xcom is going to be great! TO BAD I:M OUT OF MONEY!

I guess instead of groceries, I'll be buying a game. I'll be hungry, yet oh so happy.

The thing is that there's an overwhelmingly large possibility that the FPS would be a generic boring shooter with the XCOM name plastered on it and nothing more. So no one would be actually be happy, fans or newcomers. That being said, I have no opinion on this myself, since I never played the original. Just stating a line of thought.

The new one does look sweet though, I will be checking it out eventually.

Dear Ktchong.
Sure, I agree that soldiers eventually do specialize in certain areas. But in X-Com games (IIRC), it's said in the manual that those rookies are a chosen bunch from special forces of various contries worldwide. But considering how much room the series give them for improvement, they look like real rookies that have just left the basic training. Meaning - they might not have yet discovered their talents. And it's perfectly fine by me.
I don't like dictating the player how he should play the game. This is a common thing that isn't limited to modern computer games only, but reaches even beyond them, to say, monitor manufacturers, who know better than their customers and enforce them to buy the shitty reflective displays, because of some f***** great experience that supposed to come from vivid colours of their great (glare) LCD screens.
Having average (in all aspects of combat) an not classified to certain roles soldiers, does not hinder the "strategic consideration". It enhances it. What if Firaxis reduced the number of recruitable soldiers as it is in UFO: Alien Invasion for example? What if you have only, say, five recruits to hire in the initial month and their classes are either (pesimistic case:) predetermined by the game producer, like three riflemen + one machinegunner + one marksman, or is (in optimistic case:) pretty random and you get four heavy weapon specialists and one rifleman in your game (=bad luck!).
CASE 1: Limited recruits per month, specialization determined by Game Producer or random:
What a great "strategic consideration" you have. You are a commander of a GLOBAL defence force, having access to EVERY single grunt or officer within the ranks of every country's military force, and not only you get only five (or x - limited) bloody soldiers, but also they're specialized in areas you don't want them to be. You wanted to employ a shock squad consisting of ten troops? Like nine riflemen and one machinegunner for support? Or perhaps for this particular mission four riflemen and one marksman would be enough? Or if it's a defence mission, perhaps you should employ a force of four machinegunners and eight riflemen? Bad luck, because you have this marksmen (or sniper, yay!) in your time who can't do shit with the AR (or better - is penalized when using other weapons! Hah seen this once in some game) and only four other troops defined by the mission creator.
CASE 2: Unlimited recruits, specialization randomized.
You calmly complete your team from rookies from all over the world. You arm them the way you like (partly by looking at their, slightly different, initial statistics, partly by your own preference), you buckle them up and launch the Skyranger. Some of your troops won't come back, but some will begin to specialize in a certain area (depending on what weapon you gave them) or... perhaps they suck with the weapon you gave them and won't improve in it a bit (additional depth level). In the latter case, you'd try to find a purpose for this trooper (like assign him a different weapon class or whatever - perhaps he sucks in everything).
The thing is, you've got a total freedom in what tactics you use in your missions and it's not hindered by some stupid classes system. And frackin' perks!
Oh, and about perks.... Haven't you noticed how unnaturaly and superhumanly they affected the team in UFO (A/A/A) series? Reloading weapon in a fracture of a second and shit? Heh...

P.S. Somebody said about the X-Com game being made by fans is a good thing. I'm sceptical about it. In my life, I've seen far too many productions, be it computer games or films, that supposed to be made by so-called fans, but turned out to be disasters for real fans (=the people who praised the original creations). Be it Fallout 3, Star Wars-or-The Thing prequels.
Action/death or whatever they call it-camera thing. We had it in Fallout 3 and it grew old very fast. Tactical strategy, like X-Com/UFO, should not have it as it has hundreds of missions. Just imagine how tiring the close-up of an, be it alien or human, character being killed might be. And most of the UFOs don't comprise of a single alien, no (except for a scout UFO that is). So it's like ca. 5-10 aliens, multiplied by... how many missions...? 100-200? That gives like, 500-2000 close-up death cams (plus those from the X-com operatives killed), not to mention shooting cams... Ugh.... I'm out. I think I'll pass and pick Xenonauts instead.

You know you can turn those off right, along with the third-person shooting cam? You can play the entire game from the top-down isometric view.

On recruits, the game is confirmed to have a Barracks capable of holding up to 99 recruits. Your only limit in filling it is in how much credits you can afford to pour down buying rookies (or squaddies with already-assigned squads, if you have the relevant Officer Training upgrade).

Finally, on perks they're only overpowered if done wrong. So far from the perks we've seen so far, they don't appear to be that way. Some of the abilities that look powerful (like Snap Shot, which allows Sniper Rifles to be shot after moving) have a corresponding weakness (reduced accuracy), and you have to forsake one perk for another equally appealing one (in this case Squad Sight, which allows snipers to shoot any enemy within visual range of an ally no matter how far). Also, the move & shoot system naturally limits how powerful these perks can get, meaning that tactical consideration is still required to use them to their full potential.

Holy crap. I'm not hurting my eyes to read your big wall of cluttered text. Learn how to use spacing and paragraphs for goodness sake.

spoken like a true jerk. his long paragraph was very inciteful.

Inciteful?

So... did you mean insightful (meaning it's filled with insight) or incite-ful (which is not a word, but I suppose if it was, it would mean it's intended to incite a response)?

Either way, I don't care much for the "insight" of people who do not how to properly use spaces or paragraphs or people who can't spell.

you wont have as many friends if you do that my friend! try being nice to people, they will like you more and you will find yourself happier and more fullfilled.

you have just insulted a large percentage of the population of earth, plus there are lots of people who just plain don't like rude people. I'm sure your a great guy! you have a lot of potential you just got to work on your people skills a little!

The glam cams are a toggle in the settings menu, you can switch em off.

I don't see the appeal of Xenonauts. The point of a slavish recreation of an original is lost on me.

Before new xcom ,try UFO: Extraterrestrials http://store.steampowered.com/app/37030/

Mods: http://ufo-scene.com/plugins/forum/forum_viewforum.php?10

With mods game is very good and hard.

"Firaxis stops by to show off the latest for XCOM: Enemy Unknown. Stream starts Sept. 24th at 10am PDT!"

http://asia.gamespot.com/shows/now-playing/?event=xcom_eu20120924

Far as I know that link is to where the feed will be playing. My Google-fu makes me think that's 6,5 hours from now, but don't take my word on that >.>

Preloaded, 6 more days to go :/

I got the US version pre-ordered. When will I be able to play? US or Europe release date?

EU date (12) steam check region from you play not where you buy game.