I backed this game nearly a decade ago

[dmastri]

And we are only talking 5-10 hours of early access THIS YEAR?

wtf

this is star citizen levels of awful

[Chris]

I don't think that's a particularly accurate reflection of the situation. You say "a decade" but the Kickstarter wasn't even five years ago, and as a backer you can literally download a build of the game right now and play it all the way to the final mission.

Clearly it's taken longer than we'd like to get here, but it's hardly Star Citizen territory.

[Sander Bouwhuis]

I can remember playing X1 many years ago and being excited that the gameplay resembled the original X-Com. Other X-Com clones had hateful things like enemies spawning in per group. Also, the newer clones removed strategy by only allowing 1 move and 1 action per turn. I was also excited to hear there was an X2 in the making, but that excitement has waned quite a bit over the years. I recently saw a Youtube video, and it looks like X2 is 90% the same as X1.

Is there a specific reason why X2 is taking so long? Even longer than creating X1 from scratch?

[mclang]

I played X1 some but never finished it.

Currently I have played different versions of X2 over 80 hours, and it feels much better and more enjoyable than the first one.

That is to say, I don't agree that X2 is 90% the same as X1 - it might look pretty much the same but gaming wise there is lot of changes.

[Alienkiller]

mclang, that can too confirmed from the Testers. And the Changes to the Predecessor are not finished yet to make Xenonauts 2 great after the Line get found after 10 Beta-Test-Versions with V.17 / V.18 comming up Step by Step.

In some Cases it overflows Contenders of that Gerne (esp. old and new XCOM) with the Equipment-Upgrades / Vehicle-Upgrades [Aircrafts are still not 100% done, there is still a lot of Potential] and here & there [like Graphics, more flexibility and using Alien-Matierials for Upgrades / Modernisation / new Consturctions etc.] to direct Contendors (f. e. UFO ET-Row, Phoenix Point).

Short said: Yes, it will be great for the Base-Game with the existing Features / Contents which get in and come in as well as with the complete Refit / Rework of integrated Predecessor-Contents to reduce the Development-Time.

Edited May 31, 2023 by Alienkiller

[Chris]

On 5/29/2023 at 4:45 PM, Sander Bouwhuis said:

I can remember playing X1 many years ago and being excited that the gameplay resembled the original X-Com. Other X-Com clones had hateful things like enemies spawning in per group. Also, the newer clones removed strategy by only allowing 1 move and 1 action per turn. I was also excited to hear there was an X2 in the making, but that excitement has waned quite a bit over the years. I recently saw a Youtube video, and it looks like X2 is 90% the same as X1.

Is there a specific reason why X2 is taking so long? Even longer than creating X1 from scratch?

The main reason is that there's not much we can actually re-use from Xenonauts 1 in Xenonauts 2, other than ideas - and ideas aren't really the time consuming part of development. 

What that means is that creating X2 from scratch takes longer than creating X1 from scratch, because it's a larger game overall as it contains every feature from the first game plus a bunch more stuff we've added, and because it's a higher quality product and it takes a lot more time to produce something that is higher quality than something that is medium quality.

Also, we spent a good couple of years working on a vision of Xenonauts 2 that was quite different to the final form of the game (lots of it described on our Kickstarter page) that just turned out not to be much fun to play. So we either had the choice of putting out a bad game, or changing the design to something better and throwing away a load of work.

It's a sequel in the style of a Civilization sequel - it's not a fundamentally different story or set of mechanics, it's the same basic formula with a bunch of upgrades. Evolution rather than revolution. You'll have to decide for yourself whether the game is enough of a change from X1 to be worth buying, but I personally think it's a big upgrade over X1 (although I own quite a few different Civilization games so maybe I'm biased).

[Ruggerman]

It would seam that there is some confusion with X-1 and X-2, as X-1 was a long time ago, and we are only working on X-2 NOW!!

[CaptainSPrice]

@Ruggerman@Chris It would be interesting to hear soldier voices. Imagine Chris recording himself with 50 different character voices male/female. For me biggest X-1 meme is face of the researcher dude looking at you = are you mad bro?

 

[maxm222]

The amount of time for a game to be delivered that bothers people enough to post a comment (we don't really know about non-posters, right?) seems to vary as much as which game elements & mechanics people like or don't like enough to comment on them--which is to say, it's all over the map.  

In general, I'm bothered most by game dev teams that don't share progress updates and don't respond to feedback and make repeated promises which aren't kept while little or nothing about the game seems to change.  The Xeno-2 team doesn't fit any of these categories, and have, in my opinion, been among the best examples of competent customer & potential customer relations in the industry.  And I think the game is so much better in so many ways than the original Xeno, that whatever time to get here has been worth it.

I understand the impatience of someone who expects a game within X amount of time after a trailer or announcement, but if you look at the variety of outcomes of various development times--from short dev time-terrible game to long dev time-great game, to long dev time and still terrible or no game, etc.--and consider the thousand variables that speeds or slows progress, it helps to be fatalistic about how the process turns out.  And one has a choice of so many other games to play or follow in the meantime.

 I also realize that since I've been able to play parts of the game in various states and give feedback that I think is at least heard by the devs and often responded to, I'm probably not the typical customer demographic, although with a non-AAA turn-based SF game, I may be closer to the average audience than with a triple-A shooter-looter game.--we're a devoted bunch.

 

[Omega Infinita]

On 5/31/2023 at 7:00 PM, Chris said:

The main reason is that there's not much we can actually re-use from Xenonauts 1 in Xenonauts 2, other than ideas - and ideas aren't really the time consuming part of development. 

What that means is that creating X2 from scratch takes longer than creating X1 from scratch, because it's a larger game overall as it contains every feature from the first game plus a bunch more stuff we've added, and because it's a higher quality product and it takes a lot more time to produce something that is higher quality than something that is medium quality.

Also, we spent a good couple of years working on a vision of Xenonauts 2 that was quite different to the final form of the game (lots of it described on our Kickstarter page) that just turned out not to be much fun to play. So we either had the choice of putting out a bad game, or changing the design to something better and throwing away a load of work.

It's a sequel in the style of a Civilization sequel - it's not a fundamentally different story or set of mechanics, it's the same basic formula with a bunch of upgrades. Evolution rather than revolution. You'll have to decide for yourself whether the game is enough of a change from X1 to be worth buying, but I personally think it's a big upgrade over X1 (although I own quite a few different Civilization games so maybe I'm biased).

Easily the best direct explanation covering why the development of this game (and many games, honestly) takes longer than planned. Especially with the drastic change in a lot of core mechanics that were originally planned that were found to be just... not fun to play. I'd much rather wait longer to play a game I enjoy, than wait less and get a drastically reduced amount of "fun time".

Backed the Kickstarter way back when, and I've been nothing but proud to see the dedication of the whole team when it comes to communicating directly with the community and sticking to what they believe will give us, the players, the best experience possible. I'm no game dev, nor have I had any really similar experience that would give insight into how the dev team feels, but I still have a strong hunch that no development team WANTS to delay a project. It's when they MAKE that hard decision and take the step of telling all the fans, supporters, etc., that they really show true dedication to their standards and morals. Can't give enough props to this team for working much longer than was expected, and still consistently being open about both the progress and delays. Not a lot of teams can claim that. Not a lot of teams have the same passion this one does. No other team could make the game that this team is making.