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I am an XCOM veteran and have now played XCOM: Enemy Unknown.


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Well I'm not disappointed at all. It's fairly much what I expected and I'm enjoying it a great deal at the moment (as is my 10 year old son, mainly in multiplayer). I've bought Xenonauts for the faithful UFO: Enemy Unknown (proper title :)) experience and XCom for it's new take on turn-based strategy and higher production values. I will enjoy them both fairly equally for what they are, rather than focusing on what they are not.

This isn't aimed at HWP or anyone here (this is a haven of peace, sense and goodwill compared to the 2k forums) - I know internet moaning is all some people live for, but for god's sake - it's a game. If they don't like it they should go play something else, but it says bucket loads about them that all they seem to have the time and energy to do is bitch on forums rather than finding something more productive or worthwhile to do. It seems the internet gives almost everyone a sense of entitlement and self-importance that is beyond unrealistic.

Well said. I'm enjoying it quite a lot as well, and I did play the original 3 X-COM games when they came out. I'm just glad it was released at all; hopefully there will be more games of this style in the future.

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Well said. I'm enjoying it quite a lot as well, and I did play the original 3 X-COM games when they came out. I'm just glad it was released at all; hopefully there will be more games of this style in the future.

I've played it 35 hours so far and haven't managed to finish single playthrough(classic ironman). Thats almost as much as my 40 hour XCOM play time according to steam... Firaxis does know how to make games addicting.

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Well just take a look at what has been happening for the last couple of years.

Oblivion and Skyrim compared to Morrowind or Daggerfall... those are console games ported to PC in order to sell more copies.

Jagged Alliance back in action compared to Jagged Alliance 2 with 1.13 mod, well there is no discussion here.

The UFO series after the year 2000, aftermarth, aftershock and afterlight. They were kind of good, they lacked the "real deal" about UFO EU but nonetheless... crappy games.

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Just to clarify: I like XCOM: EU too but it really shouldn't have been named XCOM. Any other name and I would probably never tried to compare it to the original and wouldn't have been disappointed.

I personally think that Firaxis game counts as XCOM game because of same reasons why 3D Mario games count as Mario game even though they play completely differently from 2D ones: Same premise, same concept, same genre.(for example, defending earth from aliens, intercepting research and tactics, tbs in this case) But I guess its up to whether you consider gameplay or concept to be what defines series.

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I personally think that Firaxis game counts as XCOM game because of same reasons why 3D Mario games count as Mario game even though they play completely differently from 2D ones: Same premise, same concept, same genre.(for example, defending earth from aliens, intercepting research and tactics, tbs in this case) But I guess its up to whether you consider gameplay or concept to be what defines series.
Another good point :) Never thought about it like that. To me gameplay has always been the deciding factor for a game series and I pretend the others like those other two X-COM games that we shall not mention don't exist (nope didn't happen *fingers in ears* LALALALA). Haha! Kind of like hardcore Star Wars fans like to pretend Episodes 1-3 never really happened.

I'll count XCOM: EU in the X-COM group but just barely and ONLY because of the story.

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*The kind of music I'd like is more this:

Or this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URtn78-kzFg&NR

Or the more modern version:

You can find out if the xenonauts kind of music fits your criteria by:

/Folder where you installed desura/Desura/Common/xenonauts/assets/sound(or just /xenonauts/assets/sound if you installed without desura) And playing :

aircombatmusic

Ground Combat 1

mainmenumusic

Night Combat 1

.ogg files. That's pretty much the tone you're gonna get.

Edited by GoodGuyEddy
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Another good point :) Never thought about it like that. To me gameplay has always been the deciding factor for a game series and I pretend the others like those other two X-COM games that we shall not mention don't exist (nope didn't happen *fingers in ears* LALALALA). Haha! Kind of like hardcore Star Wars fans like to pretend Episodes 1-3 never really happened.

I'll count XCOM: EU in the X-COM group but just barely and ONLY because of the story.

Hey! I have childhood nostalgia for Apocalypse and its my favourite!(only problem with it is that crap ton of stuff got cut out. Its possibly to not notice it, but when you are aware of it game feels uncompleted(because really, capturing from VIP from corporations would have fleshed them out more) when compared to original game) :P But yeah, TFTD is worst of original three, though it does have its own good points. Mainly alien colonies(not gameplay wise though, they are just frustrating to play through), they feel more unique than alien bases as alien bases use same tilesets as UFOs.

Edited by XenoMask
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Hey! I have childhood nostalgia for Apocalypse and its my favourite! :P But yeah, TFTD is worst of original three, though it does have its own good points. Mainly alien colonies(not gameplay wise though, they are just frustrating to play through), they feel more unique than alien bases as alien bases use same tilesets as UFOs.
Oh no! I didn't mean TFTD and Apocalypse (had a friend that always called it X-COM: A Pack Of Lips) and now that's all I hear when I see the name LOL)! I liked those!

I meant the other two (Interceptor and Enforcer). They were awful! The FPS one is a little better than the space one but not by much. :D Oh man I need to go wash my hands now. You made me type the names! :D

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I meant the other two (Interceptor and Enforcer). They were awful! The FPS one is a little better than the space one but not by much. :D Oh man I need to go wash my hands now. You made me type the names! :D

Oh, my bad xD Yeah, those games are totally not XCOM. Though I've heard that Enforcer is apparently fun in brainless arcade shooter way even though its bad game and that Interceptor is apparently okay space sim that at least tries to be XCOM like(aka it has apparently research and some strategy elements). Still, who in the world thought those to be good idea?... Only good thing to come out of those is Interceptor's manual's in game setting history.(it doesn't have pop culture references like the game has and it does seem to fit rather closely to the canon. So I take it as canon in broad strokes)

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Liked

Environments- were interesting - earth ones- aliens were corridors of shooting

abilities - made my 6 soldiers feel more powerful - if a little OTT at times.

Art style - it worked- except for that god ugly interceptor

Base layout - was unique and more realistic for a secret top secret organisation

Terror missions- wow These were insane

Disliked

Air combat- 6 intercepts in a campaign and I never even built the one off toys as you had zero control.

Shooting - Shoot through walls- dodgy LOS %'s - cant shoot that wall that my gun can destroy to reveal the aliens

Equipment- armour was so generic - equipment space was ridiculous- 1 grenade or a scope etc- why not both?

Research - THe UFOPaedia was really really boring to read

Pickups - why did every gun explode when the aliens died

Funding - The build satellites system is so boringly flawed and you cant sell your own stuff

Speciality - random role of a dice what kind of person will I be - assault/sniper/ no lets all be support

Psychic - Why put it in when only 1 of my 20 people had abilities after 10 days of checking 3 people

Roles being set and you are unable to re specialize- meant I needed to get spare of every role not just spare troops.

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Pickups - why did every gun explode when the aliens died

From a gameplay or a story perspective?

From a story perspective I think the weapons self destruct mechanism is hardwired to a pacemaker in that particular alien or some such function to prevent advanced technology falling into human hands.

From a gameplay perspective I assume it meant more research options. freedom in how to design the research tree and possibility to play around with prerequisite for research.

Edited by Gorlom
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From a gameplay or a story perspective?

From a story perspective I think the weapons self destruct mechanism is hardwired to a pacemaker in that particular alien or some such function to prevent advanced technology falling into human hands.

From a gameplay perspective I assume it meant more research options. freedom in how to design the research tree and possibility to play around with prerequisite for research.

Which would be fine if the only stun method wasnt a 2 foot tazer with a need for aliens to be on low health to have it even work.

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Which would be fine if the only stun method wasnt a 2 foot tazer with a need for aliens to be on low health to have it even work.

I haven't played the game but from the sounds of that description anything else would be too easy.

what would you want that doesn't reduce acquiring alien weaponry to a trivial matter?

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Having played the original xcom enemy unknown, I went into the new xcom game without expecting too much. It seems that developers always mistake streamlining with over simplification. I want things to be complex, with many systems. I realised that some of my most revered PC games of all times have something in common.

I can list some of these games, although it does show my age. Sid Miers' Pirates, Sword of the Samurai (Microprose), Ancient Art of War, Star Control 2 and Jagged Alliance. Lately I've been playing total war quite a bit.

All these games have layered systems, where you often have a strategy layer combined with a tactical layer. The tactics effect the strategy and vice versa. I'm motivated to build strategy and then test it out in a tactical battlefield. The intertwining of these two systems can turn a boring grindfest into something more than just the sum of its parts.

As always, when I see a game like this that has promise, I immediately get excited. Strategy, tactics, an intense learning curve and a single player experience I can sink my teeth into.

UFO aftershock and UFO afterlight, brought turn based/real time together with heaps of complex systems, big rpg elements and a strategic war to win mars. The problem with the game, was that I got very bored with the tactical apsect. It was mundane and I always saw the same maps and enemies seemed badly concepted.

I thought about this a lot, with the new xcom game coming out I started to wonder if going down the same route as afterlight would make the game fail. Annoying aliens, strange weapons, alien alliances and strange game mechanics would put me off completely.

So I guess what I am saying, is that when I finally booted the new xcom up I was pleasantly surprised. Without spoiling anything, certain aspects of the game pay homage to the original, the customization is great, the animation fluid, the missions are mixed up and varied and most of the streamlining seems to work really well. Familiar aliens with added details. Familiar weapons that took me back 20 years. Laser weapons = nostalgia. (I used to handicap myself by not using plasma weaponry in the original).

I was worried about missing aspects such as big squads, inventory systems and base invasions. I ended up being ok with all of that. The only things I would change would be to make the atmosphere more like the original (it is called enemy unknown after all), add more UFO lore and get rid of the stupid alien squad spawn system. The last being the thing that irritates me the most. I would much prefer aliens to be anywhere. It was so good, carving my own way into ufos and then marching right up behind a muton and executing. This new game has no direction facing, so ambushes are reliant on the ghost suit and the scanner.

By making the aliens more randomly spawned around the map and taking their turns, the maps could also have been made bigger, allowing bigger squad sizes. Procedural generation should have been used to more of an extent.

Overall I really like the game. I think it fits as a remake of the original with a just a few gripes. I'm really glad xenonauts is coming out, but it was so refreshing to have turn based strategy presented in the way firaxis did. I actually want them to do TFTD now.

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About this game's intercepting... I realized that if you want to use normal ones for anything beyond small ufos, you HAVE to use those one time buff items. Of course, I didn't ever spend money on them, but in retrospect I realized that that way you can take down stronger ufos provided you have good equipment and enough evading ones.

This game's intercepting is about as complex as original game's,(Is there a need for you to do "aggressive" attack after you have better aircraft weaponry? Or cautious attack/standard attack?) but the fact you can only intercept with one aircraft at time makes it rather hard. Bizarrely it ends up contributing to that "Choice" thing they are doing with this game because using corpses and money for bonuses can end up being rather useless because ufos are rare in this game.

Edited by XenoMask
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Psychic - Why put it in when only 1 of my 20 people had abilities after 10 days of checking 3 people

Random luck. My first attemp got all 3 of my Colonel with Psychic power. After that only 2 more out of 20 though. So now I got 5 of them ^^

About this game's intercepting... I realized that if you want to use normal ones for anything beyond small ufos, you HAVE to use those one time buff items. Of course, I didn't ever spend money on them, but in retrospect I realized that that way you can take down stronger ufos provided you have good equipment and enough evading ones.

This game's Intercepting is BS. And not even those one time buff items will help, because they are really ONE TIME PER battle >.> You can't use each item more than once each battle. Incredible right ?

Not to mention the design lock the choice of Interceptors in the INITIAL spawning region. Even if the UFO fly to other region the only Interceptors I can deployed are only those from the INITIAL region it appears...

Shooting - Shoot through walls- dodgy LOS %'s - cant shoot that wall that my gun can destroy to reveal the aliens

It's nice to see I'm not the only one who saw this. With XenoMask here keep saying he saw no problem with it I begin to doubt myself at some point 8-}

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I think if XCOM:EU had employed Firaxis' standard procedural generation of map layouts and the game was less tied to a linear central storyline, then I would be quite happy with it, as an effort at popularising an ancient classic. I assumed given their heritage both of those things would be par-for-course. That's what I'm most disappointed about. I don't care too much about the changes, even if some of them (inventory management) are silly and remove a level of strategy.

The reason I am most excited about Xenonauts is the battle maps, really. I have played a lot of modded UFO:ET since it came out and the one thing it lacks (even though through modding it plays exactly like a modern X-COM), is battle map randomisation. Hopefully Xenonauts can get that right, on top of all the other stuff it's already doing well.

It depends. If you've played the original (the real XCOM), then yes, you can understand sequels or remakes or "remakes" through videos.

If you haven't... Well, watch a video of someone playing Dwarf Fortress and then try the game yourself.

That's exactly how most people get into playing Dwarf Fortress! Yes, it's complex to learn but you still fundamentally understand what the game is about and how it plays by watching videos. It's a management game with dwarves. Dwarves, beer and kobolds.

It's got to the point where I mostly trust my perception of games from watching video playthroughs more than the majority of critical output, even from those veteran journalists I trust. For example, Rock Paper Shotgun did a favourable report on XCOM:EU, and even though it was a really well written piece, I couldn't simply buy the game off the back of reading Alec Meer's (qualified) praise, like I would have done when reading PC Gamer when I was younger - purely because I had already watched video playthroughs and I knew that the things I saw in the game would affect my enjoyment of XCOM. This was vindicated when I eventually played it for a whole day at a friend's. Enjoyable in parts but the little bits dig at me.

Well just take a look at what has been happening for the last couple of years.

Oblivion and Skyrim compared to Morrowind or Daggerfall... those are console games ported to PC in order to sell more copies.

Those games are still the standard for rich, deep RPGs. You can play them for hundreds of hours and get nowhere near finishing them. They're not flagbearers for consolification, just hugely popular games on console and PC.

Edited by Harmonica
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I learned how to play Dwarf Fortress with tutorial video...

Speaking of Oblivion and Skyrim, its kind of annoying how people blame consoles for "dumbing" down. I mean, yeah, quest tracker and fast travel is immersion breaking, but Morrowind is rather ridiculously hard early on when you keep missing enemy despite hitting them with sword :P Dice rolling feels off in such games.

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