Episode 4 – X-Com
May 11, 2012Hey there Blockers!
Welcome to episode 4. This time we’re looking at our first turn-based strategy game series, X-Com.
To start, the news: Two Kickstarter projects that have come out since the last show. The first one belongs to Jane Jensen, of Gabriel Knight fame. The second is huge news for me as it’s being put on by the creators of Space Quest! Check it out, it’s looking pretty cool. I update everyone on the DOS gaming box project and finally we listen to a voicemail about last show’s topic, SimCity.
Then, the main topic: 1994’s X-Com: UFO Defense (a.k.a. UFO: Enemy Unknown). We cover all the usual suspects for this unique game, story, gameplay, graphics/sound, development story and some opinions about the first game and the series in general.
Hope you all enjoy!
Next week, a much-demanded topic: Space Quest!
Stream the show live:
Direct download:
http://umbcast.com/podcast/004-UMBCast-X-Com.mp3
[…] topic, XCOM: Enemy Unknown. I don’t cover the history of the whole series, I do that back in episode 4. I try to keep to the standard format as much as possible, we talk genre, story, gameplay ad dev […]
Ah, the infamous X-Com! This was definitely an interesting podcast for me, because this was the first game I hadn’t played “back in the day”, and which I still haven’t played to this day (I intend to remedy that after a fashion, X-COM: Enemy Unknown is sitting on my pile). So of course, I approached this episode with a very different mindset, and an utter lack of rose-tinged glasses. You certainly don’t differ from what I’ve heard, it’s that the game is generally unforgiving, and quite difficult when you don’t know what you’re doing. Oh for the days of inch thick manuals! 🙂 Anyhow, I still really enjoyed this episode, particularly the segment of sound design in the game, was really well done!
I had never played or even heard of X-Com until recently, but this game is surely one I would have sunk hours into if I had it back in the day. Of course with the modern re-tellings coming out, it has re-sparked interest (I bought enemy unknown for my android tablet, but haven’t had time to play it yet) and it is a good thing the new ones are generating positive buzz. Another modern retelling game that came out a little while ago is Xenonauts, it kickstarted and funded before the Firaxis version was announced – but does a great job at emulating the the original.