XCOM: Enemy Within will be deploying some new alien enemies, and at least one of them is going to be setting up a permanent residence in your nightmares.
The XCOM series can hardly be labeled “horror,” but at the same time there’s little more terrifying than watching one of your soldiers turn a corner and come face to mandibles with a Chryssalid. XCOM: Enemy Within, the upcoming expansion to last year’s Enemy Unknown, is adding at least one more new breed of alien to terrorize your squad: the Seeker. A new development blog explains the role of this newcomer, which has been dubbed the “Flying Spider Shark” by one Firaxis developer.
“One of the things we wanted to do in Enemy Within was to get the player looking over her shoulder more often,” reads the blog post. “The aliens were missing a subtle assassin, something that can attack suddenly and without warning when the player least expects it. The Seeker was an obvious candidate.”
The Seeker is a flying, robotic squid with limited cloaking ability. Their AI will avoid direct confrontation with players, preferring to hide until the soldiers engage another group of aliens. At that point the Seeker strikes – sneaking up on an unsuspecting human and strangling them, which deals increasing amounts of damage until a soldier can shoot it off the targeted squadmate.
There are some counters to the Seeker’s invisibility, and later armor types and gene mods can render troops immune to strangling altogether. Still, in the early stages of the game this sounds like a terrifying addition to the alien roster. Keep an eye out for more alien sightings leading up to Enemy Within‘s November 15 release date.
Source: 2K Games
