Intro

Hello and welcome! This blog is made primarily for the reporting of action that takes place as I play X-COM: UFO defense. I got this idea from a "battle report," which can be found here. I recommend this one as it has minimal distasteful language and such. Anyhow, after reading that, I decided that I needed to get this game, and attempt to do what had been done on BR.com with my friends. Because I would need a large area to write, I created this blog, as I don't have a domain name or anything, and I'm just doing this for fun.

X-COM is an old DOS game made in 1993. From my research, it is one of the best computer strategy games anywhere. And while I admit that it is fun in its own right, it will be even more fun to put my friends in the battle against the alien hordes. And it will also be fun to test out my writing skills by trying to make each report entertaining and useful to the readers (assuming, of course, that there will be some.) Hopefully this will all work out.

X-COM is abandonware, so it is free on the internet. The problem is finding a computer that can run it. There are two available versions: the original DOS version that would have to be played with an emulator. Or, you can download a windows version that doesn't require DOS to operate. After downloading about 6 files, with no success, I eventually found out that Vista is unable to run without using a hardware accelerator. However, X-COM cannot run with the hardware accelerator. So, I decided to try my luck with DOS-Box, the DOS emulator.

But, naturally, I had no idea what I was doing with DOS, and was forced to go to bed after two hours of searching downtrodden and disappointed. But do not fear, my eager fans, for there was another way out! We have an old rambler downstairs that I had failed to notice the night before. I took the downloaded files from upstairs to down (I couldn't find an Ethernet cord for the oldie)and tried to unpack the compressed files. Apparently compressed files weren't around when this computer was made, so I had to unpack them, reload them, and transfer them again. But, at long last, the program was installed, and, guess what? It worked!!

Now for a few disclaimers and such. First off, I'm not as nerdy as I sound. And if you think different, that's ok, I think this will be fun, for me, at least. And I like the whole "reporting" thing. Makes me feel important. Anyway, if you think this is absolutely ridiculous and silly, well, sorry. But I'm doing it anyway. I also might throw in an occasional off-topic story. Also, note that I'm not really writing about myself, if you don't know who I am but would like to communicate with me, leave some comments on here. And I'll do what I can to get some pictures up of the action, but that might take some time while I figure something out. I have no idea the space between updates, I doubt that I will play it extremely often, as life does demand some time. And video games get old sometimes.

Anyway, I can't think of much else to add, though I'll probably edit this if I forget. Thanks for reading!
Update 07/03-- Good news: I can upload pics from the game to this site!