Not that this is possible right at the start though as you’re probably better off pimping the base you have – spending literally all your starting funds buying an unmanned empty building on a different continent isn’t going to help. Ever wondered why in Enemy Unknown you could station Interceptors in other countries but the game never explained where they were going? That’s a holdover from the multiple-base-building exploits of the original, reinstated in Xenonauts. Choosing a base location and name is the first point, but unlike Enemy Unknown you’ll need to build more than one base over the course of the game since there aren’t any Satellites to watch out for aliens here. The mechanics and general gameplay of Xenonauts are directly like XCOM, with or without hyphen, although clearly closer to the less-flashy UFO Defense. Seeing as I was put off the original X-Com games by the lack of any in-game explanation this was not a good start, fortunately however Goldhawk have made things far more easy to get to grips with than the baffling icon-heavy original and I was soon happily clicking away. While tutorials and the like will be available for any new players to the hardcore X-Com experience in the final game, the Early Access is only equipped with a somewhat barebones online manual that leaves out key details, such as how to heal soldiers with medkits (equip it on the inventory, move to the soldier you want to heal, and use it on them as if you were shooting them), how to pick up items on the ground (stand on the item or corpse and open your inventory), and how to get goddamned started. After choosing a difficulty mode (out of four, with Iron Man Mode optional on all except ‘Insane’ difficulty) you pick a base location from the Geoscape Earth map and boom, you have a fully operational base… now what the do I do? Play about with the interface mainly and try to get your feet. On booting up Xenonauts Goldhawk have certainly achieved faithfulness in at least one area – if you’ve not played X-Com before or read the manual you’ll have absolutely no clue what you’re doing. "You go first", "No, you", "It’s your turn", "Fine, I’ll go first" BLAM Rather interestingly though the team decided to make the setting the Cold War, giving a neat style and level of technology whilst separating it from the modern day remake. Thus Xenonauts still has a place in the world as long as Goldhawk develop a more faithful remake than Firaxis’ effort. Since starting the FPS has come, gone, and turned into a digital squad-based shooter, and the long-awaited strategy reboot has been and caused a splash but still not tickled that X-Com: UFO Defense itch for hardcore fans. When the new XCOM was announced as an FPS fans were aghast, and circled around the already-in-development and promising-looking Xenonauts, the ultimate X-Com remake. It’s not fair to say that it’s Firaxis or 2K’s fault that Xenonauts exists of course. An early version of the game’s now out on Steam’s Early Access, so we decided to give it a play and see how it was shaping up. Indie team Goldhawk Interactive have decided to answer the pleas of these hardcore fans with Xenonauts, the game that’s going to try to out X-Com XCOM. not to mention the sheer overwhelming terror of turning a corner and seeing a Muton loom out of the pitch blackness. As surprising as that may seem, hardcore fans of the original X-Com titles were left deeply underwhelmed by the Firaxis reboot, as while making the series more accessible it lost a great deal of tactical depth. As critically and commercially successful as Firaxis’ XCOM: Enemy Unknown was (we gave it Game of the Year 2012) there was one group of gamers who weren’t satisfied - X-Com fans.
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