Went

Laser Squad is the best!

Maps are predominantly static objects. Walls, grounds, furniture - all this doesn't move, so it's looks better like a flat spite, drawn exactly for projection as player looks at them. But units (soldiers, machines) - dynamic. They turning, breathing, moving in different directions, they have lots of special animations like firing, dying, throwing e.t.c. Moreover, units are highly customizable - they can carry different weapons, ammunition, armor, can have different sex and faces, can belong to different players (not in X-Com) e.t.c. So when you want to have soldiers drawn with 2d sprites, you may have picture of each unit in each orientation with each weapon in each armor of each sex and face, and for all of this you need long row of animation frames. Just multiply all of this and you'll get enormous quantity of content. You want to add any new weapon or armor? Then render soldier with all these orientations, sexes e.t.c. You wan to change something else - you'll need to rerender ALL THIS CONTENT! In the same time 3d units will give you absolute freedom in clothing, equipping, turning soldier, absolute smooth frame rate, and just DRAMATICAL economy of content and time.

Harridans also fly inside of Carrier UFO's roof and get invincible there in previous version. Did you fix this issue too?

I have asked only about 3D units in 2D environment, not about full 3D game (this is no good, agree).

- You are just one GLOBAL organization, and nations/regions are reluctant to fund you as they want/try to handle things their own. (explains the odd loss of funding because of somewhat silly reasons) Why another ones doesn't even try to intercept enemy UFOs or terror sites? - The UFO's you do manage to detect are just a small fraction of the whole force. No. You see all of UFOs arrive our planet. Because only they make "accidents" on the globe. - The nations you lose are just nation that were fed up with the organization and decided to fund their own national defense organizations. So i think the cold war is a very good setting, because both major players are both busy and distrusting of a global united force. This also explains why nations only send you their privates... No they are not. Any biological kind unite against common enemy. And humans not a exception. 2. Due to the really bad political situation, Xcom needs to both prove they can handle things on their own. And not show "public" association to either Capitalist Pigs/Commy Bastards by... lets say landing a plane in their base. American goverment give me money to build base in Moscow, but didn't forgive me if my plane will land there? Weak argument. 3. UFO magical-science-gizmos operational/none-operational. Yep, magic can explain everything. But this is not only story issue, this is gameplay issue too. It make me mad, when enemy UFO lands in front of the nose of my interceptors and they need to return to base, because have not enough fuel to patrol area until UFO will take off. 5. Balance issues, its already somewhat of a logistical nightmare. Do you really want to control 20+ soldiers? Just outfitting them makes me shiver... Yes. Balance issue make game illogical. 7. Do to insert_techno-babble_here it is obviously not possible! If we do that the kaboom will be too big! And will destroy the planet! But if we infiltrate them... kill most on board... we will have enough time to make a smaller explosion! First. No, we have not enough time. Enormous reapers give us no time at all. Second. Hyperdrive malfunction is too obvious for intergalactic race. Sure, they have invented anti-malfunction device, in other case all the universe will be filled by such "unreachable places". Third. Player dropship would be destroyed once he will try to reach enemy dreadnought. Etc. No, final mission legend is sic as hell. 8. Thats a good point. Hard to make an excuse for this that is not: "For obvious game mechanics... Duh!" First. Gene pool itself is a illogical because alien gene structure will be incompatible with ours. Moreover, for millon-year creatures gene table will be such obvious thing like a Lego for our children. Second. There is many other ways to discover human kind in place of UFOs flying and city terror. Such brutal actions is incompatible with such high-developed super-mind.

I don't like "snatched graphics" and "community mods". Game may be perfect "in vanilla", and this version is a game itself, all other mods is just a... experiments for fun.

I have "invented" some time ago "X-Com" there tactical-shooting missions replaced with wargame-like battles (like a Panzer General).

Yep, strong local forces in some missions would be nice.

But they may not to be! And in this case few soldiers will not be enough. So you need to keep here enough soldiers to repel invasion even if most of batteries will miss.

Just for fun. I'm clearly understand these things never be fixed, but for my tediousness I need to tell about 1. All the humanity is under deadly alien terror, but only one organization with ridiculous budget fights against it. 2. Player interceptor have to land only on player base. So if it haven't enough of fuel, it just falls down instead of landing on any local airfield. 3. When enemy UFO lands, not my, nor local aircrafts unable to airstrike it. In the mean time, any crashed UFO can be easily destroyed. 4. Alien-tech weapon can require so much alien materials and work time like a alien-tech interceptor. 5. Player is unable to send two dropships on one crash site. 6. Player is unable to store alien weapons, meanwhile able to use it on the field. 7. For some strange reason, in final mission player is unable to carry to enemy dreadnought fussion bomb, instead this he tries to kill enemy praetor with soldiers. 8. For same strange reason, aliens "study" humans, losing their super-technologies and soldiers. Million-year creatures so stupid, that by their hands digging their own graves.

So why I need batteries at all? Thus, several soldiers enough?

They weight huge ammount of memory and give not smooth animation nor sufficient visual variety. Exceptionally for huge units. Didn't you thought, why all of them just unanimated solid bodies?

No, you are wrong. Each reload UFOs behavior and attack results was little different. Some times missed one, some times missed both batteries. But this is not a point. Point is wrong mechanics itself. Such principal things like base survival may not depend just on one or two dice throws. This is a basic rule of game design: importance of the event should be proportional to its control.

Even you'll build 3 battery, you'll not be in safe. I had one base attack in past game. Base had 2 advanced (plasma) batteries against alien carrier. I have tried 3 or more times (with game reload) to repel enemy UFO and all these times my batteries missed their target. So this is just another game design error - batteries just useless. If you rely on them, be ready for that blind chance will determine your fate. It will be better to build one more interceptor.

Thank you, Chris. Didn't you think about 3D units in isometric environment instead of tons of sprites?