U.F.O: Defense Force (2025) (PC/PS5/Android/iOS/X Series/XZeta/PSP2)

U.F.O: Defense Force is a 2025 turn-based tactical video game developed by Unreal Battlefield Interactive and published by Mojang Miami. Set in an alternative version of the year 2021, the player controls an elite multinational paramilitary organization called the Earth Defense Force during an alien invasion of Earth. The player commands troops in the field in a series of turn-based tactical missions; between missions, the player directs the research and development of technologies from recovered alien technology and captured prisoners, expands Earth Defense Force's base of operations, manages finances, and monitors and responds to alien activity.
U.F.O: Defense Force was released for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 5, XBOX X Series, XBOX Zeta and PlayStation Portable 2 in North America on February 17th, 2025, and in Europe and Australia on February 20th, 2025. An "Elite Edition", containing all previously released downloadable content, was released for Mac OS X by Feral Interactive in March 2025. A port for iOS was released in May 2025 and an Android conversion was released in June 2026. An expansion pack, titled U.F.O: Decepticon Armageddon, was released in June 2026.
== Plot ==
=== Setting[edit] ===
The game's campaign is set between 2022 and 2027, as a global alien invasion begins. Prior to the start of the game, a group of countries called the Council of Nations has banded together to create the Earth Defense Force, the most elite military and scientific organization in human history, tasked with defending them from the alien attack. The player assumes the role of the commander of Earth Defense Force, and proceeds to engage in a war against an extraterrestrial enemy with overwhelming technological superiority.
=== Story ===
In February 2022, a series of extraterrestrial objects land in a major American city. A squad of four soldiers is sent to investigate the incident. Upon entering a warehouse, the squad finds American soldiers being mind controlled by a small alien creature before being ambushed. All but one of the soldiers are killed before the area is secured. Alien attacks begin all over the globe.
After success with shooting down alien scout ships and securing the crash sites from surviving alien crews, as well as interdicting alien attempts to abduct human civilians for unknown purposes, EDF manages to also obtain the corpses of various different alien troops. Autopsies reveal that all these types have been genetically and/or cybernetically altered, which seems to indicate they are merely foot-soldiers for unseen leaders. EDF's head of research, Dr. Watanabe, requests that a live alien be captured for interrogation. This also involves developing a specialized weapon capable of capturing a live alien, and constructing a facility in EDF's subterranean base capable of safely holding a live alien prisoner.
Capturing one of the alien troops and conducting the interrogation reveals vague information about another type of alien called the Outsiders, artificially-created crystalline beings encountered aboard UFOs, that appear to serve as pilots and navigators. Dr. Watanabe then requests that EDF capture an Outsider for study. Upon capturing one of these, the examination reveals that the Outsiders' exotic crystalline structures behave in a manner similar to antennas, receiving a signal broadcast from a location buried underground on Earth. EDF dispatches a team to investigate the signal; it is found to be coming from a base that the aliens have secretly established on Earth, where experiments are performed on abducted humans.
EDF develops a method for gaining entry to the alien base and assaults it. During the mission, the alien serving as the base commander is discovered to have psychic abilities, but is nevertheless defeated by the soldiers. The commander's psychic communication device is recovered and reverse engineered. Tapping into the aliens' communications reveals a previously hidden, stealth "Overseer" UFO making rounds across the Earth. When the EDF is shot down, it is found to hold an alien species that had not been previously encountered, as well as a strange psionic artifact. The newly discovered species, called Ethereals, possess powerful psionic abilities.
Once the Overseer ship is shot down and the psionic artifact recovered, the massive enemy "Temple Ship" reveals itself in low Earth orbit over Zaire, and starts causing earthquakes even as far away as EDF HQ. The reverse-engineering efforts enable EDF to unlock and develop latent psionic powers that are present in certain human beings, thus enhancing their human soldiers. Out of these psychic human soldiers, the most powerful becomes the Volunteer, using the psionic artifact recovered from the Overseer UFO to tap into the aliens' psychic communication "hive", an experience that also increases his or her psionic strength. This allows them to attack and board the Temple Ship to seek out the Uber Ethereal, the leader of the alien invasion.
During the final battle aboard the ship, the Uber Ethereal reveals that, because of their own failure to improve their own race further, they have been testing and experimenting on other species throughout the universe in an attempt to identify a race worthy of being "Uplifted", searching for a race that is strong in both mind and body; the various species of alien troops that the player has encountered have all been failures in the Ethereals' experiments. By allowing humans to obtain their technology a few steps at a time, the Ethereals allowed humans to evolve to a fuller potential, and believe that humanity may be the culmination of their search, to find the perfect species to move on and prepare for "what lies ahead", a vaguely worded destiny that they do not describe further.
After slaying the Uber Ethereal, the Temple Ship begins to collapse into itself, creating a black hole, which would destroy the Earth due to its close proximity. While the psionically gifted Volunteer urges the other EDF soldiers to rush back to their transport and escape the doomed ship, the Volunteer stays behind, using the psychic gift to take control of the ship and fly it further away from the planet, finally causing it to self-destruct and save Earth.
== Aliens/Enemies ==
=== Extraterrestrials ===
* Acid Spitter
* Berserker
* Bull
* Big Rig Decepticon
* Chryssalid
* Cyberdisc
* Drone
* Ethereal
* Floater
* Hound
* Hatchback Decepticon
* Jolt
* Heavy Jolt
* Infiltrator
* Mechtoid
* Mosquito
* Muton
* Outsider
* Uber Ethereal
* Sectoid
* Sectoid Commander
* Sectopod
* S.U.V Decepticon
* Sport Car Decepticon
* Sports Sedan Decepticon
* Seeker
* Thin Man
* Tank
* Whisperer
* Zombie
=== EXALT ===
* EXALT Elite Heavy
* EXALT Heavy
* EXALT Medic
* EXALT Elite Medic
* EXALT Operative
* EXALT Elite Operative
* EXALT Sniper
* EXALT Elite Sniper
Category:Mojang Games