XCOM: Enemy Unknown

[ HEADS UP: Save at the start of and after completing each mission. It's an old game that's prone to the occasional crash. ] I played this game as a teen, so it was nice coming back and being able to beat it on Normal instead of Easy this time. I've always loved this game, even with its mediocre optimization. It still holds up, which is more than I can say for those 6 countries and 5 soldiers I lost. If you're going to buy this as a first-time XCOM player, I strongly suggest purchasing Enemy Within along with the base game. It's not overwhelming, and it deeply enriches the experience. If you like it, move on to XCOM 2. It's even harder, in my opinion.

While this game is great, the reason XCOM 2 will always be better comes down to 1 thing; the AI in XCOM 2 at least pretends to be consistent. For whatever reason in XCOM 1, the AI does not always behave the way they "should". You often notice that sectoids, for example, on the higher difficulties will sometimes make highly illogical moves, like moving out of cover into the open, and then shoot at your soldier and hit aa crit. Other times, they will actively abuse your soldiers LOS by making moves that your soldiers cannot make (for example, curving their movement to avoid your overwatch shots, something the player can only do in XCOM 2) even when your squad hasn't triggered the enemy yet. Some of this behavior is so egregious, that on Classic difficulty, you will notice Aliens *only* get aggressive with their positioning when they know they will hit a critical. In contrast, on Impossible difficulty they are always aggressive, so their AI ends up being more fair on the least fair difficulty. This game is great, but be prepared to be extremely frustrated. In my mind, the systems and overall gameplay in XCOM EW far exceeds what ends up in XCOM 2, as XCOM EW seems simple on the surface, but is actually quite complex. In contrast, XCOM 2 seems highly complex, but is relatively simple on both the tactical and meta-game layers. I'm still upset they didn't do more with the interrogation feature in XCOM 2, as it adds a lot of depth to how you approach the tactical layer of XCOM EW. TL;DR buy this game if you want a more "classic" XCOM experience, complete with absolute ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, and buy XCOM 2 if you prefer a more fair and simple experience. XCOM 2 is pure fun, and XCOM EW is... XCOM. You will have fun playing, but you will also rage quit.

why is this game so popular when it's littered with game breaking bugs? ironman is basically impossible because there are bugs that can and will brick your entire save such as soldiers getting stuck in the world or a bug that makes it so you can't switch soldiers game also lacks extremely basic features such as move confirm. misclicks are permanent so don't expect to be able to multitask while "playing" this agonizingly slow game because if you click back into the game and accidentally move a solder then you just waste their life. the developers are amateur game also does not respect your time at all. enemy turns takes way too long. sometimes the game comes to a complete pause while waiting for the CPU to do something. there's tons of unnecessarily long animations in every aspect of the game from enemy spawn animations to overwatch animations. cutscenes and dialogue all take too long. it's all just too much doing nothing for an already slow tactical game. if you're having a bad streak of luck, the last thing you want is to have to stew on it for mutliple minutes while waiting for absurdly long animations that serve no purpose. those animations can play out while we do other things.

have you ever gambled on a 99% hit with your life on the line? even after more a decade, this game still holds up and a excellent reboot its nice

Pretty engaging and fun tactical game. The campaign isn’t too long (a little over 20 hours for me), and it doesn’t get boring. My main caveat is that the amount of RNG is insane, and sometimes it feels just plain unfair. On the other hand, landing a 20% shot in a life-or-death situation feels exhilarating, so I guess it’s a double-edged sword.

I'll divide my review into each section of the game. Early game: Can be absolutely miserable if you're going in blind. You'll breeze through the first few missions, then suddenly get hit with a more complex one that wipes your entire squad. That first major loss will likely spiral into a restart if you don't know what you're doing. Mid game: This is where the game really shines. Your soldiers become much stronger, your base starts coming together, and the missions feel challenging without being unfair. It's easily the most enjoyable part of the game. Late game: Mostly as good as the mid game, except for one section near the end where you have to shoot down a UFO to progress the story. This is probably the worst part of the game because the aircraft you need take around two weeks to build, and during that time the strategic layer can completely fall apart while you're forced to wait. I'd still recommend the game. The story is a bit thin, but the gameplay is excellent. Just know that some of the design choices will punish you with zero remorse, and the game expects you to learn from your mistakes. That's just part of the experience.

I started my XCOM experience by watching XCOM 2 on YT. Curious as how predecesors presented themselves, I decided to watch a bit of them on YT as well. Then I decided to give them a try and my first title was XCOM Enemy Unknown. The game delivers a very climactic tutorial, that teaches you some useful info and bad habts as well. XCOM is a game of chance most of the time. But there are options guaranteeing a certain outcome. It boosts the value of tactical plays a lot, which I found to be very enjoyable and rewarding. I was surprised how simple the math for determing a hit chance was. It made playing around increasing your percentage for a succesful hit much easier and noob friendly. What was not easy to understand was how sightlines work. After playing lots of runs, understanding them is one of the most crucial parts. It allows you to have a better control over the battlefield. Planned and controlled engagement can turn the tide in your favor. Besides that, everything is usually clearly described and understandable. Utilizing offered tools, items, weapons and such is up to the player. And when in doubt... Play ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. The aliens, as antagonists pose a serious threat. They look intimidating, advanced, or in case of Floaters, straight up ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up. Too bad only Floaters and Chryssalids were the only non-humanoid, organic units. AI depends on the difficulty settings. When you play on Classic, or Impossible, the AI will exploit every possible chance to shred your soldiers. And sometimes that include teleporting, shooting off screen, triggering on the other side of the map, or bombing that one guy in the smoke with ♥♥♥♥ tons of grenades. Fighting the aliens, especially during early game, feels like your enemy always has an upper hand. Their aim and weaponry is on par, or outclasses yours. Their numbers can quickly overwhelm you. Their grenade throwing range is 2 times yours. And then... There's a Sectopod... An always ready to fire mechanical menace, that shreds through everything, fires at walls, even when you're out of range and should be the final boss of the game. Design-wise I love mechanical units. Cyberdisk being my favorite. But... The game has its problems as well. One of them is sightlines are inconsistent. You can spot a group of aliens and not trigger them, then you end a turn and all of a sudden, they activate, then scatter, then make a move and then kill 2 of your peeps. The other one is hardlocking the UFO doors by placing a SHIV in front of them. It happened to me on a Battleship wreck assault and stopped me from getting out of the starting location. The other one is lifting off a ghost mode, when the user is in sightline of untriggered enemies. After triggering the pack with another soldier, the cloak just turned off and my soldier was exposed to 3 aliens without any action to hide his ass. I have a HUGE issue with 'Psi Panic" ability. If you succesfully pull it off, there's a high chance the target will open fire at the soldier, that performed it. Usually resulting in a serious wound, or a straight up kill. The aliens NEVER shoot at each other, while panicking. Rarely, if ever, they hunker down... And that's it. Useless. All in all I sinked in deep into the XCOM EU/EW. The climat is great. The gameplay is simple, yet fun and customizable via "Second wave" options. The soundtrack delivers. Especially combat music (on YT indexed as 6 and 7), the permadeath of your units really brings out emotions, while playing on Ironman. And I still find little details, that add to the depth of the world of XCOM. Vigilo Confido!

Більшість моїх друзів померли, деякі навіть вбили один одного