Gauddlike

Hmm maybe SOME aliens should have eyes in the back of their necks...

Will they also have different types of attacks? Just wondering if some will have a stun, some will be able to use panic while others will have mind control. Worth asking even if you won't actually tell us if it is the case

Hard drives are so big the installation size generally doesn't matter to me. I mainly use my pc for playing games and doing my uni work for which win7 works fine. I would have liked to try linux at some point but the lack of support from games developers means it would be a waste of time for me. At some point PC gaming will come back into the focus of devs and publishers then I wouldn't be surprised to find linux versions will also become more common.

Yeah or when you ask a geordie if that's a cockney accent.

Why bother? Weapons are unusable without both hands now and it seems to work quite well in the game. Have you actually tried the system as it stands thoroughly to see if it has any of the drawbacks you fear?

There is no way to stop someone hunting for the rare medals if they want to. I am not sure it is even worth trying to if that is how they get enjoyment out of the game. It is also not a valid reason to only add in easy to get and pointless ones for killing small numbers of enemies etc that everyone will get sooner or later anyway. Some people will see them as a way of reminding them of when something great happened while others will just want to farm them for bragging rights or to round out the collection for the soldier they have named after themselves. Remember we aren't talking about achievements here either. These are not things that you will only ever get once and will be flashed out for all your steam friends to be jealous over. These will possibly be awarded in each game to a limited number of your troops, either because they did something special (or something special happened to them) or because you went out to deliberately get them the award. I would prefer them to be harder to obtain, not because it makes them harder to farm but simply because they will mean more to me when one of my troops manages to achieve one. Kill 5 aliens, walk 100 AP worth of steps, carry a rifle, use up a full clip of ammo and random meaningless awards wouldn't give me any great feeling of attachment to the trooper who got it because they are just things that will happen in the game. I want them to remind me of the time my rookie gunned down all five of the aliens that were trying to storm the ufo he was holding, or how it always seems to be Sergei who is left standing when things hit the fan etc. If medals are hard to get they are memorable, if they are common they will just be more fluff text like where the rookie had their combat experience or their previous regiment.

Could the ammunition be broken down into short, medium, and long range maybe? Grey out any range that doesn't have a weapon in that range equipped as well, that way a mig with full missile ammo won't look like it has 0% short or medium range ammo. An f-17 would have 100% short (cannon) and 100% medium (sidewinders) with greyed or dashed out long range. *edit* Probably need to add an explanation of what the three numbers represent as well. I prefer the angled and fully coloured images for the ships. It is more aesthetically pleasing. The only way the red ones would be an advantage for me is if they reflected any previous battle damage. My only question is how it would look if the main enemy was much larger? Do the pictures scale well? The fuel being listed in seconds is a definite advantage over an arbitrary percentage or set value that means little. I would change the Interception Successful! title though. They have not been successful until the enemy has been shot down or forced to retreat to space. Maybe "Engagement Range Reached" or something similar.

Should have thought of adding it to the wiki then linking it... At least someone did

My point was that while using the medikit you wouldn't be doing anything else and while doing anything else you wouldn't be using the medikit. In that case you wouldn't need to run round with it in your hand, it would be fine to have it in your pack and have the option to use it when required, for example from the grenade button/quick inventory slot or a button on the weapon pane (maybe something opposite the fire mode for the current weapon if that isn't too confusing?). You COULD carry it in your hand with a pistol in the other if you wanted it obvious who was carrying one though.

I think he was suggesting that having the player manually place the targets before a training mission might be too much hassle rather than adding a target dummy enemy type for the software to place. The various armies of the world run training missions regularly, very rarely does it involve wholesale slaughter of either side. If it makes you feel any better you could make sure the "dead" model isn't used, the "stunned" model can be used instead. Using the national guardsman model would be purely to differentiate them from your own troops. If armour was available in different colours I would suggest that instead but that would be a massive undertaking. Hopefully they will have different weapon models available anyway. They don't actually need to be REAL guardsmen, they could be other Xenonauts squads, rookies, trainers etc. Having training missions available inside the main campaign would be against the feel of the game for me. Using them as tutorials is fair enough though.

One major thing I see being missed is the balance of the game. If you are using a breacher with a combat shield to soak up damage strapped to one arm. If both hands can use two handed weapons then he could conceivably walk through the door with a rocket launcher, machine gun, flamethrower etc in the other hand. At the sort of ranges you expect to engage at any one of those weapons would be massively powerful with limited problems from reduced accuracy. The pistol and other short range one handed weapons would lose their primary role. The point is that there are exceptionally few situations where being able to use a two handed weapon in one hand would actually be useful and in some of those it could be incredibly overpowering and unblancing. Why should the game be reworked (costing dev time and money remember) to allow it? So far none of the "because I might want to use it for something someday" arguments are particularly convincing to me. The only one I have thought slightly reasonable is swapping to a medikit etc. I would suggest that you don't actually need to be holding a medikit in one hand to use it though do you? You would probably have it mounted in a place that is easy to access and simply remove the items you need when required. If that is the case maybe the medikit should also be used from the quick inventory/grenade button or the heal icon should be present on the weapon pane at all times when one is carried.

Damn you Evil Alien Shed®! *shakes fist at shed*

Zhab my actual comment was that I had no save file to go back into and recheck my numbers because I had been playing TFTD instead of EU. I also said previously that the exact numbers didn't matter but that you might want to check your calculations. I think the amount of manufacturing space you have listed for laser cannon was also wrong but that is just from memory. Just in case you were relying on your figures for anything, it doesn't have much bearing on the firaxis threat calculation after all Personally I may well pick up both games, might even pick up the 2K fps if it goes an sale anywhere for a decent price.

A target dummy enemy type without the ability to move or shoot would be all you need. The program would just place them like a normal enemy. I would prefer to have national guardsmen npc's playing the opfor though.

Yeah adding a few events that just show "Alien scout ship shot down by local forces" or something should point players towards that conclusion. If the change over is gradual then the local forces are adopting Xenonauts techniques and getting enough tech leaking down to them to be able to handle the odd scout.

Just a quick modification to Funkypoop's hard work to show my thinking. I tried to add something along the lines of the bits Chris said he wanted to change as well. Added colour change to the numbers, red for dead, blue for stunned. Moved AP reserve and expanded soldier buttons to fill the space. Added a ladder effect level selector with arrows. Moved crouch toggle and inventory buttons. I didn't add anything to represent vehicles as I am still unsure how best to do that.

I like the overall look of the Funkypoop mock up but there are a few things I would do differently, excluding any changes Chris mentioned: I would like to see the redundant soldier stat boxes removed and the space used for AP reserve. AP, HP and bravery are all shown twice while strength, accuracy and reflexes are not really essential information (most of the time). AP reserve would then be located in the same place as the AP is displayed. I also still feel that the icons used in the AP reserve are misleading. What is the maximum number of troops in a ground mission? I seem to recall it was 16 rather than 12 but I may well be wrong. If so where will the rest of the shortcuts be displayed? That would not be a problem if the AP reserve was moved as per the previous suggestion. I am unsure where the vehicles will be listed on the recent UI. I had assumed with mine that they would appear as just another portrait when present but that may be harder to do when you cannot see a representation on the button. Maybe making the button background a different colour would be enough? And a couple for Chris: How would moving between floors work on a grav lift, assuming there are any in the game? How will the jump function on armour be activated? Would we need to make space for more controls or will this be activated on the screen some other way?

I still prefer a weapon proficiency award for confirmed kills with a specific weapon, rather than the basic x kills = medal. I like the sound of rewarding grenade proficiency, pistol marksmanship etc rather than a basic, one size fits all achievement. Maybe there should be a valour medal for a soldier who achieves a number of mission objectives as well? For example 5 times they kill the final alien in a base defence or are in the control room for a ufo capture etc. Perhaps there should be a record of landmarks as well. If you don't like the sound of giving medals for the first of an alien type being captured and that sort of thing. I would like to be able to look back at a soldier and see that he fired the first laser pistol ever used in combat, was the first to kill a Sebillian and took part in capturing the first Dreadnought class alien vessel. If this could be accessed to allow people to mod in other medals for some of these achievements, or to flag up new ones, it would even better.

Somewhere in the laser cannon numbers yours do not agree with mine, although that could just be a mix up in the way it is worded. The ufopedia agrees with my old notes but I have been playing TFTD recently so have no save files to go back into and check. As I said though the precise numbers aren't particularly important. Being able to generate that kind of income on any base with a workshop, stores and living quarters removes any threat from the funding nations being taken over. That should not be the case with Xenonauts. I would have made the diminishing returns for sales (within a specific time frame) a suggestion if lack of profiteering was not already planned. It should really add to the tension of lost nations.

Think I have played all of the X series now. My only gripe with them is that they take so long to get anything useful done on the manufacturing side. I don't have that kind of time available so I always end up just hunting people down and taking their ships off them. I played the whole of one game in a fully kitted out Khaak M3 that I borrowed from a previous owner. Nice ship, very purple.

Well your numbers are off a bit as well Zhab but specifics aren't really important. For me the profit margins were excessive as they allowed you to overcome a whole aspect of the game (funding) with little effort. If you choose to use it then that's your own problem when you find the game lacking in difficulty. I would have preferred some kind of diminishing returns on sales just to make selling extra gear useful but manufacturing complexes less useful. The game was not balanced to my mind when using that tactic so I will be interested to see how Xenonauts pulls it off.

If you want to throw a grenade off the ground pick it up to an available slot first. As for the others medikits, demolition charges etc tend to be quite bulky and would be incredibly difficult to use while holding a rifle in the other hand. Surely in your realistic view it makes more sense to put the rifle down while bandaging a comrade? Placing and priming a demolition charge would also surely be easier if you weren't lugging that machine gun along in your other hand as well right? I feel it is better in general to keep the interface simple. If you need to pick something up then free up a hand or move it directly to your backpack etc. I agree that throwing items around may be more difficult in xeno than in x-com but it was something I very rarely used so doesn't concern me. The exception to that being grenades and hi-ex but that will be covered by the grenade button.

Missed out the weapon proficiency suggestion: For example 15 confirmed kills with a precision rifle may give you the "Sniper Proficiency Ribbon 3rd Class", 50 confirmed pistol kills for the "Pistol Proficiency Ribbon 1st Class" etc. Actually missed out most of my suggestions: For example a medal for successfully capturing a new alien type/rank. Any rank of Andron captured will get the first (and only the first) person a "Bronze Andron Cross", while capturing one of a higher rank could be the Silver Andron Cross and the highest rank would bag you a Gold Andron Cross. These could give a small bonus, specifically against that alien type, as there will only ever be a maximum of 3 people with them. There could also be a second version for first kill of this alien type, Bronze Andron Medal etc. I am not as keen on the steam achievement style medals.

Dismiss what pop up? The suggestion was to have a small check box that says play tutorial on the new game screen. I don't see much difference personally between having it play at the start of a new game or being able to start it separately. Apart I guess from any progress not carrying over to the main game. Either way works for me.

That is also one of the things I don't like. It would just mean I reserved enough for the second shot, turned it off to kneel and point in the right direction then turned it back on to make sure I saved enough for the lowest shot. With an analogue slider you might well guess a little low (or high) on how much you saved but at least you have the option. The exact number you have reserved is displayed as well so as long as you have an idea how many APs kneeling and turning costs you can make a fair guess as to how many you want to reserve. For example you move the slider until the first aim point shows. The reserve number says 30 points reserved. You will probably want to kneel and may need to look around a little so you move the slider a bit further to around 38. Next turn you realise you had left it a bit short so you round it off to 40 to give a little more chance to look around.