FLIR

Exactly - what many people remember from the original X-Com are those experiences and the atmosphere. Everyone of my colleagues and friends, who played the original X-Com, first talk about the creepy corn fields at night. And when it comes to X-Com: TFTD it is something like that: "The music + late night playing with no lights + alien base missions + high volume sonic cannon shots and aquanaut screams + tentaculats = the definition of terrifying" It is also the atmosphere and the "experience" that attracts a lot of people when it comes to games; not perfect gameplay mechanisms and balancing down to the smallest detail. It is about how it "feels" to play. The graphical presentation is a part of this: I love the sober mil-sim look of X2, but more darkness and things like fog could greatly increase how the game feels. For example: the alien bases would be much more atmospheric if they would be dark and maybe filled with fog (the alien creatures having their own atmosphere in there). "Darkwood" or "Aliens: Dark Descent" (aka X-Com: Colonial Marines) do it nice, albeit a little bit too much of everything. A more "sober" approach like in X2 would be better. And equally much can be achieved with game features: keeping the enemy creatures as "unknown" as possible (no status messages for the creatures: HP, "suppressed" etc.). A nice little, immersive gadget: a separate "motion sensor" (very atmospheric to have to use it and draw conclusions), presenting a motion sensor with overlay UI (something flashes on the virtual battlefield), on the other hand, is not atmospheric at all. This creates memorable experiences and is immersive/atmospheric ("What moves there in the darkness/inside the barn/house etc.): https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/File:Xenomorphs.png What players often remember most about games, the most memorable experiences, seem to be the "levels"/"missions"/etc. that they had to go through despite being hard (and dark and scary): Everyone talks about the "Tower of Latria" or having to climb down into the "Valley of Defilement" in Demons Souls, or "Blighttown" in Dark Souls. Same for the original X-Com: those atmospheric night missions, going through the cornfields... X2 is a game about alien creatures and the "unknown" (and not something like "Jagged Alliance") - so darkness and creating an overall eerie atmosphere would really fit imho.

Yes, I think that X2 can easily be more atmospheric and immersive than X-Com with some small changes. Night missions are already really atmospheric also because of the more serious creepy music ( no "action music", it destroys atmosphere): So these night mission in wooded areas are already really atmospheric. Some small things would make the above more scary. For example: 1st rule to make an atmospheric, scary game: The enemy is "unknown". The players should not see the HP points or other states of the enemy "running around in the darkness". Strong enemies or enemies immune to certain ammunition types were so scary in the original, because you would shoot and shoot (not seeing the HP or other effect on the target), but they did not go down... that is "movie stuff" that makes a game an experience and the player also has to be more observant then, which automatically also increases immersion. And one cool thing in the original X-Com was how important the sound was in that regard: when hitting a silhouette in the darkness with the creature going down, one had to listen - was there a scream? If not it was just unconscious would either bleed out in the next turn lying there or (and that made it tense/creepy) it would get up again silently after some turn. The "unkown enemy" is the most important part and easy to achieve, no graphics changes needed, just options to turn them all off. I would prefer a simple in-game option: "always night". I did this in the original X-Com and TFTD in Dos via an edit. Increases the atmosphere a lot! I simply pretended: it is only possible to approach the crash/landing/colony/etc. site at night or "the aliens darkened the skies" (lol). BTW: I am new to the forum. Is there a way to contact the developers and discuss such ideas/suggestions/requests with them?

Same here - I also got TFTD first. And to be honest, the original X-Com was a little bit of a letdown afterwards, because TFTD was gloomier, stranger and more oppressive than X-Com and it had atmosphere in spades. I loved the larger levels, "light management" in deep sea or night missions and the overall Lovecraftian horror atmosphere. TFTD is my absolute nr. 1 favorite game of all the time. I even prefer the Dos original over the OpenXcom version (despite all the advantages it has): the reason is the AI. Half of the AI in the original TFTD was fully random - and this is why the creatures moved and behaved so strange, which made them feel even more "alien". In other games, especially modern ones, the "creatures" move and fight like human soldiers or a human squad, total kills the immersion for me. Another detail that the other games lack: starting in the closed sub and having to open the door is such an atmospheric beginning of a mission. One always starts there, does not know what is outside until opening it. Running down the already open aircraft in the X-Com derivatives never reaches the atmosphere and feeling of anticipation of TFTD missions (what comes close to TFTD in this regard is "Teleglitch" mission starts, but it is a totally different genre). Not to speak of the strange alien structures of TFTD, like the colonies which looked like out of a Lynch movie, loved the colors... I wonder why nobody ever recreated this absolute gem. BTW: I still have the original European version with the beautiful cover:

Yes, the reason why the original X-Com and TFTD are my favorite games is: the atmosphere. They did so much right that others did not understand: the sound effects, the creepy music and the atmospheric graphics: darkness, fog, dust, smoke, etc. Seeing just the silhouettes of the alien creatures or identifying them based on their sound while they move in the darkness: that is so atmospheric. My single wish for Xenonauts 2 is that it creates a stronger atmosphere on visual (and audio level), everything else is great already! Dark corridors: