UFO: Aftershock

UFO
UFO: Aftermath	2003
UFO: Aftershock	2005
UFO: Afterlight	2007

UFO: Aftershock is a singleplayer bird's-eye view RTS game in the UFO series.

General information

Modding forums for game series

GOG.com Community Discussions for game series

GOG.com Support Page

Steam Community Discussions

Availability

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Retail		StarForce 3 DRM^{[Note 1]}

GOG.com		Version 1.2.1
Steam		Version 1.2.1
ZOOM Platform

StarForce DRM for this game does not work on modern versions of Windows (see above for affected releases).

Essential improvements

Patches

Patch 1.3 (over 1.2 or 1.2.1) is available from the official site or StrategyCore

Game data

Configuration file location

System	Location
Windows	<path-to-game>\Profiles\<user-id>\options.txt^{[Note 2]}
Steam Play (Linux)	<SteamLibrary-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/289500/pfx/^{[Note 3]}

Save game data location

System	Location
Windows	<path-to-game>\Profiles\<user-id>\Saves\^{[Note 2]}
Steam Play (Linux)	<SteamLibrary-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/289500/pfx/^{[Note 3]}

Save game cloud syncing

System	Native	Notes
GOG Galaxy
Steam Cloud

Video

UFO: Aftershock system settings menu.

Graphics feature	WSGF	Notes
Widescreen resolution		Locked at 1024x768. See Widescreen resolution for fix.
Multi-monitor
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD
Field of view (FOV)
Windowed	Add --option fullscreen=FALSE in shortcut
Borderless fullscreen windowed	See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
Anisotropic filtering (AF)	See Anisotropic filtering (AF).
Anti-aliasing (AA)	Options 1 to 8
Vertical sync (Vsync)	See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
60 FPS and 120+ FPS
High dynamic range display (HDR)	See the glossary page for potential alternatives.
Color blind mode	See the glossary page for potential workarounds.

Widescreen resolution

Widescreen resolution^[5]

Download the widescreen fix.
Go to the installation folder and create a backup of the original UFO.exe.
Open archive and extract files from selected resolution into installation folder. Overwrite when asked.

Notes

Currently supported resolutions are 1600x900, 1680x1050 and 1920x1080.

Sometimes this fix will cause game to render partially off screen. See Off screen rendering fix bellow.

Off screen rendering fix^{[citation needed]}

Delete or rename widescreenmod.vfs file and Profile folder. Backup your saves if necessary.
Run original UFO.exe, create new profile and set your options.
Apply widescreen fix again and run the game.

Notes

You can keep both original exe and fixed exe in same folder, but you have to delete or rename widescreenmod.vfs because original version will load this file as well.

Anisotropic filtering (AF)

Anisotropic filtering^{[citation needed]}

Replace Aftershock's default desktop shortcut with the one from its Start menu folder (probably ...\Cenega Czech\UFO Aftershock), reading "High Quality" or something to that effect.
Manually force 16x AF from your graphics card settings.

Notes

The resulting sharper textures and (consequentially) more detailed gloss maps add up to a significant increase in the overall visual experience, compared to "vanilla" game.

Input

Keyboard and mouse	State	Notes
Remapping
Mouse sensitivity
Mouse acceleration
Mouse input in menus
Keyboard and mouse prompts
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Controller
Controller support

Audio

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls
Surround sound
Subtitles
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost
Royalty free audio

Localizations

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English
Czech				Retail only (Score 190 covermount); download for digital releases.
French				Retail and GOG.com only.
German				Retail and GOG.com only.
Russian				Retail, Steam and GOG.com only.
Spanish				Retail only.

VR support

3D modes	State	Notes
vorpX		G3D User created game profile, requires very important settings, see vorpx forum profile introduction.

Other information

API

Technical specs	Supported	Notes
Direct3D	9.0c

Executable	32-bit	64-bit	Notes
Windows

System requirements

Windows
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	2000	XP
Processor (CPU)	Intel Pentium III 1 GHz AMD Athlon 1 GHz	Intel Pentium 4 2 GHz AMD Athlon 2 GHz
System memory (RAM)	512 MB	768 MB
Storage drive (HDD/SSD)	4 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce FX 5700 ATI Radeon 9500 DirectX 9.0c compatible	Nvidia GeForce 6600 ATI Radeon 9700 Pro

Notes

↑ Version 3.0 of StarForce DRM does not work on Windows Vista or later.^[1]^[2]^[3]^[4] For supported versions of Windows the StarForce driver may need to be updated manually using SFUPDATE.
↑ ^2.0 ^2.1 When running this game without elevated privileges (Run as administrator option), write operations against a location below %PROGRAMFILES%, %PROGRAMDATA%, or %WINDIR% might be redirected to %LOCALAPPDATA%\VirtualStore on Windows Vista and later (more details).
↑ ^3.0 ^3.1
Notes regarding Steam Play (Linux) data:
- File/folder structure within this directory reflects the path(s) listed for Windows and/or Steam game data.
- Games with Steam Cloud support may also store data in ~/.steam/steam/userdata/<user-id>/289500/.
- Use Wine's registry editor to access any Windows registry paths.
- The app ID (289500) may differ in some cases.
- Treat backslashes as forward slashes.
- See the glossary page for details on Windows data paths.

References

↑ Windows Vista support - StarForce Support
↑ Windows 7 support - StarForce Support
↑ Windows 8.1 support - StarForce Support
↑ Windows 10 support - StarForce Support
↑ Fix by jackfuste from Widescreen Gaming Forum

[5] Version 3.0 of StarForce DRM does not work on Windows Vista or later.^[1]^[2]^[3]^[4] For supported versions of Windows the StarForce driver may need to be updated manually using SFUPDATE.

[gamedir-6] 2.0 ^2.1 When running this game without elevated privileges (Run as administrator option), write operations against a location below %PROGRAMFILES%, %PROGRAMDATA%, or %WINDIR% might be redirected to %LOCALAPPDATA%\VirtualStore on Windows Vista and later (more details).

[Proton_path_note-7] 3.0 ^3.1 Notes regarding Steam Play (Linux) data:
File/folder structure within this directory reflects the path(s) listed for Windows and/or Steam game data.
Games with Steam Cloud support may also store data in ~/.steam/steam/userdata/<user-id>/289500/.
Use Wine's registry editor to access any Windows registry paths.
The app ID (289500) may differ in some cases.
Treat backslashes as forward slashes.
See the glossary page for details on Windows data paths.

[4] File/folder structure within this directory reflects the path(s) listed for Windows and/or Steam game data.

[5] Games with Steam Cloud support may also store data in ~/.steam/steam/userdata/<user-id>/289500/.

[6] Use Wine's registry editor to access any Windows registry paths.

[7] The app ID (289500) may differ in some cases.

[8] Treat backslashes as forward slashes.

[9] See the glossary page for details on Windows data paths.

[StarForce_Windows_Vista-1] Windows Vista support - StarForce Support

[StarForce_Windows_7-2] Windows 7 support - StarForce Support

[StarForce_Windows_8.1-3] Windows 8.1 support - StarForce Support

[StarForce_Windows_10-4] Windows 10 support - StarForce Support

[8] Fix by jackfuste from Widescreen Gaming Forum

[Note 1]

[Note 2]

[Note 3]

[5]

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

Developers

	Altar Games
Publishers
2005-2018	1C Company
2018-2022	1C Entertainment
2022-present	Fulqrum Publishing
Release dates
Windows	October 21, 2005
Reception
Metacritic	67
Taxonomy
Monetization	One-time game purchase
Modes	Singleplayer
Pacing	Real-time
Perspectives	Bird's-eye view
Controls	Point and select
Genres	RTS
Themes	Sci-fi
Series	UFO