XCOM: Enem y Unknown

Matt finally fights off the alien invasion, then he invites them back for another go…

XCOM: Enemy Unknown was easily my favourite Mac release of the last year(ish) – I put so much time and stock into my squad, even coming up with backstories for each member! The need to plan ahead when building your base adds long-term strategy, while the individual missions made for brilliant turnbased combat, but it was the little touches that made it – nicknames for your soldiers generated automatically, when combined with their real name and nationality, meant they became very human, and losing one permanently wasn’t just disappointing because you lost their skill – they became important to you.

Not too long after it hit the Mac, XCOM was released on iPad and iPhone. It was slightly pared back, but only in terms of graphics – otherwise it was the same deep, brilliant game. It’s this version I’ve been playing a lot of more recently. It’s involving, and deep, but being turn-based, you can just look away at any time – it’s great while watching TV or on a train.

More recently, I’ve been playing the new expansion, XCOM: Enemy Within, on the Mac again, and recording the drama of it as I go – you can watch along at youtube.com/macformatuk. I’m not sure if we’ll ever get the expansion on the iPad version, but the tell you the truth, I don’t mind. The original game was brilliantly honed strategy – near perfect in the range of options it gave you. There was depth, but not too much of it – manageable, yet involving. And there’s even multiplayer, with customisable squads, for maximum mayhem.