X-COM

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
X-COM
developer Myth Games
MicroProse
Firaxis
Publisher MicroProse
Hasbro Interactive
Atari
2K Games
First title UFO: Enemy Unknown (1994)
Last title XCOM: Chimera Squad (2020)
Platform (s) Amiga , Amiga CD32 , iOS , MS-DOS , Windows , macOS , Linux , PlayStation , PlayStation 3 , Xbox , Xbox 360 , PlayStation 4
Genre (s) Turn-based strategy game,
space flight simulation,
third-person shooter
Logo of the first X-COM part UFO: Enemy Unknown (start screen of the Amiga version)

X-COM is a series of computer - strategy games that of myth Games develops and by MicroProse was issued. The first three X-Com parts have received multiple awards and are among the most famous turn-based tactical shooters of all, alongside the Jagged Alliance series. A second XCOM series is being developed by Firaxis Games and published by 2K Games . The current rights holder of both series is Take-Two Interactive .

Backstory

Aliens are trying to terrorize and conquer the earth. They kidnap people and carry out experiments on them. A secret organization under the name X-COM (abbreviation for "Extraterrestrial Combat Force") faces this threat. The player is the head of this secret organization and must take over the defense of the earth.

Game mechanics

In a game, X-COM combines the tactical elements of combat with a small unit of soldiers (similar to Laser Squad ) with the fulfillment of global, strategic goals (similar to Panzer General ), the fulfillment of which requires economic macro management by the player.

Bases have to be built, soldiers or agents hired and trained, new weapons and vehicles researched and manufactured, aliens tracked down, fought against, captured and researched again, and finances kept under control. The goal is to find and destroy the headquarters of the aliens in order to finally repel the attack.

In the course of the game there is a large strategic overview map ( geoscape ) for management and interception maneuvers against hostile UFOs and unidentified submarine objects. If an enemy vehicle has been shot down or landed, the player must take out the surviving aliens in order to recover the vehicle. To do this, you switch to a tactical map ( Battlescape ), on which you have to coordinate the actions of each individual agent. While the game speed can be regulated in various time-lapse speeds on the overview map, the combat scenarios are turn-based.

Development history

The designers of X-COM are the brothers Julian and Nick Gollop, who developed and published predecessor games such as Rebelstar and Laser Squad in the late 1980s . Julian Gollop cited tactical board games as an important initial influence on the design . The brothers presented an early prototype under the name Laser Squad II to the then leading strategy game producer MicroProse, who eventually released the game. For the final version, civilization- like strategy elements were introduced and the game moved to earth. The design of the aliens was mainly based on well-known UFO legends and the Cthulhu myth .

With the release of UFO: Enemy Unknown , the tactical squad shooter game type became widely known. The resounding success led to the fact that with X-COM: Terror from the Deep a sequel soon appeared on the same technical basis. The third part of the game series also adhered to the general X-COM concept and now even offers tactical battles in several dimensions.

After the official support of UFO: Enemy Unknown had expired with Patch 1.4 1995, the patch support to fix the remaining program errors and support for newer Windows systems was ensured by the community of players (so-called community patches ).

Take-Two Interactive bought the rights to the X-COM series in 2005 and is now marketing the old games under the in-house label 2K Games . The previous games were re-released on Steam in 2008 by 2K Games. With XCOM: Enemy Unknown , a remake of UFO : Enemy Unknown was released in 2012 , with which a new XCOM series begins. The newest part is XCOM 2 .

Games of the series

The aliens come from Mars, you fight against six different hostile alien races. One of them are the grays by Zeta Reticuli (which are called "Sectoids" here), taken from the popular UFO literature , as well as the story by Robert Lazar about element 115 , which is an important resource in the game that needs to be captured.
This part takes place in the year 2040. The most striking difference to the predecessor: The invaders now come from the deep sea , where most of the battles against them take place. Instead of the classic UFO background, this part has more allusions to the Cthulhu myth . The game mechanics and technology are almost identical to its predecessor.
  • 1997: X-COM: Apocalypse
The action takes place in 2084, after the first two X-Com games. The aliens invade the human world through dimensional gates. The human world, however, consists only of a few fortified cities and space colonies. In this part it is the player's task to defend a city and later attack the alien world.
Apocalypse used an alternative game mechanic with linear mission specifications, but could not build on the success of its predecessor. The player could choose between bets on a round basis or in real time.
  • 1998: X-COM: Interceptor
The typical gameplay of the X-Com series is relocated to space. Here the player builds space stations, controls and commands combat ships.
  • 1999: X-COM: E-Mail-Games
X-COM is reduced to a simple board game for two players who play against each other over the Internet.
  • 2001: X-COM: Enforcer
X-COM as a third-person shooter in which the player controls a combat robot. The game is based on the Unreal - Engine .
A remake of the original with a modern 3D engine and a spiced up story. As before, the game is a classic real-time strategy game in the world overview combined with round strategy in the battles, but also with adapted controls due to the multi-platform support (PC, PlayStation 3 , Xbox 360 , iOS , Linux and Android ) and partially simplified / modernized game mechanics (including a class or skill system instead of experience system, indirect time units, simplified inventory, no tactical overview map, only one base and a maximum of six soldiers at the same time per mission). It received high ratings for PC and console in some cases. The developer is Firaxis (makers of the Civilization series). The game has been available in the US since October 9, 2012 and in Europe since October 12, 2012. An add-on called X-Com: Enemy Within was released in Europe on November 15, 2013.
  • 2013: The Bureau: XCOM Declassified
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified is the second game in the new XCOM series and was released on October 15, 2013 for PC, Playstation 3 and XBOX 360. It is not a remake, but has a completely new story. The game was designed as a third-person shooter and is based on the Unreal Engine . The Bureau is set in 1962.
There are three DLCs for the game:
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified - Light Plasma Pistol
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified - Code Breakers
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified - Hangar 6 R&D
XCOM 2 is the third game in the XCOM game series launched by Firaxis in 2012. The game was released on February 5, 2016 and received some high ratings for the PC version. It continues the story from the first part and tells the events of the human resistance struggle twenty years after the start of the alien invasion and the defeat of mankind. The task is to regroup the resistance against the occupiers, whereby unlike in the predecessor, covert action is in the foreground. The central role is played by the Avenger , a captured alien support ship from which the guerrilla fight is organized. While its predecessor XCOM: Enemy Unknown and its add-on were also released for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 consoles, the development work of XCOM 2 concentrated exclusively on the PC platform. Versions for the current consoles XBox One and Playstation 4 at the time of release were not initially planned, but were submitted on September 30, 2016.
Not published or only projected
  • X-COM: Genesis
  • X-COM: Alliance - follow-up project for X-COM: Enforcer
  • X-COM: Colonization - a prequel to the Ethereal Genesis story, now discontinued

Other adaptations

On June 1, 2015, Eric M. Lang developed a board game under the name XCOM: The Board Game for up to 4 players and launched it by the publishers Firaxis Games , 2K Games , Heidelberger Spieleverlag and Fantasy Flight Games . There is a mobile app for the board game, which acts as a coordinator of the alien invasion and also serves as a teaching aid and rule reference work for the player. As an alternative to the mobile app, an online tool can also be used on the laptop or desktop PC, so the game can also be played without a smartphone or tablet.

Unofficial offshoots or clones

Screenshot of UFO: Alien Invasion , a fan remake of the X-COM series

Between 2003 and 2007, Cenega released UFO: Aftermath , UFO: Aftershock and UFO: Afterlight, a commercial series of games based on the principle of the X-COM series.

In addition to the many commercial clones and offshoots based on X-COM , there are also several open source projects, some of which are aimed at a continuation, and some are aimed at creating a new one. With openXcom an open source clone was released that needs files from the original game UFO: Enemy Unknown , but can be adapted with mods. The implementation of X-COM: Terror from the Deep in openXcom is possible with the current Nightlies updates from openXcom . A 3D fan remake of the game has been released under the name UFO: Alien Invasion .

In 2011, fan-generated unofficial ARM versions of X-Com: Ufo Defense and X-Com: Terror From The Deep through reverse engineering and static recompilation became available for the Pandora handheld.

In 2014, Goldhawk Interactive published the game Xenonauts , which has great playful similarities to the beginnings of the X-COM series.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Dan Adams, Steve Butts, Charles Onyett: Top 25 PC Games of All Time - Dear Lord, what have we gotten ourselves into? ( English ) ign.com. March 16, 2007. Retrieved May 16, 2011: "# 1 X-COM: UFO Defense"
  2. ↑ Edge editorial team: The Making of: X-COM: Enemy Unknown ( English ) In: Edge magazine . Future plc. May 15, 2009. Archived from the original on October 26, 2011. Retrieved on April 8, 2011.
  3. ↑ a b c Classic Games Postmortem - XCOM: UFO Defense - Presentation by Julian Gollop ( English ) In: Game Developers Conference . GameSpot . March 28, 2013. Retrieved November 23, 2013.
  4. ↑ UFO 1.4 February 1995 (English)
  5. ↑ Zombie / Bomb Bloke: Combo X-COM Game Folder Patch ( en ) strategycore.co.uk. March 1, 2010. Retrieved July 1, 2011: “ Fixes a number of problems dealing with the TERRAIN, MAPS and ROUTES game folders all wrapped up into one package. This is not meant to be a mod of the game folders but rather an update of what was intended by the original programmers. "
  6. ↑ XcomUtil 9.7 […] adds new features and squashes many bugs. (2013, English)
  7. ↑ X-Com - Known Bugs on ufopaedia.org (English)
  8. ↑ Chris Remo: Irrational Games Developing X-COM Title? . shacknews.com. February 17, 2007. Retrieved May 16, 2011.
  9. ↑ Trademark Assignment Details Reel / Frame: 3102/0242 . United States Patent and Trademark Office. December 6, 2005. Retrieved May 16, 2011.
  10. ↑ Volker Weitz: Invasion of the Vega - UFO: Enemy Unknown . In: PowerPlay 5/94 . kultboy.com. Pp. 24-25. Accessed April 2, 2011: " 86% "
  11. ↑ X-COM: UFO Defense - Release dates (on mobygames.com) accessed January 6, 2010.
  12. ↑ The Lazar Tape ( Memento of the original from December 10, 2004 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. - Video transcript (1991)  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.freezone.de
  13. ^ Frank Heukemes: X-Com Terror from the Deep . In: PowerPlay 5/95 . kultboy.com. Accessed April 2, 2011: " 91% "
  14. ↑ XCOM: Enemy Unknown , Official website of XCOM: Enemy Unknown
  15. ↑ http://www.gameinformer.com/p/xcom.aspx
  16. ↑ http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/xcom-enemy-unknown/1224797p1.html
  17. ↑ Release info on IGN
  18. ↑ http://www.2kgames.com/blog/xcom-enemy-unknown-release-date-special-edition-and-more
  19. ↑ http://www.pcgames.de/Xcom-Enemy-Unknown-PC-239089/News/XCOM-Enemy-Within-in-der-Gamescom-Vorschau-Starke-Erweiterung-mit-tollen-Neuerungen-1084927/
  20. ↑ XCOM 2 , Official website of XCOM 2
  21. ↑ http://www.pcgames.de/XCOM-2-Spiel-55610/Tests/Video-Review-mit-WANY-Besser-als-Enemy-Unknown-1184854/ test with evaluation
  22. ↑ X-COM Colonization Interview Interview on StrategyCore.co.uk (August 25, 2006)
  23. ↑ Heidelberger Spieleverlag - XCOM: The board game
  24. ↑ openXcom About (English)
  25. ↑ M-HT: X-Com: UFO Defense ( English ) July 18, 2011. Archived from the original on August 9, 2014. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved on August 8, 2014: “ […] finished porting my static recompilation of X-COM: UFO Defense to Pandora. " @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.gp32x.com
  26. ↑ M-HT: X-Com: Terror from the Deep ( English ) July 31, 2011. Archived from the original on August 9, 2014. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved on August 8, 2014: “ I finished porting my static recompilation of X-COM: Terror from the Deep to Pandora. " @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.gp32x.com
X-COM -Spielereihe
X-COM range

UFO: Enemy Unknown  • X-COM: Terror from the Deep  • X-COM: Apocalypse  • X-COM: Interceptor  • X-COM: Enforcer 

XCOM range

XCOM: Enemy Unknown  • The Bureau: XCOM Declassified  • XCOM 2  • XCOM: Chimera Squad 

further offshoots

X-COM: Email Game  • XCOM: The board game