UFO: Afterlight is a strategy action game developed by ALTAR Interactive. It is the third game in the UFO game series.

Plot

The game is set after the events of UFO: Aftermath. After a devastating alien attack, the remaining humans have to move off-world to the established orbital colonies or to Mars. While Mars is undergoing terraforming, ten thousand colonists remain in cryo-sleep. However, 30 people suddenly awake from their sleep. Contact with Earth was cut off so the colonists decide to accelerate the terraforming of Mars. However, a brief archeological discovery awakens something alien yet again.

Gameplay

Afterlight's gameplay is divided into two parts, a strategy game one, and a tactical squad-based simulation.

At the first part of the game, the players have to manage their resources, train the colony's personnel, trade with other parties, claim territories, and build up completely new structures. Upon capturing a new territory, the players can begin terraforming it and mining new resources out of it. This resources can be both traded with others or used to create new buildings and units.

In a tactical side of gameplay, the players send seven-man squads of soldiers. Before sending a squad to its mission, the players have to correctly equip them and decide on its strategy. These squads can be sent to eliminate humans as well as aliens. The squads have to be formed up of several specialists, such as the technicians, scientists, commandos, and so on.