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| UFO: Aftermath PC review | |
| developer | Altar Interactive |
| publisher | Cenega |
| author | Chris O'Regan |
| date | Oct. 20, 2003 |
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Chromehounds
NA Review by Marcin
Oblivion-The First 3 Hours
PC Quicktake by walTer
Comic Quick Takes January 25, 2006
Feature by Mike
The Gollop brothers have a lot to answer for. Ever since I played Lazer Squad on the ZX Spectrum countless moons ago I have been a long time fan of the turn based tactical squad combat games they produced. The most famous line of games they produced were the incredibly addictive ‘XCom’ series, the first of which was UFO: Enemy Unknown (known in the US as XCom:Enemy unknown). The Gollop brothers have now since moved away from the XCom franchise and it has been left to others, such as the Czech developer Alter Interactive to pick up the now 10 year old game and bring it into the 21st century.
Where are the MIB when you need them?
UFO:Aftermath (UFO:A) takes place in the very near future (2004 to be precise) after an attack by a very large UFO. After launching spores that blacken the sky they eventually rain down onto the earth below, killing all higher forms of life. This event is known as ‘Nightfall’. What is left of humanity is left sheltering in bunkers. Over the next few weeks the spores disintegrate and the survivors come out of their bunkers to see what has happened to the earth. This is known as ‘Twilight’ and is when the game kicks off. You take command of what is left of the armed forces and start to wage a resistance campaign against the alien menace.
Start-stop-start-stop-oh no no no that’s not the way I wanted it to go!
Essentially UFO:A is a tactical squad combat simulation just like the XCom games. The bulk of the game occurs within set maps that are randomly generated prior to the start of the mission. The environments vary from snow bound tundra to the back streets of a major city. Control is handled using a semi turn based system that can also operate in real time. The action is paused during which you can issue orders to your troops to either attack enemies, heal other troops or pick up key items from the ground. Once these orders are given you unpause the action and the troops carry out the orders. The action only stops when key events occur such as a new enemy being spotted, a squad member is shot and/or killed or an enemy has been killed. It also stops when a squad member has completed their orders and awaiting new ones. This set up is very much like Baldur's Gate combat, only with automatic weapons instead of swords and the odd fireball.
This system forces you to spend most of your time carefully plotting out where you want to place your troops to ensure maximum coverage from attack and to achieve covering fire for fellow squad members. The actual combat only lasts for seconds. Thankfully, with this being a PC game, you can save at any time meaning that if strategy you adopt for one engagement fails quite badly you can restart the mission from a more favourable point and have another bash.
The same, but different
Those of you familiar with the original XCom game will recognise the globe map that is present in UFO:A. Like the original, the missions described above appear on the globe which can be rotated and zoomed in and out by right clicking on it. On this globe all of the bases the player controls are shown along with the areas of the earth under the player's control. There are three types of bases available: Military from which you can launch attacks; Engineering which builds weapons and armour for your squad members; Research which allows you to build new equipment. Having the right type of bases is crucial to the game as without having the upper hand technologically you'll never win the game as the aliens have weapons that do a lot more damage than your average assault rifle.
No! Not him! He can’t die!
One of the 'hooks' to the XCom games was the squad development. As they carried out missions they became better at it and in time you began to become quite attached to them. This facet of the original remains with UFO:A and is its saving grace. After every mission experience points are given to squad members which increase their level. Once a new experience level is reached certain attributes can be boosted. As soon as they attain a reasonable grades the squad member can go in for training in a variety of skills. These range from soldier to Psi abilities which are used heavily in later parts of the game.