I figured there would be no better place to just ask this than here so why not?

I've been on the fence about getting this game but not because I am unsure of its quality, I am actually just losing more and more free time as the weeks in school go on. So I was wondering how well this game lends itself for the occasional play. I am aware of its difficulty and that does not scare me away at all, its the primary reason why I am so interested, but would it be best for me to get it now and play it occasionally or should I just wait for Christmas break or something..?

I was only able to put in about 10 hours in the past week, but most missions weren't that long. Up until I got to a main base. That mission took an hour and 15 minutes. >_>

You can save at any time so it shouldn't be a problem if you have to drop it mid mission.

Outside of some main story missions that can take some time, you can pop in and do a mission or two then leave really quickly. 10-20 min for the average mission depending on enemy squad size. Whether or not you will have the Willpower to our not is another thing.

You can save/load at any point so no worries about losing progression or anything. Unfortunately you can't name your saves (afaik) so leaving a game mid-mission could get quite confusing if it takes a while to get back to it. Having that said each mission only takes like 15-30 minutes though, and the game could very easily be played on a mission by mission format. That is if you're able to put it down though =) If you have an hour here and an hour there you should easily be able to load up a game at your base, get reaquinted with what you were doing, progress untill a mission pops and go do it and set up your base again for another session later.

The missions are 15-60 mins long and you can save anytime, in and out of missions.

@SargeMcD:

XCOM should arrive on mobile platforms momentarily. I'd be surprised if it doesn't show up within a year. Definitely works well played in that 'on the go' way.

It's brilliantly addictive though - so if your time comes at a premium - dive into XCOM at your own risk. Totally worth it, as far as I'm concerned.

@Seppli: Hmm.. never did think about Mobile. Might have to check it out.

But thanks for the quick responses guys, just might have to make a quick run to the store tomorrow and stare at the game for a bit..

@Seppli said:

@SargeMcD:

XCOM should arrive on mobile platforms momentarily. I'd be surprised if it doesn't show up within a year. Definitely works well played in that 'on the go' way.

It's brilliantly addictive though - so if your time comes at a premium - dive into XCOM at your own risk. Totally worth it, as far as I'm concerned.

Oh man. Where can I go to throw money at an Android version of this?

So, I'm definitely in the same situation. I had a free weekend and got over a serious effort hump in School and Work. So I treated myself.

I started it on Thursday at 7PM, and I just beat it today at 5PM. Total playtime according to Steam was 26 hrs on Normal. 43 battles, so 15-60min per battle sounds right. Lost 14 guys, killed ~440 enemies. Lost 2 countries. I never lost a battle, but i definitely lived with a few screwups. It gives you the stats when you're finished.

I would expect the average range of playtimes to be about 25% faster than mine to 50% longer than mine(depending on how much pain you're willing to live with)

Its pretty well portioned, but if like feeling like you've made 'progress', this game can be aggravating. Of the 43 battles, I would say only 60% were 'progress', wherein you've captured/seen new enemies, captured new equipment, got things you really needed, etc. Keep that in mind if you suffer from 'one more turn/must make progress' syndrome.

I don't think there is 'save anytime' on the advanced difficulty options so watch out for that.

@Rbrendecke said:

Its pretty well portioned, but if like feeling like you've made 'progress', this game can be aggravating. Of the 43 battles, I would say only 60% were 'progress', wherein you've captured/seen new enemies, captured new equipment, got things you really needed, etc. Keep that in mind if you suffer from 'one more turn/must make progress' syndrome.

How so? I don't think I understand how you're using "progress". The game doesn't have limitless enemy types, nor objective types, so no, you're not always going to encounter something new and interesting every single time you deploy your troops on a mission. But you do get something out of every mission (progress), unless you really bone up the objective or your entire squad dies.

@SargeMcD doesn't have to always set a goal of "ok, I'll play until I advance the story/see a new alien". He could easily just sit down and say "OK, I'll play whatever the next 2 missions are that the game gives me", and then be done with it for the night.

i feel like you could play this in bite size chunks, but that really depends on your own will power to stop playing. the game does give you a good stopping point when you finish a mission. promote your units/mourn the dead save game and come back later. unless your in the middle planning out your upgrade strategy its pretty easy to pick back up later on

@Rbrendecke: That play time jumps if you play Classic Ironman. I'm on Game 8 (the previous 7 ended in failure) and you can lose everything after putting in like 10 hours.

@SargeMcD: If you suffer from "One more turn..." then you might end up failing all of your classes.