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While Alien Crossfire's core game is still very much the same as its predecessor's, the new factions, technologies, and projects increase that core game's depth. Alpha Centauri wasn't quite the commercial success that Firaxis hoped for, but it did earn a loyal following. These fans looked past Alpha Centauri's similarity to Civilization II and reveled in its deep turn-based gameplay and strong premise: an interplanetary war for military, economic, cultural, and scientific dominance. But many others shied away from Alpha Centauri because both its alien factions and its technology were too unintuitive. Fortunately, Alpha Centauri's official expansion pack, Alien Crossfire, resolves at least one of those concerns. As with its predecessor, Alien Crossfire has a good background story, which is unusual for turn-based strategy games. The planet Alpha Centauri was apparently seeded with great power by an ancient alien race. Now, the descendants of those aliens have returned to claim that power. However, the aliens are divided. Their two factions, the Caretakers and Usurpers, have opposing views on how to exploit the planet. In addition, they are joined by five new human factions, including the cyborgs, the pirates, the data spies, an ecological cult, and a drone proletariat faction. Although there are many to choose from, it is now much easier to decide which faction you want to play because you can see all pertinent information for each new faction from the selection screen. Each new faction has different specialties. For example, the Cybernetic Consciousness gets better research because they have computer-swift brains, but they have stunted growth because replacing their minds with cold computers weakened their ability to interact with others. The Nautilus Pirates get free shipyards and several early sea bonuses, although they also suffer in growth because ......

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