Imagine if Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six turned into a 2D, top-down shooter. Well, you would get something a lot like Door Kickers. Door Kickers is a tactical squad-based strategy game created by Indie developers, KillHouse games. I was given a free Steam code to review the game, so let’s get on with it.

Door Kickers focuses on managing your team to complete various complex missions, ranging from killing a set amount of hostiles, to rescuing hostages, to disarming bombs, to arresting a specific target. Door Kickers really shines with its Real-time strategy elements, which reminds me a lot of the classic real time strategy shooter, Jagged Alliance. Door Kickers allows you to choose to pause the game at any time to manage your team, using really simple and intuitive controls. I was surprised at how easy everything worked once I understood how to play.

Left clicking the mouse on your agent will give the order for them to pause and hold their position, while dragging your mouse from their body will create a waypoint path for them to run to. You use the right mouse button to rotate and look around, and if you hold the CTRL key while right clicking you can lock their direction to cause your agent to strafe while moving.

At any time you can right click your agent or the waypoint circle you create to give more detailed orders like, kicking down a door, throwing a flashbang, or reloading your weapon. You can play the game completely in realtime, or use the pause function to plan everything out from the start of the mission using “Go codes”. You have four go codes, Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, and Delta, which allows you to create a sequence of orders for your team to follow. You can activate each Go code by clicking the icons at the bottom right corner of the screen.

Depending on the mission there are achievements that you can unlock by completing specific requirements for that stage, such as, finishing the mission without ever pausing the game. You can also upgrade your team’s gear, changing their equipment to better suit your playing style so that you can complete missions flawlessly.

I personally find Door Kickers to be really fun to play. It does take a bit of time getting used to the controls and managing your team, but once you get the controls down you can easily get addicted to playing the game and finding new ways to complete the missions. As an added bonus for more fun factor, you can also edit and create your own levels using the built in game editor, adding hours upon hours of extra game content. I provided a gameplay video of me playing the game so that you can see how it all works in real time. Ignore the fails, I was still learning how to play!

The game plays beautifully smooth, there are no hiccups or glitches that I’ve run into; the sound is nice, the music fits the game and sucks you in, and the art style is simple, yet detailed enough to keep your attention. I love the animations and the way the characters move. The amount of planning and strategy the game takes to successfully complete missions is a blast for anyone that loves tactical strategy games.

You can buy Door Kickers From the Steam Store, get it for iOS from the iTunes store, or buy it for Android from the Google Play Store. So if you like tactical strategy games, go ahead and pick your poison for which version of the game you want, you won’t regret buying this one. I give the game a 9/10; would save hostages again.