Play X Zone (Europe) Online

X Zone on the SNES is one of those games you boot up expecting something decent and end up glued to the screen for hours. At first glance, it looks like a straightforward tactical RPG—grid-based movement, turn-based combat, all that good stuff. But then you notice the little things: how your squad’s attacks play out in real-time after you input commands, or how the synth-heavy soundtrack somehow makes moving a soldier two squares to the left feel intense.

The isometric battlefields are surprisingly detailed for a 16-bit game, with terrain that actually matters (unlike some other strategy titles where cover feels like an afterthought). I remember getting wrecked in my first few missions because I underestimated how much elevation mattered for line of sight. And the enemy AI? Sneaky. They’ll flank you if you leave an opening, which makes every decision tense—even reloading feels risky when you’re down to your last trooper.

It’s got that perfect ’90s vibe where the manual probably explained half the mechanics, but figuring out the rest through trial and error is part of the charm. If you dig tactical games with a sci-fi twist, this one’s worth digging up.