In this XCOM 2 Collection review we are finally talking about the transposition of the excellent strategic Firaxis for iOS systems, which has almost reached a distance four years since the debut of the original game for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. A period that saw the release of various post-launch content, first of all the excellent expansion War of the Chosen, but still very long by industry standards. That element goes to testify the hard work that the developers of Feral Interactive (authentic gaming specialists for the bitten apple) had to support to make a rather heavy title compatible with Apple devices, which already suffered more than a few hiccups on consoles. The final result is therefore particularly precious, but it comes to some conditions not really accessible for anyone: let's find out why.
The necessary premises
Away the tooth, away the pain: XCOM 2 Collection arrives on the App Store at price (almost) record of € 27,99. A bargain, if you consider the value of the title and the fact that the package includes all four DLCs released later plus the huge War of the Chosen, but at the same time a real drain for those on iPhone and iPad who are used to spend much lower amounts for premium experiences. The other barrier to entry to consider if you are interested in the game, even before talking about the qualities of this conversion, is the volume occupied by the title in terms of the memory: to the 4GB of initial download it is necessary to add almost as many, for a total of over 8GB of storage space required, with a note from the developers recommending having at least 17GB free to avoid running into problems during installation. Last but not least, XCOM 2 Collection absolutely does not run on all Apple devices: i minimum requirements, speaking of the year of release of the hardware, they are an iPhone 7 Plus or a second generation iPad Pro (2017).
The usual, excellent gameplay
In short, there are reasons to make a good slice of users turn away, but the fact remains that XCOM 2 Collection is still an amazing game, which in portable format obviously gives up something in terms of graphic rendering but instills the exaltation of having one of the greatest strategists of recent times in the palm of your hand. Referring to our previous reviews of XCOM 2 and War of the Chosen for all the details on the game if you do not know what we are talking about, here we prefer to focus on the rendering of the gameplay on the iPhone and iPad. The basics in terms of control system and interface had already been thrown by the conversion of the XCOM prequel, so Feral continued on that virtuous path by proposing the same solutions: the result is that the game performs very well on a touch screen (obviously even better on the more generous screen of an iPad), making you absolutely regret a mouse and keyboard or even a pad. The management part in the base of operations flows away which is a pleasure, with all the menus just a tap away, but even during the fights the work done by the developers is commendable, with the keys to perform the different actions that are positioned at the edges of the screen leaving the view almost completely free, with the user who can at any time manage the zoom and rotation of the camera with a pinch or a circular movement of two fingers.
Technical sector
XCOM 2 was not a prodigious title from the point of view of graphics and it is even less so with four more years on the rump, but on iOS it still makes a good figure, despite the obvious stakes that Feral Interactive has had to put here and there. In particular, the low resolution of the intermission footage and the reduced definition of the texture which is especially noticeable when the camera approaches the action to capture the actions of enemy agents or soldiers. Nothing that makes XCOM 2 Collection unpleasant to the eye, but it is evident that it is the least flashy version of the title among those released so far. The sound accompaniment is excellent as always, while it is right to point out the remarkable rapidity of the uploads which leaves the door open to a fruition that is not necessarily too prolonged. It should be noted that our test was carried out without any problem on a shiny iPhone 12 Pro, but on older devices it is not said that everything runs smoothly.
Comment
Tested version iPhone Digital Delivery App Store Price 27,99 € Resources4Gaming.com8.8
Readers (1)
9.5
Your voteXCOM 2 Collection is a great value package that comes to iOS without too many compromises, offering the complete experience of all the DLCs of one of the best strategy of the generation. A masterpiece that lovers of the genre who prefer to play on the move should not miss, while those who have already lived the experience elsewhere or have the opportunity to buy it on another platform would do well to do the math: the demands in terms of hardware are considerable. and the graphic limitations still make it a less beautiful version to look at than the others.
PRO
- The game is always great
- Touch controls and interface work great
- Very fast uploads
- It doesn't work on many devices and can trudge on older ones
- It takes up a lot of storage space
- Technically it is the poorer version
