The makers of popular XCOM mod The Long War (you can read Chris' take on that here) have formed a development studio. It's named, pretty cannily, Long War Studios, and its first game is a strategy title where you have to defend Earth during an alien invasion.

It's not called YCOM, ZCOM, or even XCO.UK; Long War's game is titled Terra Invicta, and it'll be more of a "grand strategy" than Firaxis' smaller-scale operation. Here is everything we know about it so far (there are no images yet), before Terra Invicta heads to Kickstarter sometime in the future:

"Terra Invicta is a grand strategy game in which the player leads the defense of Earth during an alien invasion.

"An alien force has arrived in the far reaches of Solar System and begun probing Earth's defenses and building an invasion fleet. The player must assemble a council of scientists, politicians, military leaders and operatives who can unite Earth's squabbling nations with the ultimate goal of taking the fight to the aliens in the high ground of outer space."

It sounds like a more strategic, less fighty XCOM, and if it's even slightly like Europa Universalis but with space aliens, I think we would all be happy with that, right? (Thanks, NeoGAF.)

When a Redditor by the name of Crruzi decided that he wanted to take his newly-acquired Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) skills out for a spin, he did what any of us would do: He created EXLCOM, a follow-up to XCOM: Enemy Unknown that runs in Microsoft Excel.

Yes, that's Excel as in the famous spreadsheet software created by Microsoft, and no, it's not at all actually something most people would do. But Crruzi is a big fan of XCOM, and this struck him as a natural way to indulge that fandom while simultaneously increasing his familiarity with VBA.

"Two months ago I couldn't write a single line of code either—just keep at it," he encouraged another Redditor who's in the midst of learning VBA. "I feel like excel is a great (but also often times infuriating) environment to learn to create simple programs in, because you can use it quite easily for a wide range of real-world issues, and it is often more powerful than one might expect."

EXLCOM is set between the events of Enemy Within and the upcoming XCOM 2, which you might say is a bit narratively iffy (if you want to be that way about it) since Firaxis has previously explained that the two games don't share the same timeline. However you want to describe it, EXLCOM is neither a remake of the previous game nor a representation of the upcoming one—or, more accurately, will be neither, since at this point only the tactical portion of the game is actually operational.

Recreating the combat element of XCOM in a spreadsheet would be enough of an accomplishment to keep me satisfied for a month, but Crruzi is continuing to work on the project in order to incorporate the strategic layer as well. (For now, character stats and weapons are randomly assigned.) It's obviously not as pretty as the more recent XCOMs, or even the originals, but according to PCGamesN, "it functions pretty much identically" to the Firaxis games. 

And it runs in a spreadsheet! That alone is worth the price of admission, which by the way is free: Crruzi warned that "it will definitely not be a polished experience" right now, but if you don't mind dealing with some bugs and balance issues, you can snag a copy of EXLCOM to try for yourself here.

This article was originally published on October 23, 2015.

The best moments in XCOM: Enemy Unknown happen on the ground, at the squad level. It s where you hope all your base building, troop training, and bizarre government research will pay off. With soldiers hunkered down behind a broken piece of debris or scanning for alien activity from a rooftop, you have to hope the team you ve assembled is made of the right stuff. Or they ll soon be the dead stuff.

But being prepared in XCOM will only get you halfway. As Evan noted in his 2012 review, the turn-based strategy game has a way of vaporizing your best-laid plans and best-trained soldiers. And this core appeal—the constantly-evolving tension between planning and execution—is what has always drawn me back.

With XCOM 2 having just arrived, I m focusing this edition of If you like… on the serious and satirical side of close-quarter, squad-based combat and the government agencies that try to help win the war from a different kind of battlefield. Among the two films and an underappreciated TV series you ll find there s a lot of XCOM s underdog spirit to go around. I m also including, unusually

Three Kings, directed by David O. Russell 

A rare movie that deals with the first Gulf War, Three Kings is memorable for its gritty, in-the-sand depiction of a relatively short conflict that most people remember from cable television. While the film deals with the very last days of the 1991 war, it weaves its strange story through the lives of multiple stakeholders—ordinary soldiers, Iraqi civilians, and ambitious news media personalities.

Three Kings is on one level a humorous heist movie about a group of American military men who want to take a little something back for themselves. But it also makes an argument for the way the unpredictable nature of war can change those who see it up close. As well-trained (or not so well-trained) as the movie s soldiers are, the randomness of the conflict they re caught in can t help but change them. It s up to them to decide who ll they will be if they make it home.

Area 51: The Graphic History of America's Most Secret Military Installation

Written by Dwight Zimmerman, illustrated by Greg Scott

From the development of the SR-71 Blackbird to killer satellites shooting tungsten bolts from outer space, this story of the notorious Area 51 research base is filled with fascinating insights. While it s long, Cold War narrative saw it often associated with alien visitors and conspiracy theorists, Zimmerman and Scott s presentation makes a strong case for Area 51 as the unsung hero of late 20th-century defense research. Just because no one wanted to acknowledge its existence doesn t mean its labs weren t turning out some brilliant, game-changing designs.

The spectre at play in this graphic-novel treatment of Cold War history is, of course, the Soviet Union and the USA s post-Cold War enemies. The book doesn t attempt to take an authentic political stance on these events, which is refreshing. Instead it offers a clear look into the development of the technologies that scientists, and the politicians who funded them, felt might turn the tide of war in favor of the United States. It s a history told from a particular point of view, but one that s both informative and entertaining in its style and attitude. In its own way Area 51 tells the story of an XCOM many of us lived through but didn t even know it. 

Manhattan

Now two episodes into its second season, Manhattan s take on the development of the world s first atomic weapons at Los Alamos is a compelling watch. Although it s clear throughout that we re not watching a purely historical look at the top-secret Manhattan Project, the show s commitment to recreating the claustrophobic atmosphere of the period is well-executed and thrilling. Like the bases you dig into the ground in XCOM, we see how scientists, soldiers, and bureaucrats converge to try and win a war using untested technology against a seemingly unbeatable enemy.

The show s first season deals mostly with the struggles of physicist Frank Winter as he tries to perfect his bomb design with an understaffed and undervalued team considered second-rate on the classified Los Alamos base. A rival scientist leads the much larger and better-funded team developing what the US military hopes will be an atomic bomb it can drop on Germany to end the war. The tension between these scientists, and the way politics often interferes with scientific reality, creates a fascinating story arc demonstrating the effect of total war on the homefront.

Restrepo, directed by Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger

Directed by the late, great photojournalist Tim Hetherington and Perfect Storm author Sebastian Junger, Restrepo documents a year in the life of 2nd Platoon, Battle Company during its deployment in the Korengal Valley of northeast Afghanistan. While there are moments of levity and humor to be found in the soldiers daily lives, the documentary film s release in 2010 was notable for its transparent look at the successes and failure of the American mission in Afghanistan.

Hetherington and Junger embedded themselves in the military unit for 15 months as they filmed and gathered footage that is often breathtaking and sometimes disturbing in its honesty. If war is hell, then we also have to say it s also a place where ordinary people—civilian and military grunt alike—still find ways to live and survive. This film is worthy testament to that reality. 

Patrick currently works as web editor for Hinterland Studios, which is making The Long Dark. For more installments of If you like... , check out the other games he's covered in this series below: 

• If you like Metal Gear Solid 5
• If you like Dead Space
• If you like The Witcher
• If you like Dishonored
• If you like Mass Effect
• If you like Skyrim
• If you like Fallout 3
• If you like Deus Ex
• If you like Company of Heroes
• If you like STALKER
• If you like Her Story

XCOM 2 is now available for pre-purchase, if it's something you're planning to throw your money at up-front. To mark the big moment (and also the real reason we're here), 2K Games has made XCOM: Enemy Unknown free for the weekend on Steam—and the weekend, at least on the 2K bizarro calendar, has already begun.

Pre-purchases of XCOM 2 will include the Resistance Warrior Pack, which enables customization of your resistance fighters with new outfits, headgear, and war paint. It will also unlock a "survivor of the old war" as a recruitable character, "instantly," according to the Steam description, implying that you'll be able to unlock him or her through other, more laborious means (or maybe just pay for it) as well.

As for the "original" XCOM: Enemy Unknown ("original" in quotes because, as you'll recall, Enemy Unknown is a remake of the brilliant 1994 release X-COM: UFO Defense), it will remain free until 10 am Pacific on September 13, and will be on sale for 75 percent off its regular $30 price during that period as well. Progress earned during the free weekend will carry over if it's purchased—although if you're anything like me, three days of play will be just enough time to figure out what an absolute mess you've made of things, and that starting over is the only option left.

Written by Julian Murdoch

Most board/videogame crossovers are terrible, so it was with a healthy amount of skepticism that I sat down at GenCon 2014 in Indianapolis this weekend to play XCOM: The Board Game, a coop strategy game due later this year from Fantasy Flight Games.

Fantasy Flight has a small pocket industry making these crossover attempts: several runs at the World of Warcraft license, A Gears of War game, even a game based on the world of Doom. Most of the time, the theme of the videogame seems like a weird bolt-on to the cardboard version, both watering down what might be good gameplay mechanics and failing to create a meaningful connection to original game. XCOM: The Board Game avoids both of these traps, both delivering a new, fun coop experience and conjuring up the XCOM world in interesting ways.

It s worth noting that when XCOM: Enemy Unknown hit the PC in 2012, many reviews pointed out that core tactical gameplay was actually prototyped as a boardgame before being brought digital. XCOM: The Boardgame has nothing to do with that tactical miniatures (video)game we all lost countless hours too.



That s good news. Eric Lang, the designer of the upcoming digital/boardgame hybrid, put it this way: Why would we try to replicate that exact experience, he said, sitting across the plastic counters and cardboard chits that define the boardgame experience. It already exists. We all played it. So we pulled the camera way back and put you in charge.

The core conceit of XCOM: The Board Game is precisely that. In the video game version, most of the gameplay happens at the ground level, occasionally pulling out for a brief geoscape perspective. In the board game, you sit above the geoscape level, the big-boss of all. Each player assumes one or more key roles: Commander, Squad Leader, Chief Scientist, and Central Officer. Each role has its own tasks to accomplish, working together to defeat an incoming alien invasion: assigning ground troops, interceptors, and satellites to defend planet earth, researching technologies, salvaging wreckage, and completing critical missions to repel the invading sectoids, floaters, and the rest of the XCOM menagerie.

As a cooperative boardgame, it shares much in common from games like Z-Man Games Pandemic, which assigns each player at the table a critical role in achieving a common objective against the game itself.

The Commander sends interceptors to shoot down incoming UFOs and manages the budget, allocating cash to all of the other players. Everything in the game costs money, and money is always scarce. The commander will never be able to give everyone all the money they need.
The Chief Scientist researches new technologies that act as buffs for other members of the team using card game mechanics. Each other player has buffs that can provide enormous benefits, but she only has so many scientists to deploy, and more scientists cost more money.
The Squad Leader assigns specialist troops (assault, sniper, special ops) to both defend XCOM home base and achieve the missions required to actually win the game. But troops get killed in combat, and recruiting new ones or leveling them up costs money too.
The Central Officer manages satellites and communications infrastructure. But the enemy is always targeting satellites, and new ones are expensive.



Each turn, each member has critical tasks to accomplish, and as a team, there are limited resources available to tackle the ever-changing crises which spread panic to the continents of the world. Too much panic, and the game is lost. Successful resource allocation requires real team communication and collective decision making.

But it s the Central Officer that sets the game apart. Instead of a traditional fixed turn order (I go, you go, the game goes), the Central Officer uses an app (iOS, or browser-based) to tell each team member what to do, when, and to relay the new information that comes in from the computer controlled AI. She also manages the satellite network to make sure that the best possible information is coming into the team. And it all happens on a timer.

Here s how it worked in practice, in my demo game:

Commander, assign your interceptors. You have 15 seconds.

Africa s about to fall into panic. Europe s no better. I have six inbound UFOs, and six interceptors, but I m short on cash. If I move to defend, I ll have nothing to give my ground troops, who are repelling a base-invasion at XCOM HQ. And the Science Officer won t shut up about wanting to get more salvage.

Five seconds! screams my Central Officer.

I let Africa fall, assigning three interceptors to Europe.

Done! I cry. He presses a button on the iPad next to me. Squad Leader, Defend the Base! You have 13 seconds.



Time itself is the most critical resource. If the Commander (me, in our demo) takes too long, there are consequences. If anything goes wrong like losing satellites or letting a continent fall into chaos there are consequences. Sometimes the consequences are traditional boardgame consequences fail a few dice rolls when trying to defend XCOM base, and your soldiers die. Fail to research a new technology often enough and your scientists have to take a turn off and think about what they ve done.

But because the AI for the game is in the App, both time and information are part of those consequences too. After our failure in Africa, the next round had us assigning resources before we even knew where the UFOs were going to land. After running over time last turn, the Squad Leader, forced to decide between three missions to pursue, only gets 10 seconds to read the mission cards and decide, instead of 25 seconds.

And just like that, the game goes from strategic allocation and resource management to real time panic. The irony here is that this is unique in the XCOM universe. XCOM, after all, is a turn-based strategy game. A safe haven for people who don t like the stress of managing a build order in StarCraft 2 or getting a skillshot just right in League of Legends.



This is the genius of XCOM: The Board Game. It uses an app to change the very structure of the game (Do well, and you ll get critical information before you have to act. Do poorly, and you re flying blind), and it adds an element of real-time panic to what would otherwise be a fairly staid resource and strategy design.

This, it turns out, was the entire point: to stress you the heck out while you re trying to save the world. Making decisions with limited information and limited time is what brings out stress, explains Lang. Real time is the best way to do that. But using a sand-timer just doesn t cut it. An App feels really impersonal, it actually feels actually sinister. When the app pings you, that sound effect starts stressing you out.

By turn three of our demo, I d failed to allocate resources effectively with time being our most critical resource of all. And the earth was lost.



XCOM: The Board Game works as a boardgame for two reasons. The first, obviously, is it s connection to a beloved strategy videogaming franchise. The second is it s integration of a digital component. It will be easy for crufty grognards to immediately dismiss that as a gimmick designed to appeal to people who aren t real boardgamers a comment I heard more than once on the floor of GenCon.

But XCOM: The Board Game is doing something that happens all too rarely in board games it s actually innovating. I only got to play once the line for demos ran around the Fantasy Flight Games booth all weekend long but I will for sure be playing many, many times again, when it s out later this year for $60.

Xenonauts began life as a reimagining of the classic turn-based strategy game X-COM: UFO Defense. But where 2012 s excellent XCOM: Enemy Unknown modernized the setting and recreated the franchise s systems in broad, easy-to-read strokes, Xenonauts threw itself headlong into the details. From individual, grid-based inventories to a line-of-sight cover system and destructible environments, every mechanic from the classic has been reimagined, rebuilt, and given an extra layer. The result is a deeply engaging, indie version of an alien invasion that stands toe-to-toe with X-COM the classic and the reboots.
Colder war
The year is 1979. An alien invasion has interrupted the apocalyptic bickering of the USA and the USSR, and the international forces of the Xenonaut project are Earth s only organized defense. The first thing you ll see in-game is the Geoscape, the world map. Placing a base and building a radar station allow you to track and intercept UFOs across a continent. Unlike in Enemy Unknown, satellites and sci-fi won t help you intercept UFOs on the other side of the planet. Here in 1979, you ll need to build and manage supplementary bases to protect everyone.

Building a second base as soon as you can is imperative.

It s frustrating to watch abductions and other alien activity happen beyond your reach, but it s part of some excellent world-building. The world in X-COM is also at war, but Xenonauts makes me feel besieged and horrified in a way that X-COM never did. From my base in Florida, I can track UFOs across North and Central America, but reports of alien attacks across Europe and Asia continue to rattle in. A passenger airliner has been shot down; 128 dead. A military helicopter disappeared; 11 dead. A boat drifted to shore with no one on it; 14 missing. By the end of my first month, over 1,000 casualties have been reported in the areas that my radar doesn t cover.

As time goes on, the many nations of the Xenonaut project start to complain. Too many of their citizens are dying, and you re not everywhere at once. It s a constant balancing act that is familiar to X-COM players, but Xenonauts represents this tension with a fantastically granular system using dollar figures instead of star-based panic metrics. As a country loses faith in you, they decrease their funding $5,000 or $10,000 at a time. Every time a crop circle goes unanswered, for example, that might be one less jet fighter you can put in the air.
Taking turns
Once you spot a UFO, you scramble your nearest jets to go meet it. This second phase of the game is Xenonauts largest single addition to the classic formula: an overhead, strategic air combat map that plays out in real time. The on-rails button-pushing of Enemy Unknown s air combat mode is more fully realized in Xenonauts. Each fighter can be individually ordered to move, use evasive maneuvers, and target specific opponents. It s intricate fun, but there s an auto-resolve option that will skip this phase if you d rather get straight to the nitty-gritty.

It s good looking, but the aerial combat mode is just one more way for you to get your people killed.

After a UFO has been brought down, you send in a dropship with an assault squad to kill the surviving aliens and capture technology. This phase, which makes up the majority of the game, plays out in a classic, turn-based style that is second-nature for classic X-COM fans but could involve some trial and error for newer players. Each soldier has a reserve of time units they can use to move, check their inventory, open doors, and shoot. Xenonauts sticks very close to X-COM s roots here, but my favorite improvement is a time-unit reserve slider. If your soldier can move 70 units this turn at a dead sprint, you can tell them to move less and reserve enough time units for a quick shot or save more time for an aimed shot. You can use these time units in any order, one or two steps at a time, and you ll still reserve a chance to shoot back when an alien flanks you by surprise. It s an incredibly useful addition that fits right in with the classic mechanics.

Another welcome addition: if you capture the UFO and hold it for five turns, you win the mission. The days of scouring the far corners of the map for the one alien hiding behind a rock have been thankfully left behind.

Xenonauts includes a detailed online manual, but it s a bit of a retro throwback that fails to take the place of a hands-on, in-game tutorial. If you ve never played X-COM or anything of its type, you may have a hard time getting up to speed in Xenonauts, which presents you with a ton of menus and not a lot of in-game guidance. The manual is opened through the launcher, but an in-game tutorial would ve made it more accessible for new players. For die-hard fans of the series, though, the game plays so much like X-COM that you ll already understand all but the most specific details.

Assaulting a crashed ship is a lesson in bloody close-combat.
Class warfare
I like the flexibility Xenonauts gives me to manage my soldiers, especially in regards to their equipment and class designations. The biggest frustration in Enemy Unknown is taking a rookie into the field and having them randomly promote to a soldier class that you don t need. Soon your barracks is full of snipers who can t replace your newly KIA heavy weapons expert. Xenonauts ditches that system and lets you assign any weapon to any soldier. There are class designations (assault, rifleman, sniper), but they re for your organizational purposes only. If you need another assault trooper, hire a rookie and hand them a shotgun: you re in business.

Having an adaptable squad is crucial, because these soldiers are fragile like porcelain dolls. In one of my first missions, my troop transport s doors opened to reveal an alien already aiming at us: we d been dropped into a hot LZ. The oversized reptile s first shot hit my assault trooper in the face, and he dropped dead like a bag of hammers. We returned fire, but the alien s second shot wounded our sniper, who dropped her rifle and ran. As the rest of the squad stayed in cover to take out the alien, she ran into a field and bled to death. Losing an experienced soldier to permadeath always sucks (with Iron Man mode on, there s no save reloading), but after that mission I was able to take one of my other veterans, equip him with a sniper rifle, and rebuild my squad without promoting a gun-shy rookie.

The Cold War theme is expressed with powder-blue uniforms and boxy helmets. Nice duds, Oscar.

Equipping your squad also gives you an opportunity to bring gadgets like demolition charges, heat-resistant riot shields, smoke grenades, and flashbangs. Adding these to your kit opens up new ways to play in Xenonauts fully destructible environments. I never imagined a version of X-COM that would encourage me to use C4 to blow apart a wall, toss flashbangs, and charge into close range with shotguns. Now that I ve found one, I never want to go back.

New features like these are a lot of fun, but in replicating and improving what made X-COM great Xenonauts also repeats the steep initial learning curve, unforgiving failure states, and occasional frustrations of the classic. The Geoscape and all its many possibilities is daunting for first-timers, and getting used to the time unit system will require some tinkering and missteps. Players who appreciate granular detail will love the options Xenonauts gives them, but it may take a couple of hours of work and a few quickloads to feel comfortable with everything the game has to offer.

If you re an old fan of the X-COM series, of course, forget about finding your old install disks or putting up with twenty-year-old graphics playing Xenonauts is the best way to relive those glory days with deeper systems. If you re new to X-COM, Xenonauts will let you explore the series classic roots with added depth and details.

Vitals
Price: $25 / 15
Release date: Out now
Publisher / Developer: Goldhawk Interactive
Multiplayer: None
Link: http://www.xenonauts.com/

The word went out in late May that the hit strategy game XCOM: Enemy Unknown was in the process of being ported to Linux by Feral Interactive, as were its DLC and expansion packs. Today that port went live, just in time for a pretty sweet Steam Summer Sale price.

I don't like the word "re-imagining" but I have to admit that XCOM: Enemy Unknown got it right. It somehow managed to turn a 20-year-old turn-based strategy game into a modern hit, putting players at the head of an elite international military organization charged with defending Earth from an alien invasion. It's not in the league of, say, Call of Duty, but the enviable review scores and healthy amount of add-on content speak for themselves.

Now it's available natively for Linux, too. Feral's version of XCOM: Enemy Unknown runs on Ubuntu 14.04 and SteamOS, and it's a SteamPlay release, meaning that if you already own the Windows version, you get the Linux release free.

And if you don't happen to own it, this would be a good time to rectify that situation: It's currently in the Steam Summer Sale mix at $7.50 for the base game 75 percent off the regular $30 price or $16.50 for the Complete Edition, which includes the Slingshot and Elite Soldier DLC packs and the Enemy Within expansion, that normally sells for $50. The Summer Sale pricing will remain in place until 1 pm EDT on June 21.

Some claim that summer doesn t start until the 21st, but Valve says it s time for the Steam Summer Sale and we haven t heard anything from the solstice lobby so, happy first day of summer! As always, it s celebrated with a ridiculous store-wide Steam sale renowned for its low prices and intoxicating effect on the PC gaming community. Everything looks great when it s 80% off, but before you start filling up your library, here are our favorite picks of day one.

Reminder: if a game isn't a daily deal or a flash sale, it could pop up later in the sale for an even lower price. If you want to be safe, wait until June 30 to pick up a sale-long deal.

5 - Trine Complete
85% off: $3.74 / 2.69 - Steam store page
What Trine lacks in challenge it's not very difficult as platformers go it more than makes up for in magical fairy tale charm. The sequel, Trine 2, improves upon the formula just about every way, particularly through the addition of cooperative multiplayer action. And with the original game about to undergo a dramatic (and free!) overhaul thanks to the coming Trine Enchanted Edition, this bundle at this price is a must-have by any measure.

4 - Hotline Miami
85% off: $1.49 / 1.04 Steam store page | Flash sale: Buy it before 8 p.m. EST
No game revels in ultraviolence like Hotline Miami, which turns pixelated murder sprees into an art form. It's brutal, stylish, and challenging in that perfect way: once you make a perfect run through a level without stopping, mowing down a dozen thugs with a knife and then a pipe and then a shotgun, you'll feel like the god of sleazy Miami murders. You'll want some practice now, since Hotline Miami 2 includes a level editor that will let you craft your own murder rooms. Get it fast the flash sale on Hotline Miami won't last long.

3 - Far Cry 3
75% off: $7.49 / 3.74 - Steam store page
Attacking outposts is our favorite part of Far Cry 3. The sandbox shooter s story is a strange and meandering mixture of Alice in Wonderland and the spring break trip you made in college, but dismantling the dozens of bases that populate Far Cry 3 s islands however you want is scrappy, open-ended FPS combat at its best. Now s a good time to jump in before Far Cry 4releases later this year.

2 - The Witcher 2
80% off: $3.99 / 2.99 - Steam store page
You ve got until early 2015 before The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt releases, and it s looking fantastic. That s plenty of time to catch up on one of our favorite modern RPG series not only is The Witcher 2 on sale, the first game is only $1.99 / 1.39. Bonus value: The Witcher 2's fantastic story splits into two completely separate arcs in its second act, so if you want to experience both paths, you've got two playthroughs ahead of you.

1 - XCOM: Complete
67% off: $16.49 / 8.24 - Steam store page
Our favorite strategy game of 2012, conveniently collected into bundle form with the equally-great Enemy Within expansion, has one of the best campaigns in gaming. Hand-building your alien defense force replicates the feeling of running imaginary missions with action figures in your living room. Except this time, G.I. Joe can die for reals. Thoughtful strategy, a tense metagame, and detailed maps that explode into pieces make XCOM the second-best digital board game available (Civilization V would be the first).

Other great deals today:
Rising Storm: Game of the Year Edition (50% off) $9.99 / 7.49
Tomb Raider (50% off) $9.99 / 7.49
Max Payne 3 (70% off) $5.99 / 4.49
Mirror s Edge (75% off) $4.99 / 2.49
The Witcher Enhanced Edition (80% off) $1.99 / 1.39
Papers, Please (50% off) $4.99 / 3.49
Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines (50% off) $4.99 / 3.74

Long-suffering Linux gamers will get a nice treat later this summer as XCOM: Enemy Unknown will finally make its way to the platform, in a bundle including all add-on content and the Enemy Within expansion. The "new" game is being developed by Feral Interactive, which until now has worked exclusively on games for Apple platforms (including the OS X version of XCOM), as its debut Linux project.

We re thrilled to have been given the opportunity to bring XCOM: Enemy Unknown to Linux, Feral Interactive Managing Director David Stephen said. It s an amazing game and we are hopeful that Linux gamers will welcome this addition to their platform.

The Linux version of XCOM: Enemy Unknown will be a SteamPlay title running under Ubuntu 14.04 and SteamOS, and will include the original game plus the Slingshot and Elite Soldier DLC packs. More significantly, it also includes the XCOM: Enemy Within expansion that adds new base facilities, weapons, research projects, upgrades, and of course plenty of new and interesting ways to die at the hands of the rapacious alien invaders.

There's no release date or pricing info yet, but as a SteamPlay title, those who already own the game on Windows or Mac should automatically have access to the Linux version once it's out. There's also a pretty cool trailer heralding the game's announcement, which is perhaps a bit more action-packed than the actual game, but I don't think XCOM is really a secret at this point; if you're buying it for Linux, the odds are pretty good that you already know what you're in for. In the meantime, you can find out a little bit more about what's coming (and listen to some ominously moody background music) at Feral Interactive's XCOM page.