If Xenonauts sells well enough...

[Eyes of Argus]

Can we expect to see Xenonauts 2: Menace from the Ocean?

[StellarRat]

Can we expect to see Xenonauts 2: Menace from the Ocean?

I heard a rumor that they're won't be another UFO game from Goldhawk because of the misery of this project.

[Eyes of Argus]

I heard a rumor that they're won't be another UFO game from Goldhawk because of the misery of this project.

Misery? Aren't they getting tons of preorders and stuff?

[Voidfoam]

I remember the beloved leader (Chris) saying something in the line of "Id rather end my own life"

But i think he was referring more to the strain of developing a game in 2d, tiles.

I am glad he did it though, Xenonauts looks awesome, but i never liked 3D

I guess "no" was the short answer

A sequel of some sort though, is probably very likely if as you stated, sales favor it.

[thothkins]

While I'd love to see an expansion allowing all sorts of things, I imagine that the Devs may want to move on to other things. I can't see them wanting to go near the engine any time soon.

[Gauddlike]

If they did decide to go ahead with a TFTD type clone it wouldn't be using the current engine.

It is just so much easier to work with 3D models than it is to work with 2D spritesheets a lot of the time.

Unless Xenonauts does fantastically well I doubt Chris would want to go near TFTD.

If we were lucky he would skip it and go straight to an improved Apoc.

[Mermel]

I actually never understood why they didn't choose to go 3D. 2D is nice and all, but the game can be made in 2D and 3D without any change in gameplay. Plus 3D is easier to make by now. A lot easier

[Dowly]

I actually never understood why they didn't choose to go 3D. 2D is nice and all, but the game can be made in 2D and 3D without any change in gameplay. Plus 3D is easier to make by now. A lot easier

I'm glad they went with 2D. I've seen plenty of games ruined by switching from 2D to 3D.

[thothkins]

If we were lucky he would skip it and go straight to an improved Apoc.

Always a shame for me that some of the Apoc ideas weren't part of this one (albeit for understandable reasons). After all, that's where the original creators saw areas of improvement.

[Gorlom]

I'm glad they went with 2D. I've seen plenty of games ruined by switching from 2D to 3D.

+1

[HWP]

I'm glad they went with 2D. I've seen plenty of games ruined by switching from 2D to 3D.

Not this once. It was the case when 3D graphics had to be appallingly low-poly.

Even back in the Golden Age (late 90s to very early 00s) a lot of 2D games had their sprites 3D-rendered. Just saved your processing power. 2D backgrounds with 3D characters worked well later on.

And then there's all the flexibility, 2D is just that limiting for a high-interactivity game. A shame that Goldhawk had to find out the hard way. But I suppose 2D seemed like the way to go early on, it's easier to start with.

[Mermel]

Yes, in the beginning. As soon as you come to the animations severe nausea is around the corner.

And as the whole gameplay of this one would work out 100% identical in both 2D and 3D, it was a bad decision in the end.

Even going with 3D models for the units only would have saved a tremendous amount of work.

Well... you learn.

[Buzzles]

Yes, in the beginning. As soon as you come to the animations severe nausea is around the corner.

And as the whole gameplay of this one would work out 100% identical in both 2D and 3D, it was a bad decision in the end.

Even going with 3D models for the units only would have saved a tremendous amount of work.

Well... you learn.

Just to point something out as people have not quite got the right idea, but from what Chris has previously told us about development is that the units in the game ARE 3D models on the developers side.

What they then do is export those 3D models and render out the animation frames into 2D sprite sheets, the 2D sprite sheets being what the game uses and us users get to see and play with.

A lot of time and effort involved with Xenonauts comes with the conversion process from what Chris has said, plus having to have things rendered as sprite sheets is quite limiting in terms of content.

It's very much a shame that Goldhawk don't have source access to the engine they use, otherwise I suspect they could have modified the engine to render the 2D sprites on the fly from the 3D models as the game runs (so to only render what's needed in that frame, while keeping the sprite style and art theme), cutting down on the issues with development time.

[Max_Caine]

According to the Reddit AMA that Chris did a while back, the choice of engine and consequently the limitations and troubles Goldhawk has had with it all came from the first lead coder that Chris approached. The first lead coder picked the engine, and by the time that same coder left so much work had been done that the decision was made to press on with the project.

[Mermel]

It's very much a shame that Goldhawk don't have source access to the engine they use, otherwise I suspect they could have modified the engine to render the 2D sprites on the fly from the 3D models as the game runs .

Even easier... just use the 3D Models dirctly, no need to convert them into sprites at all.

And if I think about it... isn't the isometric style of display Xenonauts uses kind of an attemp to turn 2D into 3D? No wonder it produces so much work in the end

[Gorlom]

Even easier... just use the 3D Models dirctly, no need to convert them into sprites at all.

And if I think about it... isn't the isometric style of display Xenonauts uses kind of an attemp to turn 2D into 3D? No wonder it produces so much work in the end

I enjoy the 2D esthetics over what would be their 3D counterpart. Even if it was rendered by Pixar's or Square's animation computers I still find the 2D approach more appealing. I'm incredibly happy they chose a 2D approach and I don't think I would be interested in the game if it was in 3D.

[TrashMan]

Xenonauts 2...

Now in 3D !!!!!

2D has it's charms, but 3D has advantages of it's own.

Honestly, discouting a game beacause it's 2D or 3D is just...stupid. I have no other word for it.

A game in 3D can be in may ways easier to develop AND to mod.

Just think of all the soldier sprites. You have to render them for each pose, each weapon, each angle.

In 3D you make a model (for the soldier and the weapons), animate it and you're done!

You can add a 100 new weapons - they will all use the same animation rig and the same soldier model (or you can chagne that one too)

If you wanted to add a wepon for xenonauts, you'd have to re-render every frame for every armor combo.

Edited October 17, 2012 by TrashMan

[HWP]

I enjoy the 2D esthetics over what would be their 3D counterpart. Even if it was rendered by Pixar's or Square's animation computers I still find the 2D approach more appealing. I'm incredibly happy they chose a 2D approach and I don't think I would be interested in the game if it was in 3D.

But it is 3D. Most everything in the game. It wasn't rendered by Pixar's HPC farm, it was rendered by, presumably, a regular desktop. Then they just apply a filter to make it look hand-drawn.

I don't even think they do any hand-retouching, there's way way too many sprites and it isn't some 50-million project.

You can just as easily apply these filters as shaders, modern GPU can do an insane amount of processing in real time. It will look the same or almost the same. You don't have to fill it with 3D gizmos, you don't even need to render perspective.

There is a whole range of NPR techniques: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-photorealistic_rendering

And as for system requirements - maybe an Atom (but not AMD) netbook might struggle, but then you can make some shaders optional. And the game pretty much requires a SSD as it is now, try running it off a hard drive, it's excruciating.

[Dowly]

@Trashman

Sure, 3D has it's advantages over 2D. The thing is, many devs who take on a project of transforming a game to 3D usually get carried away and start adding silly and unnecessary 3D gimmicks just because they can.

As for the graphical style, I'm with Gorlom in that 2D just is more pleasing to the eye. It makes your imagination fill in the gaps.

Great example is the Close Combat series, a top-down WWII strategy where your soldiers are like ants on the screen. Still, I find it to be more exciting than for example Achtung Panzer, which is very similar in gameplay, but instead of 2D is in full 3D. Of course, this is highly subjective matter, so.

[ko2fan]

If Chris doesn't want to do a sequel himself he could probably have another team work on one. It's usually best to have a couple of projects going on at once, since you can pool some of the talent together and have more chance of surviving as a professional game studio.

[Mermel]

I think there are settings where 2D is actually preferrable to 3D.

Take Braid as an exampel. It's a little beauty and it works because it's a sidescroller. The necessary amount of work is a lot less than in the case of Xenonauts because you only see the characters from the side.

When you start taking efficiency into the equation 2D gets a lot worse when you do something like xenonauts with it.

I prefer gameplay over optics. And in some scenarios 3D really cuts it.

We won't be able to blast holes in UFOs here. A main reason for that is the amount of work required to make that work. 3D might have solved that problem. Looking acceptable and giving the option of destroyable UFO parts. (I actually think the 2D UFOs will look better than theoretical 3D counterparts)

[Gorlom]

Honestly, discouting a game beacause it's 2D or 3D is just...stupid. I have no other word for it.

It's a preference. same way you prefer to be able to change the name and not just the nickname. I don't find 3D games that appealing if there is not a sufficient point to the 3D ( First person or Third person games and racing games has more point to it than point and click adventures, sidescrollers, RTS or isometric games.)

But it is 3D. Most everything in the game. It wasn't rendered by Pixar's HPC farm, it was rendered by, presumably, a regular desktop. Then they just apply a filter to make it look hand-drawn.

I don't even think they do any hand-retouching, there's way way too many sprites and it isn't some 50-million project.

I have no idea what you are talking about now. Xenonauts or something else? technically Goldhawk takes a screenshot of a 3d model and does something to that image. (I think Chris said that they did hand draw a sprite on top of that picture) The image is 2D since they use sprites and you can't rotate the character less than 45 degrees.

(if you nitpick everything that is shown on a flat screen is 2D.. depends on how you define 2D and 3D. I choose to define the state Chris renders the models in as 3D and the state they appear in game as 2D)

Edited October 17, 2012 by Gorlom

[HWP]

(I actually think the 2D UFOs will look better than theoretical 3D counterparts)

But there are no theoretical 3d counterparts - current UFOs, AFAIK, are also 3d model renders.

It'I have no idea what you are talking about now. Xenonauts or something else? technically Goldhawk takes a screenshot of a 3d model and does something to that image. (I think Chris said that they did hand draw a sprite on top of that picture)

Doesn't look that way. I know for sure it's not that way for soldier sprites, wouldn't be possible. Goldhawk doesn't seem to have the thousands of man-hours that takes. Maybe some statics are hand-edited. Other than that, it seems to be just a filter over a NPR of a 3d-model.

A lot of animation these days is done in 3D, even South Park.

[Gorlom]

A lot of animation these days is done in 3D, even South Park.

what does that have to do with anything? Is Southpark a point and click adventure? sidescroller? isometric game?

I don't get your point?

[HWP]

It's a cartoon. And, among cartoons, its animation style is really primitive - look it up. Yet even that is done through 3D rendering.

2D today is really limited in application. Most anything trying to look even remotely real, and a lot of what doesn't, uses 3D technology under the skin. In sprite rendering, in surface presentation, elsewhere.