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Posted January 28, 2014 by Ryan Villanueva in Gaming
 
 

GAME REVIEW: XCOM: ENEMY WITHIN same old game made even better

 

xcom_enemy_within
XCOM: Enemy Within is the expansion to the original game XCOM:Enemy Unknown.  Developed by Firaxis games and published by 2K Games.  XCOM: Enemy Within is a turned based strategy game and these past few weeks this game had consumed most of my playing time.

XCOM_Mech In XCOM: Enemy Within you play the role of the Commander where you command Earth’s defense against an alien invasion. I also played the first game XCOM:Enemy Unknown though I wasn’t able to finish it until the end. At the first few stages of XCOM: Enemy Within there weren’t any noticeable changes from the first game. If you’re not familiar with the XCOM series, you command a squad of soldiers in the game fighting against an alien invasion. After each mission you earn different rewards which you could use to develop your command center to produce new technology that would help you in your fight against the alien invaders.

 

XCOM_SniperOne of the additions to XCOM: Enemy Within is MELD, which is a powerful energy source that you use to enhance your soldiers genetic capabilities or convert them into cybernetic Mechs. MELD is found throughout different missions in the game however they are quite hard to get as you need to obtain only for a certain number of turns. Sometimes you’d think if the MELD is worth the life of your soldiers but that is the choice you need to make for yourself. If you are successful in obtaining MELD it’s definitely rewarding even if you only upgrade one soldier, it would still have a large impact with your squad.

 

xcom_command_centerAlso by completing missions and mission objectives, the game also rewards youMEDALS. Medals can only be assigned to one particular soldier. Mission medals adds additional skill points (range,will power,etc.) to your soldier. One thing that you need to be careful of is your soldiers, once they die you could no longer revive them after the mission, either you recruit another soldier or try to level up a rookie from your barracks. This is especially hard when you had already a lot of progress in the game. Its important that early in the game you balance which soldiers you are using for your missions.

Not only would you level up your soldiers in XCOM: Enemy Within, you also need to upgrade your base, the Command Center. Upgrading the Command Center means more technology and weapons would be available to you and your squad. Another villain is also introduced in this expansion, the EXALT. They are renegade Human soldiers who would use the alien technology for their own gain and its up to you to figure out they’re bases around the world and stop them. If they slipped you then they could still a few credits from your Command Center and credits are hard to come by in this game.

xcom_mission_squadXCOM: Enemy Within is a great expansion of the original game. With the inclusion of the additional features and missions it makes a wonderful upgrade of the first game. The only downside to this game is that it’s time consuming, which might not necessarily be a bad thing if you have a lot time to spare. It takes to time to enjoy the game as rushing the game would only make it more difficult for you. One good thing though is that you could save this game at any point (NOTE:Try to save the game after each mission, it would be a life saver for your squad, trust me), so in case you need to go, just save it and get back where you left off. If you haven’t played XCOM:Enemy Unknown you haven’t missed out on anything, XCOM: Enemy Within is probably a complete version of the original game, it’s the same story, same characters with a few sweet additions which made the original game a whole lot better.

 

RECOMMENDED PC REQUIREMENTS:        

OS:Windows 7

Processor:2 GHz Dual Core (Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4 GHz or Athlon X2 2.7 GHz)

Graphics:NVIDIA GeForce 9000 series / ATI Radeon HD 3000 series or greater

Memory:4 GB RAM

DirectX®:9.0

Hard Drive:20 GB HD space

Sound:DirectX Compatible

 

MY PC:                                                                                               

OS:Windows 7

Processor: AMD Athlon II X2 2.9 GHz

Memory:4 GB RAM

Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 650 Ti

DirectX®:9.0

Hard Drive:20 GB HD space

Sound:DirectX Compatible

 

Rating: 4/5

 


Ryan Villanueva

 
Your resident all around Flipgeek, from comics,movies,games,toys,music and even sports. A big Spider-man fan raised in the ways of the Jedi,who listens to punk rock and a sucker for chick flicks.