The Game Most Like X-com

[Hyper_Barret]

I may be wrong and there may be others, (if there are then I haven't come across any), but the game most like X-COM (UFO and TFTD) is a game called Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate. Ok, there isn't much in the way of base management (as you're on board an Imperial ship in space) but you can select equipment, psyker abilities etc.

 

Ok now as for the battlescape - which I know is why a lot of you guys love the X-COM games, Chaos Gate is virtually identical. There is very little difference at all. Other than the fact that your troops are Ultramarines with armour - so you don't usually die in one hit (but then in X-COM when you get the good armour you dont usually either). You have action points/time units - you can run, walk, crouch, go on overwatch. The games are so alike. The animation is really nice as well, your guys take aim and fire, they say cool things, and the hand to hand is really good as well. Anyone who likes turn-based, squad-based tactical combat, where you have around 5 - 15 troops, can have more or less as well - then you should play this game because you will like it. I think X-COM is probably harder, and the AI is more advanced, but hey, this game is a lot like it, and I haven't tried the other difficulties yet.

 

Also there is a scenario maker - so once you've done the campaign missions, and you dont want to do random scenrios, you can make your own, with full terrain editors and everything. It really is an underrated and relatively unheard of game, but it's the closest thing to X-COM i've ever played - as we all know games like X-COM arent very common. Well here's one, and it rocks.

[Snakeman]

I've heard of Warhammer, but confess I've never seen it or played it yet. I do remember a couple games (I think they're the same game universe, not sure), one called Battletech which was a top-down affair, and one which I thought was the first Mechwarrior (first person robot fights).

 

The second one I liked the best, I liked buying and modifying my mechs.

[[Blehm 98]]

well, Rebelstar: Tactical Command i believe is probably the most X-comlike game there is... It was made by the Gallop brothers and they purposely tried to make it like X-com so...

[Panzeh]

Jagged Alliance 2 is pretty similar.

[X-Op. Nicolai]

Yeah I played Warhammer, its more like Command and Conquer in a way when I played it. Im looking for games that are turn-based like X-Com. Chess and Checkers dont count . And where they stepped it up a notch to where you can add in cool features like Proximity Mines/Nades or mind control capabilities. X-Com 2? I havent played Apacolypse yet, for some reason my computer is being gay or the game is just too old.

[Snakeman]

I hate to bring it up too, but since you mention it - Does anyone know if there have been more than one incarnation or sequels to Battle Chess?

 

I loved what they did every time a chess piece took down another, they show these fight animations. Not very many of them but it was entertaining. I feel ashamed to admit it, but I actually learned how to play chess by playing this game against the computer.

 

Every time you selected a piece to move, then hovered your cursor on spaces on the board, it would highlight where you can move that selected piece. Considering how different each one can move I thought that was a great way to learn - AND you got to see violence!

[Ente-X]

Yeah I played Warhammer, its more like Command and Conquer in a way when I played it. Im looking for games that are turn-based like X-Com.

 

Just to clear it up, I think you're talking about the moderately recent Warhammer Dawn of War. That is very much a RTS clone. He's talking about Chaos Gate. I, too, have and loved that game. It is very much like X-COM on the battlefield. I do have to confess to using the medic exploit Your medic heals an amount of health equal to the amount of remaining time units. But each distinct application of healing gives you a set amount of experience. So...you spin around by the wounded Marine, leaving yourself with 1 time unit left and heal him. One point at a time. Very slow and cheesy, but you would end up with Super Medic ROFL

 

I also have somewhere Final Liberation, which was another Warhammer 40k-based game, but more of a unit-based game, but with an overall planetary map. Well, it was fun, but not as engrossing as Chaos Gate.

[Sir Crashalot]

Chaos Gate is ok though it`s a little clunky in this day and age.

 

It feels like a cross between Xcom and Fallout Tacticsd as the campaign maps are all premade and preset.

 

Unfortunately it doesn`t have the appeal and replayability of Xcom due to the limited amount of different items in the game and it`s very linear.

Edited August 30, 2006 by Sir Crashalot

[Ente-X]

No argument there. It definitely did not generate the "itch" to play again, that X-COM has But it was fun.

[Elros]

Fallout Tactics is almost identical to apocalypse's battlescape in terms of gameplay (obviously the style it's presented in is incredibly different), just with more structured objectives. It's a pity all the battles take so long in it when playing TB

[Sorrow]

No. It didn't have a very important thing - a destructible terrain. Also, grenades were pretty horribly done.

[Elros]

Those are good points. I started playing XCom having heard it was the main influence for FT and it was quite a revelation when I blew up my first petrol station. My upbringing on FT is probably also why I've only just started to use grenades to full effect.

 

BOOM in both cases.

[Sorrow]

Heh...

Gameplaywise FT is inferior to X-Com and Jagged Alliance 2. It has better graphics thought, but at the price of terrain interaction.

[Elros]

I won't dispute that. I got Xcom halfway through the FT campaign and haven't gone back.

 

I did like being able to use the SPECIAL system, though.

[Dynatos]

Vandal Hearts for PSX had very similar turn based battles. Only problem is that the entire game was only turn based battles.

[Sectoid Navigator 22]

Don't shoot me here, but I LOVED UFo Aftermath. It had the same creepy feeling as the original, combined with the tough tough aliens that you need to outwit to kill. I also loved the Transgenants. They had a kind of, I am Legend feel about them. I think it got rid of the most irritating parts of X-Com (money largely, your the last hope of mankind and your bank manager suddenly decides you can't have that Firestorm you need, so Earth falls, yeah, right. Realistic though I suppose. Even when Earth is screwed people still try to make a quick buck). and enhanced the best parts (soldier training, base capture).

 

I was sad when it ended though, it was just tooo similar to X-Com in the end. But, the buildup was great.

[Torgen]

So, is there any modern game out there that has destructible terrain and the "X-Com feel" to it, that's worth spending money on? As has been said forty million times before, I'd LOVE an updated X-com, with 3D and taking advantage of today's computers, but keeps the feel of the original. I actually spent $150 for the Torque Game Engine and started recruiting people to start a game development company to make an updated X-Com, but then the company I worked for went out of business and I've been scrambling to find full time work ever since.

[Zombie]

UFO: Extraterrestrials is supposedly pretty good. But some have said it falls short in that "X-COM feel" department. Might want to give it a whirl nonetheless.

 

- Zombie

[Torgen]

Read up on it, and from what I gather, while the original game wasn't all that great, the mod community has polished it up some. I grabbed a copy off of eBay, and will check out the mod community.

 

Thanks!

[[stewart]]

You're all gonna hate this answer but the game most like XCOM is XCOM 2.

[Torgen]

I have Xcom 2 installed, but have never played it. I downloaded f0dders fix for it, but when I run it, it wants me to pick the exe target, then I get a "patch code timed out" error, and still have garbled video.

[Snakeman]

One of the games in my rotation at the moment is Company of Heroes. Its no where near X-COM, but some things I like about it: destructible terrain, unit management (no longer have to concentrate on one soldier since they come in small squads, and hot keys to manage), engineer units. The engineer units are the bane of my existence simply because you wind up spending a good deal of time building defenses like tank traps, sand bag forts, barbed wire fencing etc. I wouldn't trade 'em for anything, although I'd love to see them improve them by including some defense building shapes in their build menu so you could do things a little more on the fly with those.

 

I figure if those cats can come with a sci-fi twist to this sort of engine, all they'd need are a couple of unit types to update the time period a bit (i.e. like flying transports for the battlefield), skins for those units, a Geoscape, and base building. Bases are in that game, but you build it on a per battle map basis.

 

My only major fault with that game is how mods were managed. Quite a shambles between all the various patches for the game. Every time the world builder editor was updated, it affected mods as well as maps. Its kept me from getting the expansion, since to my understanding, installing it would mess up any mods that worked with previous pathes.

[Torgen]

Checking back in, and I have to say that UFO:ET with Bman's Mod is great fun! The mod cures a lot of the things that were wrong with the standard game, and I'm having a great time. Cash is a HUGE problem, but the mod allows you to set bounty on aliens killed, and that is the only thing that keeps me solvent. One frustrating part was the inability to research alien weapon tech, but I read on a forum that I have to capture a live commander and force it to talk to learn the secrets of Eleriu- uh, the source of the aliens' power.

 

I've restarted twice after overextending myself early on. My last game, I had just entered the second era/phase, where alien cruisers start showing up, and my scientists come up with plans for a new fighter craft using captured alien alloys and power sources.

[Draxo]

UFO: Aftermath was the most X-Comish game I played, it had a similar feel and I loved it.

 

However half way through, it jumps the shark. Suddenly, every enemy from little Sectoids to lumbering morelmen ALL carry rocket launchers.

 

Suddenly, the game is not fun any more. You spend all your missions clciking pause and making your men run left right and centre like headless chicken because everything is shooting rocket launchers at you.

 

I don't mind making my men dodge the occasional rocket, but when every enemy is shooting the at you it grows old and annoying fast, and breaks immersion.

 

I waited for someone to make a fan patch for that for ages.. then gave up hope and on the game.

[Karstedt]

Silent Storm was probably the best turn based tactical engine made to date. It's WWII with a sci-fi twist though, not alien invasion. A few funky things with soldier development, a fairly linear campaign, poor distribution, and an EXTREMELY difficult expansion really hindered it's popularity though. When I played it, I hoped so much that they would take that engine and remake X-Com. But if you like turn based tactical combat, give it a try. I loved it, and there are quite a few mods that iron out some of the quirky stuff.