The Amazing X-COM Thread

[Jason]

Since there's a lot of interest in X-Com-related projects around here, I've decided to collect all the relevant links in one thread for hawt quick reference action.

• First, the Gollop Brothers, part of the original X-Com team, put out Laser Squad Nemesis a few years back under the name Codo Technologies. It focuses mainly on squad-based action instead of all the base building and research stuff. Some people got bored with it quick, but it's only $10 so I say give it a try. They also made a GBA game, Rebelstar Tactical Command, that kicks much ass.
  
• Chaos Concept is working on UFO: Extraterrestrials as we speak and hope to have it ready sometime later this summer. It looks very pretty so far, if you don't mind creepy eyeless people.
  
• The best known of the X-Commy games are the UFO: After- titles from Altar. These are also the most controversial because they ditched turn-based combat for RTwP. There's Aftermath, Aftershock, and Afterlight (still in production). Here's our interview with Altar for more info.
  
• If you hear someone referring to that Quake 2 engine X-Com game, they're talking about UFO: Alien Invasion. It's a community-driven project that's died once or twice, but they managed to release Beta 2 not that long ago and are hopefully still on track.
  
• Another open source project is UFO2000. It's basically a multiplayer mod of X-COM that even uses the original X-COM art assets, although they're slowly but surely switching over to fan-made graphics.
  
• If you have a Pocket PC, you'll want to check out Pocket UFO ASAP. It's free and it's pretty faithful to the original. You can also download a normal PC version if you like looking at tiny games on big monitors.
  
• Project Xenocide is still going strong and they're supposed to have some big announcement soon, or so their news page says. Stay Tuned etc!
  
• If you don't mind dealing with translation issues, there's also X-Force (German) and Invasion 2021 (Russian).
  
• Sheek pointed out Project Colonisation, but I know nothing about it. Maybe he can share more info.
  
• The last link I'll mention is for our affiliates at StrategyCore. They are without a doubt the best source of info for X-Com-related projects, mods, and obsessive X-Com trivia that no one else knows or cares about. I shamelessly steal all their news stories and articles.

Please feel free to add your own comments and links if you know of an interesting project to share with the rest of the class.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

2010 Updates

• UFO2 Extraterrestrials announced
  
• Xenonauts
  

  The game is heavily inspired by the classic X-Com series of strategy games that arrived in the mid-90s courtesy of the now-defunct Microprose. It is a labour of love for many of the team, all of whom are big X-Com fans, but we have decided to try and reinvent the game rather than recreate it. The result is a game that is neither a sequel to X-Com nor a remake. We have taken our franchise in a different direction, retaining the core mechanics that made the original so compelling but updating the settings and features of the game to fit in with the modern age. Gone are the near-future stylings of Xenonauts' forerunners, replaced by a militaristic Cold War setting and a retro-inspired art style.

• X-COMgate (aka the Death of X-COM)
  

  X-COM was a game about investigating an alien invasion of Earth at your own speed, by your own means. So is XCOM. You can start believing.

• XCOM Assault Kit

 

[LlamaGod]

Oh baby arm, your OCD is so lovely.

 

[bryce777]

I am working on a tactics and strategy guide. Probably about 13 years late, but all the ones I have seen are written by morons.

 

[Atrokkus]

OH OH ME ME!

Mr baby arm, can I give you an apple?

 

[Slaughter]

Good stuff baby arm! There are a few other projects listed here (though the ones you listed are the ones that seems to live). We just added a forum for X-COM: Colonization here, and there's a geoscape from it in our files section.

 

[sheek]

Don't know any more about Project Colonization than you baby arm.

Here's a pretty good history/overview I found:

http://www.llamalicious.com/xcom/future.html

Aussie Defence Squad is the only new one that looks like it's going anywhere but it has no aliens. Only connection is that it's made by an X-com fan.

 

[Naked_Lunch]

Rebelstar: Tactical Command is probably the best out of all the games here. LSN comes close, but the phase-based combat can get kinda ehh sometimes. It feels like a puzzle game at times, it's more about figuring out where the enemy could be and then just sending your drones out in all directions with "shoot on sight" enabled.

 

[bryce777]

it's more about figuring out where the enemy could be and then just sending your drones out in all directions with "shoot on sight" enabled.

Well, isn't that kind of how higher level command would be?

 

[Naked_Lunch]

Possibly, but the game is squad-level and it gets tiring real fast. It may be "realistic" in a sense, but it's certainly not very entertaining.

 

[sheek]

Rebelstar: Tactical Command is probably the best out of all the games here.

http://rebelstar.namco.com/screens.php

The video says "from the makers of UFO: Enemy Unknown". The anime stuff does look a bit weird though.

 

[Naked_Lunch]

if you can ignore the anime, your'e in for a treat

 

[Jason]

Yeah, the anime-style cutscenes are horrible, but you can just quickly click through them and get to the turn-based missions without too many mental scars. It's totally worth it regardless.

 

[Severian Silk]

I made a thread, previously.

 

[Jason]

Yes, but mine is amazing. It even says so in the title. Plus, this one is just about X-Com projects.

BTW, that link that sheek pointed out is awesome, not only for the info, but also the reader wishlist further down.

THEY SHOULD MAKE AN XCOM GAME IN THE FIRST PERSON PERSPECTIVE. LIKE A DUKE NUKEM 3D SHOOTER. START AT A BASE. AND GO OUT ON A SKYRANGER. SHOOT AT ALIENS IN THE BATTLESCAPE AND GET PROMOTED. GET NEW WEAPONS AND ARMOR AT BASE AND GO OUT ON MORE MISSIONS. EVENTUALLY YOU GO TO CYDONIA AND KICK ALIEN BUTT.
THEN THEY COME BACK AGAIN UNDER WATER AND YOU HAVE TO DO IT OVER AGAIN.

and

AN ARMOR THAT LETS YOU DO THE FOLLOWING:
(1) SHOOT ELECTRICITY
(2) FIRE,PLASMA
(3) STUN
(4) ALL WEAPONS FROM PREVIOUS XCOM GAMES
IT LETS YOU TURN INTO THE FOLLOWING:
(1) SKELETOID
(2) MULTIWORM
(3) ANTHROPOD
(4) SPITTER
(5) MEGASPAWN
(6) HYPERWORM
(7) AND OTHERS YOU HAVE IN MIND AND NO LIMITS TO THE CHANGES.
AND YOU CAN FREEZE YOUR ENEMIES FOR THE WHOLE TIME EVEN STEAL THEY'RE STUFF WHILE THEY,RE LIKE
THAT.
AND A SHIELD ON THE ARMOR THAT HALVES THE DAMAGE AND THE ENEMY GETS THE OTHER HALF OF THE DAMAGE AND IT DOESN'T RUN OUT OF ANY POWER IN FACT NOTHING ON THE SUIT RUNS OUT OF POWER.
YOU TELEPORT TO THE DESTINATION OF YOUR CHOICE. IT AUTOMATICALLY HEALS YOU WHILE YOUR DOING ANY THING.
YOU CAN CLOAK YOUR SELF. YOU CAN SENSE MOVEMENT. YOUR ALWAYS PROTECTED FROM PSIONICS. YOU CAN INITIATE ALL PSIONICS. YOU CAN BLOW UP ANY THING.
AND YOU FLY.
IT SHOOTS AT ANY RANGE.
AND BEST OF ALL YOU START OUT WITH IT!

 

[onerobot]

Ordinarily I'd think that wishlist is horrible, but it's in all caps so I'm completely sold.

I like how it was "edited for grammar and readability".

 

[bryce777]

LOL!

I lovehow it lets you transform into stuff.

 

[sheek]

I've been watching these games and UFO: Extraterrestrials is easily the most promising and most developed one of all. Despite what the people on their forums say I now doubt it's vaporware.

The latest news is that it's been delayed until September (from August).

Xenocide looks amateurish and disorganized.

Alien Invasion looks good but I'm not sure how committed the team is to getting it finished. They're the second best hope.

 

[Jason]

Chaos Concept released some new screenshots today. They look good, but they need to do something about those frightening faces.

 

[Claw]

Wow, those look great.

Right now, I can't decide if I should play UFO or X-Force. I stared both, X-Force is a bit lacking in terms of ground combat but has many small improvements, extensive research and a somewhat interesting plot in that big-ass alien motherships are approaching and I harbour no hope of developing an appropriate countermeasure in time.
UFO on the other hand has superior ground combat and art.

 

[NoisyKillerHPB]

I'm going to necro this thread and ask what remake is best right now and if one of the new UFO games is worth picking up?

 

[VenomByte]

Of the Altar ones, avoid Aftermath like the plague.

Aftershock is playable if you don't mind realtime combat, but I got bored of it long before completing it. Then again, I had the same problem with Apocalpyse... it's similar in that you end up doing huge numbers of the same missions with little variety or purpose other than 'stem the tide'. at least in Aftershock the majority of the missions are mercifully brief. I personally found Enemy Unknown and TFTD (and even Interceptor) to be vastly more enjoyable as it feels like almost every encounter is either a big step forwards or a big setback. None of the newer games have captured that feel.

 

[freegamer]

These days UFO:AI development is going strong and it looks like it's only going to get stronger. Now at version 2.1.1 with 2.2 in progress. The game is now fully playable.

 

[Jim Kata]

I'm going to necro this thread and ask what remake is best right now and if one of the new UFO games is worth picking up?

http://www.ufo-extraterrestrials.com/fo ... um.php?f=2

this one is looking very good. I had my doubts, but the modders have done amazing work to fix some issues, and the devs are working on a patch....

 

[mister lamat]

rumour mill sez: 2kG are in talks with Irrational about developing a new x-com... this of course is dependant on 2kG surviving the year.

 

[Goliath]

rumour mill sez: 2kG are in talks with Irrational about developing a new x-com... this of course is dependant on 2kG surviving the year.

I am sure it would be a RTwP game, so I am not interested. I liked the first two X-COM games (who didn't?!), but as soon as they went real-time I lost interest.