Under a Gibbous Moon

By some amazing quirk of fate, I dusted off X-COM and started playing again about a week before it hit the news. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the game, Shamus Young describes it best, “X-Com was an overhead turn based game where you directed a team of extremely expendable commandos.” Of course, he was being generous. The Zerg die in fewer numbers than your commandos do.

I was first introduced to the game back in 1995 in the form of its sequel X-COM: Terror from the Deep. The two games are functionally identical as back then sequels were nothing more than the same game just with better graphics (wait a minute…). The game takes about 15 minutes to learn and then you can sit back and let the aggravation begin.

As mentioned above your commandos (or aquanauts) won’t stand up to anything more than a stiff breeze. Causality rates approaching 50% are not uncommon. Not only do you have to contend advanced alien weaponry but your newly hired “elite” troops are weak, whiny, and can’t shoot straight. That and they get paid something like forty grand a month.

In order to keep them (and your other staff paid) it is your job to keep the countries of the world happy with you. If you don’t they will reduce or eliminate your funding (because that will make it better). Because of this, just like in the real world, you spend you time and energy focusing on protecting the rich countries.

Researching new technologies scavenged from the fighting aliens is a huge part of the game. Without access to better weapons and armor your soldiers will go from being slaughtered to massacred as the game progresses.  In order to research some technologies, though, you don’t just need the weapon or an alien corpse but you need live aliens to talk to. Of a certain rank. And all ranks look alike. There’s nothing like sacrificing the lives of your men to bring one back alive to find out it doesn’t know anything.

So now your saying, “That doesn’t sound like fun, that sounds like the video game equivalent of Sisyphus.” Well, kudos to you for making that reference but it is actually a hell of a lot of fun. Actually, it’s more like an addiction. Despite the pain (hair pulling frustration), you just want to play more.

I find this to be because of the games frustration and difficulty. As you move through the game, you have to fight for every inch of it. Every mission is difficult enough that it still feels like an accomplishment even after the hundredth time.

If you’re still brave enough to give it a try, I hear there is a version available under Valve’s Steam or if you can track down and old copy it runs great in DOSbox.

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