voice actors perfectly fit their respective characters.”
    • “Each squad leader has a unique personality and specialization, with persistent progression and skill customization enhancing character development.”
    • “The excellent character design makes all squad leaders feel very different through detailed bios, appearances, voice acting, and unique tech trees that define distinct late-game roles.”
  • monetization
    4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game’s monetization is not perceived as a cash grab, with clear effort evident in its design and tutorials enhancing accessibility. However, some users feel that advertising may overpromise certain features, leading to disappointment when gameplay elements tied to monetization, like authority-driven drama, feel limited or less impactful.

    • “Between their ads on Reddit and here, I am disappointed in the product.”
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28h Median play time
91h Average play time
14-74h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 81 analyzed playthroughs
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Frequently Asked Questions

MENACE is a survival role playing game with fantasy, romance, dark fantasy and science fiction themes.

MENACE is available on PC, Windows, Xbox Game Pass and Xbox.

On average players spend around 91 hours playing MENACE.

MENACE was released on February 5, 2026.

MENACE was developed by Overhype Studios.

MENACE has received very positive reviews from players. Most players liked this game for its story but disliked it for its grinding.

MENACE is a single player game.

Similar games include Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters, Phantom Brigade, Terminator: Dark Fate - Defiance, Xenonauts 2, Phoenix Point and others.