Posted on: April 3, 2022

Megalazor

Games: 206 Reviews: 3

A bad game close to being great.

I love XCOM games and this game checks many of the boxes while improving on some. Unfortunately it never gets good enough to be actually good, it's like on an edge and I wondered where it would tip. There are many contradicting design decisions or some that are outright bad (also minor bugs, which are kinda whatever). Some of the gameplay issues I had and thoughts during my playthrough: - Economic and tech pacing is bad. Mostly because air superiority is king. - Base building is uninspired. You have 1 base for research, 1 for producing items and the rest are just launchpads for interceptors. Base defenses are pointless, because if you intercept everything they can't get to you. - Ground Vehicles are useless. - RNG on damage values is so insanely high that early / midgame armour is kinda useless. - Enemy variety is great, but they are designed in such a way that they all have this "bullshit"-factor. Lizards snipe you through smoke grenades, Caesan Psionics have a global chance each round to eff you up, Androns can't be supressed and snipe you with Plasma Casters. -Reaction fire seems so useless. The counter to the melee aliens is just blowing everything up and relying on it to breach a ship door gets you killed since the reaction fire happens after the enemy opened the door and killed you through various means. - Graphics are lovely, but navigating the world and inventory feels like a Diablo 1 alpha. The amount of micro is just insane. - Breaching and securing UFOs is just annoying. Rooms are usually very small and the enemy doesn't care if he suvives. He runs in, kills some, and dies. This usually leads to another round of "just nuke everything". 3 levels of Teleporters is just infuriating. Even with a 100 TU scout. - minor bugs and crashes. Maybe this game is a good XCOM tribute, it's just not contemporary I guess. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who didn't liketeleporting in and throwing a bunch of Vortex grandes in XCOM. 500 IQ move.

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Posted on: September 3, 2014

Lord_Rasalom

Games: 8 Reviews: 2

This game needs to be worked on... Hard.

First thing I've noticed is that the game is unnervingly buggy. I got so many crash-ups with "program not responding" messages, that I allmost broke my screen. It resembles a browser-based flash game, and still hammerging resources like a goddamn Vista. The research is a mess; researched projects are popping up at random it seems. One time I'm researching Laser weaponry, and then suddenly, out of nowhere Alien Biology pops up... and after the project finishes, I still have Alien biology on the list. Even though I already have results of that research. And the simplicity... On one hand I receive freebies like aircraft/vechicle armanent, and on the other I have to manufacture soldier weapons and armor... Still it's a X-com clone, and those are so few and far in between, so I'm giving it +1. I can't believe I'm saying it, but UFO: Extraterrestrials is better...,

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Posted on: July 14, 2015

Zlmndra

Verified owner

Games: 164 Reviews: 1

Veteran setting review

I haven't played on normal yet, so this review is based on veteran mode only. I am a UFOD veteran, and have been playing it on and off on an annual basis for around a decade. Pros: - Updated loadout system. - Loving attention to detail expanding the roles of various weapons, rather than everyone carrying heavy plasma rifles. - Removal of the 'Be Tony Stark laser tech' merchandising of UFOD. - Beautiful graphics update, respecting the legacy of UFOD. - Suppression! Few things are more satisfying that suppressing aliens, flanking and killing them at close range or with grenades. - Stun grenades. No more entering dangerous UFOs. Blow open the door, lob in stun grenades, and wait for them to pass out, or stagger out of the smoke in which case you gun them down. :D Cons: - AI exploit: magically knows the location of all your soldiers, all the time. - AI exploit: visual range is greater than your soldiers. Con #2 is a complete game breaker for me. Aliens can engage from BEYOND visual range even in broad daylight. This is different from UFOD where one alien would spot, and the others use him as a spotter to open up on you. The latter technique you could counter by smart movement, and you could use the same tactic in return. In Xenonauts you will be constantly pushing forward while UNDER fire, simply so you can get eyes on your target. To me, this second exploit absolutely screams of lazy AI programming. Tactics count for nothing if you can't even see the enemy while they're chopping you to pieces. Rather than being 'smart', the AI just cheats. Unforgivable in this day and age. Being a hardcore UFOD fan, I am bitterly disappointed in Xenonauts. I will try normal mode and see if the visual range AI exploit is removed.

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Posted on: March 3, 2019

Magnitus

Verified owner

Games: Reviews: 95

X-Com's Worthy Successor

This would have been a five stars from me if they could have ironed out the bugs. It's not unplayable, but you'll definitely need to save often in order not to lose too much progress when the game crashes (there are other lesser bugs that are not game shattering, but still annoying). The game is obviously influenced by the original X-Com (lots of tactical combat, some base management with a research tree and planning to intercept flying UFOs worldwide). In my opinion, they mostly improved on the original formula by doing the right combination of additions and removals. It shows that the devs were fans of X-Com and gave a great deal of thought into improving it. They removed some capabilities your solders could have that imbalanced the original game: mind control, shooting while fyling, aguided rocket launcher that does insane amounts of damage They also removed some of the ultra micro-management elements: buying/building ammunitions, med-packs, grenades and regular guns, managing flares in night missions, the to build a holding facility to capture live aliens, base storage capacity management (technically still there, but one or two stores per base will be enough for the entire game) They made some aspects of the gameplay deeper: introduction of a fighter vs bomber paradigm when taking out different kinds of UFOs, angle of interception (ie, head on or from the rear) making a big difference, having tactical dogfights when intercepting UFOs, more varied solder roles depending on the type of guns/armor they get and whether or not they have a shield, having to build a human-compatible version of the alien technology you capture (no unlimited supply of human-compatible alien technology from the bodies of dead aliens). I could go on about differences, but I'm reaching the length limit. As a fan of the original X-Com, I find this game is an improvement on that already awesome game and a worthy successor. If only they could have gotten rid of the bugs...

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Posted on: August 11, 2020

Darth_SHAKER

Verified owner

Games: 476 Reviews: 10

Non-official remake of the first X-Com

This game is almost an exact port of X-Com Enemy Unknown (UFO Defense) from Microprose. It has modern resolutions, new sprites and fixes the primary problems of the original title. Overall is a better version of UFO Defense. The bad things are on the art department. Under average sprites, poor aesthetic on the menus and forgettable soundtrack. Despite not being inspired at all on this things, the game is the best way to experience the original X-Com nowadays.

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