News XCOM: Enemy Within Preview

We reveal new mission types and new enemies in this year's expansion to the modern-classic tactical series.
http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/2013/10/09/xcom-enemy-within-preview/1

 

I enjoyed EU, but after a few rounds of research I was really disappointed with how shallow the research (especially weapons) was. Changing /changing mechanics is good (like the jet pack), but all three tiers of guns all functioned exactly the same, just had different skins and bigger numbers. It is clear from the moment you start playing to just throw all your resources in to satellites, and as mentioned here is just got very "by the numbers".

Being a massive fan of Apocalypse, I was quite disappointed. Still finished it, as it was enjoyable (I especially liked the streamlining achieved with the move from TU to the "two actions" mechanic) for the most part, but I certainly doubt I will ever revisit it (unlike Apocalypse which I must have finished 5 times).

The new content sounds intriguing, but if it ends up being just as shallow in the long run, I will unlikely be investing.

 

i agree with points raised - original games battles became a lil formulaic once you get a good squad together (and since timed missions were so rare you could sit in overwatch all day), plus the research tree was very basic and linear.

quite excited for EW as it really seems to mix up the formula but i'm not sure if i can justify ~£15 for an addon these days especially if it follows the same (rather uninteresting) plot - hope there are some story changes along with new faction. will wait for a full review then probably a steam sale before buying. the price is too damn high.

 

heehee. Xmas come a month earlier this year.
XCOM Enemy Unknown the same day as X Rebirth. Need to use my holidays

 

I agree. TFTD had epic research trees.

 

All the additions should add more to the research trees as the base game is a little shallow once you get a little way into it. Hopefully this will put some meat on the bones.

And more importantly some of the bugs in the base game should finally be patched shortly before EW is released.

 

I am looking forward to this. The new xcom, while not being as good as the original is still a great game. I agree the late game was a bit flat, once you had all the good tech, the overall threat did feel a bit less. There was also the issue that every battle fought looked like the american mid-west :S

It was also a bit annoying to have to manually fight every battle, I'd have liked a total war style 'auto resolve' where there was more risk of failure attached.

Those issues aside, I enjoyed it immensely. Iron Man and Second Wave options were really a good move by Firaxis

From preview, Enemy Within would seem to add a decent chunk of content, more threat, more research and some decent variety to the battle scapes, both artistically and objectives wise.