I have been playing turn-based strategy games for a long time. I absolutely loved the first X-COM games, and thoroughly enjoyed the Firaxis reboot.

After playing them over and over, though, I eventually started looking for other games that scratched the same itch. This is a list of what I've found over the years.

Basic criteria:

• Turn-based combat. Pausable real-time isn't allowed, though simultaneous-move games with fixed-length rounds are marginally acceptable. It's okay if the strategy layer or parts outside of combat are real-time.
  
• Squad-based. All units should be controlled equally during fights, not as a leader with semi-automated sidekicks, but it's okay if one unit is extra-special outside of battles.
  
• Units may be pre-defined or procedurally generated, but there should be choice in their selection. They should have some amount of personality, rather than just generic Elf Warrior or Flame Tank (which rules out most wargames).
  
• Combat takes place on a battlefield, and involves positioning units and attacking with ranged or melee weapons. Terrain may provide bonuses, such as cover, or hazards, but this is not required. Maps may be "small", with full visibility over a relatively small area, or "large", where it's necessary to traverse the map and reveal enemies hidden by the fog of war.
  
• There should be a strategy layer that allows you to do things like manage personnel, buildings, or buy and sell equipment. Even if it's just a quiet period between fights.
  
• There should be some element of randomness to missions, rather than a fully-scripted campaign. There should be at least some measure of freedom in choosing the next battle.
  
• There must be a fully-formed single-player gaming mode, not just a training arena.
  
• I'm a desktop (PC) gamer, so the list does not include games exclusive to consoles (sorry, fans of Fire Emblem).

I have no requirement for dependence on random number generators. While XCOM is famous for having a brutally honest random number generator - just about everyone has a story about the missed 99% shot - I don't consider it a defining characteristic of the genre.

Each game is listed by name, with year of publication. Some of the older ones aren't available on Steam, but may be available through other services. Games are placed into broad categories based on their general XCOM-alikeness, then sorted alphabetically within each section.

I have tried to avoid expressing opinions about the quality or entertainment value of each game. See the reviews on Steam for that. (I've written reviews for a number of these games, but I don't want to turn this guide into an argument.)

I don't include links to the store pages, because the Steam guide system turns those into large HEY BUY THIS widgets that don't even have helpful mouse-over pop-ups. I do list the year of publication so you can step past the stuff from 25+ years ago if you're not interested. There actually isn't all that much from way back when, because real-time strategy games took over completely for a few years.

First up, some games that very closely match XCOM. Actually, the first few are XCOM.

X-COM: UFO Defense (1994). The original classic. Initially released as UFO: Enemy Unknown in Europe. The best way to play this is with OpenXcom (2010), a faithful open-source remake that has many QoL improvements.

X-COM: Terror From the Deep (1995). A re-skinned copy of the original, with some minor improvements, like bigger maps.

X-COM: Apocalypse (1997). While it can be played turn-based, it plays better as pausable real-time, and hence doesn't really belong here. But if I exclude it I'll be inundated with comments asking why it's missing.

XCOM: Enemy Unknown (2012). Hugely popular reboot of the series. The Enemy Within DLC is recommended.

XCOM 2 (2016). The current gold standard in XCOM-like games. Don't miss War of the Chosen.

XCOM: Chimera Squad (2020). A more limited experience, this has a fixed set of units fighting small tactical battles.


Some non-XCOM games that didn't fall far from the tree:

Gears Tactics (2020). Very similar to XCOM, but in the Gears of War universe.

Laser Squad (1992). This was the game Julian Gollop worked on before X-COM; according to wikipedia, X-COM: UFO Defense began development as "Laser Squad 2". First published in 1988 for the ZX Spectrum, it offered squad-based combat in a fixed set of scenarios - essentially X-COM without the strategic layer. Abandonware.

Phoenix Point (2020). Developed by the original X-COM author, this puts a new spin on some things but stays close to the original formula.

UFO: Alien Invasion (2003). This is an open-source project that strove to be an updated version of X-COM. Free.

Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate (1998). The original WH40K X-COM-like. Needs a little help to run on modern systems.

Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters (2022). Similar feel, but plays somewhat differently, emphasizing aggression over caution.

Xenonauts (2014). Very closely follows the original X-COM formula. The sequel, Xenonauts 2 (early access 2023), expands the formula.

These diverge modestly from the classic XCOM design, but reviews tend to compare them to XCOM.

Battle Brothers (2017). Assemble a collection of medieval mercenaries and fight tactical battles to build them up.

BATTLETECH (2018). Gather pilots and large fighting robots, and blow up hostiles for profit and spare parts.

Dreadlands (2020). Thematically a cross between Borderlands and Mad Max, this features small-map battles with a mix of ranged and melee combat.

Hard West (2015). Tactical combat wrapped in a story about struggling with demons. This was followed by Hard West 2 (2022), which added fancy shooting mechanics and expanded tactical RPG elements.

Incubation: Time Is Running Out (1997). Turn-based combat in 3D, from back when that was hard. Has a fixed set of missions with minor branching.

Jagged Alliance (1995), Jagged Alliance 2 (1999), and Jagged Alliance 2: Unfinished Business (2000). Hire mercenaries from a pool of soldiers, with real-time movement and open-world exploration. A true classic of the turn-based tactics genre, the dearth of similar games inspired a number of community mods over the years (SOG'69, Urban Chaos, Wildfire, v1.13, Stracciatella).

Jagged Alliance 3 (2023). A reboot of JA2, made 24 years after the original, this features a new setting and modern GUI but familiar characters and mechanics. Previous attempts to create spin-offs include Jagged Alliance Flashback (2014) and Jagged Alliance Online: Reloaded (2015), as well as some real-time variants and the tactical RPG Jagged Alliance: Rage! (2018).

MissionForce: CyberStorm (1996). A primitive version of BATTLETECH.

Mordheim: City of the Damned (2015). Based on a tabletop game, this pits two squads against each other in a crumbling city, presented in 3D.

Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden (2018). RPG-ish story wraps tactical battles that emphasize stealth.

Necromunda: Underhive Wars (2020). An ambitious game by the developers of Mordheim, this feels unfinished.

Othercide (2020). XCOM-style combat with a unique art style and some rogue-like mechanics.

Phantom Doctrine (2018). XCOM-like missions in a Cold War espionage setting, but with an emphasis on stealth.

Silent Storm Gold Edition (2003). WW2 game with some sci-fi elements. 3D presentation of highly destructable environments. Followed by Silent Storm Sentinels (2004).

SOF: Enemy from the future (2024). Fight mysterious alien creatures through a fixed series of missions. A Russian "XCOM Lite". Free.

Templar Battleforce (2015). Build a squad with customizable power armor and fight the bad guys. Top-down graphics with a WH40K vibe.

TROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Children (2020). The answer to the question, "what would you get if a Korean developer combined XCOM with a JRPG?"

Warhammer 40,000: Mechanicus (2018). Turn-based tactics with some interesting tweaks to the XCOM formula. For example: each mission involves exploring an area to get to the objective. Exploring side areas can yield resources, but also makes the objective area harder.

These games feature tactical combat, but deviate from the XCOM formula in significant ways. These aren't primarily RPGs, which are listed later.

Age of Wonders III (2014), plus various prequels and sequels. The first Age of Wonders came out in 1999, but it could be considered a descendant of Master of Magic (1994). AOW3 is a turn-based 4X game with scripted campaigns. When groups of units fight, the game switches to a tactical combat mode.

Attack of the Earthlings (2018). Slightly silly game where you're a fierce alien creature fending off (and dining on) invading humans.

Darkest Dungeon (2016). Difficult combat in a creepy dungeon setting. Permadeath is mandatory. Very popular.

Dead Season (2024). Turn-based zombie survival horror.

Dungeon Rats (2016). A series of difficult tactical battles, in a game that confused people by calling itself an RPG.

Endless Legend (2014). Fantasy 4X with tactical combat.

Fantasy Wars (2010). Gather a variety of units and fight a series of tactical battles in a fantasy setting. Followed by a series of Elven Legacy sequels. Arguably a Panzer General-style wargame, but the unit upgrade system gives them a bit of personality.

Fort Triumph (2020). HoMM-style strategy layer combined with turn-based combat that emphasizes knocking things into other things.

Frozen Synapse (2011). Abstract top-down graphics present a minimalist simultaneous-move "we go" combat game. Games like this, Breach & Clear (2014), and Broken Lines (2020), straddle the border between turn-based and pausable real-time.

Galaxy Squad (2019). One of the reviewers summed it up thusly: "what happens when someone watched FireFly, played some XCOM and wanted to cross it with FTL but had no idea about game design".

Heroes of Might and Magic III (1999). The HoMM series was first published in 1995, inspired by King's Bounty (1990). The third installment, and its expansions, are a true classic of the genre. An "HD Edition" re-release came out in 2015. This was one of three games featured in the launch of the GOG Game Preservation Program (blog post)[www.gog.com].

Invisible, Inc. (2015). A stealth-focused roguelike. It has few similarities to XCOM, but players who enjoy one often enjoy the other.

King's Bounty: The Legend (2008). This reboot of the classic King's Bounty (1990) game was followed by half a dozen expansions. It features tactical battles with light RPG elements, using a combat system that will be immediately familiar to HoMM fans.

Mainframe Defenders (2020). Low-res mech fighting roguelike with procedurally-generated maps and missions.

MASSIVE CHALICE (2015). An odd little strategy game with inbreeding.

Mech Armada (2022). Robots fighting critters in square-grid combat. Each playthrough gives you permanent upgrades for future runs.

Pathway (2019). FTL-style roguelike strategy with XCOM-style combat in a 1930s adventure setting.

Rogue Waters (2024). Pirate-themed roguelite where you slowly build up a ship and crew. Small-scale battles with a bit of story and some random events. Demo available.

Shieldwall Chronicles: Swords of the North (2018). Medieval fantasy combat with a fixed pool of characters and replayable missions. Part of a series of similar mobile games that began with Strike Team Hydra (2017) and continued with Demon's Rise (2018) and Strike Team Gladius (2021).

Space Hulk (2013), Space Hulk: Ascension (2014), Space Hulk: Tactics (2018). These are conversions of a tabletop game in which you fight fast-moving aliens with slow-moving soldiers in extremely cramped quarters. (Warhammer 40,000: Deathwatch - Enhanced Edition (2015) is in the same camp, but no longer available.)

Spaceland (2019). Fight through a series of scripted, replayable missions with pre-defined characters that you can upgrade. At times this felt a bit like Incubation (tactical battles with a puzzle feel).

Urtuk: The Desolation (2021). Gritty hex-grid battles with a small group of fighters in a "procedurally generated survival campaign".

These are games that have an RPG feel, but don't give you as much choice in how you interact with the game world. A "proper" RPG allows you to be who you choose, not simply fill a pair of boots. Some of these games are barely RPGs at all; the choice of whether to put them here or in the non-RPG section comes down to how much emphasis is put on the story, and how much personality each individual unit has. What they do have is a lot of combat.

Age of Fear: The Undead King (2011) and Age of Fear 2: The Chaos Lord GOLD (2016). Tabletop-inspired game with "gridless" combat.

Ash of Gods: Redemption (2018). RPG often compared to The Banner Saga. The combat system was completely reworked in 2024.

Banner Saga, The (2014). Somewhat bleak RPG in a Viking setting. The combat mechanics are different from many games, e.g. damaging a unit will make its attacks weaker. The story continues in The Banner Saga 2 (2016) and The Banner Saga 3 (2018).

Blackguards (2014). This looks like a classic RPG, based on the Dark Eye tabletop system, but is really a tactical RPG that offers a series of battles in a fantasy setting. The sequel, Blackguards 2 (2015), added some additional party management.

Broken Lines (2020). WW2 game with simultaneous movement, planned out in 8-second rounds.

Dungeon of Naheulbeuk: The Amulet of Chaos (2020). Light-hearted series of tactical battles with RPG-ish exploration.

Fae Tactics (2020). Cute console-style square-grid game with elemental attacks and timed criticals.

Fell Seal: Arbiter's Mark (2019). Cartoonish tactical RPG with square-grid combat and a gamepad-focused interface. Often compared to the classic console game Final Fantasy Tactics (1997).

FRONT MISSION 1st: Remake (2023). A faithful remake of a mech-combat game published for consoles in 1995. Followed by FRONT MISSION 2: Remake (2024).

Halfway (2014). Sci-fi tactical RPG with XCOM-ish combat.

Heroes of Steel RPG (2014). Top-down fantasy RPG, initially developed for mobile devices.

King Arthur: Knight's Tale (2022). Dark fantasy RPG in which revenant Mordred is tasked with killing undead Arthur. Followed by King Arthur: Legion IX (2024).

Stirring Abyss (2020). Fight Lovecraftian monsters on the ocean floor while searching for missing crew and repairing your sub. Demo available.

Telepath Tactics Liberated (2022). An upgraded version of Telepath Tactics (2015), this features a series of scripted fights in a fantasy setting.

Valkyria Chronicles (2014) and Valkyria Chronicles 4 Complete Edition (2018). Excellent tactical combat through a fixed set of replayable missions.

These are role-playing games that feature turn-based tactical combat. The games are fairly distant from XCOM because they have a lot of activities that have nothing to do with combat, and may actually have mechanisms that allow you to avoid fights entirely. Games in which you control a party of characters are preferred, as that's more XCOM-like.

ATOM: RPG (2018). Fallout-inspired RPG in a post-apocalyptic setting. Followed by the stand-alone sequel ATOM RPG Trudograd (2021).

Baldur's Gate 3 (2023). RPG set in the Forgotten Realms universe, from the developers of Divinity: Original Sin. Initiative-order combat with free movement and primary/secondary actions. Hugely popular.

Dead State: Reanimated (2014). RPG where you fight battles while fortifying a school against the zombie apocalypse.

Divinity: Original Sin Enhanced Edition (2015) and Divinity: Original Sin 2 (2017). Enormous RPGs with detailed combat.

Empire of Sin (2020). Set in Prohibition-era Chicago in the 1920s, this has turn-based fights for territory against the police and other gangs.

Encased (2021). Fallout-inspired post-apocalyptic RPG.

Expeditions: Viking (2017). A Viking-themed RPG with hex-grid combat. This is the second of a series of games, which began with Expeditions: Conquistador (2013) and continued with Expeditions: Rome (2022).

Fallout (1997) and Fallout 2 (1998). Post-apocalyptic RPGs that inspired a host of imitators, some first-person sequels, and a TV series.

Marvel's Midnight Suns (2022). Sometimes referred to as a "superhero dating simulator", combat in this RPG has positioning and hazards, but attacks are card-based.

Pathfinder: Kingmaker (2018). Fantasy RPG that allows combat to be pausable real-time or turn-based. (Turn-based combat was added well after the game shipped.) Followed by the enormous Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous - Enhanced Edition (2021).

Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire (2018). Fantasy RPG that allows combat to be pausable real-time or turn-based. (Turn-based combat was added well after the game shipped.)

Shadowrun Returns (2013), Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director's Cut (2014), and Shadowrun: Hong Kong - Extended Edition (2015). Sci-fi RPG with solid tactical combat, based on the Shadowrun tabletop gaming system.

Temple of Elemental Evil, The (2003). Initially released in a badly-broken state, the game was largely fixed with fan-made patches. Based on a popular D&D module, the game features turn-based combat based on the "3.5e" D&D rules.

Underrail (2015). Large, brutally difficult sci-fi RPG.

Wasteland 2: Director's Cut (2014) and Wasteland 3 (2020). Nominally sequels to the classic Wasteland (1988), these post-apocalyptic RPGs have a lot of gun fights.

XCOM frequently presents you with a puzzle: given a particular arrangement of units, figure out which actions to take to maximize damage to the enemy while minimizing damage to your own troops. While a degree of puzzle-solving is present in most tactical combat games, some games make it the primary focus.

Gorky 17 (1999). A series of battles in which your goal is to kill the enemy without getting hit.

Into the Breach (2018). Deterministic combat in small, procedurally generated battlefields. Feels more like a puzzle or rogue-like chess than a combat simulation.

Tactical Breach Wizards (2024). While it looks like a cousin of XCOM: Chimera Squad, the fixed missions are more like scripted puzzles than combat zones.

These are games that are insufficiently XCOM-like to be included. For each, I'll explain why I don't think they qualify for an earlier section. This is heavily opinion-based, and is meant to be representative rather than exhaustive, i.e. I'm trying to give examples of games that don't fit rather than listing all of them.

Deep Sky Derelicts (2018). This is a deckbuilder / card battler, which isn't really in the spirit of XCOM.

Disciples: Sacred Lands (1999). The strategy layer feels a lot like HoMM, which is in the list, but the combat was too rudimentary to merit inclusion.

Fallen: A2P Protocol (2015). This would be a pretty good candidate, except that it was shipped before it was finished and has a lot of problems. While I've tried to avoid categorizing games based on my opinion of their quality, some games are just objectively broken.

Fallout: Tactics (2001). As with X-COM: Apocalypse, this allowed you to play as either turn-based or real-time. Both could actually be useful: turn-based to pick enemy units apart, real-time to deliver a huge alpha strike (put units prone behind cover, then tell them all to stand up at once). It feels like it wants to be real-time, though, and unlike Apocalypse it's not called "X-COM", so it doesn't make the cut.

Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle (2017). Cartoony game with puzzles and XCOM-style combat. This isn't on the list because it's exclusive to Nintendo Switch, and I'm only looking at desktop games.

SteamWorld Heist (2016). Frequently described as "XCOM meets Worms", this is a turn-based 2D platform shooter with an emphasis on aiming and ricochets. It checks a lot of boxes but doesn't feel like XCOM. Followed by SteamWorld Heist II (2024).

UFO: Afterlight (2007). Features tactical combat and a deep strategy layer, thematically similar to XCOM, but uses real-time with pause. This is the third in a series of games, preceded by UFO: Aftermath (2003) and UFO: Aftershock (2005).

All of the games listed earlier have one thing in common: I own them and have played them, for at least a little while (except in a few cases where I list sequels that I haven't gotten around to). What follows is a list of games that look interesting but I either don't own (wishlist), haven't gotten around to playing (backlog), or that haven't actually shipped yet. They will be added to one of the curated sections eventually.

Age of Decadence, The (2015). RPG.
Classified: France '44 (2024).
Colony Ship (2023). RPG.
CORRUPTION 2029 (2024).
Crown Wars: The Black Prince (2024). Medieval setting.
Cyber Knights: Flashpoint (early access 2023). RPG.
Darkest Dungeon II (2023).
Disgaea 5 Complete (2018). JRPG, part of a series.
Forgotten but Unbroken (2024). WW2 setting.
GIRLS' FRONTLINE 2: EXILIUM (2024).
Iratus: Lord of the Dead (2020). RPG.
Kriegsfront Tactics (2025?). Mech battles, similar to Front Mission. Demo available.
Lamplighter's League, The (2023). RPG.
Mars Tactics (2025?). Looks very XCOM-like.
Menace (2025?). Tactical RPG.
Miasma Chronicles (2023).
Persona 5 Tactica (2023). JRPG.
Phantom Brigade (2023). Claims to be a "hybrid" of turn-based and real-time.
Project Haven (2025?). Urban gang warfare.
Reverse Collapse: Code Name Bakery (2024). Tactical RPG.
Shock Tactics (2017).
Showgunners (2023).
Soldiers at War (1998). WW2 setting; abandonware.
Songs of Conquest (2024). Looks like HoMM.
Stolen Realm (2024). RPG.
Tactics Ogre: Reborn (2022). Remake of console game from 2010.
Terra Invicta (early access 2022). Grand strategy with XCOM theme.
UFO: Extraterrestrials Platinum (2023), a remake of UFO: Extraterrestrials Gold (2010), which was itself a remake of UFO: Extraterrestrials (2007). Look a lot like classic X-COM.
UFO2: Extraterrestrials (2021).
Urban Strife (early access 2024). RPG.
Warhammer 40,000: Battlesector (2021).
Warhammer 40,000: Mechanicus II (2025?). Sequel.
Wartales (2023). RPG.
Wildermyth (2021). RPG.

On a personal note, here's what steamdb.info says my top 5 time sinks are:

• XCOM 2: 654 hours.
  
• Mordheim: City of the Damned: 590 hours. And I wrote a Steam guide for it.
  
• Age of Wonders III: 484 hours. The battles are outstanding, especially castle sieges.
  
• XCOM: Enemy Unknown: 459 hours.
  
• BATTLETECH: 259 hours.

(This only includes games listed earlier.)

Going old-school, the games I remember spending a lot of time with are:

• X-COM: Terror From the Deep (my very first XCOM)
  
• Jagged Alliance 2 (<= v1.12)
  
• Incubation: Time is Running Out

If you want to go back even farther, the first turn-based tactics game I can remember playing is Computer Ambush (1982) for the Apple II. Set in WW2, it's one of the earliest (if not the very first) simultaneous-move tactics games.

One thing I've learned from perusing other people's "games like XCOM" lists is that there's a lot of variety in taste. Some games that did nothing for me were hugely popular with other people, and vice-versa. There really isn't a simple, "if you liked X then you'll like Y" that applies to everyone.

For the curious: I have played a number of games with real-time tactics, but I don't enjoy them as much because I feel like it separates me from the actions of my squad. Pausable real-time lets you avoid micro-management and keep an eye on the big picture, which is great for an RTS with anonymous units, but I like to see each individual unit perform. I want to see the investment made in upgrades pay off, and take part in every clutch hit or heartbreaking miss. I'm marginally okay with simultaneous-turn games that use fixed-length rounds, because they usually have a replay feature that lets you go back and watch how individual units perform.

Hopefully this list has helped you find something new to play.