Very slick and cinematic re-imagining of the classic Best Game Of All Times. Interface is streamlined, classes and abilities give it more RPG-esque feel. Two-action game mechanic gives the game more of a battle chess feel, but I enjoy it, so no regrets here. I love the interface and design language. Interface is convenient and minimalistic and design it has a very distinct sci-fi feel to it. Plus, the atmosphere of the unknown horrors lurking in the darkness... fought off by well-trained professionals (as opposed to rag-tag crew anime circus of the XCOM 2) is thick and dense. The feeling of the danger and eagerness to crack open the box of gifts that the shot down or landed UFO represents is majestic. The immersion is full and complete. DLC is awesome and it should be a golden standard of what DLCs should be. It adds new risk/reward mechanic (meld), gene mods, and MECs! New aliens that make the invasion even more horrific and even human traitors. New maps, new missions (including your own base defense!), Site Recon for battling your worst nightmares... Totally worth it. However, the difficulty of the base game is low and goes down in campaign rather quickly, snipers in archangel armor are god-like and could basically wipe off entire maps. But. There is Long War mod. In fact, I recommend to install base game, play for about 5 hours to get accustomed to new interface and features and then install Long War. Play it. Love it. Hate it. Enjoy it. So many more options on both strategic and tactical level, classes rebalanced, difficulty is tough but fair, lots more challenge, but a lot more feeling of accomplishment, too. So many missions only won by a narrow margin... Hamper your hubris, you will never feel your teams are overpowered. And yes, you WILL have teams thanks to fatigue mechanics. There are awesome wikis, Reddit, and YouTube videos to help with this mod (you will need it). And yes, it is LONG. But oh-so-pleasing! Good luck, Commander.
