RPS - X-Piratez (A Total X-COM conversion)

Rock Paper Shotgun explores a total conversion for the original X-COM called X-Piratez.

Based on OpenXcom Extended, a long-running open source clone of UFO, it takes the story and gameplay structure of the original, and a huge stock of resourcefulness, and turns them into something that's simultaneously very similar and completely new. The result is a dangerously addictive compound of comfortable old UFO with constant surprise, discovery, and content.

The imaginative premise brings together influences from all the X-COM games, as well as smaller touches from spiritual successors like the UFO Aftermath/Afterglow/Aftereight/etc series (principally in its ‘after the end' setting and colourful story, the strongest draw of that interesting but flawed trilogy). If anything it fits better than the original story, as a small-time group of ambitious bandits should scrabble for resources a lot more than the combined military elite of the entire planet, something that players of Aftermath or XCOM 2 have likely already observed.

What's that about bandits? Oh yes. Let's talk about the premise.

X-COM failed. The aliens conquered Earth, had their gross tentacly way with it for centuries, and then, at some point, buggered off. Earth is now a forgotten backwater of some stellar empire, awash with mutants, human collaborators, and abandoned underlings of the terrifying, but absentee Star Gods. Your band of all-female mutant pirates has stumbled across an ancient military research base. From here, you decide to make a living cowing the world with acts of theft and violence against the filthy human agents of the Star Gods, extorting protection money from petty local governments and seizing goods, weapons, and captives to ransom from everyone else.