Reverse X-com?

[Brother Oni]

While the scenario of Earth defending against alien invaders is a very popular and common one, is there a game which explores the theme from the other side, ie highly technologically advanced aliens trying to conquer a less advanced but numerically superior race?

I'm more interested in the strategic/tactical side of the setting, so things like Alien versus Predator are excluded. The Halo series generally has technological parity so Halo Wars is also excluded. While I could play Civilisation and use cheats, I'm wondering if there's something a bit more tailor made.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

The only thing I can think of is Protoss vs. Zerg.

[TheEmerged]

There is a board game that has this as a theme - Conquest of Planet Earth. I rather enjoy its co-op mode, even tried to run a Let's Play of it on this board at one point. It's a bit abstracted though, and from the X-Com reference I presume you were looking for something more wargamey.

[Brother Oni]

There is a board game that has this as a theme - Conquest of Planet Earth. I rather enjoy its co-op mode, even tried to run a Let's Play of it on this board at one point. It's a bit abstracted though, and from the X-Com reference I presume you were looking for something more wargamey.

A little bit, but given that it's a fairly niche theme, I'll take any suggestions on board.

[Flickerdart]

Minus the alien bit, both Total War and Crusader Kings/Europa Universalis let you pit technologically advanced European troops against natives of various places.

[Wraith]

Some of the single player story lines in Age of Empires 2 were pretty much this, particularly the Conquistador vs. Aztecs campaign.

Laser Squad Nemesis also has it, depending on what races you play as. Pretty much anyone - though especially the Greys - versus the Spawn qualifies as 'heavily armed and technologically superior invaders against bug-like horde".

Dawn of War 2 probably qualifies. I haven't played much of the campaign, but you start out with a small force that gains experience as you keep them alive from mission to mission so you're very regularly outnumbered despite your power armour and automatic grenade launchers.

GoG.com have also recently released an updated version of Chaos Gate, another Games Workshop-licensed TBS which works in a similar vein to Space Hulk, but with a greater variety of maps and enemies. Might be worth a look, as anything in which you play as a squad of Space Marine Terminators is inevitably going to be outnumbered but plough through regardless.

[Lea Plath]

Destroy All Humans? Play a little green man and probe your way through the planet?

[Grey_Wolf_c]

It might be the nostalgia talking, but I remember enjoying Chaos Gate a heck of a lot in my younger days. I particularly liked that you can't replace your dead, and only those given the exterminator honors (a medal for killing, IIRC, a certain number of enemies in a single battle) where allowed to wear the exterminator armour. I actually discovered XCOM while trying to find similar games to that one (which lead me to Rebelstar)

Going back to the OP question, I kinda expect some enterprising modder to reverse the XCOM 2 game and allow you to play as the aliens being invaded by the terrifying Human Galaxy Empire, or hunting down the Extremist Terrorist Group known as "XCOM"

GW

[Artanis]

While the scenario of Earth defending against alien invaders is a very popular and common one, is there a game which explores the theme from the other side, ie highly technologically advanced aliens trying to conquer a less advanced but numerically superior race?

Lessee, in X-Com, aliens with a massive technological advantage invade the Earth and the only way that you can keep them from crushing the much more numerous locals is by something something laser ex machina something kaboom. The opposite of that would be a game in which aliens with a massive technological advantage invade the Earth and the only that way they can keep you from crushing the much more numerous locals is by something something laser ex machina something kaboom.

If that sounds about right, than have you heard of Universe At War: Earth Assault?

[Brother Oni]

Going back to the OP question, I kinda expect some enterprising modder to reverse the XCOM 2 game and allow you to play as the aliens being invaded by the terrifying Human Galaxy Empire, or hunting down the Extremist Terrorist Group known as "XCOM"

I think I might have gone a little too 'war gamey' in my previous post.

Using the X-com analogy, I was wondering if there was a game where you played the part of the aliens, eg setting up terror missions, establishing secret bases, balancing what to send on a mission to complete it versus what the enemy might loot off the corpses of your soldiers if they manage to stop you, that sort of thing.

[Rodin]

I think I might have gone a little too 'war gamey' in my previous post.

Using the X-com analogy, I was wondering if there was a game where you played the part of the aliens, eg setting up terror missions, establishing secret bases, balancing what to send on a mission to complete it versus what the enemy might loot off the corpses of your soldiers if they manage to stop you, that sort of thing.

I've been thinking about this the last few days and it sounds really fun.

You would start out as a scout expedition - you get a small outpost and few small UFOs. You're sending out missions to probe humans, abduct cattle, scout for cities - all that jazz. All of this would fuel your economy, allowing you to send back to Mars for additional troops and ships. Unlike X-COM, you wouldn't be doing research and upgrading your individual troops with experience. You would instead be garnering fame and promotions within the alien hierarchy and using that to requisition higher quality troops (like Mutons) and larger UFOs. Early mission combat would be against local law enforcement and militaries, until X-COM shows up.

X-COM itself would be a much larger operation and would have bases on every continent. They would shoot down your UFOS (of which you have numerous on missions at the same time - think worker units in an RTS game) and then you would need to decide whether it's worth trying to save that ship or not. Unlike the X-COM side of things, there would be an "auto-resolve" for the times when your scout ship with 4 aliens got shot down and 8 veteran X-COM troops came out to get it.

X-COM itself would have its own economy going - you would see the same troops again and again if you fail to kill them, and they'll rank up in experience with each mission. Losses would be expected rather than a case of reloading the game - your alien minions are far more expendable than X-COM troops are. It may be worth your while to lose an entire UFO and its guard squad if you manage to take down the Colonel leading the X-COM squad.

Progress in the game would be made by forcing countries to surrender and then expanding your bases to them. This would be done either by exterminating the X-COM base or kidnapping the head of state - two different difficult propositions. The X-COM base would naturally be heavily fortified and hard to locate, but once you've found it the base is always there. The head of state missions would be of the "prevent them escaping" variety - you'd have their security and later in the game X-COM forces to deal with as you chase them down and try to knock the leader unconscious.

Also unlike X-COM, there wouldn't be a "slippery slope of terror". As you conquer more nations, the remaining nations grow more resolute and desperate and start throwing more and more money at X-COM. Terror missions would be on a local basis - you terrorize the country to weaken local X-COM and government support, which would result in less troops to face against on missions as well as other benefits. Maybe kidnapping the head of state isn't available below a certain terror level.

[Gnoman]

Xcom: The Two Sides (one of the many Xcom fan remakes) was exactly this if you were playing as the aliens, except that the devs pulled the plug on it (despite rumors, they never got a C&D or anything, they just quit with vague "having this on our resume will hurt us as game developers" excuses) before the Xcom AI was implemented. They work perfectly in multiplayer, and the last versions of the project (which require a copy of the original game) are still obtainable.