Old hand from the OG X-com from 93, just finished X2 and have some thoughs

[obsidian_razor]

First off, congrats to the Goldhawk team. The original X-com from the 90s is my most favourite game of all time, but it was "lighting in a bottle", no game has ever been able to replicate the feel of playing that for the first time.

Xenonauts 2 comes close, possibly the closest any other game trying to replicate the OG formula has. It has really cool aesthetics, and I really like the cold war vibe, though I preferred the straight up alternate universe 1970s/80s from X1.

There's gonna be spoilers here, so if you care for such things, move away

Mechanically the game is more than competent, the TU system is solid, and while I miss some QoL features from more modern games like soldiers being able to lean over cover to shoot, it generally works.

I really like that we're back to soldiers just having general stats instead of character classes, it gives you more variety on how to assemble your teams or replace soldiers if someone is wounded or kia.

There are few issues with the game's "pacing" though. Nothing horrible, but I was playing on normal difficulty since I barely have time to play games anymore, and my research always outpaced my resources by a substantial amount. I never had the alloys to build colossus armours until literally the Endgame, for example, and I only ever used fusion weapons for like 2 missions.

It feels like resources are set thinking most players will take the OP penalty from raiding UFOs more than twice, but I never did because I actually valued the RL time saving measure. Perhaps you could also get a small cut of the resources? Or maybe an OP bonus?

I've seen some people complain that the equipment you research is just "number go up" and adds nothing new to the gameplay, but I think this is due to modern games trying to do such things to keep thing interesting. The premise of the OG X-com was that the aliens had the technological upper hand, but you eventually closed the gap and levelled the field. I personally don't really like sidegrades unless the mechanic they bring is really interesting, and sadly they rarely do (looking at you Phoenix Point).

It could have been fun to have more "gizmos" or such to use with your soldiers as you advanced your research. The status enhancing equipment you develop is really neat, but it's more like passive bonus magic items in an RPG. 

The gimmicks each alien type has are a bit uninteresting.

It may be because of my low diff setting, but sectons/ psyons mind control abilities didn't come up much (which may be for the best as they were super annoying in the OG X-com), Wraiths just become harder to hit after they get hit once, androns ignore cover (which is very funny actually), reapers are chryssalids, so no complains here, they are still terrifying in close spaces.

Servitors and cyberdrones are two of the most interesting ones, specially that stupid dancing game you need to do to take down cyberdrones until you have enough firepower to just blow them up.

Sebillians I despise... they are just boring damage sponges that also regenerate. They are very dangerous in the field but fighting them is such a fucking slog...

Eternals are fine as they barely come up.

Finally, story wise... you magnificent bastards, I thought I was playing UFO Enemy Unknown but I was actually playing X-Com Apocalypse XD

Good plot twist, I liked the idea that the aliens are interdimensional.

My only qualm is with the ending. I was expecting an end where you destroy the Eternals relay and their empire crumbles, leaving Earth alone to lick it's wounds and figure out what the fuck we do next. Maybe the eternals will come back, maybe they are gone forever, but for now things are quiet.

The whole "the Eternals surrender and the Empire is now ours" felt like it came out of fucking nowhere. WTF? How did we pull that off? Did we blackmail them into surrendering? How did that even last? We're just a bunch of guys and they have a fucking empire, surely they could have recaptured the relay eventually?!

It left me very confused. 

I do love me a good happy ending, but this one felt oddly unearned.

 

Anyhow, do not take my negative feedback as a nasty dis or anything of the sort. Overall I loved the game, and while I don't know if I will play it again as life is busy and there are many games to enjoy, and I will defo recommend it to anyone who enjoys the classic X-coms.

I hope I see more games from you in the future!

Since you're already doing interdimensional shenanigans, why not tackle what X-com Apocalypse tried to do and sadly failed?

Best of luck in the future!

Edited April 25 by obsidian_razor
typos

[Chris]

On 4/25/2026 at 10:40 AM, obsidian_razor said:

First off, congrats to the Goldhawk team. The original X-com from the 90s is my most favourite game of all time, but it was "lighting in a bottle", no game has ever been able to replicate the feel of playing that for the first time.

Xenonauts 2 comes close, possibly the closest any other game trying to replicate the OG formula has. It has really cool aesthetics, and I really like the cold war vibe, though I preferred the straight up alternate universe 1970s/80s from X1.

There's gonna be spoilers here, so if you care for such things, move away

Mechanically the game is more than competent, the TU system is solid, and while I miss some QoL features from more modern games like soldiers being able to lean over cover to shoot, it generally works.

I really like that we're back to soldiers just having general stats instead of character classes, it gives you more variety on how to assemble your teams or replace soldiers if someone is wounded or kia.

There are few issues with the game's "pacing" though. Nothing horrible, but I was playing on normal difficulty since I barely have time to play games anymore, and my research always outpaced my resources by a substantial amount. I never had the alloys to build colossus armours until literally the Endgame, for example, and I only ever used fusion weapons for like 2 missions.

It feels like resources are set thinking most players will take the OP penalty from raiding UFOs more than twice, but I never did because I actually valued the RL time saving measure. Perhaps you could also get a small cut of the resources? Or maybe an OP bonus?

I've seen some people complain that the equipment you research is just "number go up" and adds nothing new to the gameplay, but I think this is due to modern games trying to do such things to keep thing interesting. The premise of the OG X-com was that the aliens had the technological upper hand, but you eventually closed the gap and levelled the field. I personally don't really like sidegrades unless the mechanic they bring is really interesting, and sadly they rarely do (looking at you Phoenix Point).

It could have been fun to have more "gizmos" or such to use with your soldiers as you advanced your research. The status enhancing equipment you develop is really neat, but it's more like passive bonus magic items in an RPG. 

The gimmicks each alien type has are a bit uninteresting.

It may be because of my low diff setting, but sectons/ psyons mind control abilities didn't come up much (which may be for the best as they were super annoying in the OG X-com), Wraiths just become harder to hit after they get hit once, androns ignore cover (which is very funny actually), reapers are chryssalids, so no complains here, they are still terrifying in close spaces.

Servitors and cyberdrones are two of the most interesting ones, specially that stupid dancing game you need to do to take down cyberdrones until you have enough firepower to just blow them up.

Sebillians I despise... they are just boring damage sponges that also regenerate. They are very dangerous in the field but fighting them is such a fucking slog...

Eternals are fine as they barely come up.

Finally, story wise... you magnificent bastards, I thought I was playing UFO Enemy Unknown but I was actually playing X-Com Apocalypse XD

Good plot twist, I liked the idea that the aliens are interdimensional.

My only qualm is with the ending. I was expecting an end where you destroy the Eternals relay and their empire crumbles, leaving Earth alone to lick it's wounds and figure out what the fuck we do next. Maybe the eternals will come back, maybe they are gone forever, but for now things are quiet.

The whole "the Eternals surrender and the Empire is now ours" felt like it came out of fucking nowhere. WTF? How did we pull that off? Did we blackmail them into surrendering? How did that even last? We're just a bunch of guys and they have a fucking empire, surely they could have recaptured the relay eventually?!

It left me very confused. 

I do love me a good happy ending, but this one felt oddly unearned.

 

Anyhow, do not take my negative feedback as a nasty dis or anything of the sort. Overall I loved the game, and while I don't know if I will play it again as life is busy and there are many games to enjoy, and I will defo recommend it to anyone who enjoys the classic X-coms.

I hope I see more games from you in the future!

Since you're already doing interdimensional shenanigans, why not tackle what X-com Apocalypse tried to do and sadly failed?

Best of luck in the future!

Thanks for the feedback - glad to hear that you enjoyed the game overall. We'll probably address some of this stuff in DLC, but yeah, I can understand if you just don't have enough time for a new campaign even then. Hopefully we'll see you again if when we decide to make a new game :)

[obsidian_razor]

On 4/26/2026 at 9:00 PM, Chris said:

Thanks for the feedback - glad to hear that you enjoyed the game overall. We'll probably address some of this stuff in DLC, but yeah, I can understand if you just don't have enough time for a new campaign even then. Hopefully we'll see you again if when we decide to make a new game :)

Thank you for taking the time to read my feedback!

I didn't know DLC was planned! That may be something that pulls me back one more time! :D