I finally picked this game up after Christmas and have been playing it quite a bit since. This is the type of game who will take some time to get a really solid impression of, so I wanted to spend a few hours before I tried to come up with a conclusion. I’m a big fan of the original XCOM series, even though I didn’t play the original that much and spent the most time with Terror from the deep and Apocalypse. The problem with a remake of a great game is that you want the same game, but at the same time, you want something new. I think this game, overall makes agood job of recreating the original feel of the gmae, even if parts of it feels a bit dumbed down. Overall, There’s also some limitations in the gameplay that annoys me a bit; for instance, you can’t deal with multiple alien attacks at once, even if you had the resources to do so. You have to pick one abduction site and the areas you don’t pick with suffer from increased panic levels and eventually withdraw their support for XCOM. I should also mention the “dumbing down” in the tactical department. In the original, your squad member had action points. IN this one, every squad member has 2 actions per turn, and you have to plan your movement accordingly. If I remember correctly, you also had an inventory in the original game, something that doesn’t exist now. Well, it does exists but there’s now way to change anything during a mission.
Graphics
The graphics are good enough for a strategy gmae. SOme of the graphics are quite impressive and the tactical map is good enough.
Audio
The sound effects in the are good and I in my openion the music is excelent. The voice-overs are generally good, even though the one liners from your squad tend to get a bit repetitive after a while.
User interface
You’ll likely learn everything about the UI in a few minutes. It’s quite simple and you’ll learn how to access everything quickly. At your base, you’ll reach everything in a few clicks and the menus are intuitive. Same goes for the missions. You’ll do everything with one or two clicks or a hotkey.
Gameplay
THe gameplay consists or two parts: The base management part and the missions. The base management part has a decent dept to it, even though there could be more. You basically decide wiath to build, what soldiers to hire, where to place satelites and what to research. I felt the original series had a bit more depth here, This is also true for the missions. Now you pick your squad, pick their equipment and head out to the abduction site or UFO crash site. WHile in the mission, you are stuck with your choices. THis can cause a bit of trouble when the wring person dies. Let’s say you have one person with a medikit (can revive or stabilize unconsious squad members). If this person dies and one of your other squad members is injured, there’s nothing you can do. If he or she is dying, there’s no way to save him. Same goes for special weapons. There’s also the things I already mentioned about the simplified 2 action turn system. I could go on and on about things I don’t like here, but there’s no point. There is a few things i do like. I play in Iron man mode. THis means you can’t reload if something bad happens to you. THis really forces you to make be careful and plan your decision well. This brings back a lot of the feel and tension from the original game, Some turn based combat is also nice for a change, and overall it’s done pretty well. The game also has an RPG element. Your soldiers will gain experiance and promotions over time and you’ll have to pick the right skills for each of them. I should mention the different classes I guess. There are 4 classes in the game, each with a different set of skills. They usually obtain their first skill after their first kill, when they get their first promotion to squadie. The classes are assault (speaks for itself), support (SMoke granades, supression and stuff like that), heavy (well, heavy weapons :)) and sniper. It’s usually a good thing to have all of these in your squad for every mission.
Conclusion
In spite of it’s flaws. This is a really good remake of one of the best game series ever. As mentioned I played Terror from the deep more, and wouldn’t mind if they made a simular thing with that game. Not sure it’s wort the full price, but if you’re reading this, it’s probably because you see this game on sale somewhere, and you should definitely pick it up.