Rating: 
Summary: Moderate Anticapation
Review: After having played it for 20 hours or so I must say my impressions are not that far off from my projections before it was released.The move to real-time was not an issue, the did handle it much like the Baulder's Gate Series, which handled real time play very well. The update to a new 3D engine is nice, but the 3D graphics do look pretty basic (to me, especially the character portraits). The strategic game is streamlined as I though it would be, each new section you capture alows you to create a new base, one of several types. You get hit with more missions than your one assualt chopper can handle, and the intercept missions don't have even the limited choices of the older X-Com series. Th research i funky with some things that should be under research under engineering. Biomass is better balanced with the 1.2 patch. And I'll cede that the game is not nearly as bad as Abomination in the strategic portion The tactical combat is fairly ok. It does not include any of the immersive elements I liked about the X-Com series. There is no multi level maps, getting on a roof adn snipering a alien is not a option. It also lacks tha ability to enter buildings that X-Com had which really created a dynaimic and tense battle play. For some hunting down that last alien in this varied enviroment was a pain, but for For me this is one of the things that made the original X-COM so unique and engaging. A complex environment that shifted fluidly between street fire fights and room to room sweeps. X-Com surpassed any other game at the time with providing an experience that felt a living city/world. The only thing I felt that was missing from the original were Cops and armed pedistrians running around fighting along side you in cities and farm animals drawing alien fire in the farmlands. The developer was also the creator of Original War which was one of my favorite RTS tactical games, and I'll give them credit it's pretty good game, but not anywhere near the classic titles. UFO wasn't nearly as ambitous as the old X-Com trilogy of games, and does lack the complex and robust levels of the orginal series. UFO does have'gamey' elements, and X-Com had much more of a Sim feel with you managing the repulsion of a alien invasion. On the flip side, I do like the premise better in the game, the previous series faltered a bit with tentative alien invaders giving their victims too much time to mount a defence, the story of UFO seems much more plausable. It does lack the feel of living cities and civillans running around and getting in your way, but the game has a great theme and tense in it's own gamey way. Good game and I think the review out there that average in the mid seventy percent are on the money. Beware bugs and copy protection issues, the former are reduced with latest patch but I've still had a number of desktop crashes, adn actualy had to reinstall the game once. :(
Rating: 
Summary: X-Com Rules Supreme
Review: Call it X-Com 4 I guess, but as usual, I was impressed. Loved it, loved it, loved it. Why they don't make more X-Com games, I'll never understand.
Rating: 
Summary: UFO: AFTERSPLASH
Review: Don't buy this game if you are looking for the old UFO Defence/Enemy Unknown magic... because it just isn't there. If you didn't know the old UFO games. Well try and buy this one and have a flat experience of a game that could be much more layered.
I'm sorry, I know the guys who made this game made a valiant effort for it, but it just doesn't work. Very important! DOWNLOAD the demo first and see what you make of it. My patience with this game was killed after 5 hours of gameplay, and here's why:
1st crash: in the bloody configuration right after installation!(the 1.2 patch fixed that though so not so bad)
2nd crash: when I use ALT+TAB to check something out or talk with someone on msn while playing (it can have many funny effects) and i'm not talking about a game crash, I'm talking about a full blown Windows 95/98 like crash in my XP that just locked the computer(which millenium are we in again?)
Glitchy graphics: suddenly the Geosphere was covered with the game's logo(!!?) and the soldiers faces looked like they had a bad rash from spores.
Dumb opponents: they might as well apply for a job in a slapstick comedy game instead. These things along with LOOOOONG load times and terrible interfaces completely killed the enthusiam for this game. This game seems completely rushed and unfinished and i'm very surprised something like this is even allowed to be released to the public. The soul this game could have had is lost in the flat gameplay, plot, and interfaces... But the guys who did this will get two stars for trying as well as they could I'm sure and for the brave dream of reviving something dear to a lot of people. But who knows maybe they can make a 750 MB patch that fixes everything... I would hope so.
Rating:
Summary: Wait until you've played it!
Review: Hey! I have a great idea -- why don't you wait until you've PLAYED THE GAME before you REVIEW THE GAME! Idiot.
Rating: 
Summary: No one said this is supposed to be X-Com
Review: I have a hard time seeing how someone can like X-Com and not like this. The play-style is similar to X-Com: Apocolypse in that it is semi-realtime. I find this acceptable because it greatly speeds up gameplay and really puts more tactical decisions in your hands rather than relying on automatic reactions during the enemy's turn, as happened in UFO Defense. I also like that the missions frequently have more defined goals than just "kill everything". I distinctly remember some X-Com missions taking me over an hour just trying to find the one last alien hiding in a closet somewhere. Aftermath missions tend to be more specific (you don't have to kill everything) and even the "kill everything" missions only have you kill about 90% of the enemies before giving you the option to declare it a success (presumedly your backup troops will do the mop-up after your elite team does the majority of the work). I also personally appreciate the pacing of technological advancement. The one thing I never liked in X-Com games was a shortage of real-world weaponry and what you did get was replaced by alien technology almost immediately. In Aftermath you have a great variety of normal human weapons and the desire and ability to replace them with alien weapons occurs much slower. Furthermore, if there is a type of mission you just don't like doing, you can "delegate" it to the regular army. It will be resolved automatically without the use of your team. Obviously you want to use your team where success is vital, but if your team gets shot up or you just don't like to do scouting missions then you can delegate and still have a chance of success. Another change is that you can't enter buildings on a map. When I heard about this I thought it would suck, since entering structures was a predominant feature of X-Com games, but it's really not that bad: where X-Com would have an "urban" map that consisted of a small map and one big building, Aftermath has "urban" maps that consist of city streets and many buildings. Having to enter them would be a time consuming and unnecessary distraction. In the instances where you do need to enter a structure (such as a crashed UFO), it's done as a two-part mission: part one to secure the exterior, part 2 takes you inside. The only thing I can think of that I really miss is in these crashed UFO missions: In X-Com, the crashed UFO had battle damage, including some of the alien crew already being wounded or dead. In Aftermath the ships all seem perfectly intact on the inside with no wounded or dead crew. (I guess the aliens invented better surge protectors and shock absorbers.) One bit of cheese is that you can abort a mission at any time and any upright team members are automatically extracted. This is useful but cheesy: In UFO Defense you had to make it back to your ship to extract your team, in Aftermath you can hit "abort" whenever you want and extract your team in unrealistic circumstances, like just before a big missile is about to kill everyone. But still, overall it's a great game. Where Apocolypse was really taking X-Com into a ridiculous direction with crayola aliens and a bizarre futuristic setting, Aftermath goes back to the roots: guys with machineguns fighting horrible aliens. (Well, eventually you get machineguns, initially you're fighting with pistols, shotguns and grenades! (Hint: Grenades are your friend.))
Rating:
Summary: Good X-Com Game
Review: I have a hard time seeing how someone can like X-Com and not like this. The play-style is similar to X-Com: Apocolypse in that it is semi-realtime. I find this acceptable because it greatly speeds up gameplay and really puts more tactical decisions in your hands rather than relying on automatic reactions during the enemy's turn, as happened in UFO Defense. I also like that the missions frequently have more defined goals than just "kill everything". I distinctly remember some X-Com missions taking me over an hour just trying to find the one last alien hiding in a closet somewhere. Aftermath missions tend to be more specific (you don't have to kill everything) and even the "kill everything" missions only have you kill about 90% of the enemies before giving you the option to declare it a success (presumedly your backup troops will do the mop-up after your elite team does the majority of the work). I also personally appreciate the pacing of technological advancement. The one thing I never liked in X-Com games was a shortage of real-world weaponry and what you did get was replaced by alien technology almost immediately. In Aftermath you have a great variety of normal human weapons and the desire and ability to replace them with alien weapons occurs much slower. Furthermore, if there is a type of mission you just don't like doing, you can "delegate" it to the regular army. It will be resolved automatically without the use of your team. Obviously you want to use your team where success is vital, but if your team gets shot up or you just don't like to do scouting missions then you can delegate and still have a chance of success. Another change is that you can't enter buildings on a map. When I heard about this I thought it would suck, since entering structures was a predominant feature of X-Com games, but it's really not that bad: where X-Com would have an "urban" map that consisted of a small map and one big building, Aftermath has "urban" maps that consist of city streets and many buildings. Having to enter them would be a time consuming and unnecessary distraction. In the instances where you do need to enter a structure (such as a crashed UFO), it's done as a two-part mission: part one to secure the exterior, part 2 takes you inside. The only thing I can think of that I really miss is in these crashed UFO missions: In X-Com, the crashed UFO had battle damage, including some of the alien crew already being wounded or dead. In Aftermath the ships all seem perfectly intact on the inside with no wounded or dead crew. (I guess the aliens invented better surge protectors and shock absorbers.) One bit of cheese is that you can abort a mission at any time and any upright team members are automatically extracted. This is useful but cheesy: In UFO Defense you had to make it back to your ship to extract your team, in Aftermath you can hit "abort" whenever you want and extract your team in unrealistic circumstances, like just before a big missile is about to kill everyone. But still, overall it's a great game. Where Apocolypse was really taking X-Com into a ridiculous direction with crayola aliens and a bizarre futuristic setting, Aftermath goes back to the roots: guys with machineguns fighting horrible aliens. (Well, eventually you get machineguns, initially you're fighting with pistols, shotguns and grenades! (Hint: Grenades are your friend.))
Rating:
Summary: In the Aftermath of Glitches
Review: I have to say, not many games with the title UFO come close to capturing the awsome experience of the original Ufo:Enemy Unknown game made my Micropose, but this one is by far the closest yet. It incorporates crisp graphics and a simple non-micromanageable interface that is loads of fun - WHEN IT WORKS. This is my second day playing the game, and although I havnt had much trouble the first day, the second day was wasted playing catch-up due to fatal excexution errors. (you would think saving often helps... but no. The errors seem to be saved with your files- meaning you have to load a game from hours ago.) My recommendation is to wait until they come up with a COMPREHENSIVE patch (up till now the 1.2 patch is more like a placebo.) Just in case you were wondering, this game would get 5 stars otherwise- but glitches DO effect the playing experience.
Rating: 
Summary: Terrible Dissapointment
Review: I was very excited at the prospect of playing a game similar to the original X-COM games. The X-COM series has forever been my favorite strategy game. So, when I heard about this game, I had to order, even though I saw many negative reviews on it. I must tell you, that I have had this game for over a week and I still have yet to play it. I installed it straight out of the box and it instantly crashed. I was prepared for this, as I had already read the reviews. I then downloaded all the patches, bringing my game version up to 1.3. Guess what? It still crashes and my computer greatly exceeds all the recommended system specifications. A LITTLE RANTING: I have never played a game by Cenega before and I probably will think twice before buying another. This game certainly doesn't speak well for them. If I went to a car dealership and bought a NEW car, I would expect the engine to be in it and be able to drive the car off the lot. Cenega should ensure its games are complete and playable before they release them to the market! Even if it means pushing the release date back. BOTTOM LINE: I can't recommend this game, I haven't even played it! You buy a game for enjoyment and trying to fuss with multiple patches and still not have the game work is NOT enjoyment.
Rating:
Summary: Terrible Dissapointment
Review: I was very excited at the prospect of playing a game similar to the original X-COM games. The X-COM series has forever been my favorite strategy game. So, when I heard about this game, I had to order, even though I saw many negative reviews on it. I must tell you, that I have had this game for over a week and I still have yet to play it. I installed it straight out of the box and it instantly crashed. I was prepared for this, as I had already read the reviews. I then downloaded all the patches, bringing my game version up to 1.3. Guess what? It still crashes and my computer greatly exceeds all the recommended system specifications. A LITTLE RANTING: I have never played a game by Cenega before and I probably will think twice before buying another. This game certainly doesn't speak well for them. If I went to a car dealership and bought a NEW car, I would expect the engine to be in it and be able to drive the car off the lot. Cenega should ensure its games are complete and playable before they release them to the market! Even if it means pushing the release date back. BOTTOM LINE: I can't recommend this game, I haven't even played it! You buy a game for enjoyment and trying to fuss with multiple patches and still not have the game work is NOT enjoyment.
Rating:
Summary: Not worth it.
Review: I would've given it 1 star, but there were a few little touches that were nice. That said, if anybody I knew asked me whether they should buy it, I would definitely say no.
It crashed, and crashed, and crashed. When it wasn't crashing, it would hang for minute after minute, loading, loading...on a machine that has far more than the recommended harware requirements. And when it crashed, it often left the desktop messed up, changing the settings to a lower resolution so that I had to go into Control Panel and reset, then clean up the icons which were now scattered across the screen.
The game play itself had its fun moments, but it was sloooooow. And the voices--man, I wish I could just turn them off. (Maybe I could--I never bothered to find out.) Was it all one guy playing with different accents? The aliens were sometimes quite creepy, but never had any of the charm of the old X-Com.
I give the makers a couple points for trying to keep X-Com alive--it was one of the best games ever and has never had a sequel that came close to measuring up to the original. Unfortunately, this one is even farther from measuring up than most. Thank goodness I was only playing it on a friend's machine--at least I didn't waste any money on this one.
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