XCOM: Enemy Unknown is 'reimagining' of 1994 game

We get more details on Firaxis' XCOM: Enemy Unknown, including just how closely it will stay to the 1994 original.

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Firaxis gave us a pleasant New Year's surprise last week with the announcement of XCOM: Enemy Unknown, and now more details are slowly dripping out about the classic-styled real-time strategy game. The game is a reimagining of the original XCOM, taking place before the upcoming XCOM shooter.

Game Informer shares the details and a few screens. The game promises the same core concepts of the 1994 original, but tweaked in subtle ways like soldier stats. Firaxis is also streamlining aspects to remove micromanagement, but core aspects like permanent death and fog of war are still present.

The game's turn-based tactical view spans the globe, tracking abductions and managing resources and upgrades to stop them. When a transport arrives at an abduction site, it switches to a real-time view to command the squad of soldiers.

Much of the game is still shrouded in mystery, but any info seems to serve as welcome news to those who feared the shooter game being developed by 2K Marin would spell the end of the classic XCOM series.

Editor-In-Chief
From The Chatty
  • reply
    January 9, 2012 12:30 PM

    Steve Watts posted a new article, XCOM: Enemy Unknown is 'reimagining' of 1994 game.

    We get more details on Firaxis' XCOM: Enemy Unknown, including just how closely it will stay to the 1994 original.

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      January 9, 2012 12:51 PM

      taking place before the upcoming XCOM shooter

      So its set in an alternate 1950's too? The gameinformer cover looked pretty modern. Did you mean releasing before the shooter (I hope) ?

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        January 9, 2012 12:53 PM

        Based on the source article, it's just switched - Enemy Unknown takes place after the shooter.

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        January 9, 2012 12:54 PM

        No, this is a different game, check out one of the giant threads in todays chatty for more info

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        January 10, 2012 3:12 AM

        Release date is this fall supposedly, setting looks like modern/near future

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      January 9, 2012 12:56 PM

      i believe the origional game had it reversed, where the world view was real time, and when you landed at a site it went into turn based tactical combat, you took turns moving your guys. if they have made the combat real time, i am not sure i am really interested after all, shame.

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        January 9, 2012 1:20 PM

        It's exactly the same as the old. The globe view is in real time, the tactical battles are turn based.

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          January 9, 2012 1:28 PM

          then this quote from the article confuses me "The game's turn-based tactical view spans the globe, tracking abductions and managing resources and upgrades to stop them. When a transport arrives at an abduction site, it switches to a real-time view to command the squad of soldiers."

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            January 10, 2012 5:18 AM

            He got it all backwards. The original article he links doesn't even say that.

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          January 9, 2012 1:29 PM

          Yup. According to the Game Informer article - The real-time element of XCOM is confined to the global view, where the player keeps track of known UFOs and abductions going on around the world. Managing research and development at the XCOM organization's secret base can be done at the player's leisure, and all combat is completely turn-based.

          The Shacknews article has them switched.

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      January 9, 2012 1:22 PM

      Will the sequel be called UFO: UFO Defense?

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      January 9, 2012 2:22 PM

      That screenshot is terrifying. :|

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      January 9, 2012 4:08 PM

      This is sounding awesome. Been a while since I played the original and now it looks like I won't have to :D

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      January 10, 2012 2:36 AM

      "Firaxis is also streamlining aspects to remove micromanagement, but core aspects like permanent death and fog of war are still present."

      This scares me immensely - I really hope they don't end up dumbing the game down too much.

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      January 10, 2012 3:50 AM

      I'm really worried about the direction this game is going in regards to the aliens and lore and if at all they are going to follow any of it from the original game. Reading various articles and what has been revealed so far suggests that the game is going to take place in modern times but in the FPS universe. This bothers me because I was really not all that impressed with the aliens and lore introduced from the already released information regarding the FPS version of XCOM. My hopes had perked up seeing a sectoid on the cover of game informer but I'm not sure if this was just a quickie art teaser unrelated to the actual game.

      What really impressed and amazed me about the original XCOM was that it followed UFO pop culture closely and borrowed a lot of ideas from it and incorporated it into the game. Examples of this can be seen from the face on mars, the alien grays (sectoids), the snake men, even the mutons and lots of the technology are all based on real UFO lore. This all made XCOM that much more interesting and believable. The idea of geometric shape morphing aliens and "the outsiders" seems rather silly.

      I really hope that more information is released surrounding this concern of mine as for me, a big fan of XCOM is a big deal.


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