The successor to the turn-based strategy game UFO: Extraterrestrials, which “came oh-so-close to replicating the X-COM enchantment, falling short primarily owing to what must’ve been a painfully tiny budget,” was planned to be released before the end of the year in 2010. It fell well short of expectations and was finally pushed out to early 2012. Then there was nothing.
I believe it’s safe to argue that once most games are a decade late, there’s a natural temptation to dismiss them, as Redditor Yonzy said. “For months, I had been looking forward to this game. The absence of updates led me to believe it was no longer active “They wrote in April of 2012. But in this situation, it truly happened: UFO2: Extraterrestrials, which has been in development for 11 years, is now available on Steam.
UFO2 is a completely 3D game that, like its inspiration, X-Com: UFO Defense, combines global strategic administration and turn-based tactical combat missions. You’ll face a variety of aliens in a variety of destructible settings, discover new weapons and technology, and train an elite combat force whose troops get more proficient as they acquire experience—unless they get squandered in combat, of course.
The pricing is a surprise—it costs $35/£28/€30, which is absurdly high for a very modest XCOM clone and actually makes it more costly than the excellent XCOM: Enemy Unknown. It has only five user reviews on Steam for now, but four of them are favourable, which is a good winning rate.
What’s more intriguing is how the release date shifted from “end of 2010” to “mid-2021″—enough time for two sequels and a spinoff to beat it to the punch. Unfortunately, there isn’t much information available: In answer to a Steam user’s question about why it took an extra 10 years to complete the game, developer skalisko said, “MONEY?”
That’s a reasonable response. More information on UFO2: Extraterrestrials may be found at ufo2extraterrestrials.com, which likewise looks like something out of 2010.
Thank you, RPS.
