You begin your mission, tasked with sneaking into a high-security vault, stealing a package, and making it to your extraction vehicle undetected. Like a true super-spy, you quickly disguise yourself as a guard and steal a keycard to enter a security room. The mission is going well so far, but you can’t shake the feeling that something isn’t right here. Looking around the room, you notice someone dressed as a waiter is trying to open a safe – the very same safe you snuck in here to search. Realizing you aren’t the only Agent in the room, you quietly draw your gun, point it at the waiter’s head, and pull the trigger.
That’s the general fantasy that Deceive Inc. tries to model its’ matches after – and for the most part, the game succeeds in spades. An extraction shooter that cleverly ties in aspects of both Spy vs. Spy and Prop Hunt, Deceive Inc. enables players to live out that espionage spy shenanigans you’d see in classic James Bond movies. The general gameplay loop is pretty straightforward. You and up to 11 other players drop into a location, all given the same task of stealing a high value package from a heavily-guarded vault. Security is tight, requiring players to deftly utilize espionage, deceit, and a bevy of spy gadgets to gather the intel, upgrades, and key cards needed to successfully finish the mission. This challenge is made all the more difficult when you consider that you’ll have to accomplish all of this while avoiding the attention of your fellow Agents, who like you will be creeping around buildings and searching for clues.
To get started, players can choose from one of nine different playable Agents, each offering distinct weapons and overall playstyles. Despite only having nine characters to choose from as of publication, Deceive Inc. does an excellent job at designing their Agents to appeal to different gameplay styles. While Agents like Chavez and Hans excel at close-quarters gunfights, you could instead opt to play an Agent like Ace or Yu-Mi to strike from a safe distance. Hoping to avoid combat altogether? Characters like Larcin and Madame Xiu provide tools to aid in stealth and exfiltration. Choosing an Agent is only the first step in customizing your playstyle, as each Agent comes with three different guns, primary abilities, and passive abilities you can swap around to create your ultimate super-spy. After choosing their guns and perks of choice, players can also choose two different gadgets to bring along for the mission, including sentry guns, tripwires, bounce pads, and spy drones. To finish off your build, Agents then choose five different field upgrades – passive abilities that you’ll unlock by completing side objectives during the mission. As a whole, all of these choices provide a wide variety of options to support your ideal espionage experience.
Deceive Inc. differentiates itself from its’ multiplayer peers with a highly robust disguise system. In order to safely move around the map and complete objectives, you’ll have to take advantage of your disguise kit, which enables you to transform into any character on the map, including guards, researchers, maids, and everyday citizens. While your disguise may protect you from the computer-controlled guards, it will not protect you from other players who notice your abnormal behavior. Much of the game’s charm comes from this deadly game of cat-and-mouse where players try to blend in as everyday NPCs while simultaneously trying to guess which NPC may secretly be an enemy Agent. The developers at Sweet Bandits Studios did a brilliant job programming the AI for the NPCs in Deceive Inc. – the characters behave appropriately for their positions, yet are still programmed to be just eccentric enough to keep you guessing who might secretly be an Agent. For example, I recently encountered a butler who sprinted into a staff-only service room, only to stop in place in front of a safe containing a powerful spy upgrade. Naturally, I dumped a magazine of assault rifle rounds before realizing the poor man I just shot was just a harmless NPC. Mistakes like this can prove to be fatal – enemy Agents will oftentimes quickly pounce on a location as soon as they hear gunfire, potentially blowing your cover.
The cat-and-mouse tension only racks up more as the round progresses. As Agents get closer and closer to the vault, players are forced into more choke points, where encountering an enemy Agent is all but guaranteed. This tension comes to a boil once an Agent enters the vault and grabs the package, beginning the Extraction Phase. In the Extraction Phase, all Agents that are still alive will periodically get a ping to see where the Agent with the package is currently located, while the package-carrier can see enemy agents through walls at the cost of expending intel. This additional knowledge ups the ante, pushing stealth gameplay aside as Agents use guns, traps, and wits to take gunfights and safely escape with the package. These finales can be tense, exhilarating, and at times heartbreaking, especially for the package-carrier as they try to contend with multiple Agents closing in on them at once.
While Deceive Inc. possesses some of the best social deduction gameplay in the market right now, the same can’t be said for the combat. I want to preface this by establishing that for a game like this to work, Deceive Inc. needs to have a lenient TTK (or “time to kill” – basically how long it takes you to kill an opponent). If Agents all died to 1-2 pistol shots, then every match would devolve into a murder-thon where every NPC is shot on sight. Giving players time to react keeps fights fair, but the slower TTK combined with the game’s clunky gunplay makes it difficult at times to feel immersed in a tense firefight. Even as the game’s weakness, the gunplay has its’ moments – close-quarters fights are usually still pretty enjoyable, and some weapons are more satisfying to use than others, such as Chavez’s revolver and Red’s assault rifle. Balancing a social deduction shooter’s PVP is bound to be difficult, but Sweet Bandits Studios will have to do some tweaking to make gunplay more satisfying.
Deceive Inc. offers two different gameplay modes, allowing players to queue up for solo matches or opt to play in a team of three. The solo matches are the bread and butter of Deceive Inc., delivering the well-designed social deduction you’d expect, layered with quality espionage gameplay. Your first few minutes of a solo match are often highly tense as you attempt to complete objectives while keeping an eye out for enemy Agents hiding in plain sight. Making a mistake in solo play can often be fatal – once your health drops to 0, you are immediately taken out of the match. While some of this tension and deception is still present when playing as a team, the game as a whole is far more chaotic – teammates can revive each other, empowering spies to adopt a more reckless playstyle and take aggressive gunfights. These kind of matches really highlight the janky gunplay, but are still fun and can be highly charming as you try to adapt your Agent’s skills and abilities to work alongside your team.
Deceive Inc. currently has four maps to choose from, each filled to the brim with rooms to explore and safes to loot. Each map is meticulously well-designed, enabling player creativity and freedom to approach objectives the way they see fit. Many high-value rooms are outfitted with secret exits, keeping enemy Agents from simply camping outside security rooms and gunning down whoever walks out. While these maps are robust, I can only hope that Sweet Bandits Studios continues to add more locales to keep the game fresh – it doesn’t take longer than 10-15 hours to pretty much memorize all the maps that are currently available.
Deceive Inc. pulls an obvious deal of inspiration from the classic ’70’s spy aesthetic, crafting a world that feels like it could be the setting of the next James Bond movie. All four maps exhibit a great deal of charm, designed with meticulous eye-popping color and just enough flair to make each locale feel like an ideal spot for a daring spy heist. This care is extended to the game’s playable roster of Agents as well – each Agent cleverly meshes a unique design with easily recognizable spy tropes. As a whole, characters in Deceive Inc. are designed well – the cartoony style popularized by Fortnite suits this game’s goofy spy mechanics perfectly. The classic ’70’s vibe isn’t just baked into the visuals – Deceive Inc.‘s soundtrack is groovy, bombastic, and meshes in perfectly with the zany cast and gameplay you’d expect from a game like this. Overall, Sweet Bandits Studios does an excellent job at crafting a world that emulates an adoration for the classic ’70’s aesthetic while still establishing their own distinct style.
Like most multiplayer games these days, Deceive Inc. posesses a battle pass in the form of a Season Catalogue, containing a number of cosmetics and boosters for players to unlock. Unlike many battle passes offered by its’ contemporaries, Season Catalogues in Deceive Inc. will always be available to purchase and do not expire after a set date. However, I noticed one bizarre design decision in the Season Catalogue’s free rewards. While the first Season Catalogue offers more than 10 free rewards, players who opt to not purchase the ‘Premium Catalogue’ can only unlock the first two free rewards before needing to spend precious Season Tokens to unlock rewards they could only use if they paid for the Premium Catalogue, just to get to the Catalogue’s second page and unlock two more free rewards. This same format continues through every page of the Season Catalogue, creating a somewhat predatory incentive to convince players to spend money and unlock the Premium Catalogue to use all of their hard-earned rewards.
As a live-service game, ultimately Deceive Inc. will live or die by two factors. Firstly, will gamers be willing to pay the $20 price tag to enter the world of Deceive Inc. – and better yet, will they want to stick around? I personally believe the game is more than worth the price tag, and can see that the game has a modest but engaged fanbase that’s eager for more content. I do almost wish this game was released free-to-play with microtransactions, as it would make Deceive Inc. an easier game to recommend to a friend, but at least the cost of entry isn’t too steep for most, especially since the game promotes cross-platform play. That being said, the biggest factor controlling the fate of Deceive Inc. will be the rate and quality of gameplay updates. The foundation here is solid, but more agents & maps will need to be added to keep the community on board. Sweet Bandits Studios‘ website notes that the indie studio has 18 employees on staff – I hope they have enough members on board to provide the development cycle necessary to give Deceive Inc. the future it deserves.
As a complete package, Deceive Inc. delivers on its’ premise of providing unique extraction shooter focused less on gunplay and more on espionage. The playable Agents are unique and the game permits an excellent variety of gameplay and cosmetic customization. While the combat leaves a bit to be desired, Deceive Inc. refines multiplayer stealth gameplay while bringing enough new ideas to the table to make this a game worth watching.