HIGH The resurrection of a long-absent, fan favorite franchise.

LOW Restarting after ten hours due to crushing poverty.

WTF Walls don't function properly in this universe.

If nothing else, the developers at Firaxis had their work cut out for them.

The original X-COM: UFO Defense was an undisputed classic held in high regard by anyone old enough to have played it in the early 90s, and it's never easy to update something so treasured for a current audience. From this perspective, XCOM: Enemy Unknown is largely successful in taking the core source material and re-molding it to fit current sensibilities.

On the other hand, when viewed as an experience unto itself, it's not as balanced and as satisfying as it could be. I certainly want to applaud the work that's been done, but while the game gives a stellar first impression, I found that my enjoyment decreased incrementally with each additional hour invested.

As an isometric squad-based, turn-based strategy game, XCOM: Enemy Unknown is easy to get into thanks to a straightforward formula and a fiercely streamlined amount of options. The emphasis is on tactics. Players will spend most of their time moving characters from cover to cover while taking shots at visible enemies, or holding in "overwatch" mode to guard against any that suddenly appear. Each map is of a small-to-moderate size, and portrays various real-world scenes; a gas station, a stretch of forest, an office building, and so on.

Characters are divided into four classes (Assault, Support, Heavy and Sniper) and the player is free to mix and match as they choose. The initial squad size is only a quartet, but the maximum of six troopers is soon reached, and it's just the right number. Less feels like too few, and more would be unwieldy.

It's been quite a while since a game of this sort grabbed me; the Western art direction and extraterrestrial subject material are a great change of pace from the usual Japanese-influenced offerings, and there's something deeply satisfying about moving soldiers around like the deadliest chess pieces that ever were. It's not quite as deep or as nuanced as I might have wished, but it's still satisfying to bring the hammer down on aliens through solid planning and brainpower.

I was also quite happy to see that the HQ management of the original was included in Enemy Unknown, although like combat, it's very streamlined and simplified. This side of XCOM asks the player to design their base of operations for optimal efficiency. A wide variety of rooms can be installed (Workshop, Science Lab, Power Generators, etc.) and placing similar sections adjacently will increase their functionality. Also carried over is the now-classic ability to dissect alien corpses for developing high-tech items and ever-deadlier weaponry.

When viewed on a macro scale, XCOM: Enemy Unknown seems to be the total package, and a spot-on update to something which earned the devotion of so many players back in the day. However, once I got over the initial rush of this long-lost face looking so fit and trim, its weaknesses started to appear. For example, as a strategy and tactics fan, I found it hard to accept the fact that line-of-sight in the environment plays an inconsistent role in most circumstances, and even worse, throws logic out the window with the "overwatch" mode mentioned earlier.

When a character is "overwatching," they get a free shot at any enemy who crosses their field of vision. The problem is that the game doesn't recognize when the shots are impossible. I saw characters shooting through walls, solid structures, and even entire buildings at enemies—and then hitting them—with laughable regularity. I have no idea how the developers thought the game was "done" when these ludicrous shots are possible.

The non-combat aspects of XCOM: Enemy Unknown have issues as well, primarily in the balance of resources and money. After getting ten hours in on my first playthrough, I was in such a severe state of poverty that I felt it necessary to scrap everything and start over. On my second attempt, I ended up with a cash surplus and frequent shortages of raw materials.

It's not always clear which resources will be necessary to advance the plot, so in trying to kit my troops with better gear, I was inadvertently consuming things I needed later. Due to the frequent lack of story-crucial materials, it's too easy to get stuck in tedious cycles of grinding through dull, samey missions while waiting for the game to drop what's required to maintain forward momentum.

The developers have said this paucity of resources was intentional, as a way of making players feel the tension of deciding between wants and needs, but it doesn't feel tense—it's just progress-halting bottlenecking that unnecessarily inflates playtime. As a result, the campaign's pace sputters into an overlong, patience-testing trudge when it should be ramping up to a fevered pitch.

Apart from what I've mentioned, there were production issues to deal with—I had characters "fall" through the world several times, and I had two sessions where my characters could move but not shoot. Because of the limited camera angles, it was sometimes hard to tell where a rocket would hit (friendly fire? No thanks!) and it's often tough to work effectively in multi-level buildings. It was also common to find that the top portion of the screen was cut off when zoomed-in, leaving crucial information unavailable while deciding whether to take a key shot.

While I still call myself an XCOM fan and was thrilled to see the property return after so many years, I couldn't commit to XCOM: Enemy Unknown wholeheartedly. Although I appreciate the update for modern audiences, the game comes off as a bit undercooked and stumbles on things which should be airtight. On the other hand, it's still a very welcome addition to a genre that's gone a bit stale—just be prepared for a little probing when dealing with these creatures from another world. Rating: 7.0 out of 10..

Disclosures: This game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Xbox 360. Approximately 34 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. No time was spent in multiplayer mode.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game contains blood and gore, strong language and violence. Although this game wouldn't be my first choice when my kids needed something to kill a few hours with, I didn't find it particularly objectionable, either. Of course, most of the action is about aliens shooting humans, or humans shooting aliens, but the graphics are mostly on the small side and hardly the bloodiest thing I've ever seen. I genuinely don't remember any instances of strong language.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: There shouldn't be any problems. There are no auditory cues necessary for gameplay although the sounds and music do shift in certain circumstances. That said, I didn't find the sounds to be of great use, and had no difficulty playing with the sound off. All dialogue in the game can be accompanied with subtitles.

At this year's convention, the word on everyone's lips was "pre-alpha". You could not take five steps on the show floor without that phrase sneaking into your ear and insulting your grey matter. Now, this didn't bother me when applied to obvious first-draft code like Bastion's actual initial build. If it looks and plays more or less like it's eventually going to look and play, though, don't toss out the meaningless pre-alpha catchphrase. Just say "we're still working on it". I promise to understand.

Time to crack: 45 minutes

My first stop was the line for the Mass Effect panel, which apparently I didn't need to stand for since Dan somehow managed to walk out of the Dragon Age panel and immediately turn around and duck into Mass Effect. This panel offered some helpful clarification for the large number of journos and commentators who did not read the announcement of new ending DLC closely and reacted as if the world was ending and all art was through forever. No, they are not changing the ending. They are expanding the ending that already exists to provide "additional clarification". Also, there's new multiplayer DLC coming this week for free! Krogan Vanguard! WOOOOOOOOOO!

Kicking off the panel with a list of things BioWare was going to give us for free ensured a relatively pleasant atmosphere and allowed for a few good stories to be shared. The question of Tali's infamous stock photo came up, and Weekes was basically able to deflect it by pointing to the actual face model for Samara, who was in the room, cosplaying Samara. There was also an uncomfortable silence and a blunt "no comment" in response to a question about the Indoctrination Theory. This is understandable, since the existence of the theory is one of the key signs that the writers flubbed the ending in spectacular fashion.

Nonetheless the atmosphere was not, to use the game's favorite word, brutal. Everyone was basically pleasant, and the moments where the controversy showed were mostly uncomfortable silences, sometimes covered by awkward jokes.

Theme of the Con: Stealth

The convention's stealthy aspect kicked off with a great panel on the subject featuring Nels Anderson, Andy Schatz, and Dan Silvers, chaired by Matthew Weise, also featuring the con's largest single-room concentration of guys in suits. The indie developers covered the bases, discussing how stealth historically hasn't dealt with fail states efficiently, the underuse of deception-style stealth (Spy Party came up but Assassin's Creed multiplayer didn't), critique of the compromises necessary for first-person stealth, and how awesome Thief is in general. Alas, this panel also featured plenty of a major PAX trend: the long, rambling comment posing as a question.

I also wandered over with Chi to check out the demo of the upcoming Hitman: Absolution, which looks like it will at least have the option to play some genuine disguise-based stealth. I believe this was just a public repeat of a demo they did at GDC, showing two runs through part of an orphanage level. The first one featured a lot of knocking guys out, stashing their unconscious bodies in inconspicuous places, and stripping them to disguise yourself, although it revealed a lot of very badly-written dialogue between the thugs.

The second run-through was a guns-blazing affair, and overall I wasn't terribly pleased at how easy it was to survive the storm of bullets. Absolution also features a point-shooting system similar to Splinter Cell: Conviction and Alpha Protocol that is surely good for the lulz but probably less so for solid stealth gameplay. The violent play-through seemed more like Hitman: The Movie: The Game than what I'm looking for in Hitman. Again, it's optional, but if 47 really is as tough to kill as the demo implied then I feel like players will be strongly tempted to just blow their enemies away when stealth breaks down.

Worst busker: Big dude in Park Street station singing "Wonderwall". If I'd been on that side of the platform I'd have payed him to stop.

I also paid a visit to the X-COM panel, which was a much more reassuring trip. Half the developers said their clearest memory of the original X-COM was walking out of the dropship and immediately getting their team killed, so at least they understand the direction. They also had some humorous comparisons between the original game's enemies and their redesigns. I think the art direction is fine, although I feel like the Berserker enemy mostly exists to attract bro gamers with the promise of some splatter kills. The concept for the base looks intriguing, though it seems like they haven't totally worked it out yet.

I also got a chance to see the demo on the show floor, which I put here because it was a theater-style hands-off demo (a dev played on a PC using a controller). The producer running the show said that they were aiming for Project Dark-style difficulty, which is a decent direction for both design and marketing. As expected, it showed off the Berserker's brutality, but the demo also suggested that dealing with Berserkers was going to be a matter of bringing enough rockets to the fight. Overall, though, it left me with a positive impression that it will be hard enough and interesting enough to live up to the X-COM reputation.

The last panel I got to (unfortunately I missed the Parsely panels) was "Real RPGs", which was a decent review of ways to make tabletop role-playing a welcoming and safe environment. Nothing particularly new was said, and there was not a lot of focus on how to design (or shoehorn in) mechanics to safely explore race, gender, or sexuality, which is what I was really interested in. The next time I see a panel like this I hope it includes something about modding video games to make them more inclusive or mature. That would be a terribly interesting discussion.

Next up: The games!

Amidst the sea of near indistinguishable first- and third-person shooters, MMOs and MMO shooters at PAX East, I found it somewhat ironic that two particular titles that stood out to me where both remakes of classic games: XCOM: Enemy Unknown
and Double Dragon Neon.

XCOM wasn't playable on the convention floor, but the developers were giving 25-minute gameplay presentations to limited groups of gamers who were willing to line up for the preview.

The beauty of Enemy Unknown is that fans of the original X-COM can rest assured that this isn't a duck-and-covered shooter with old X-COM elements retrofitted in. This is unquestionably a turn-based strategy game with alien resource and research management at the heart of its gameplay.

During the demo presentation, the developers walked through a classic X-COM-style intercept mission that gave audiences a sense of the tactical combat flow and highlighted the 4 specific roles of squad characters, which include assault, support, heavy weapons and sniper.

The thing that I found most striking about the gameplay was that there was no grid on the play map of any sort. Players select squad members and can freely direct them to any point or cover position, which made the game feel more open and non-traditional/hybrid-ish.

Commands for squad members can include pinning down enemies with suppressing fire, taking clear sniper shots and lobbing grenades. Aliens will also attempt to ambush squad members running through open spaces and larger brute-type aliens would smash squad members who aren't given properly coverage.

The big visual difference is that once commands are executed, actions immediately play out in dramatic cinematic slow-motion close-ups where you can see the detail and personality of the 3D models interacting with one another in bloody engagement.

Environmental damage to the surroundings and destructible building walls will also play strong factor in the strategic battles. Characters will also not faint and be revived. Death is permanent in order to add to the tension to the gameplay.

Closing out the presentation, the developers also gave a sneak peek of the home base which they likened to a childhood "G.I. Joe aircraft carrier" toy that only the rich kid on the block could afford. In that base, there will be all kinds of options for squad mates to hone their skills and of course research and develop captured alien technology.

Everything from the style of the art to the game design choices made it abundantly clear to me that not only are the developers fans of the original X-COM games, but they have a strong sense of what made them so great and that has me super psyched for this release.

In literally the final hours of PAX East, I also managed to discover Double Dragon Neon tucked away in one of the farthest corners of the exhibition hall.

At first glance, I'll admit I wasn't bowled over. There hasn't been a Double Dragon sequel that really grabbed me since Super Double Dragon on the SNES. Seeing the cheesy "neon" moniker left me a little puzzled.

It wasn't until one of the staff members explained the concept that Double Dragon Neon is essentially a tribute to all things eighties like Big Trouble in Little China did I really get it.

Just recently on the GameCritics.com podcast, we talked about how many eighties action movies would make terrific IPs for games and how it was near criminal that there isn't a Big Trouble in Little China video game.

Well boys, our prayers have been answered in the form of Double Dragon Neon where Marian bears a striking resemblance to Kim Katrall, Billy and Jimmy Lee sport ass kickin' mullets, embarrassing fashion choices abound and when a co-op player goes down, the other player can revive him by symbolically rewinding a cassette tape with a pencil (turning the thumb stick).

The fighting gameplay also felt worthy of the Double Dragon co-op legacy. In addition to the standard punch and kick combos, there were also grappling attacks that could be initiated upon stunning a foe.

The classic knees-to-the-head and elbow-drops-to-back were absent, but throws and double noggin knockers (if you grabbed two stunned enemies close together) livened up the action. The staff person assured me more grappling techniques would be unlocked as the player progresses through the game.

The hands-on demo ends in a crazy cliffhanger. Entering a Chinese restaurant-looking building reveals itself to be pagoda-shaped rocket ship that launches into space. Once in space, Billy and Jimmy face off against a heavily armored Raiden-looking boss wielding a massive sword with Marian being held captive in the background.

So while the business of video games drive the development of countless first-person shooters and MMOs, I'm happy to see that game culture has progressed to the point where revivals and reimagining's of classic titles actually feels more than just desperate attempts to cash-in on nostalgia.

When done right and in a proper historical context like these two titles, it feels like there's actual cultural value and relevance in revisiting these titles as is so often the case in other mediums.

XCOM: Enemy Unknown is set to release in fall of 2012 for Xbox 360 and PS3 and Double Dragon Neon is due out on Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network in July 2012.