By running the game executable.

If you have any problems in launching the game on your system, please:
A. Read the previous posts in this thread. There is a good possibility that someone had a similar problem and managed to get a solution.
B. If that didn't help, run a search on Apocalypse in Troubleshooting section.
C. If you still have not found a solution, then post a new thread in Troubleshooting and describe your problem in a _detailed_ manner. The more exact is your description, the easier it will be to find a solution, as well as faster.

i have a very important question. a friend of mine figured out that i downloadet x-com apokalypse here. he also wants this game but he is not able to speak english or even to understand. he would appreciate it if anyone knows where i can get the german version. its not possible to change the language with the version which is available on this awesome site.

A couple pages ago somebody said that hoverbikes en masse are quite good. In my current game my fleet consists out of a valkyrie, a wolfhound, a stormdog, 6 hovercars and about a dozend high end hoverbikes using the best engine, a light targeting system and a rendor or a lineage cannon. Now my hoverbike count peaked at fifteen but during the last attack I lost two bikes and several just made it... I'm wondering if you can really get through the dogfights using clouds of hoverbikes as at the beginning of the week I have to choose between five or six bikes plus equipment or a hawk air warrior. So far the bikes have proven that they are able to cream enemy UFOs quite efficiently, but... well, they're so fragile.. I can't begin to imagine the losses if I had to battle a mothership or a battleship.

Apart from that: What settings do you suggest for hoverbikes?
For all my craft I currently use the cautious mode (not the extreme one but the 2nd) and fly on the 2nd altitude setting so that my craft shoot up in the sky instead of shooting down on the city. I'm not sure whether hoverbikes are easier to hit (for UFOs) if they're right on top of them or if they keep their distance.

I always use them setted on agressive, with the default gun plus a small aiming box in the equipment square with the best engine it can take. Plus to that, I always make them fly at higher height than the UFO's so the UFO's don't fire on the ground.

The trick with the Hoverbikes is that they are very fast but very weak. Only one hit can destroy one easily, so I always set them to retreat to base as soon as they are damaged. They are so small they are repaired very quickly, so having a lot of them damaged is usually not a problem. You also must not use them single handely because they don't really pack a punch, use other ships to finish the job.

The Hoverbikes have a certain timeline in which they are not as usefull because they are more vulnerable when there is more ships around, but as soon as the Aliens begin to send UFO's equipped with shields they are extremely usefull because they can take the shield down very fast. If you are concerned about losses at that point, hit and runs is what I'd suggest first.

I dont like giving hoverbikes lineage plasma cannons, too expensive equipement for too fragile a ship. I was shocked though when i found out that the big huge lineage cannon actually fits on a titch hoverbike, more useful once you have explorers as then you use alien diruptor weapons instead of plasma tech so you can equip hoverbikes with the cannons then.

You should watch out for alien bombers though, they are evil on hoverbikes as they fire the dreaded multibomb, can easily kill a few hoverbikes on its own, although it sucks more when it uses the multibomb to down your hawk, for bombers i use hovercars, they combine firepower with constitution, can dodge more easily then hawk air warriors, and they are much more cheaper.

Smaller UFO's can be dealt with hoverbikes, troop-transports gets hovercars and air warriors while hoverbikes deal with escorts, and the mothership gets the whole armada on it, escort ships are laughable without anything escorting them.

Once you get shield tech though, then hovercars really shine, just send out fleets of em with shields and watch the UFO's hit the floor hard, and get your best ship fully equipped with shields and it can take a lot of hits, one manual controlled retaliator equipped with med disruptor beams and full shields (well, one matrix missile evasion) managed to wipe out 3/4 of the UFO's in the alien dimension, including a pesky mothership, (got to watch out for statis missiles though, in the alien dimension the escort ships get my full attention).

Also... one last thing.... a stormdog....really????

I found the only good thing a stormdog does is help the UFO destroy the road outside the cultists temples, stop whatever nasty deeds there up to.

Thanks for the advice, next time my hoverbikes will go right on top of those UFOs.
But I still prefer flying lower than the UFO... all those hoverbikes firing and missing can do a lot more damage to the city than the UFO they are pursuing.
Also, I have only 3 lineages between the (surviving) 12 HBs, the chance that they are taken down is reasonably low so I just deal with it.
I don't have any problems with bombers just yet simply because the aliens aren't that worried just yet.

About the cheap alien transporters: during the 3rd invasion, when they first appeared, my entire fleet was occupied taking down one transport plus two escort ships (not actual escorts but whatever it was they send along for protection)... the second transport (didn't know it was unarmed) was taken on - and downed - by a single megapol police car on the other side of city... lucky policecar ... the aliens didn't think of ramming it :bleh:

Ground vehicles / Stormdog:
I didn't have the heart to sell the stormdog.. maybe as a financial reserve one day or I might deploy it for base defence, since I'm going to avoid a second base for a while... I might actually be able to cram everything I need including advanced labs into my home base. Also I'm considering field tests of griffons, then deploying ground forces, parking them near dimension gates... hell, those things have to be good for something (And by that I mean something other than pissing sirius off :evil: )

Oh yeah, diplomacy:
Recently I spotted an illegal vehicle (aka 2 phoenix hovercars, dispatched by diablo) which attacked some corporation which disliked me after a civilian got killed by aliens in the crossfire while I was weeding them out...
I paused, gave the matter some consideration and came to the conclusion that I would be better off with Diablo hostile and other companies happy, especially since the worst diablo could do was bring some equipment along for sale (and give my agents the opportunity for some.. adventure training in the process).
So I dispatched a few hoverbikes; one enemy was destroyed by megapol and I got the other one.
But when I checked my diplomacythingie the result was rather shocking:
4 more corps had started to dislike me
The attacked corps couldn't care less what I did for them
Diablo didn't care either
Now don't tell me Diablo has alliances with corps such as the recyclingfolks... It just doesn't make any sense...

Generally, if you attack anything or anyone, intentionally or otherwise, besides the alien forces on the cityscape map, everyone's opinion of you will go down.

I have finnaly finnished the game (hard).... I can just say that X-com Apocalypse is the funniest game i ever played. The game and the sound works perfekt in XP if u have dosbox.. (not musik sound)



*thanks God for Dosbox*

Try using VDMSound, then the game will work even better.

Later on i used 6 or so Dogs with rockets to defend the senate (parked it inside the buildings nearby and the senate itself) from an mother ship beleve me or not but the bastard turned back.
Griffons are not good cos they can take the same amount of damage (street)
usualy a single hit destroys it.

For downing UFO's 3 hawks with med Disruptors and Lineage's can take down an battleship.