For my fellow XCOM fans...

[EricKei]

If'n you play XCOM 2, the new Long War 2 (free) mod has been released, by the same guys who made the original. For the uninitiated, this is for those masochists among us who feel that the basic game just isn't difficult enough for your tastes More to the point, version 1.1 has already come out, bringing with it hundreds of fixes, and a hotfix is on the way to deal with a few glitches caused by 1.1 They messed with the loading screens, as well, just because they could -- most of them now shift back and forth between facade and reality.

I strongly advise shifting any other mods you use over to LW2-compatible versions (things are different enough that many mod makers have made separate releases), and looking for one of the lists out there that show which mods are known to work with LW2. In general, anything purely cosmetic (voice packs, armor and weapon skins, etc), as well as many "add a button command to use in combat" will generally work, but beware most others.

Good luck, Commander

[lordlundar]

Ahh yes, The Long War. Otherwise known as the "Do you REALLY hate yourself THIS much?" mod.

[Talon]

From what I've seen of TLW2, I really like the strategic layer of the game. But I'm iffy about the tactical layer. The new gameplay rules and classes seem needlessly complicated to me. Then again I haven't tried it yet. Blame Civ6 for that

[RichS]

Also, for the next 20 + hours of this post, the original XCOM:UFO Defense is free through The Humble Bundle Store! Just need a Humble Bundle account and Steam.

[EricKei]

Much obliged, RichS. Of course, if I hadn't bought the original half a dozen times or more over the last 25 years, I'd have more use for it

Note -- The original is VERY much a worthy game. Buy that (for free, for now!) and then install OpenXCOM. It's a major mod pack....even if for no other reason than to fix the glitch that causes ALL games of XCOM: UFO Defense (aka UFO: Enemy Unknown) to drop down to the easiest difficulty setting after the first mission.