2K Games just Announced XCOM

[schild]

The FPS.

Windsor, UK – April 14, 2010 – 2K Games announced today that XCOM®, the re-imagining of one of gaming’s most storied and beloved franchises, is currently in development at 2K Marin, the studio behind the multi-million unit selling BioShock® 2. Currently in development exclusively for the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and Windows PC, XCOM combines the strategic core of the groundbreaking franchise with a suspense-filled narrative and distills it into a tense and unique first-person shooter experience.

 

[Megrim]

FPS

[Ard]

Remind me, didn't this idea fail miserably once already?  Twice if you include Interceptor?

[Velorath]

Seems like an attempt to do something like what Bethesda did with the Fallout franchise.  Unfortunately they've got the Bioshock 2 team on this rather than the Bioshock 1 team so I'm not really optimistic.

[Azazel]

 
 
 

[Xuri]

1. Pick a random game series that was popular some time in the past
2. Create an FPS game based on it
3.
4. Profit?

Sigh.

[Margalis]

Completely expected, verging on parody, but still  

YES JUST WHAT I'M LOOKING FOR IN A NEW XCOM GAME MOVING MY CURSOR OVER A DUDE'S FACE AND PRESSING RT TO HEADSHOT HIM! GREAT WORK GUYS YA NAILED IT!

Lulz. Maybe they can call it a sequel to X-Com 2 and re-use Bioshock assets. A least System Shock to Bioshock made a little sense. "Suspense filled narrative." In X-Com. Yeah.

[tgr]

It's somewhat funny that the first thought I got when I read this news was "I hope they won't fuck us over with DRM", followed by "I hope they won't fuck us over by making the game filled with consoleitis", and only THEN "...I wonder if this'll even be fun".

I'm having trouble seeing how they'll make this actually work, but I suppose it'll become something like the C&C FPS spinoff, i.e. mediocre but fans of the series will lap it up anyways.

[Amarr HM]

fans of the series will lap it up anyways.

I thought we were fans?

[Xuri]

Hm. What does it take to be counted as a "fan of the series"? I loved Enemy Unknown and Terror from the Deep, while I absolutely detested Apocalypse and Interceptor.

[Xilren's Twin]

I'm just glad they didnt sneak in the term "reboot the franchise" 

Gut reaction was snark, and while the tiny optimistic part of me says they could make a decent SS2 style FPS with heavy RPG and strategy elements to it (including the base building and research), the much larger jaded gamer part of me is busy chuckling at the re-skinned FPS we will end up with and pantsing the optimistic sucker that lives in my brain.

[Amarr HM]

Hm. What does it take to be counted as a "fan of the series"? I loved Enemy Unknown and Terror from the Deep, while I absolutely detested Apocalypse and Interceptor.

Enemy Unknown is probably my favourite game of all time, so I guess being a games enthusiast that must make me a fan?

Oh and this is a heinous way to cash in on the franchise, fuck 2K.

[Sir T]

It's somewhat funny that the first thought I got when I read this news was "I hope they won't fuck us over with DRM", followed by "I hope they won't fuck us over by making the game filled with consoleitis", and only THEN "...I wonder if this'll even be fun".

I'm having trouble seeing how they'll make this actually work, but I suppose it'll become something like the C&C FPS spinoff, i.e. mediocre but fans of the series will lap it up anyways.

Actually, to be fair, the multiplayer in C&C Renegades was a blast. You had to protect the harvesters as the went out harvesting and then you could use the cash they collected to buy veichles. Actually somewhat original and really good fun.


This idea for Xcomn is fail.. ok yet another franchise where we run around shooting aliens... joy...

[Amarr HM]

I'm personally looking forward to Tetris the fps.

[Wolf]

Ok, did I sleep through the announcement of what irrational is working on or is that still hush hush?

[Yegolev]

If it is a TFTD sequel, minimal reskining of Bioshock 2 will be required.

I'm going to guess it won't be turn-based.

[KallDrexx]

It's kind of sad to go back to Enemy Unknown these days.  Back in the day the version on floppies that I had back in the day was (I only found out recently) was bugged in that all the difficulties were really the easy difficulty, it didn't matter which you checked.  So I have all this nostalgia on being able to beat the game on one of the highest difficulties, only to come back to the game now and get my ass stomped on the 2nd easiest difficulty.

[Aez]

I hope they let us control our SunBlaster projectile with a first person cam.

I'm not really raging over this even though X-Com: UFO defense is one of my top 5 game.  There's not enough corpse left to fuck.

[jakonovski]

Fuck you guys and your FPS hate, it's going to be all about the atmosphere and crazy UFO shit. If they manage it it'll be great, even as a shooter.

[Rasix]

1. Pick a random game series that was popular some time in the past
2. Create an FPS game based on it
3.
4. Profit?

Sigh.

Replace "random game series" with IP and you've got what they did with Shadowrun.  Worked out pretty well, didn't it? 

[Amarr HM]

Fuck you guys and your FPS hate, it's going to be all about the atmosphere and crazy UFO shit. If they manage it it'll be great, even as a shooter.

This isn't about hating on fps, well not for me I like a lot of fps games, but XCOM the fps isn't XCOM. It's a cash cow.

[Aez]

I don't think cash cow is the right expression.

[Lantyssa]

Replace "random game series" with IP and you've got what they did with Shadowrun.  Worked out pretty well, didn't it? 

Mother fuckers taking my Shadowrun and turning it into some bastardized FPS that... $&%@!

[Murgos]

I still have XCOM and TFTD on my HDD (I've diligently copied everything over every time I've upgraded).

That said, I think it would be fun to rappel out of a Heli, hunt alien scum through a farm, find the crashed ship and go all Gears of War on it's dark, dimly lit corridors.

[jakonovski]

I have the original XCom on my cellphone. So nyah!

[01101010]

There really is nothing more to say - that pic pretty much captures it all.

(and thanks for the lulz)

[Xuri]

I still have XCOM and TFTD on my HDD (I've diligently copied everything over every time I've upgraded).

That said, I think it would be fun to rappel out of a Heli, hunt alien scum through a farm, find the crashed ship and go all Gears of War on it's dark, dimly lit corridors.

Also available on Steam, btw.

[WayAbvPar]

Original is still fun as hell. I would buy a reskin of it with an updated UI and better graphics today. Hell, I bought the original from Steam over the holidays. A FPS? So many better ones to choose from- why would I bother?

[Goreschach]

This is such bullshit. It's the same kind of crap they tried with Fallout 3. Not only was that one of the worst games of the year, but once I installed it, fallout 1 and 2 wouldn't even run on my system anymore.

[Mrbloodworth]

Bah.

[Ironwood]

Strangely, I didn't mind Fallout 3.  I even....liked it.

Would I have preferred something more like the original ?  Yeah, don't be daft.  Course I fucking would.  However, as a game, 3 wasn't bad.

With this, it strikes me as being LESS of a plausible concept, but my mind keeps floating back to Dungeon Keeper and the way you could zoom in to FPS it while at the same time building your base up.

Things that make you go hmmm.





Yeah, it'll probably suck balls.

[Rasix]

This is such bullshit. It's the same kind of crap they tried with Fallout 3. Not only was that one of the worst games of the year, but once I installed it, fallout 1 and 2 wouldn't even run on my system anymore.

 

[Typhon]

If they leave the strategic/base building part alone and replace the tactical parts with a Rainbow Six-style FPS it could work.  If the tactical parts have random maps.... it could be very cool.  It they limit the number of pauses, or reward you for using fewer pauses, that would be nice also.

If they make it multiplayer and have co-op and alien-versus-human options... well, ok, they won't do that, but it would be fun.

If its all just FPS shooter I can't see it not blowing goats.

[jakonovski]

This is such bullshit. It's the same kind of crap they tried with Fallout 3. Not only was that one of the worst games of the year, but once I installed it, fallout 1 and 2 wouldn't even run on my system anymore.

You must have exquisitely bad taste in games, because FO3 was one of the best games of 08.

[Engels]

A lot of people went to FO3 expecting the same tone as F01&2, which is a mistake. FO3 is awsome, but its a different tone an humor. That said, as an FPS, from a mechanics point of view, it blew radioactive goats.