Fantasy Flight Games XCOM the Board Game

Reviews

Ricardo

There are a few modes of difficulty to choose from before you start, and every mode with the exception of easy has a countdown timer for actions to be completed. The more missions your squad leader has successfully completed will factor into how soon the final mission arrives. There are 4 roles filled by 1-4 players which combat the crisis as they emerge in very unique ways.

Luis

This is a board game however and essentially it all comes down to die rolls. This is justifiable I feel because you are combatting a technologically superior enemy, and the odds are always against you, which is why the chief scientist role is so important to levelling the playing field. The Squad Leader has an important role as he or she will be in charge of the finite supply of soldiers, deploying them to missions and defending the base.

La Kobra

Then there is the Central Officer who is responsible for keeping track of the threats as they should be appearing on the board, communicating these to the rest of the team and deploying satellites into orbit to combat any little green men attempting to interfere with the order of your turns. Either by having your base destroyed by aliens attacking it, or by losing 2 countries to panic. It's cheaper than other games, but worth every dollar.

Stuart Billson

The price in store was somewhat higher than I'd have expected from a board game, but given the quality of the product looking back I can see how they can justify it, however I did manage to secure a better price from Amazon, which is where I ultimately made my final purchase. It's quite possibly the cleverest tool I've ever seen and it makes it possible for a player to play this game alone, assuming all 4 roles against the app generated AI.

All in all a great clever game that can be played solo, or with up to 3 friends joining you against an AI that will do everything it can to throw you off balance and crush you lolIn short I'll say this. The premise of the game for those who may not know is to defend the earth in turns from an invasion by hostile aliens with an unknown objective. This adds an element of plunging urgency to the proceedings as you quickly assign resources within your budget and click next on the app screen. These roles are Commander, who's job it is to dispatch interceptor craft to take out UFO's to keep the skies clear and he's also in charge of the overall budget, as each unit deployed by the whole team costs 1 token.