The Game
Hi everyone!
A few times in the past, I’ve played a game of XCOM (the 1997 original) and given a narrative of the entire game using the namesakes of forum members.
If you’ve never played X-COM, it’s like playing “chess with GIJoes”, as my wife put it one time. You take a squad of soldiers out and fight aliens in turn based game using soldiers you can customize. The new games made by Blind Squirrel and Firaxis even let you choose nationality along with language, a specialization, hair, helmet, hats, scars, etc. The overall goal is to beat the alien threat and save earth by playing out a strategic game while going on many tactical missions where you resolve battle. A word of warning though. This game is hard. Punishing hard. Your soldiers typically don’t last long, especially at higher difficulties. I’m gonna need a HUGE list of people to serve the cause. Normally the game starts out very hard and gets a bit easier later because at the start you are using human guns and no armor and can be killed in one shot. As you go on and research alien weapons, armor, and your soldiers gain many, many fiddly upgrades and abilities, your squad becomes stronger and less “brittle”. In accordance, many Qt3ers will die on the battlefield in the early game. Let’s hope you make it to the end!
How to Participate
All I really need is a post saying you want to join X-COM. I’ll use your QT3 forum name as the name of your in game avatar. However, you can choose several customization options as well:
- Name
- Country of Origin
- Gender
- Uniform color
- Preferred Specialization (more on this below)
Specializations
If you survive a couple of firefights, you’ll probably get promoted from “Rookie” to “Squaddie”. Squaddies get a specialization chosen for them, but I can always fiddle with things if you last a bit longer. I’ll outline them below, though no promises you’ll last that long!
Ranger - This is your close support specialist. They have a sword and shotgun. They are also usually a bit more stealthy.
Sniper - Exactly as it sounds, but they also have some fun revolver abilities
Specialist - In my games, this is basically a medic. Can also hack and provide buffs and support.
Heavy - Carries a minigun and a grenade launcher. Big boom.
There are few more that you don’t get many of, so I can only have 1 or 2 each. Thus they are first come first serve for picks.
Psi Op - The ultimate trick of this class is Mind Control. Also has other tricks.
Skirmisher - Kind of a close in specialist but very mobile. Can get an electric whip at some point!
Reaper - A very stealthy sniper. This is will probably be our main scout.
Templar - A melee class with the ability to dodge well.
This game might take a while, like all summer. I’ll post after actions reports, narrative description of events, and screenshots of the action.
I would also love a volunteer to edit a top post in this thread to keep track of the list of names in order, including who alive and who is dead. If you’d like to volunteer for this simple edit your first post and keep track of a current roster. I’ll also post screenshots of the roster from the game occasionally.
So, who wants to kick some alien butt?