I'm not familiar with the UFO games and its connection to XCOM, but I played the latest XCOM: Enemy Unknown and really enjoyed it.

Now I want to give it a try with other aliens strategy games like XCOM: EU. It seems UFO is some kind of predecessor. Which one should I get?

I liked the simple controls and the simple management in XCOM: EU, however its possibilities. So the game shouldn't be too *micro* sensitive. Which UFO is more suitable to me? Are they at all?

UFO:Afterlight is some complex (you have to micro the management of toons, the planet, the base..), that's why I prefer UFO:Aftershock. UFO:Aftermath is good for it's mood and some features, but Aftershock is still better in the whole.
The 'worst' micro in Aftershock is that you may need one (simple) excell sheet, if you have more than height soldiers (I have 12), to plan choosing them their trainings, but you really don't need to use it often, and once your troop is set the sheet becomes useless.

Here's my review of Aftermath that got rejected because it has TOO MANY CHARACTERS (letters) - more than 1500! Apparently GOG doesn't want people using too many of those annoying wordy things. I hope this helps your decision making process.





After Math, The Next Lesson Is Game Design 101.



Taking place in the far distance future of ... um ... 2004 immediately after aliens have wiped out the

overwhelming majority of life on earth, UFO Aftermath was supposed to be a mix of strategy via a global

view central command with real time tactical missions and a somewhat crpg element in regard to control of

tactical teams. In addition to this if you had played this title you would have been required to do research to

advance your cause against the aliens. A seemingly interesting balance of game elements right? Wrong.


So what went wrong? The game was also to advance via the tactical missions. However, poor game balance

blamed partly on an impossible learning curve left this aspect of the title unappealing to the average gamer. What was

leftover for those who did not free themselves from UFO Aftermath after a mission or so was a tedious and repetitive

rut in an unoriginal game with unappealing graphics, amateurish voice acting and no sense of any real point to it.


In addition, a frustrating optional hybrid system could auto-pause the game allowing the player to plan their

next ''move'' before unpausing the game. This was done, perhaps, as an attempt to appease or appeal to the legions

of fans of the venerable turn-based X-Com, some of whom were lead to believe that this clunker was some sort of

''spiritual'' successor to the X-Com series. Indeed, a retro isometric style presentation would have been a better

tribute to X-Com instead of the low grade 3D graphics that look so tediously similar to dozens of other Jim

Crack RTS games of the past decade or two. However, not even that would have saved this pot boiler from

sub-mediocrity. Furthermore the old 1024x768 resolution leaves wide screens half empty. So please, do yourself a

favour today - choose the easy option and just avoid it. {RATING 12%}

Similar to what game? I can't see pc games of your said decades which have a so good trashy mood than UFO-Aftermath. Just see the little intro movie, with its spores and weird mutants: for sure that's not walt dysney nor the toons of UFO-Afterlight (you should prefer it)...
Graphics of Aftermath are happily as bad as needed. This game is not a tribute to X-Com. If you believe this, then you can't like Aftermath, for sure.
If you want one, go see UFO-Extraterrestrials.

"This game is not X-Com, so it's a bad one." Not a good review.

It's not a Cenega UFO game. Its title is for there are UFOs in... It is not named UFO:After-extraterrestrials...
Wait for UFO:ET2, don't buy UFO:ET-Gold for it is starforced, and the base UFO:ET is to be modded (buy and mod it if you can't wait for UFO:ET2).
i wish UFO:ET2 would be released on GOG.
http://www.ufo2extraterrestrials.com/

I have the gold version and that came with mods I just don't like it very much as the rest of the UFO are better and as you tell me not related

I love the old XCOM, and I never finished XCOM Terror from the Deep or XCOM Apocalypse because I never been very happy with the sequels, but actually as I like the last XCOM game I decided to give an oportunity to all them and In a consumist attack I bought all them on STEAM and here in GOG.

So I am actually playing: Xcom Terror from the Deep, I still found it so much worse than the original XCOM, it has many issues, bad balanced gameplay, horrible art direction HORRIBLE, a good Idea for the sequel: UFOs coming from the deeps of the sea but actually really bad done... but anyway the game is enjoyable for the "mistery" of the investigation and because trying to overcome it´s difficulty is a total challenge (probably is 10 times more difficult at the beginning that XCOM) I am in this moment of "I want to complete all UFO games" Hahaha so I just started it a month ago, now I am in the middle of a campaign with this one, actually starting to dominate and enjoy the game finally, with all it´s CRAPPY weapons, impossible situations, huge unbearable and bad done levels, not only outdated but horrible arts and graphics (even when it was released I hated this), and unbalanced things...

Also there is a fantastic MOD to play the old Xcom on windows and in a better way: OPENXCOM I am replaying it with this mod from time to time, not as much as "Terror from the Deep" I think I already finished the old Xcom years ago more than twice.

So there is the "crazy" list of Xcom games I plan to complete in the future:

Xcom Apocalypse (Available on STEAM with the first one and also Terror from the Deep)
UFO: Alien Invasion, a FREE game you can download, based on XCOM and with 3D graphics, looks nice but is like "homemade"
UFO Extraterrestrials (Available on STEAM)
UFO Aftermath, Aftershock and Afterlight, the three UFOs from GOG.

And of course the new XCOM ENEMY UNKNOW

I am waiting for the expansion of this one XCOM Enemy Within to be available at a cheaper price plus XCOM THE BUREU


Also I am waiting the release of XENONAUTS. In fact you can actually play it and buy the BETA of XENONAUTS available on STEAM and it definitively deserves a view, as it looks that can be a GREAT remake for the old XCOM, probably the best one I hope. But I dont like at all the "early access" thing. I want the game to be completed.

And as a final counsel: I should TOTALLY FORGET about XCOM Enforcer is a CRAPPY 3rd person shooter based on the XCOM Universe and also forget about XCOM Interceptor, is better you use your time playing any of the spacesims available here from Wing Commander I to Freespace.

I response to all this I will chime in:

First the Altar UFO:AfterX series are not related to XCOM in any way really other than the idea that humanity is attacked by aliens and we manage to fight back. But unlike XCOM where humans tend to win a lot and lose little, in Aftermath you start off with the majority of Earth decimated by the aliens. Believable. You only have a chance fighting back because most of what is left of the survivors is centered around military installations and military tech, and you actually go to Area 51 for the 'Dreamland Files' to help fight the aliens on top of reverse engineering their technology. This is where Altar was genius, while the aliens will kill you easily with their shields and weapons against your human tech but the game starts you off against mutants, results of the biological agent infecting Earth. This gives you starter enemies that you can take on and win against in the beginning, although you still have to play smart against most of them. Aftershock does the same, until the Cultists show up you are mostly mutant-bashing. In both games once you get used to dealing with the mutants you then go against aliens with similar or better equipment and really need tactical thinking to start pulling through missions. This difficulty scaling let's you get a good start without being as cheesy story-wise as XCOM in letting you kill hi-tech aliens easy right off the bat. UFO: Afterlight starts you off fighting weak aliens and ancient robotic Martian drones.

As for XCOM, we currently have the remake by Firaxis. It's simplified but still quite good really. I only like the first XCOM Enemy Unknown in the older XCOM's. TFTD and that 3rd one did not interest me much at all. TFTD was a good idea, alien sea bases in real life are much more likely since it's easy to hide there and we haven't explored much of the ocean at all. That and the Norwegian Navy has officially documented chasing USO's (unidentified seaborn objects) that were going way faster underwater than anything human then watching this USO go into the air as a UFO, with multiple ships and their crew witnessing it. But, big but, TFTD as mentioned by someone else had terrible artwork and in general the game was just a more difficult rehash of the original. Gauss guns = laser from first game but needed ammo etc. it was same stuff different names. The new XCOM is actually quite good in comparison and has an intuitive cover system. Not a bad game at all, I just wish it'd let you pick what class a solider will be instead of relying on random chance to get the sniper you want.

Xenonauts is pretty much done now, too. This is basically just a modern re-hash of the original XCOM. It's more like the first game than the Firaxis reboot by a large margin. Runs at modern resolution, decent graphics and not expensive. I'd recommend it, and the dev team is still actively patching the game.

UFO:AI is an open source project that has been going on for years and it's in a playable condition now. It's free to download and actually good fun now, but development has been slow since it is free and everyone working on it are volunteers donating their free time to the project. Considering it's a modified version of the old Quake2 engine, it looks really good. New higher-res soldier models are needed but it doesn't look as janky as it used to. This is worth a try for sure.

To sum it up, I'd suggest UFO: Aftermath, UFO: Aftershock, and UFO: Afterlight the most. Aftershock is my favorite by a long shot, it had global management and still had the gritty feel like Aftermath but has more stuff. Aftermath has random generated maps, the 2 others do not. Afterlight is the most modern and runs in widescreen but has the cartooney graphics, and is different as a whole in the geo-screen management but the actual in-game missions still play the same. All 3 are good. By the way UFO: Aftermath was one of my first PC games, I bought it like right when it came out new and it ran so slow I learned I had to get a graphics card upgrade to make it run smoothly. This game specifically led up to me eventually building my first full PC by the time I was 10, that and the gritty military sci-fi has left a major impression on me that I appreciate to this day. Good stuff.

I played Aftermath and Aftershock, no Afterlight.

Aftermath had it's moments but it's not a *very* good game. It's ok though. It's a modern/alternate take on classic xcom with a different tactical combat mode and some improvements (and some failures) The plot/research/storyline progression is very similar which is nice as a nod to xcom but there's some improvements here as well.

Enter Aftershock, that continues from the BAD ending of Aftermath and right away does what way too few xcom-clones ever did. It DITCHES most of what made xcom tick save the desperate struggle of a 'green' squad in tactical engagements against initially overwhelming odds. There is also global management/base managemet but while xcom had the same idea, it is executed completely differently.

Probably the only original departure from xcom in any xcom-clone that was done well (at least up until the release date), and an excellent, excellent game.

Mind you... it's not perfect. much like OP psionic warfare that killed late game in the classic game, Aftershock goes through some balance whiplash itself. At certain times you may find yourself completely and utterly outgunned 'all over again' unless you happen to know a trick or weakness (which you won't in your 1st playthrough). Other times you can decimate opposition with ridiculous ease, yet struggle very badly in a different random engagement.

Not all research paths are of equal value, and going down too many at once is impractical. Sure, drones are fun for some goofing around, and some builds are fantastic for getting enemies out of cover, but they are strictly a support tech and just barely worth the investment. Some techs are just like that... even Cyborg techs kinda lack value, which is strange.

But, technological madness aside, Aftershock is a decently hard game both in management and tactical combat and features interesting enemies, interesting storyline progression, *diplomacy* (in an xcom game???), and most importantly of all, a good athmosphere and feeling of struggle against a world it's inhabitants no longer know. And the sense of discovery as new gameplay elements are introduced, or later on plot twists add much to your desire to keep playing. Squad management and specialisation is also nice to have. Oh hell, i love everything about the game. Even the bugs. I'm just completely biased, so don't trust anything i say.

Easily the best *xcom* game since the original classic until Xenonauts. Xenonauts was more true to the original, but Aftershock's deviation was refreshing and satisfying.

NOTE/Question - This still doesn't work on Intel integrated chips right? It's the only damn shame about the game, that it doesnt work on PCs that have iSeries Intels but no dedicated GFC card.

Once we know the game (after having finished one or two games),
it becomes almost easy and is to be played in the hardest Super-Heroic 4th difficulty level.

When Aftershock was released, Intel graphic cards were for sure not for gamers.
What is a shame is that Intel still didn't adapt their drivers (hardware?) to the games.