Into the Breach is getting a free Advanced Edition expansion

Into the Breach is a turn-based tactics game about mechs and bugs developed by Subset Games, the makers of the outstanding sci-fi adventure-sim FTL. And it's even more outstanding: We said Into the Breach delivers "the most perfectly formed tactics" experience in our 93% review, and then selected it as our Ultimate Game of the Year for 2018.

On July 19 it will get even better with the release of Into the Breach: Advanced Edition, which will expand the original game with five new mech squads and nearly 40 new weapons, additional enemies, bosses, and mission objectives, and new pilots and pilot abilities. The Advanced Edition will also feature a new, "Unfair" difficulty mode, support for seven additional languages (Arabic, Thai, Swedish, Korean, Traditional Chinese, Turkish, and Spanish), and two new tracks from composer Ben Prunty.

See more

Even better than all that, the Advanced Edition will be available as a free update for owners of the original Into the Breach—which, by the way, is on sale for $10 in the 2022 Steam Summer Sale, which got underway today.

The Advanced Edition will also see Into the Breach finally released for Android and iOS devices. The mobile version of the game will have a revamped interface "to ensure an excellent experience on smaller touch devices like phones," but will otherwise be identical to Into the Breach: Advanced Edition on other platforms. Interestingly, it will be available exclusively to Netflix subscribers through the Netflix Games service.

It's a generous move by Subset, and one the studio has made previously: In 2014, a couple years after the launch of FTL, Subset released the FTL: Advanced Edition expansion, also free for owners, which added a new race, ships, weapons, subsystems, in-game events, and more. The net result was "the definitive edition" of an already excellent strategy game—hopefully we can look forward to more of the same from Into the Breach.

Andy Chalk

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.