Jump to content

Xenonauts - the game that left me wanting


Recommended Posts

The old X-COM (which Xenonauts wants to be its spiritual successor) had in fact two gameplay cores, combat and research & development. While Xenonauts has a well designed research tree and combat is good with nothing of notice added, its economic core is a failure. Everything feels railroaded and limiting and the fact that not even once in my playthrough (veteran difficulty) I had been attacked in the base or had to deal with an alien base, feels very unrewarding. There is an abundance of ufos, the resources are not scarce and their presence becomes trivial. Trying to streamline the economic aspect (whatever the reason) made it less hardcore but also more bland, reduced it to a checklist you have to tick. In the old games you really felt like an administrator in which was more rewarding when you managed to fine tune the many gears in motion for the optimum output.

There are no in depth logistical decisions you have to make from an economic point of view. Some structures auto upgrade themselves (like defense structures that not fired one shot) and plane ammo (whatever its complexity) lies in infinite quantities. The number of structures you have to build to survive is laughable, their positioning in the base has no tactical meaning.

The game does not make you to have hard choices or even entertain the illusion of choice.

The plane-ufo combat minigame introduced is an example of a layer of complexity added that enriched the game. The tactical economic aspect did not received the same attention. X-COM is never about combat only. Is the intertwine between ground and air combat and the economic, R&D aspect of managing the conflict.

There are a lot of things that could have been introduced to R&D to give it depth, and because of that Xenonauts, despite having some good to great aspects to it, left me wanting still for a proper X-Com style game.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You get no base attack/defence missions if you are too good at shooting down the UFOs. Perhaps you should try upping the difficulty level?

Bases only get constructed by UFOs finishing a construction mission. Not sure about base attacks, I have not had one either.

I have also had very few terror missions, though I actually find them to be both great fun, and to give the biggest relations boost possible, so I sometimes let them land on purpose.

I do think this is something that may need further balancing in a mod.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The game is balanced on the assumption of consistent casualties, even the occasional squad wipe. If you're save scumming or just doing really well in ground combat, the game is easy. Replacing lost soldiers is a big part of the costs the game assumes you have, and if you aren't paying those costs everything becomes easy to afford. Sounds like you might enjoy insane difficulty more.

And I deeply disagree with you that losing the fussy mother aspects of checking with each one of your soldiers to see if they remembered that guns need bullets today is a bad thing. That's a flaw, just because it was in the original does not mean it should be recreated.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Honestly I always disliked the logistics and administrative aspect of the old Xcom, it felt like really tedious micromanagement. I'm really glad that they removed and simplified this aspect a lot in Xenonauts. I think that the economical aspect and the base management work really well in this game.

Also in this game it actually feels like aliens are launching a full scale invasion with the abundance of ufos that fly around. It really enhances this "being overwhelmed against a superior foe" atmosphere. I like it a lot.

But I understand your point, I think it's just a matter of preference.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Given what I've discovered in the last couple of hours, it seems that the lack of base attack missions is essentially a bug.

Speaking of, Solver do you think its possible to make the base attack missions dick around less? Right now it feels like the navigator on the UFO is lost and accidentally turned the map upside down so he has to wander around for a few days before he finds your base.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Given what I've discovered in the last couple of hours, it seems that the lack of base attack missions is essentially a bug.
I've noticed that they don't seem to take much interest in attacking your bases the in the last few builds. My mighty AA batteries are hungry for alien blood.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Given what I've discovered in the last couple of hours, it seems that the lack of base attack missions is essentially a bug.

Perhaps you will agree the spawning of more base attack missions doesn't necessarily and most likely will not lead to more base attacks happening because the UFOs executing them are the easiest ones to shoot down heading for your base directly. I think additional measures need to be taken to see more of these actually happen, such as making the respective aircraft much harder to shoot down by the player's interceptors.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If X-com stood up the test of time was primarely because of the setting the the hybrid quality it had. Not just because of combat because at this aspect it never really excelled. There are other games that did it better at the time. Its clear to me I am one of the few "purists" but all of you that find the in depth management of the bases tedious, you never liked x-com as a whole.

And the overused example of soldier munition management thrown out here becomes a little tiresome, don't you think?

Munition is/should be an important aspect. And there are dozens of ways that could be implemented not to mouseclick a hundred times to properly equip your squad.

A. We should have an R&D system with more depth which could house more playstyles and give choice weight.

B. No! Clicking four times for each soldier to properly equip with ammunition is tedious!

Straw Man fallacy at its best.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If X-com stood up the test of time was primarely because of the setting the the hybrid quality it had. Not just because of combat because at this aspect it never really excelled. There are other games that did it better at the time. Its clear to me I am one of the few "purists" but all of you that find the in depth management of the bases tedious, you never liked x-com as a whole.

And the overused example of soldier munition management thrown out here becomes a little tiresome, don't you think?

Munition is/should be an important aspect. And there are dozens of ways that could be implemented not to mouseclick a hundred times to properly equip your squad.

A. We should have an R&D system with more depth which could house more playstyles and give choice weight.

B. No! Clicking four times for each soldier to properly equip with ammunition is tedious!

Straw Man fallacy at its best.

You do realize you can set up a standard load out for any type of soldier role, right? Then you only click once per soldier.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

You do realize you can set up a standard load out for any type of soldier role, right? Then you only click once per soldier.

And I deeply disagree with you that losing the fussy mother aspects of checking with each one of your soldiers to see if they remembered that guns need bullets today is a bad thing. That's a flaw, just because it was in the original does not mean it should be recreated.

"And there are dozens of ways that could be implemented not to mouseclick a hundred times to properly equip your squad."

I was referring to the overused example how old xcom was tedious at ammunition management and how this could be avoided to make munition manufacturing relevant. And this type of argument makes a Straw Man fallacy.

Once you take away the ability of the player to also fund themselves, all the economic structure is just a facade which has reverberations in other areas of the game.

A. We should have an R&D system with more depth which could house more playstyles and give choice weight.

B. No! Clicking four times for each soldier to properly equip with ammunition is tedious!

It seems anything I say about an economic system that "could house more playstyles and give choice real weight" is translated by "ammunition management=bad"

I rest my case.

Edited by Grotesque
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Once you take away the ability of the player to also fund themselves, all the economically structure is just a facade which has reverberations in other areas of the game.

I think that adding the ability to self-fund trivializes the rest of the economy, because it allows you to no longer care about the funding nations (which is supposed to be a core mechanic). Like in the original game, the optimal economic strategy is to build a laser cannon factory and ignore the rest of the economic part of the game.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The old X-COM (which Xenonauts wants to be its spiritual successor) had in fact two gameplay cores, combat and research & development. While Xenonauts has a well designed research tree and combat is good with nothing of notice added, its economic core is a failure. Everything feels railroaded and limiting and the fact that not even once in my playthrough (veteran difficulty) I had been attacked in the base or had to deal with an alien base, feels very unrewarding. There is an abundance of ufos, the resources are not scarce and their presence becomes trivial. Trying to streamline the economic aspect (whatever the reason) made it less hardcore but also more bland, reduced it to a checklist you have to tick. In the old games you really felt like an administrator in which was more rewarding when you managed to fine tune the many gears in motion for the optimum output.

There are no in depth logistical decisions you have to make from an economic point of view. Some structures auto upgrade themselves (like defense structures that not fired one shot) and plane ammo (whatever its complexity) lies in infinite quantities. The number of structures you have to build to survive is laughable, their positioning in the base has no tactical meaning.

The game does not make you to have hard choices or even entertain the illusion of choice.

The plane-ufo combat minigame introduced is an example of a layer of complexity added that enriched the game. The tactical economic aspect did not received the same attention. X-COM is never about combat only. Is the intertwine between ground and air combat and the economic, R&D aspect of managing the conflict.

There are a lot of things that could have been introduced to R&D to give it depth, and because of that Xenonauts, despite having some good to great aspects to it, left me wanting still for a proper X-Com style game.

I feel opposite. In original ufo selling hvy plasma, and other stuff meant insane cash very fast, the funding of the nations stopped to be importnat early on, which imho was a bad thing. Also you could develop laser rifle or whatevever factory scale production, and start theoreticly earning infinite cash. Here first and foremost for money is the funding and you really look with worry at the contentemet level of each nation.

The very easy air combat/managment of ofignal ufo meant you didnt need more then 2 fighters at each base, each craft being all purpose.Here you need alot of crafts, they often gets dmaaged ./destoryed, you can specialize some crafts to be better at takign out bigger,slower ufos with torps.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I feel opposite. In original ufo selling hvy plasma, and other stuff meant insane cash very fast, the funding of the nations stopped to be importnat early on, which imho was a bad thing. Also you could develop laser rifle or whatevever factory scale production, and start theoreticly earning infinite cash.

Of course that system had a fault that you can abuse it if you know well how the game mechanics works.

I never said that abusing this in the original is OK and that should be replicated in Xenonauts.

But the oversimplified management Xenonauts has just to avoid this (and maybe some other motives) instead introducing some kind of failsafes to avoid this is like throwing away the horse just because one bad horseshoe.

You can't even transfer engineers and scientist from one base to another.

That says a lot.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Of course that system had a fault that you can abuse it if you know well how the game mechanics works.

I never said that abusing this in the original is OK and that should be replicated in Xenonauts.

But the oversimplified management Xenonauts has just to avoid this (and maybe some other motives) instead introducing some kind of failsafes to avoid this is like throwing away the horse just because one bad horseshoe.

If you can generate a significant profit by manufacturing, then you create the same situation as the laser cannon situation in the OG. If you can't generate a significant profit, then it you basically have the same situation as we have now. If you made items that cost alien materials to manufacture profitable, then it might be balanceable but it would also tilt the economy even further towards being grind heavy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

But the oversimplified management Xenonauts has just to avoid this (and maybe some other motives) instead introducing some kind of failsafes to avoid this is like throwing away the horse just because one bad horseshoe.

You can't even transfer engineers and scientist from one base to another.

That says a lot.

I don't really see where the management is "oversimplified". At least not, to the point where it really makes a difference in the game play or the strategic difficulty.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Considering how long individual manufacturing projects take and how much they cost, the idea of having to build individual weapons for individual planes one at a time and then swap them out fills me with dread.

Micromanaging the facilities of 3+ teams is actually pretty tough, but unfortunately the game rewards you for keeping only one, MAYBE two teams.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Considering how long individual manufacturing projects take and how much they cost, the idea of having to build individual weapons for individual planes one at a time and then swap them out fills me with dread.

.

Thats why you would have several workshops working in parralel producing more plane weapons than you would actually need in the case of loosing a plane with the weapons.

And then a storehouse would really be important to store this equipment. And having a limited build space in the base, you would have to choose if you really need one extra storehouse and lose the build space in the detriment of some other important building.

It's called forward thinking and planning.

And losing a plane would be a big deal, not the miracle retrieving and you as a player would be forced to adapt and find new resources.

Edited by Grotesque
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't think I'd be in favor of implementing the scale of manufacturing present in the original XCOM but it does irk me that you sell any weapons that you do manufacture at a loss.

Maybe the sell values of manufactured weapons could be upped to at least cover the costs of making them. They could even be raised enough for the player to make a profit on making them, but given how slow stuff gets manufactured in the game it would probably only be feasible once you have multiple workshops running which generally happens when you're rolling in cash from having air superiority and downing every UFO in a wave.

The other limit on making this the dominant source of funds is that you'd need alien alloys to make them. In the original XCOM you could make big bucks on motion detectors and laser cannons, both of which didn't require any finite materials.

Though it's not really needed in Xenonauts, I do miss making some money on the side from manufacturing and modding something like that in could spice up the strategy a bit.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thats why you would have several workshops working in parralel producing more plane weapons than you would actually need in the case of loosing a plane with the weapons.

And then a storehouse would really be important to store this equipment. And having a limited build space in the base, you would have to choose if you really need one extra storehouse and lose the build space in the detriment of some other important building.

It's called forward thinking and planning.

And losing a plane would be a big deal, not the miracle retrieving and you as a player would be forced to adapt and find new resources.

Bases already have limited enough space without needing multiple storehouses between the need for multiple workshops, labs, radar arrays, living quarters, several hangars, and usually at least a cryptology center or a garage here and there. The only time you'd have space to spare is when you're building a base just for a radar and planes to serve as an outpost, in which case you'd have so much space you could just use that one outpost as your bank for every other base.

Also, manufacturing cannons, missiles and torpedoes one at a time for planes would lead to making it nearly impossible to keep up with the air game and ground game simultaneously. It's already difficult enough to outfit your team with lasers and wolf before plasma shows up. Trying to manufacture 8 cannons, 16 missiles, and 8 torpedos for a decent sized fleet of condors and foxtrots would be even more ridiculous. You'd get halfway into laser cannons and alenium missiles before plasma blasters and warheads showed up and the game expects you to keep pace.

In order to implement that much micromanagement, manufacturing would have to become a LOT quicker and a LOT less expensive. I'm not necessarily saying micromanagement is bad, but under the current model of the game, you would need 30-45 engineers at each base just to try and keep the air fleet up to date, with additional engineers on top of those to actually build the aircraft themselves and upgrade your ground crew.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nope. I've been attacked twice in my short game.

I don't think he means that the bug causes them to be totally absent, just that by looking at the mission generating code the chance of one happening seems to be suspiciously low compared to every other mission possible. You may have had some "luck" with the RNG, maybe you should buy some lottery tickets.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...