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Has anyone one ever gotten through the game without losing a country to an alien pact?
I was doing so well, but then all of a sudden, India was out at the end of the month. Then I found
out an alien base was right next to there, and no save game was further back enough to
save India... darn infiltrators.

[Incappucciato d'Ombra]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Donald @ Jul 12 2007, 03:40 AM) [snapback]299035[/snapback]</div>

Has anyone one ever gotten through the game without losing a country to an alien pact?
[/b]

I don't think, it is normal to loose at least some countries during the whole game, this because the only way to avoid an alien pact is to shot down ALL the ufos that take contact with the "targeted" government.

With ALL i means :
1) shot down the ufo with recon mission : 1 very little and/or 1 little, plus 1 (or some ?) medium if player are doing very well or game are advanced (in term of time and difficulty level)

?) unable to remember, some years are passed from the last time that i've played Ufo enemy unknow, if sometime also some medium/big ufos can appear, if yes..... also these must be shotdown.

2) Shot down from 2 to 4 (or 5 ??) Battleship, depending ... see point 1)

If also only one of this is saved, next month the targeted government will sign an alien pact. In these conditions it is practically impossible to save ALL nations

[Dave]

It's a random thing, sometimes if you reload game you'll not lose a country...
I'm saying that because Europian nations can be protected very well...(for example Italy )
I had a base in Italy (full of big radars) with 1 Avenger and 2 of those Ufo Interceptors always flying to protect the nation...it was impossible that ufos take contact with Italy government.
At the End of the month Italy was OUT! Damn...I reloaded the game and...surprise!

I've played the game until there was only one nation left...and then mission to Mars!

[Incappucciato d'Ombra]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(David86 @ Jul 12 2007, 01:16 PM) [snapback]299073[/snapback]</div>

It's a random thing, sometimes if you reload game you'll not lose a country...
[/b]

Yes, it's a random thing... but only the "decision of the alien to take contact with a nation (or not to take contact)". Therefore is a random thing only if you had a game saved before this decision was taken, otherwise you must to shotdown all ufo or say goodbye to the nation :tai:

I had forgot another important thing : Ufo must be shotdown on water otherwise is necessary a mission to destroy the ufo on land or, after few days, it take off and the nation... is lost !

Reassuming : ALL ufos must be shot down and TOTALLY destroyed (by recovering the ufo or shotdown it on water) or you loose the targeted nation. (reloading game is another thing :bleh: )

[Dave]

You can't Shotdown a Ufo on water...it is a waste!
I prefer to kill'em all and stole precious things.

Riassuming: guys, remember to save game often LOL

[laiocfar]

The other option is to rush cydonia before they get those battleships to infiltrate... Also about killing ufos on water, last months of game you are mostly waiting for something (Avenger/Psi training/flying suits/hoovertanks/ammo) to go on mars and is quiet boring and useless to risk your veterans when recovering an scout.

[Incappucciato d'Ombra]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(David86 @ Jul 12 2007, 04:47 PM) [snapback]299111[/snapback]</div>

You can't Shotdown a Ufo on water...it is a waste!
[/b]

*become mad*

Yes i can, because i'm the Incappucciato d'Ombra and from the shadows i can do all

*return serious*

Well, it's a waste, i agree, but only at the beginning, after the firsts 5-6 months it's however a waste..... but of time and not of precious thing. Consider that we are talking of :

1) shotdown at least 3-4 battleship (and various other minor Ufo)
2) send a transport to recover every Ufo
3) when alien attempt to sign a pact, all the ufos appears with little distance (in term of time) one from the other and always land in proximity of the nation capital.

This means : only in the best one of the cases, when all things goes well, you can do all of this. In the other cases (pratically always) you must use the bug (or trick) that prevent the disappearance of the ufo after some time.

Imho, a work so gigantic that it is not worth the pain :tai:

Finally, as far as saved games, i know that it's always better to save often but in this case it's useless.
Aliens tries to sign a pact with nations when player act well, therefore if you reload a previous saved game, can happens :

1) Aliens try to sign a pact with another nation (this happens often)
2) Aliens try to sign a pact with the same nation (very rare..... but if happens --> :wallbash: :wallbash: )
3) Aliens try to sign a pact next month. (in this case, sometimes with 2 nations, and this means --> :wallbash: but not in a symple wall, directly onto Hoover Dam :tai: )
4) Aliens do nothing, but only if after reloading player loses points, for example another Ufo appear with different mission (like harvest or terror mission) and it's successfull. In this case Aliens takes points, player loses points and there's no more need, for aliens, to sign a pact. But next month it's possible that some nations decide to lower subsidies to x-com :tai:

[Dave]

Ok, I know it could be difficult, but the secret is to have all bases equipped with Avenger, 20 soldiers (Min) and 2Firestorms (and maybe a Ranger for emergency)
Yeah, in the first year is impossible to stop them all, but then if you do a great job you can stop 5 or 6 big ufo's in a day without losing soldiers.
I've played 3 game years, captured over 700 ufo's and conquer 25 Alien Base...I've lost only one soldier (Sorry Micheal Davies )
I'm a little fanatic of this game, but I think I'm not the only one.

This is my Commander (after some training ):


And this is an example of Base:


You can see, I don't use defense weapons...I like Ufo's landings

[Icewolf]

Yep, I'm about to do a header dive into that game as well!
By now I'm a bad player but I always need some time to get the trick in strategy games.

Makes me think of Red Alert 2 I guess I'm a pretty good one at it.

Hey, I am new to this forum, but I do have some questions for this great game.

1: I know I have to find a leader of some sort in one of the alien bases to know where on mars they have there HQ, but how do I know witch Alien is the Commander/Leader???`

2: Is there a newer version of this game???

3: atm I am playing the DOS version on DOSBox but I cant get the sound to work.. enyone know what to do???

Thx.