Customer Reviews

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri Expansion: Alien Crossfire

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Seven years after planetfall, as the Gaians, Collective, University and other factions struggle to make their way on Planet, two alien spacecraft fight in the space above...and ultimately crash land, to make their own way on Planet.

Alien Crossfire puts the Alpha Centauri game in the center of this conflict, as the factions we all know and love are caught between the Caretakers and Preservers, two alien factions diametrically opposed to each other and any who would ally with the other. New Human factions to play such as the Cyborgs and Pirates just add to the fun. New unit types, and planetary features such as the Manifold Nexus make the Alpha Centauri experience even richer than the already excellent basic game.

So you thought Alpha Centauri is all there was? Well, get ready for an even bigger game experience.

Most companies just add a few frills to a computer game with an expansion. But the Alien Crossfire expansion not only adds the frills, it adds totally new thrills. In addition to the new human factions and their units, it adds two Alien races to the mix - making this one of the most original colonization / civilization games available.

There are new secret projects to build. There are new units to add to your already full arsenal. There are some new features on Planet that make exploration more interesting. Add to that the alien races - one which is bent on recovering "their" world at all costs, and one that is more interested in working with the humans that have colonized this new world.

My favorite new faction is the Nautilus Pirates. They start with a unique advantage - they build their first city in the sea, and they can very quickly achieve dominance of Planet's oceans.

If you liked Alpha Centauri, it might be worth your effort to try to find a copy of Alien Crossfire. My only dream is that both discs will be released as a single package someday. Still one of my most played discs. One of my very highest recommendations.

Take the winning formula of Alpha Centauri and a new twist in the story of Planet, and you have Alien Crossfire. Two alien factions are struggling to regain control of Planet, or Manifold Six as they call it, while several new human factions emerge.

This may become a little repetitive for those familiar with Alpha Centauri at the beginning, but play for long enough and you'll be hooked all over again. New native lifeforms, units, technologies, projects and facilities spark up Planet and allow you to rediscover the game. You can mix and match factions to pit your favourite side against the new, or try one of the alien factions and see how bizarrely they transform units and human technology.

The creators of this game tried to make it a cross between an expansion pack and a sequel, and they've succeeded amazingly. As addictive as Alpha Centauri itself, Alien Crossfire is a worthy successor.

I was one of the beta testers on SMAC and SMACX and sank far more hours into it than I'd ever want to admit to. Burned out, immediately after the retail release I set it aside for a couple months but came back to it and never left. I've probably spent more time with SMAC/SMACX than any other game and I'm still playing. Why? Because it's truly a classic piece of work--a story within a game and a game within a story. I know of no other game in the genre that is quite like it. And guessing at the amount time, effort and money that went it making SMAC, I don't expect to see another one like it either. If you're a fan of the TBS genre, then for that reason alone you should have a copy of this--its a reminder of just what can be done by a talented, dedicated crew of artists working in pixels and code.

If you've not experiened this game, then there is really only one question you need to answer to know if you should get it: do you like turn-based strategy games? If so, then you need to try this one. A few people are put off by the Science Fiction setting but unless that's a fatal flaw for you then find a copy of this and enjoy. Some things you need to know:

* This game isn't new so don't expect state-of-the art graphics and eye-candy. However, the graphics hold up pretty well tho' and they serve the purpose extremely well.

* Yes, it will play on the latest machines running WinXP. At least it does on machines I've tried running P4 processors and Win2000, WinXp Home and WinXP Pro. There are a couple of tweaks you may or may not need available to make it fully compatible and with a P4 processor the game will warn you that 'your CPU isn't supported' but it plays just fine.

* Don't rush through this one. Play the game like you're reading a really good novel--read everything, look at stuff, watch the cut scene videos, etc. There's an incredible amount of 'back story' for the game and its easy to miss just how rich it is.

There aren't many things, much less games, that can be called unique but I think SMAC/SMACX is one of them.

This is an expansion module for Alpha Centauri. If you like Alpha Centauri this is a very good upgrade. If you don't like Alpha Centauri this won't change your opinion. I happen to love Alpha Centauri and bought the expansion pack as soon as it came out. While it is not perfect, it does what it does very well (introduces new player races in the game and different game options). I am very happy with this product.

I loved Civ II and I lovedAlpha Centauri, and in fact I loved all of Sid Meiers products. Which is why I wasn't suprised by the excellence of the expansion pack. I loved how unique the factions were, which led to a diffrent style of game than Alpha Centauri...which was played like Civ II, i.e. 7 similar factions which give a subtlty to the game play...where as in Alien Cross fire, each faction is radically diffrent...not even including the massive difference between Human and Alien factions...One human faction can maintain an complety water civilization, and another can completey criple anoter faction with just probe teams. I also really liked being able to comit atrocities without sanctions.

I had a few objections...namely, The council doesn't seem to work to well with only 5 governments, and they're weren't really enough new techs, wonders, weapons,graphic changes and new ways to beat the game for my taste. My only other objections are that the Aliens seem a little to powerful, especially at the beginning, and and I thought it would have been cool to coexist with them, instead of wiping them out.

Alien Crossfire is not a sequel but a refinement of the original game which, by the way, can still be played after the expansion is installed. Gameplay is unchanged but the new techs and units add balance and even more subtlety to the game. I find the seven new factions to be slightly more powerful than the seven original but it's fun to mix and match. The two alien factions have an advantage at the beginning of the game but are left out of the world council, which can be a big disadvantage later on. There are some minor bugs so be sure to get the patch.

Alpha Centauri is such an absorbing game that completely outpaces anything similar that has come out over the last 12 years. The Alien Crossfire expansion adds enough to the game that it surely is worth owning and using. Be sure to get the patch though as the game has a lot of bugs!

The new human factions (Pirates, Drones, Consciousness, Planet Cult, and Datatechs) are fantastic fun! The alien factions are overpowered, irritating, and suck the life out of the game in my opinion. Fortunately you can play without them. Too bad you can only have seven factions max in a game as playing with the 12 human factions would be incredible fun!

The new planetary features are worth having for sure. The Manifold Nexus is mysterious and worth fighting over. The crash site of the Unity spaceship has lots of goodies to dig up, and the borehole fields are nice to build near.

The new technologies add a lot of excitement to the game along with new base installations like the Aquafarm which gives you more food from kelp farms or the Flechette missile defense which gives you better defense from missile attacks. Brood pits make even bigger and more dangerous mind worms, spore launchers, sealurks, and isles of the deep. New Technologies like marine detatchments can be added to ships so you can board and capture enemy ships! Four new secret projects are also made available: Planetary Energy Grid (energy bank in every base - nice!), Cloudbase Academy (air complex in every base - definitely the most valuable secret project!), the Nethack Terminus (probe team bonus - yawn!), and the Manifold Harmonics (nice for extra food and energy but the game is almost over!).

Once you play with the new factions and buildings, it's doubtful you'd go back to playing just the original as much if at all.

This is one of those, 'don't ask us about' it addons. Seems the owner and a head developer when seperate ways. If you really only want to play the game and are not stuck on collecting it, or the box artwork, do a search for 'The Laptop Collection', and just buy the thing for 19.99 along with Alpha Centauri and like 2 other games. If you need to show the box to your friends, or want to resell it on e-bay, you'd better buy it used for like $75 to $125 here. Whatever you need. Cool game. Next time I won't wait so long to get what I wanted. Collectors glut just about ruined getting a hold of this one. Barely made it. Notice, I don't need the pretty box. :)

This game is as addictive as its predcessor (which I highly recommend), with all the goodies of the previous game and some interesting new factions with their own stories. However, they were not as well thought out as the ones in the original game.

What gave Alpha Centauri the tremendous amount of time one could spend on it and still play many more games was its game balance. With the new factions being nice but less than well thought out (read: heavily overpowered), most games quickly turned to predictable.
It's not fun seeing the aliens or cyborgs dominate the entire map in a short time, even crushing the old militaristic powerhouses like the Spartans and Believers easily with half as many bases. In each game, you will eventually end up endlessly fighting one of the new factions which has taken over the world and I don't think that was intended by the developers. The game could have used a bit more polish in that regard.

Still, many good sides need to be praised as well. The new factions, technologies and flavor texts match the quality of the original ones, and dialogue choices for alien factions are simply hilarious, perfectly executed and remembered for a long time.

Given the expansion's lack of copies in circulation (read: high price) and its overall quality, I don't consider it a must have. However, if you can find a normally priced one, it's definitely worth seeing.