XCOM

Chances are you never played the X-COM series. Some of you may have never even heard of the series until recently. And that, my friends, is what I call an injustice.

X-COM is a series dealing in the popular alien invasion sci-fi topic, and is known for delivering players a great deal of unique gameplay options and pushing the boundaries of what a tactical game could accomplish in the 90’s.

A Brief History
The X-COM series originated in 1994 with the release of UFO: Enemy Unknown (later released under the X-COM moniker) and was critically and commercially successful. In fact, the title constantly tops lists of the world best video games even to this day.

Following the success of the first game, the series went on to consist of a further four games, the tactical style slightly shifting towards more conventional strategy gameplay. Originally developed by MicroProse, the X-COM brand swapped hands more than a few times and essentially died under the ownership of Hasbro Interactive in 2001.

In 2005, Atari Inc. sold Take-Two Interactive a handful of Intellectual Property rights, including the famed X-COM name. Which they acquired after purchasing Hasbro Interactive in 2001.

Revival of a Legend
Now, in 2011, 10 years since we were last delivered an X-COM title, we are finally getting a worthy successor to the series. Being developed by 2K Marin, the team behind last year’s Bioshock 2, the new game is throwing convention and titles dash out of the window with XCOM.

XCOM is a primarily a First-Person Shooter, a genre greatly different than anything the series delivered previously. While this is quite worrying for long-time fans, many of whom want an experience closer to the original game, 2K has promised to keep and stay close to some of the games original themes, such as a heavy reliance on investigation and the helplessness players have against the alien threat.

Taking the role of an FBI agent assigned to investigate and eliminate the extraterrestrial invaders, players will have to use a mix of cunning, firepower and technology to overcome the odds. While there is little information about gameplay itself, it’s suspected that players will be able to upgrade and cross-customise weaponry and gadgets with the alien technology they will be objected to obtain throughout the game. You will have to adapt and continually upgrade your arsenal to defeat the alien threat during the campaign, giving the game some overlaying RPG elements.

The game hopes to create a sense of tension and danger through its first person perspective, which will help deliver the combat experience 2K Marin want to incorporate, and are known for, into the games other elements, such as the strategic planning and tactical play needed to survive.

How will you defeat Earths’ greatest threat?

A new era, a new look
XCOM is already looking rather dashing. Using a unique design style and visual representation of a 1950’s era American, the title is standing out from the usual batch of FPS games. Characters have exaggerated features and the suburban areas we’ve seen all look like the 50’s American dream; the white picket fence, the beautiful stay at home wife, clean air, green grass and perfect neighbours. Oh, and Aliens.

The aliens in XCOM are being kept under wraps at the moment, but so far we’ve seen a few examples of what we’ll be facing. Primarily a crazy, jumping, black goo that spread faster than illegal substances at a summer music festival, and looks just as inviting. Assuming said substances look as inviting as black death launching itself at helpless civilians and creeping its way at you as you rapidly unleash a hail of lead into it. What, never been to a music festival in Australia?

Aside from the black goo of doom though, we haven’t seen much in terms of opposition. There was however, a greatly intimidating alien weapon taking the shape of a large rectangular box, with the power to suck up and obliterate the surroundings and even shoot what look to be large balls of death housing the same power. What real, in-game threat these will pose is still unknown and whether or not they will be given the scripted solution is still speculation at best.

XCOM has an expected release of late 2011, and is expected to be exclusive to the Xbox 360 and Microsoft Windows. Stay tuned for further details of Take-Two’s XCOM when they break.