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9 years ago
Feature: Golloping along
I know exactly what I'm doing. Including when I screw up. When I screw up in X-COM, I invariably know that I've screwed up long before the results of said screwing-up actually come to pass. My soldier is out of action points and left standing in the open while an alien silently eyeballs him, or a yet-to-explode grenade lands casually at the feet of an…
Feature: Silence is golden
As promised yesterday, here's another chat with XCOM: Enemy Unknown lead dev Jake Solomon. Here it is - and it brings with it particularly glad tidings if, like me, you weren't 100% convinced the slo-motion 'glamcam' killshots and 80s action movie soldier vocals were for you. Turns out we will indeed be able to turn them off in favour of quieter, interruption-free strategising. I'll probably…
Feature: Part Five Of A Three-Part Interview
Two XCOM: Enemy Unknown interviews in (across four huge posts), I'm afraid I'm still nowhere near out of questions. And people are still saying 'why didn't you ask about thing x?' Well, let's do it all over again. Once more, Firaxis' Jake Solomon fields my endless queries about his reboot/remake/reimainging of precious, precious X-COM - and in this first of two parts, we talk about…
Much as I love X-COM and would have as many of its turn-based, slow-scrolling babies as it asked me to, I would have zero hesitation in demanding one important change from it - to change the name of hovering alien foe known as the Floater. No, no, no, NO I'm not going to tell you why. If you don't already know you live an enviably…
It's probably horribly sensationalist to suggest there's a cold war on between Firaxis' XCOM: Enemy Unknown and Goldhawk Interactive's more mechanically purist X-COMlike Xenonauts, but then again it is the battle to end all battles, one shall stand and one shall fall and the Earth itself will be left in smoking ruins by the time this apocalyptic conflict is over. Xenonauts has been smartening itself…
Feature: The never-ending interview
Just in case my three-part, 15,000 word interview with Jake Solomon, lead designer on Firaxis' XCOM: Enemy Unknown, wasn't enough for you, here's a follow-up chat with the effusive main brain behind the X-COM remake. This time, we're finding out about how much soldiers' special abilities define the game, what's been done to ammo and why the perception that this new version only has one…
Here are my words on Firaxis' X-COM remake, here are the lead developer's words, and below, for the first time, is your own chance to eyeball it in glorious technicolour and living motion.
Feature: Cydonia or Sigh-donia?
Last week, I finally got to see XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Firaxis' X-COM remake, with my own failing eyes. I have various things to post about it over the coming days, but let's start with a break down of what made my little belly flutter with excitement and what made my weak jaw clench with anxiety. It's X-COM, but... not. Here's why.
Feature: The enemy of my Enemy
Up until January 5, 2012, the mega-ambitious Xenonauts, Goldhawk Interactive's Cold War-set tale of alien invasion, was our number one hope for a modernised X-COM. Then, on January 5, 2012, 2K and Firaxis announced they were making an official modernised X-COM. We've already chatted to Firaxis about XCOM: Enemy Unknown at length, but what did that shock news mean to Goldhawk lead Chris England? Here,…
You've read an awful lot about XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Firaxis' remake of the original, the legendary X-COM, in our fact'n'theory-fat 13,000 word interview with project lead Jake Solomon here, but the only images we've been able to show you thus far are tiny 600 pixel jobbies you need to squint at to make much out. How cruel we were. But how lovely we now are:…
Feature: Time units, modding, Iron Man Mode and failure
In the third and final (for now) part of my enormo-chat with Firaxis' Jake Solomon, head brain on XCOM: Enemy Unknown, the official remake of the legendary X-COM, we get into the nitty-gritty. To whit: why throw out time units, how the replacement system works, modding support, difficulty, soldier classes, country funding, Julian Gollop, 'ZCOM' and why he feels this new game has to bear…
Feature: Investigating the unknown
In this next chunk of a mammoth chat with XCOM: Enemy Unknown's lead designer at Firaxis Jake Solomon, we talk Chrysalids, the death and critical wounding of your soldiers, the fanbase, why min-maxing X-COM's not all it's cracked up to be, the base, the geoscape and which of the original game's aliens didn't make the cut...
Feature: The origins of a reimagining
They did it. They really did it. As we unexpectedly discovered last month, Firaxis are remaking/reimagining the original X-COM, the 1993 title that is quite rightly often hailed as the greatest game ever made. Recently, I had a long, fascinating and genuinely reassuring chat with XCOM: Enemy Unknown's lead designer and evident fellow X-COM gonk Jake Solomon - in this first of three parts, he…
We'll have a very big chat with the XCOM: Enemy Unknown devs at Firaxis up for you at some point in the next few days, but in the meantime an American magazine has released a few more screenshots of the strategy reimagining of darling old X-COM. The magazine's post also shows off some of the tactics you'll be using, how a battle might play out,…
OK, here we go. Brace for impact. Barricade yourself in your home. An American magazine has just put the first screenshots of the XCOM remake 'reimaginging', some teasy details, plus the vital answers to to whether it's linked to the XCOM shooter and if it's been... altered for consoles. Good news! Well, ish.
Feature: Keeping my enemy close
Firaxis making a new, true X-COM remake is the best gaming news of the year, and I fairly much expect to still be saying that on December 31 2012. Of course, it isn't that simple. There are things this game needs to do, to get right, if it is to be both a successful homage and a successful modern strategy game in its own right.…
EDIT: added Gamersgate deal.Steam's daily deal sees the complete X-COM bundle reduced to £3.05, while the complete pack is £2.49 at Gamersgate. It's as if they think the whole internet is talking about the series. You probably don't want Enforcer and Interceptor but if you don't have them, you almost definitely want the other three. They are £1.01 each on Steam. I still play the…
Night will always follow day, controversy will always follow a highly-anticipated game scoring less than 9/10 on a mainstream videogaming website, and X-COM will always see remakes. Xenonauts is the one to watch at present, of course, but Xenowar caught my attention because it's going for a hyper-stripped down, simplistic, scrappy mini-take on the oft-aped formula.
Feature: X-COM in spirit if not in name
OK, I admit it: I am as cynical as you when it comes to half-suspecting that enormously ambitious, fanbase-courting independent projects announced before work on them has even begun carry the dread stench of vapourware. I've been very interested in Xenonauts for some time, if faintly horrified that lead designer Chris England claims he made the final decision to pour his life savings into funding…
Feature: Irrational's co-founder on the future of immersive sims
Curse our limited-length titles! For this post should really be called something like 'Irrational co-founder and now Blue Manchu boss Jon Chey talks more about his splendid-sounding new PC boardgame/ CCG/ MMO mash-up Card Hunter, how to make free-to-play non-horrible, what he thinks the future might be for immersive sims in the vein of System Shock and his thoughts on his former studio's controversial XCOM…
