Still having fun with Apocalypse. The geoscape here is unmatched. Great flavor, great variety of options, and I mean options which aren't practically suicide. It's like someone listened to fans of the first XCOM and made a game for them. Equipping/unequipping items from a slot for several soldiers at once? Hell yes. Destructible environments but having there be a reasonable cost? Sweet. NPC factions engaging the aliens ineffectually? These were all features demanded of original XCOM, and here they are.
I'm still not very far in, though, since it's about as slow as original XCOM. Finding the last alien is still a chore, except now it's a chore which can run up to one of your search party and OHKO them (turning them into an enemy unit, but at least you know where they ARE). Freakin brainsuckers (and hyperworms). But even that part is much less severe than the originals.
Yeah, I'm still using turn-based. I tried a real-time battle against the Cult of Sirius, since they're super-easy in turn-based. I came across a cluster and my scout got pelted with, I swear, 5 grenades in a few seconds. I think I'll stick with turn-based. Brainsuckers are hyperworms are rough, but leaving TU for reaction fire is working sometimes. And my few robots are immune to the brainsucker insta-kill-converts anyway.
My situation seems pretty grim at the moment though. I'm only 3 days in on this attempt, and I've done 5 alien investigation missions (plus 3 raids on Sirius in the first 10 in-game minutes, heh). I can't stand to let any group get infiltrated, so when I see the UFOs beam down troops, I launch an investigation to that location as soon as the UFOs are driven back. As a result though I just did a very iffy bughunt with only 4 troopers. Now I'm down to three.
My plan for an all-cyborg army is proving untenable. I'm recruiting people as soon as they come available - completely regardless of stats. I even made a donation to the grav-ball league based on a sketchy forum post suggesting that it'll increase my recruiting pool. But I'm still taking casualties faster than I get reinforcements. My score is high for now (and I haven't had to save-scum yet) but I hope the aliens take a few days off while my forces replenish. Somehow I'm not optimistic.
And the guy I lost on my last mission was my last cyborg ): I've been allied with SELF but they've been stingy with volunteers. Here's hoping that changes fast. I need those recruits yesterday, so hopefully tomorrow.
Edit: Nope. 1 (one) recruit today. At least they're a cyborg, but still... Screw the grav-ball league. Just for this, I'm throwing my lot in with Synthovision. As soon as rebuild my fighting force...