September 2nd, 2007
I am a big fan of the XCOM series. Released in 1994 „UFO: Enemy unknown” was never surpassed in playability. If I counted spent hours per game, „Enemy unknown“ and it’s sequel (or expansion) „Terror from the deep“ would be on top. 13 years later there is still no successor on sight, game which can take original idea, improve on it and use current technology to give us even better game.
Apocalypse brought pausable real time system (turn based was also an option) which made the game very different. Missions were much quicker but tactics is simplified. You could mostly win the mission if you just stood in cover and for alien to come. Fortunately, aliens were very different so you had ten beasts requiring different tactic so on hardest levels you could really had some great fights.
There was one more game planed, “Genesis”, but was canceled when publisher shut down the developer’s studio. In the last few years, Altar and Cenega released spiritual successors, UFO Series, which are good games on its own but only so-so when compared to the original games. There are few more attempts to recreate original game, some finished, some in development, fan base is big enough to make profit, somebody just need right components mixed in correct way and voila, you could have game of the year.