Although an older post, i have a reason to PHALANX existence in secret.
Why the aliens do a limited war? Because the aliens don´t invaded the Earth, they are doing an INCURSION. This could be a scout "team" based on the Carrier ship? That could be the reason for a limited scaled-war. The aliens begun to scout with limited resources and their primary goal is stablish a secret base on Earth in order to prepare for a full scale invasion from their reinforcements.
Maybe the UN is aware of their prescence, but not the entire population. So, PHALANX is created. The ground incursions could be denied and media-controled by goverments. But if an alien crash or landing is not controled, the "facts" goes to world media and panic raises. That´s the reason to keep happy the countries. The war is so secret, that formal military forces is not allowed to confront the aliens. Another thing, not all countries have the same research capacity, the same military strengh and technology, so, a combined and secret effort is needed.
More than that, i have another storyline for the same game, but requires a little change to the mecanics of the game.
The invasion begun by an alien force that have about 100 or 200 hundred years of technological advance over mankind. This could explain how we can understand quickly their techs and why they invade us; their aren´t sufficient advanced to terraform another place or take their resources from another place. So, they need our planet and maybe our labor force.
NOTE: There are no reason for an high advanced space-faring civilization to invade Earth, when they can take almost infinite resources from many barren planets of the galaxy, including asteroids. There are not reason to take slaves when they can build robots or clones. Even water is not a full scale war trigger. Is a simple thermodinamic fact; the matter doesn´t destroy, only transform. With very little techs, the contaminated water could be cleaned. So, water is not a reason for a war, except by the stupid modern Earthlings
Well, E.T have more technology than ours, so, the mankind lose the conventional war to the alien forces. But not all is lost. There are pockets of resistance in all planet. The UN assambled a last line of defense in a secret base with the best of the human tech with the hope of found a way to stop the aliens.
Here begun the game.
The fact is that there´s no funding at all or market. You only have a small scientist and engineering staff, and a small group of elite forces. One or two stealth interceptors and a dropship.
A first, you can answer to disstress calls in AM frecuency. Small groups of "civilians" (resistance forces) calling for another survivors. You can go in the dropship and rescue the "civilians". There are your new soldiers, scientist or engineers.
You can go to another missions to capture technology. Maybe an alien base located by the resistance. By this way, you can take techs for research.
The aliens will patrol all the planet searching for the PHALANX base, so, when the ufos fly near the base, it could be detected by IR systems. This makes the detection range very limited. When the first ufo is downed, you can research the alien detection, increasing the capacity to detect the aliens stealthy.
Bases. Bases is not needed anymore, because aliens controls the planet. Instead, when tech advance, you can build outpost to locate aliens around the world. How to build it? When you assault a landed ufo, you can capture it and use it. So, the ufo can fly to any location on Earth stealthy.
How to win? When you found the way to stop the aliens. Destroying their bases and his Command Center.
How to loose?
- When aliens found the main base and assault it.
- When you lost all your soldiers.
