History VideoGame / PhoenixPoint

** Survival of humanity: After finishing the corresponding research, the game shows the percentage of remaining human population on Earth. If it drops below 10%, there will be too few humans left to repopulate Earth even if the Pandoran threat is eliminated. Game over.

** You can actually mutate your own soldiers if you so wish. It requires a special resource to do but the cost of completely ofset by the abilities the confer: Regeration, massive increase to seconday stats like Accuracy or the ability to inflict Paralyze damage to name a few.

* ArtificialLimbs: With the Blood and Titanium DLC installed you get access to these. They come in three flavours: Heads, Torsos and Legs and confir such benefits as mind control imunity, extra carrying capacity or a limited rocket jump. All Bionic Augmentations are immune to Bleeding, as well as being highly resistant to Viral, Poison, and Paralysis, but at the cost of being vulnerable to Acid Damage and not being fixed by standard med kits, requiring you to either keep a Technician about or carry or a special item to repair them.

* AwesomePersonnelCarrier: Unlike in the newer ''XCOM'' titles, vehicles make their grand return, such as APC-type vehicles. And yes, they certainly fit the ''awesome'' in the trope name, as despite their main role being troop transportation they can deliver an ''extraordinary'' amount of damage on their lonesome. Each faction gets their own distinctive class of vehicle. The vehicles are capable of moving on their own and at the least provide mobile cover to nearby soldiers at the cost of taking up a ton of space on your air transport.
** New Jericho's is the ''Armadillo'', a ''very'' heavily armoured APC. Four wheeled, and covered in metal plating, it's almost more of a mobile ''tank'' then a troop transport, bearing a heavy, roof mounted turret, as well as a ''devastatingly'' powerful iron ram that can be used to absolutely demolish enemy formations, and travel at high speeds. It's so well built, it's almost as tough as a Pandoravirus ''Queen''. It can hold a single squad of up to four friendly soldiers.

* PoweredArmor: Phoenix Heavies wear fully enclosed armor suits reminiscent of the ''Franchise/{{Halo}}'' series.

Taking heavy inspiration from ''VideoGame/XComTerrorFromTheDeep'', the works of Creator/HPLovecraft and the SciFiHorror films of Creator/JohnCarpenter, ''Phoenix Point'' is set in a [[CrapsackWorld bleak world]]. In 2022, the climate change-induced melting of the permafrost layer has awakened a mysterious virus dormant inside the ice. The so-called Pandoravirus infects all it touches whether it be plant, animal, or human, and twists it into something alien. The sea was the first to be consumed, as a strange mist fell over it, which soon spread to land. [[EldritchAbomination Nameless abominations]] began pouring from the murky depths of the ocean, and civilization soon collapses against a mixture of monsters and WorldWarThree. By the year 2047, humanity has been driven to the brink of extinction, now only existing in small, guarded communities, isolated havens, and secretive para-military organisations.

* CrapsackWorld: Even before the pandoravirus hit, it's implied Earth was heavily factionalized and human governments cared more about ideological purity and the status quo than survival of the species. WorldWarIII began because China and the US couldn't be bothered to forgive the other trespassing on their territory while studying the pandoravirus mist, India nearly nuked Pakistan into oblivion because some bright spark decided that Pakistan ''must'' have been behind the outbreak (stopped by the Phoenix Project flipping a lead technician on the nuclear systems to disable them), and {{Hollow Earth}} cranks [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking were given equal time to actual scientists on news programs discussing the pandoravirus]]. It was already bad, it just went to [[UpToEleven ''hell'' when the millions of horrors poured from the oceans.]]

** Survival of humanity: After finishing the corresponding research, the game shows the percentage of remaining human population on Earth. If it drops below 10%, there will be too few humans left on Earth to repopulate after the Pandoran threat is eliminated.

** The Pandorans win if Phoenix Point either loses all of its bases, fails the final mission or lets the human population drop below certain percentage (5-20%, based on difficuilty) of the original amount.

* TheyWouldCutYouUp: Before the collapse, some governments allegedly did invasive studies on pandoravirus survivors. And, of course, cutting up alien bodies is one of the main research trees.

* TranshumanTreachery: Parts of the pre-human hominid civilization that first encountered the pandoravirus willingly embraced the mutation as a means of gaining power over their peers.

* WeAreStrugglingTogether: Both before and after the Pandoravirus has been discovered, many factions among the humans led to World War III erupting, and Pakistan nearly got nuked. In the game, politics play a role in appeasing three major factions with differing ideologies, who are ''still'' fighting each other despite the human race being a small fraction of it's former size and very close to extinction.

* AndIMustScream: Research includes vivisection (live autopsy) of paralyzed Pandorans. They are probably still conscious during the process.

* FrickinLaserBeams: Synedrion's weapons tend towards laser weapons. Instead of New Jericho's raw damage, they tend to have armor-piercing attacks or additional effects like inflicting paralyze damage on enemies.

* ArmorIsUseless: Averted. Armor on soldiers helps absorb bullets and explosions, altough melee attacks and anything else with the Armor-Piercing trait bypass this. Pandorians from the very beginning have heavy carapaces that protect them very effectively, although the aiming system means the players can still hit vulnerable spots.
* ArmorPiercingAttack: Weapons with the "Armor-Piercing" trait ignore any armor a character/creature has, examples so far being sniper rifles and melee attacks. Explosives and the Heavy's weapons are also capable of decreasing armor, similar to ''VideoGame/XCOM2''.

* BadassArmy: The remnants of humanity are filled with veteran fighters, hardened from the constant battle with the monsters of the Pandoravirus. All the factions field an impressive, if small, company of soldiers.
* BadassNormal: All humans in general really, but New Jericho gets by with fanatically loyal elite soldiers, advanced technology, heavy armour, and ''lots'' of CoolGuns.

* ConcealmentEqualsCover: Averted. While concealment does prevent auto-targeting, even solid "cover" like wooden house's panels can get shot to pieces in order to get at whoever is behind them.
* CrapsackWorld: Even before the pandoravirus hit, it's implied Earth was heavily factionalized and human governments cared more about ideological purity and the status quo than survival of the species. WorldWarIII began because China and the US couldn't be bothered to forgive the other trespassing on their territory while studying the pandoravirus mist, India nearly nuked Pakistan into oblivion because some bright spark decided that Pakistan ''must'' have been behind the outbreak (stopped by the Phoenix Project flipping a lead technician on the nuclear systems to disable them), and {{Hollow Earth}} cranks [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking were given equal time to actual scientists on news programs discussing the pandoravirus]]. It all went to [[UpToEleven literal ''hell'' when the millions of horrors poured from the oceans.]]
* CounterAttack: One of the abilities is Return Fire, which allows the user to retaliate against enemy fire even if not outright using Overwatch.

* FriendlyTarget: Not being careful about the game's realistic ballistics can result in allies getting the brunt of the damage from an attack. The Mindfragger also intentionally sets you up to do this by latching onto friendly soldiers.

* TakeCover: It's very important to keep your troopers behind corners, chest-high walls, inside buildings, etc. and the enemies will seek to do the same. Due to how the aiming system works, anyone not behind some sort of cover can be hit quite easily (depending somewhat on the soldier in question and their weapon) so staying in cover is necessary to stay alive. However, a lot of the potential cover is easily destructible, and the free aim system with simulated ballistics allows you to shoot whenever you want to destroy whatever you want.

%%* BadassGay: Nikolai from the Phoenix Archive stories develops into this after a TimeSkip.

** The fungal traits of the Pandoravirus are a subtle nod to the Fungi From Yuggoth, more commonly known as the ''Mi-Go''. [[spoiler:This isn't a coincidence.]]

** The fungal traits of the Pandoravirus are a subtle nod to the Fungi From Yuggoth, more commonly known as the ''Mi-Go''.

* CosmicHorrorStory: The Pandoravirus is reveled to be from eldritch origin, caused by an evil EldritchAbomination called Yuggoth. This entity is the villain of the game.

** [[spoiler:Alternatively, if the player allies with Synedrion's Polyphonic Tendency subfaction, the retrovirus is used to simply sever the connection of the Yuggothian entity to Pandoravirus, rendering it inert and liberating Pandorans from their servitude to Yuggoth, giving Synedrion and Phoenix point a chance to achieve peace with the new ecosystem. Disciples of Anu are dissolved, while New Jericho falls apart.]].

** The Pandorans win if Phoenix Point either loses all of its bases, fails the final mission or lets the human population drop below 10% of the original amount.

Taking heavy inspiration from ''VideoGame/XComTerrorFromTheDeep'' and the works of Creator/HPLovecraft, ''Phoenix Point'' is set in a [[CrapsackWorld bleak world]]. In 2022, the climate change-induced melting of the permafrost layer has awakened a mysterious virus dormant inside the ice. The so-called Pandoravirus infects all it touches whether it be plant, animal, or human, and twists it into something alien. The sea was the first to be consumed, as a strange mist fell over it, which soon spread to land. [[EldritchAbomination Nameless abominations]] began pouring from the murky depths of the ocean, and civilization soon collapses against a mixture of monsters and WorldWarThree. By the year 2047, humanity has been driven to the brink of extinction, now only existing in small, guarded communities, isolated havens, and secretive para-military organisations.

** The Pandorans win if Phoenix Point either loses all of its bases, lets the Oneiric delirium reach full intensity or fails the final mission.

* DoomsdayClock: The Oneiric Delirium Index (ODI), which represents the intensity of Pandoran psychic influence on humanity. It increases throughout the game and can be reduced by destroying Pandoran structures. As it increases, gradually causes nightmares, hallucinations, eventually shifting to periods of somnambulistic mind control, and finally even seizures and death. If it reaches 100%, Pandoravirus takes control of humanity and the game is lost.

''Phoenix Point'' is a TurnBasedTactics game developed by Snapshot games. Several team members worked on the original ''VideoGame/{{XCOM}}'' title, including franchise creator Julian Gollop himself. The game was released in December 3 2019 for the PC.

** [[spoiler:If the player allies with Synedrion, they are able to develop a retrovirus that severs the Yuggothian Entity's control over the receptacle and the Pandoravirus and then use it to terraform the Earth into a ecological utopia, bring back extinct species and even genetically engineering new ones, the Disciples of Anu are dissolved as the Exalted agrees to let humanity to continue as it is and disappearing, while New Jericho is destroyed due to their refusal to accept the new state of affairs]].

* DoomsdayClock: The Oneiric Delirium Index (ODI), which represents the intensity of Pandoran psychic influence on humanity. It increases throughout the game and can be reduced by destroying Pandoran structures. As it increases, gradually causes nightmares, hallucinations, eventually shifting to periods of somnambulistic mind control, and eventually even seizures and death. If it reaches 100%, Pandoravirus takes control of humanity and the game is lost.