First Look at XCOM: Enemy Unknown

iGameXbox | 09 January 2012 | 0 Comments

Story Written by: Str8fe

Firaxis’ XCOM: Enemy Unknown continues the age-old tale of an all-out alien invasion and the countries of the Earth combining their forces to fight the evil. Not to be confused with the 2K Marin first person shooter simply titled XCOM which takes place in the earlier days of the series and enraged fans of the series because of its lack of respect for the mechanics of the original, Firaxis’ XCOM: Enemy Unknown chronicles the fight after the full blown invasion of the alien forces. Unlike RTS games like StarCraft, XCOM uses a global view, where players keep track of UFOs and the abductions that are going on. Players can also manage research and development at the XCOM organization’s secret base. Plus the game switches between turn based and real time. Once your transport lands to do battle with the alien nemesis, the battle view turns to a tactical view.

Players also use strategy to combat the alien invaders by giving their engineers intelligence to combat their superior technology and give foundries fabrication requests. Strategy is also used to communicate with the other nations in the fight, use fighter jets to combat UFOs, and also level up your soldiers or recruit new ones. One question being asked “is the game being dumbed down for console audiences” is met by a resounding no. The game has had some mechanics removed but according to the report, it is useless mechanics that will not be missed.

The original game which was released for PC only in 1994, should be widely received by the console crowd due to the possibility of long gameplay which is the norm for most strategy games. The Firaxis crew realizes the undertaking of reimagining such a beloved game and wants the gaming world to know that they take it very seriously and plan on making XCON: Enemy Unknown even better than the first while still using the magic that made the first XCOM such a classic. Strategy lovers and gamers alike are going to be quite impressed with the finished product.