Original XCOM Creator Was Asked to Work on Mario + Rabbids

...and he might have said yes.

By Lucy O'Brien

Creator of the original XCOM Julian Gollop was asked to work on Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle.

Gollop, who worked at Ubisoft Sofia for six years between 2006-2012, told PCGamesn.com that his ex-colleague and Mario + Rabbids creative director Davide Soliani called him about three years ago to ask him to work on an upcoming game.

“I didn't know at the time that the project he was talking about was Mario + Rabbids, he couldn't say what it was,” Gollop says.

However, Gollop had just left Ubisoft to begin work on Chaos Reigns at his new studio Snapshot Games.

“Had I been at Ubisoft I may have worked on it,” said Gollop.

Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle does share XCOM DNA, which Gallop likes, though he hasn't had a chance to play it yet. “To his credit, Soliani created his own tactical turn-based game, albeit in a rather unusual setting, which is brilliant," he said. "It has to join the XCOM genre because it's the only genre that's pushing this really interesting turn-based tactical system."

In our review of Mario + Rabbids, Dan Stapleton said "is XCOM-style, turn-based tactics gameplay is just about the last thing I’d have expected from either Mario or Rabbids, but its absurdist charm works against the odds and it’s far more difficult and meatier than you probably think."

Lucy O'Brien is Games and Entertainment Editor at IGN’s Sydney office. Follow her on Twitter.

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