Montie

Adapting things for faster/slower playthroughs would take a bit of work, mostly in adjusting the research/manufacture speeds. I've heard people brag about having beaten X-Com in under six months gametime with no adjustment at all simply by knowing what is needed as far as research and what isn't.

Another idea would be asking for a strike team to secure the site themselves from local military forces. You wouldn't get the salvage (obviously) but I think the relations adjust afterward could be geared on a random scale based off the size of the ship that crashed and losses incurred by said military.

I'm a little confused... wouldn't having their own STATS make them different from each other? The kind of perks you're referring to there would only be identified by some seriously deep psychoanalysis. Most of the stats have nothing to do with personality, that's going to depend on how you play them. There is an argument to be made for things like bravery not being shown at all as there's no real way to quantify the concept of bravery. Don't need a 'Sluggish' trait to tell me someone has crappy reaction time. Just look at his React. WOW he's slow. At the end of the day it's a lazy gimmick as opposed to a properly designed random generation of the character.

I'll freely admit that there are some games where perks are awesome. The newer Fallouts used them to reasonable effect, the original Bioshock also used something similar to enhance plasmids. That being said, I don't think they belong in military squad/strategy games, which is what Xenonauts is to me. Yeah, there are aliens, but who's kickin em in the daddybags? A bunch of pissed off Infantry

LMAO I'm actually working on not swearing as much, so freakin, forkin, and a few other words get put in place of various swearing. people look at me a little funny, but are usually less offended. If only because they don't realize what I meant

lol I hear ya there, Rodan. I pick up my pre-order tomorrow when I get paid.

Yes, let's have the perk 'Fairy Feet' so someone can traipse across landmines without setting them off, etc. I tend to find that kind of stuff not only annoying, but if you hide it, I can't tell if FuFu can do this or not. or 'Bulwark' with the ability to ignore damage a set % of time... Or Pinky Rings! for ultimate bling blinding! Please Gods No I'm about to get crude here, so turn away. I'm tired of the Candy-ass casual genre waterdown effect I'm seeing across the board in strategy or Real-Time Spam gaming. I say we draw a line in the FORKIN sand right here, right now. And say "NO MORE! This Far and NO FURTHER!" Don't mind me, I'm just tired of a number of dev teams (here excluded) pissing on my head and telling me it's rain.

Classes and Perks... If you REALLY need those to figure out what your soldiers should be carrying go play the cheap X-Com knockoff Firaxis is putting together for the kiddies. Yes I'm snippy, The application of lazy gimmicks to every new game I may enjoy is starting to grind my nerves as well as my patience. This is one of my last hopes for a NEW and complex game, and I don't want it cheapened by shoddy construction short-cuts. Thankfully what I've seen implies the development team isn't interested in said shortcuts.

Women and Beer... Didn't you ever play Duke Nuke'm? lol

Point taken. sometimes I forget about little thinks like tech bleedover lol

It has a long history of being used by the enemies of the U.S. (circa 1979) and not so much in use by the U.S. That may require it's manufacture if communist countries are unwilling to provide them, but I can hardly see a realistic reason for needing to research them as by 79 I think we had a pretty good idea how they were constructed. Just my 2 cents. Won't break my heart either way.

I came here the same way. Just can't afford the pre-order til I get paid or I would have already. Now the wife is telling me I can pick up the Xenonauts preorder or Mass Effect 3 0.0 May have to break out my secret weapon and see if the puppydog eyes still work.

Look to someone else for Fanfic mate. I can get about a page in before whatever I'm writing starts to just fall apart. That and I don't know enough about the Xenonauts back history to tie it in properly.

Ah, that's something I was unaware of since I haven't had a chance to tinker with the early build. The tabs would effectively do the same thing so long as there aren't upgrades added into older tech, which appears not to be the case. hrrm

And a Good intro is ALWAYS remembered. The intro to the original Dawn of War was among the most jarring and memorable I've seen. That said, as far as the funding Thermometer.... How much would I have to donate to get a cute little redhead with large... assets?

Nah, Ram em first! Pretend it's Independence Day (the movie)

I think their definition of Ballistic would be current generation firearms (I say current as they've changed little since well before 1970 in regards to basic operation) Gauss weaponry could possibly be classified as an EM (Electro-Magnetic) weapon. Plasma a High Impact Energy weapon and Lasers a Direct Energy weapon. Just tossing some ideas out there.

The lack of complete historical accuracy is no reason to abandon it entirely. Even set in 93 women were still struggling to be allowed to fly combat missions in the US Air Force. I'm an example of one of those guys that has no problem with men dying around him, but I have significant issues with women even getting hurt around me. I recognize I'm old fashioned in that regard, but there are a lot of men especially in the military with that particular issue. I'll also freely admit that one of the best places to push against that particular mindset would be in video games... course, I've long held that if women want equal treatment they should get an equal cut of the crap work

upgradeable weapons was one of the best ideas to come out of the UFO: After+ series. the problem becomes that I don't know how many of these ideas were options at the time. You could possibly convert the weaponized laser into a low powered targetting device (think that's how we ended up with them after failing to create said weaponized laser) I think scopes in general are already attached to the sniper rifles, but as far as binoculars... Unless the Aliens have some way to counter you could just spot them with the Binos and blast em to bits with whatever weapon fit your heart's desire.

wouldn't necessarily need Blaster Bombs for that, though I don't know that they had laser targetting at that time. think it as still grid coordinates and smoke signal.

The interface of those games was actively adjusted to take into account that some weapons would be totally useless and remove them as options unless specifically requested by the user. I'm kinda guessing here, but Xenonauts doesn't have a similar automatic UI adjustment so you'd be looking at the entire array. Unless you sold the rest off I guess, if you can do that in Xenonauts.

I evaluate the pieces of the new X-Com with no regard to the original. Have to, I'm not seeing enough similar to do a comparison. So I take the parts separately and examine them. I'm not seeing a very interesting game from them. The ammo one is big for me, mostly because I'm a Marine. Knowing how many rounds I have on me doesn't stress me it reassures me. It's almost like I have a counter in my head that declines every time I squeeze the trigger. I always know how many rounds I have... That is the sole emotional/gut rejection for me. Gazz, what you're suggesting is a very interesting idea, with each clip equipped reflecting a type of ammo instead of a set amount. I'd have to play around with that to see how it felt, tbh. It'd simplify quite a few things from manually replacing ammo (in the original) to the need to constantly manufacture more with the advanced weaponry. Still doesn't work around the cooldown for rocket launchers... I'd love to know who's airdropping additional rockets every 4 turns. On the heavy weapons like that I still think a mission limit for ammo would be the best option, perhaps with an ammo satchel to expand that (possibly double) The original TUs did need an overhaul, but the move/act system is just as old, and equally antiquated. trading one system in need of overhaul in favor of another... not something I consider an improvement. It restricts hit and run tactics and yes, may have been chosen for precisely that reason. Inventory... the point of least contention for me so long as I get a reasonable amount of interaction with what they're using. I'd like to see how they approach things like night vision/thermal imaging or if they'll bother. The removal of the grid and simplification of everything else implies this will get similar treatment and a lot of potentially interesting advances/changes may get ignored. The Squad - 6 men is just silliness... it BARELY worked with the UFO series (which introduced some very nice ideas otherwise) but it was barely enough to secure/sweep the small maps they had to offer. This gives me a pretty clear idea of the scope of their tactical game. Since that's where I found the most depth in the original and every clone since... well it's not impressing me. As far as Firaxis itself, and I was just discussing this with someone on the forums there (thread I started, do it rarely because the I feel somehow responsible for following/maintaining it) Their catalog of games is primarily Civ#, with the best game outside that being Alpha Centauri, which was Civ just with a lot of radically differing ideas in tech and some very interesting gameplay mechanic changes. would have loved seeing that game evolve alongside Civ. Partly I'm left wondering if it was their lack of experience with tactical combat that caused some of this 'streamlining' (they hated it being called dumbed down) and that they're hoping to make up the difference in depth with the new interactions in the Geoscape.

I'd have to agree with AD, I wouldn't care if I was flying someone from another continent to ensure I got the best available. I don't know of any African forces I'd be particularly interested in recruiting from, personally. However, that's primarily due to my lack of knowledge of military forces on that continent.

Very true in regards to the armors, hadn't really taken them into account in regards to doing things other than being dead weight until the troopers start getting shot. UFO: Aftermath did something similar with it's heaviest armors in that they'd augment strength and allow you to carry miniguns. I'd hope for some opportunities where different weapon types would be more effective as well, but Chris did seem pretty clear about the more linear tier system.

works for me boss, still means I can move people in a quick, proficient military manner! lol