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2025-01-20T20:26:08Z

AShugg: Update the link to the UFOpaedia forum at StrategyCore

Because of the diverse international user base, the authors on this wiki hail from many different X-COM related forums on the web. The following is a directory of X-COM related forums that may be of interest.

Wiki authors: This list is small at the moment, but please feel free to add your 'home' X-COM related web forum to this list.

==English Forums==

* [http://www.strategycore.co.uk/forums/ strategycore.co.uk]
* [http://www.xcomufo.com/forums/ xcomufo.com]
* [http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=225 Steam X-COM forum]
* [http://steamcommunity.com/app/7760/discussions/ Steam X-COM discussion hub]
* [http://openxcom.org/forum/ OpenXcom forum]
* [http://forums.2kgames.com/forumdisplay.php?76-XCOM-General-Discussion 2K Games forum - XCOM General Discussion]

==Russian Forums==

* [http://forums.ag.ru/?board=fl_xcom ag.ru]
* [http://www.xcomrus.com/conference/ xcomrus.com]

== UFOpaedia.org Official Forum ==

* https://www.strategycore.co.uk/forums/forum/96-ufopaediaorg/

UFOpaedia now has its own web forum, hosted on [http://strategycore.co.uk Strategycore].

What's it for? Here you can discuss pretty much anything about the wiki. From matters concerned the running of the wiki, the articles, or if you simply want to discuss matters off the wiki so you don't clutter the recent changes with minor discussions. It is also a good place to contact the administrators if the wiki is unreachable for whatever reason.

Talk:Steam Versions

2025-01-20T20:17:55Z

AShugg: Updating the "StrategyCore" section

==Steam Talk==
Probably we should create a new page for Steam on this wiki. Also, we could even get support from Valve now and start adding mods onto steam. This would help tremendously, but might remove the original purpose of the game. It will turn it into a easier game, with super heavy lasers (no offense Seb) and the like. This would increase X-COM's rep, but lower its individuality. Still, this is a decision for the Admins to make, certainly not us.

:I agree we should have a Steam page now but I'm not sure where to put it. Is there a "distributions" or "where to get it?" section? I couldn't find one. It would be good to make all the mods available on Steam. By the way I don't agree the mods make the game easier. Generally they just remove bugs, restore game balance, and improve playability. Seb76 is very aware his Heavy Laser mod is unbalancing, that's why he has kept it in a separate "development" version of his loader.

:I've been playing TFTD for a few days using the Steam version. To my surprise, TFTD Hack and XComUtil command line both work, once you find the game save files which are under "common" in the Steam install directory. They don't seem to be protected by Steam "anti-cheat", fortunately. I'm not sure if any mods that change the executable will work, however - haven't tried that yet.

:It's been quite interesting to play TFTD for the first time, unmodded, bugs and all. I suggest that only bugfix-type mods should be distributed with Steam, the tools and cheats should probably stay on this site and others. Also, I think the discussions would need to be with Take Two /2K, as they are the releasers of the games - Valve's Steam is just a channel in this case.

:Anyway I'm going to start contributing to the TFTD wiki items and also adding notes about any more Steam specifics. [[User:Spike|Spike]] 03:01, 2 October 2008 (CDT)

::Spike, I think you were looking for [[Where to Get the Games]], and I agree that listing all known mods there would be advantageous. Personally, I think there should also be an article investigating what changes, if any, were brought to the game with 2K's release. In particular, does the difficulty stay at what you chose, now? It seems to, but it's hard to know without looking under the hood. I do know that they didn't make proximity grenades remember being armed after loading a save. [[User:NightChime|NightChime]] 19:41, 20 January 2009 (CST)

:You don't really need to look under the hood to find out what difficulty level you are at. If you have a Mind Probe or Psi-Amp, check the stats of an alien and compare that to the tables in my [http://www.strategycore.co.uk/xcom/pg/ufoalienstats#ufostats2 Alien Stats] page at StrategyCore. --[[User:Zombie|Zombie]] 20:14, 20 January 2009 (CST)

::Thanks for the tip, will do. [[User:NightChime|NightChime]] 17:25, 28 January 2009 (CST)

To test:
TFTD mag. nav research; deep one bug; MC reader research, sub construction research.

That's all I can think of offhand, I'll test these later today. A link to the Geoscape.exe page where there's some talk about this version (as it's occasionally referred to as the Geoscape.exe version I think) could be handy, unless anyone has a problem with that I'll add one in the see also section later. Still bugged wrt skill levels; no bugs from psi skill gain.

== Some bugs fixed in Steam? ==

I'm playing the Steam version on Superhuman level and it looks very like I'm about to lose the campaign in March. After 4 interceptions in January I achieved none in the next 2 months (very few subs spotted and all got away; only actions were two terror missions, in the same place, at month-end).

This looks very much like the difficulty level has been patched in the Steam version, because this is unlike any previous TFTD experience.

No idea about the tech tree situation, in the circumstances. I am minded to go back and restart the campaign with a whole new approach - this level of difficulty seems to call for one. [[User:4th Cuirassier|4th Cuirassier]] 05:54, 11 January 2011 (EST)

== StrategyCore ==

Does anyone know the origin or background for the following line in this page?

XCom 1 (UFO Defense / Enemy Unknown) is the DOS 1.4 version, from strategycore.com.

I don't know what strategycore used to be, but that web address now belongs to StrategyCore K.K., a technology solutions provider in Japan.

[[User:AShugg|AShugg]] ([[User talk:AShugg|talk]]) 11:18, 7 January 2025 (UTC)

:Potentially answering my own question (while spawning another), the reference may be to strategycore.co.uk, where various forums are hosted. If that's right, the next question is, did the _information_ come from strategycore.co.uk, or the V1.4 DOS release of XCom 1 come from there? The latter would seem unlikely, but that's the problem with this ambiguous statement. [[User:AShugg|AShugg]] ([[User talk:AShugg|talk]]) 20:17, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

Talk:Steam Versions

2025-01-07T11:18:19Z

AShugg: Query the "StrategyCore" text on page

Steam Versions

2025-01-07T11:14:14Z

AShugg: Corrected typo

== General Notes on Steam Distribution of XCom Series Games ==
 
 
This page may contain out-dated information
 
 
 
The games are available via Valve's Steam service, at http://store.steampowered.com . (The exact link is currently on the main page of this UFOPaedia.)

In the Steam distribution, the XCom executables and game files are found in e.g. "C:\Program Files\Steam\steamapps\common\x-com terror from the deep\TFD" and "C:\Program Files\Steam\steamapps\common\xcom ufo defense\XCOM".

XCom 1 (UFO Defense / Enemy Unknown) is the DOS 1.4 version, from strategycore.com.

XCom 2: Terror From The Deep (TFTD) is also a DOS version, possibly the version sometimes called "TFTD Beta".

Steam provides anti-cheat functionality to prevent modification of the games distributed via Steam. However this fortunately does not seem to be fully implemented for the XCom series. The game executables are patched to force them to chain to the Steam launcher first, and the Steam launcher chains to a file configured by Steam (in '''runme.dat'''). However the target file can be changed to point to a different target, or the target file can be overwritten (e.g.by the contents of runxcom.bat).

The game data files themselves can be edited using standard tools such as XCOM Hack / TFTD Hack, and the command line version of XComUtil. The data file changes are then correctly picked up by the game.

== XComUtil ==

=== Summary ===

XCom 1 works fine. Just edit dosbox.conf autoexec, after you install using xcusetup. The only issue may be problems seeing messages or prompts from runxcom.bat if you opt to use the inter-executable actions such as xcomutil after-combat messages, or autocombat.

TFTD is now pretty much as described for XCOM 1 (see below for full details).

=== XCom 1 ===

Copy xcomutil files into the "XCOM" subdirectory of the "xcom ufo defense" installation directory. Open a command window in the XCOM subdirectory and run XCUSETUP. It should work normally.

Then edit the '''autoexec''' section of '''dosbox.conf''', replacing:

call ufocd.bat

with

call runxcom.bat

Launching XCom 1 from Steam should now provide all the normal RunXCom features.

There may be issues if runxcom needs user input during the black screen between Battlescape and Geoscape. You will probably be unable to see any messages or prompts. Just hit enter. If that doesn't work, hit ctrl-C. If you want to see what the prompt was, check xcomutil.log.

=== TFTD ===

TFTD is now also distributed on Steam as a DOSBox version, possibly the version identified as "TFTD Beta" which apparently includes some research tree bug fixes. Again, after copying all xcomutil files to the "TFD" (''sic'') sub-directory and running XCUSETUP, edit the '''autoexec''' section of '''dosbox.conf''' and replace "call terror.bat" with "call runxcom.bat".

User:AShugg

2024-12-15T15:49:26Z

AShugg: Initial version of page

Home page for Andrew Shugg on UFOpaedia