XCOM: Enemy Unknown: Sid Meier not the only heroic game developer cameo

Legendary Civilization creator, Sid Meier himself, made a cameo appearance in an E3 trailer for XCOM: Enemy Unknown - now the lead developer Jake Solomon confirms he will not be the only game industry stalwart to turn up as a playable character.

"We call them heroes," says Solomon. "We've only shown one, we've only shown Sid - and so yes there are some other heroes: friends of XCOM that may make an appearance if the player can find them. But we're not going to reveal who they are yet. Somebody will find them probably in the first day!"

We suggest he could have a role to play in the game himself.

"No, not me," says Solomon. "Nobody wants to play as me. I wanted to put Sid in the game because I've worked with Sid forever. For 13 years. I owe Sid everything and this was the first time I've worked on my own. So I told Sid, 'I want to put you in the game. We've got these heroes. Do you want to be a sniper, a psionic warlord or a heavy?' And Sid was like, 'Can I be a diplomat?' Sid's just... he's probably not as into the mature themed games as I am. I'm sort of the Annakin to his Obi Wan. When I showed him he was a little taken aback, but he now has the poster in his office, so I think he likes it."

Find out about XCOM: Enemy Unknown's PC-exclusive features here .

Latest in Strategy
Manor Lords promo art - knight on horseback looking at a medieval village in the distance, viewed from behind
PCG's best city builder of 2024 is adding a map with a gigantic hill in the middle: the perfect spot for your next castle
Maximillian from Evil Genius 2
Rebellion CEO says Evil Genius 3 could happen but wonders 'what else could we do with it other than a base-building game?'
A city from 1800
One of the best city builders of the last decade is currently 90% off on Steam
Company of Heroes 3
Company of Heroes 3 is free to try and 50% off, so it's the best time to check out the beefy 2.0 overhaul
People swimming in a pool and lying on floats
Planet Coaster 2's spring roadmap splashes down, with 'round-bottomed flumes' coming in March and buildable restaurants arriving in April
A bird's eye view of a nuclear bomb detonating in Ara: History Untold.
Microsoft's Civilization 7 competitor escalates tensions with Firaxis' embattled 4X, announcing that nukes are coming with its impending diplomacy update
Latest in News
A computer screen with program code warning of a detected malware script program. 3d illustration
Coder faces 10 years' jailtime for creating a 'kill switch' that screwed-up his employers' systems when he was laid off
Project C4 teaser still
It's another day of Disco Elysium-related announcements trying to kneecap each other: Studio ZA/UM has put out a teaser for its first new game since 2019, and it's not Disco Elysium 2
A goblin wizard, holding a dice, and a dice with a goblin wizard holding a dice placed within it.
If you've ever wanted to trap your D&D character in dice like a fly in amber, 3,700+ people are paying Hero Forge close to $400,000 in Kickstarter funds for the pleasure
The PCIe slot on an Asus ROG Strix B850-F Gaming WiFi motherboard, showing the Q-release latch for GPUs.
Gigabyte seemingly mocks Asus' recent Q-release debacle with a video swapping out an RTX 5070 Ti 100 times
Inzoi - A Zoi with blonde hair and blue eyes wears a cardigan and smiles in a gaming room
'I was recklessly brave to even think about creating a game of this scale': Inzoi director admits he now sees 'why so few companies have attempted to develop a life simulation game'
Manor Lords promo art - knight on horseback looking at a medieval village in the distance, viewed from behind
PCG's best city builder of 2024 is adding a map with a gigantic hill in the middle: the perfect spot for your next castle