Malevolent-Gaming

Steam is doing another crazy sale. This time, you can get all 5 XCom games for $2. Not $2 each, but $2 for all five. So I went for it, and I'm now hard at work researching laser weapons, shooting down UFOs, and generally kicking some alien butt. I've never finished a game of XCom, I always get bogged down when it gets to the point of invading their bases. Maybe I've learned enough strategy now to take them down.

I played UFO Defense and Terror from the Deep when they came out and loved them, although I'm with you about getting bogged down. I too purchased them on Steam, as well as the two game Freedom Force Pack for 2$ and Tropico 3 for $13.

I found TFTD too difficult, since you're stuck fighting with crap weapons underwater and the first couple waves of enemies are pretty tough. UFO Defense has a much better difficulty curve. I just got to February in my game and hired a crapton of scientists and engineers.

how long until they're not available for that price anymore?

Yesterday at 12:01 am. They're $5 each now, or $15 for the set of 5.

I shot down my first large UFO last night, went to bed before starting the recovery mission. I have power armor and plasma weapons, hoping I can get some good loot.

Doh.

I bought XC:UD from a thrift store for $3 recently but I was hoping to get everything in Steam for easy launching. Oh well, guess I'll just have to DOSBOX it instead.


XC:TFTD kicked my ass too. I was horrible at it, and took straight to a save-game editor but that still didn't even help.

Steam uses DOSBox. It is nicely set up though with config files so that you just double click in Steam, and the game runs. It's easy enough to do that yourself with windows shortcuts. I had Master of Orion set up that way last year.

Precisely why I texted you Saturday about the deal.

Is there a way to tweak the DOSBox config files? I bought the Space Quest Collection over Christmas, and after installing it, I realized that not all the games work. I really want to play Space Quest III :\



Hahah, I know. I slept all Saturday. I'm old, weekends are for sleeping.

Yeah, if you look in Steam/steamapps/common/yourgame, it should have the DOSBox stuff in there. Make a backup of dosbox.conf and then edit to your heart's content.

Interestingly, XCom: UFO Defense is set up to emulate a system running at 9 MHz. Because it's emulating a "perfectly efficient" system, i.e. no paging, cache misses, perfect pipelining, etc., this runs the game at about the same speed of my old 386/40. I might bump it up a notch since it performs pretty poorly when you're on the 3rd floor of a crashed UFO with holes in the floors and ceilings.

Speaking of which, that large UFO I shot down was a supply ship. Apparently the aliens have established a base in South America. And conveniently, I've just researched stun bombs, so I might try to go there and capture an alien commander. Or I might just continue shooting down their supply ships and stealing their loot.

It was actually 8 MHz, and I bumped it up to 15. The interface is a lot more responsive now.

That reminds me when our first PC (486/40mhz) had some overheating problem and the CPU would only run at 9mhz. I was a sad panda for about 6 months there.

I finally installed it last night and played for a bit. I never got the chance to play back when it came out so it's all new to me. I learned really fast not to attack aliens until I've researched some new weapons. I bought a laser cannon tank as well so it's on!

When can I research and buy armor? My soldiers are weak sauce.

You can do it with rifles, it's just harder. You also have a heavy cannon and an auto-cannon, both with high explosive rounds. And you have a rocket launcher, too. Sell your small rockets, buy some large and/or incendiary rockets. Give the heavy weapons to your soldiers with high strength, and the rifles to your soldiers with high accuracy. Everyone else becomes your meat shield -- they step around corners, open doors, etc. Definitely recruit at least 2 more soldiers, too, so that you have a full skyranger with 10 soldiers plus a tank.

After you assault a UFO you should have some alien alloys. After researching these you can research Personal Armour (gotta love all the Euro-spellings). If you shoot down a UFO there's a 75% chance that its power source explodes. If you wait for it to land (you can follow it around in your Skyranger for a long time until it lands), you'll always get the power source. Then you can research Elerium and Power Suits (among many other things). Go for medikits once you have armor, since soldiers will have wounds to heal instead of dying in one hit.

Armor is strongest in the front, so try not to get shot in the back.

I've built quite a bit of Laser Rifles and Heavy Lasers. My guys can take down aliens in 1 or 2 hits usually, but as of yet I've only encountered those purple aliens and the ones that look like they walk on all fours. I learned quick to spread out ASAP.

The power sources explain a lot. I didn't realize I had to grab those, and after looting some purps off of dead aliens I realized I needed alien power sources and some weird minerals. Now when I shoot down the UFOs I won't leave them be.

I'm guessing the downside to tanks is that they can't go indoors, right? Why not just get a crap ton of them (other than cost) and roll over everything?

I must have forgotten that I bought the whole X-Com pack for cheap the other day. I can't wait to check this out now. Which one should I start with?

Spreading out is definitely important. Actually, if you start in a corner, you're at a big advantage because the aliens can only shoot you from 2 directions instead of all 4. However, it keeps your units more clumped together. I tend to only bring 6 people out on my first turn if I'm starting in a corner, and just move the other 4 closer to the ramp inside the Skyranger. Some people like to have their guys in back throw smoke grenades before anyone moves, to give cover as you deploy.

You don't need to pick stuff up to loot it. If you kill or subdue all the aliens, all remaining items are automatically collected, including UFO parts. So if you see an unexploded power source, just don't shoot at it.

Tanks can't go inside UFOs, and they take up 4 spots in your Skyranger. Usually 1 tank and 10 soldiers will do the job, but some people prefer 2 tanks and 6 soldiers. 3 tanks and 2 soldiers doesn't give you enough firepower or area coverage IMO. Wait until you can build your own UFOs and you'll get more space to bring more tanks.

Tanks also can't throw flares, which sucks for night missions. Flares are reusable, so just bring 10 on every mission and you'll recollect them at the end. You can also pick up a thrown flare and re-throw it if you need. But I recommend avoiding night missions whenever possible.

You can blow a hole in the side of a UFO, but the only weapon powerful enough is a Blaster Launcher (which is a guided missile with waypoints... pretty awesome). You won't find Blaster Launchers until you assault an alien base or battleship, or until they assault your base.

I didn't see this post earlier. Start with UFO Defense, Terror From the Deep is much harder.

Cool. If I recall, this is like a Tactics game, similar to Final Fantasy Tactics or Fallout Tactics?

I played a Demo of Terror from the Deep back when they still gave you diskettes in the PC GAMER magazine pack, and as a young lad, couldn't figure it out.

Yeah, it's quite similar to those. The feature that sets it apart is the strategic interface. When you're not in a tactical battle, you're building new base facilities, hiring troops, manufacturing weapons and armor, researching the aliens' technology, and of course shooting down UFOs. In that sense it's a lot like the Total War games.