The Bureau: XCOM Declassified
The year is 1962 and the Cold War has the nation gripped by fear. A top-secret government unit called The Bureau begins investigating a series of mysterious attacks by an enemy more powerful than communism. As…
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified is a shooter developed by 2K Marin, released 6 August 2013 on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Mac and PC (Microsoft Windows). It currently starts at $3.99 at GOG. The main story takes about 31.4 hrs to finish.
What The Bureau: XCOM Declassified is
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified is a shooter game developed by 2K Marin and released in 2013. It was published by 2K Games. It is available on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Mac and PC (Microsoft Windows). It runs on Unreal Engine 3.
The premise, in the publisher's words
Set in the United States in late 1962, at the height of the Cold War, the story follows William Carter, a CIA special agent tasked with delivering a mysterious briefcase to a secretive government organization. When the delivery goes catastrophically wrong and a hostile extraterrestrial force known as the Outsiders launches a coordinated assault, the bureau at the heart of the crisis is secretly activated as XCOM, humanity's last line of defense. With communications worldwide jammed and military bases falling one after another, its director assumes control of the nation's remaining forces while agents planted in major cities keep the public calm. Carter leads squads across the country to…
How it plays
It is played from a first person perspective. Its themes are action, fantasy, historical and science fiction. It is a single-player game with no multiplayer component. There are 41 achievements to unlock.
Where it sits in the X-COM series
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified is the ninth of 27 entries we hold in the X-COM series. It arrived 8 months after XCOM: Enemy Unknown - Slingshot Pack. The next entry was The Bureau: XCOM Declassified - Hangar 6 R&D in 2013. Its critic score of 69 is 12 points below the series average of 81. The highest-rated entry is XCOM: Enemy Unknown at 89.
How it was received
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified holds a critic score of 69 out of 100. That places it above 35% of the 3,306 rated shooter games in our database, which average 70. Games released in 2013 averaged 70, so it scored about average for its year. Player ratings track closely with critics at 64, across 118 votes.
How long it takes, and what that costs
The main story runs about 31.4 hrs. At its current cheapest price of $3.99, that works out to about $0.13 per hour of the main story, or $0.27 per hour if you finish everything.
What you need to run it
The minimum specification calls for Intel Core 2 DUO 2.4 GHz / AMD Athlon X2 2.7 GHz, 2 GB RAM and DirectX9 Compatible ATI Radeon HD 3870 / NVIDIA 8800 GT. At 2GB of RAM, it will run on essentially any working PC — that is below what a budget laptop ships with today. Install size is roughly 12GB. Both tiers are compared side by side on the requirements page, and you can check your own parts against them without installing anything.
What it costs, and where
The cheapest verified price right now is $3.99 at GOG, 80% below its usual price.
What it launched against
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified launched on 6 August 2013, within three weeks of Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, Papers, Please, Saints Row IV and Europa Universalis IV. All of them reviewed better.
Released around the same time: Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, Papers, Please, Saints Row IV, Europa Universalis IV.
Cheats and codes
We have not confirmed any working cheat codes for The Bureau: XCOM Declassified yet. Rather than reprint a list we have not tested, this section stays empty until one is verified.
Official trailer
Sourced from the publisher’s YouTube channel. See all 5 videos →
Screenshots
All media
Dlc
Quick answers
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