On [Finally] Preordering, and Xenonauts in general

[RaptorEchelon]

I should point out that right now I have no suggestions. I havent really played enought as of yet to say "this should be done". However. I have been following Xenonauts since Eurogamer(?) 2011, when Totalbiscuit covered the gaem for his WTF Is series.

I finally preordered it the other day and mostly that's due to the new XCOM by Firaxis. It's quickly become my favourite game yet, as I don't particularly enjoy the original XCOM for it's steep learning curve and lack of tutorials (or even tooltips). With Firaxis' game I've currently logged 100+ hours and several Ironman runs, none on Impossible.

With Xenonauts I was expecting the same frustration I had with the original XCOM, and it's still there a bit, but I hoenstly think the new look the game has sort of made up for it alone. The move to real weaponry, neat animations, and a very nice Geoscape are some of the reasons I think I like Xenonauts. I've played some ground battles, and of course currently their arent a huge number of maps, so once I did them a few times it became easy to corner aliens, and then wipe them. Especially since I have access to a bunch of useful weapon types rather than one awful rifle or pistol.

The game does have frustrations. It seems that by the time UFOs become too fast for my MIGs or F17s I need to build another base, but it doesn't feel like I've done enough or got enough funds to do so. So I'm left with a Europe base that's let nearly 15 UFOs escape because of range and fuel, and another base that will take a while to even reach combat readiness on basic UFOs.

Reasearch of course isn't fully realised, and my biggest frustrations have been not knowing what to research to get something specific. So I'm left reasearching at random until I hit what I need. Of course not all of the research options have descriptions yet but I feel it shoudl still be clear what research leads to what. How do I know what leads to Anti-matter whatever for Plasma weapons?

My opinion is overwhelmingly positive, and I didn't think it would be. Most of my issues are based in the fact the game is in Alpha, but that still feels like a cop out, I don't intend to treat is as such everywhere, because many of the main mechanics are in place and work.

Overall, I enjoy Xenonauts, and no doubt It'll become a staple of my YT channel alongside Firaxis' XCOM, but for now, I feel like my enjoyment is being hampered ever so slightly by the base issue. I feel like myabe the game needs to recommend when to build a base so I know, maybe as an option that can be turned off.

[Max_Caine]

If you have any more first impressions of the Alpha, don't hesitate to talk about them. It's always good to get the impressions of someone who is coming to the game for the first time, as opposed to someone (like me) who has been around for quite a few builds and has gotten used to it's quirks and flaws.

[RaptorEchelon]

That's the thing, even though Firaxis' game is entirely different (It's to XCOM what Civ Rev was to Civilisation agems), it instilled in me the careful patience needed to play. I don't know how the game would play amongst people who have no XCOM experience.

Also I keep thinkign it'd be neat to boss about those local forces. I mean, isn't that what a military group would do in that situation? They'd shout at civvies, and boss about the cops.

[Chris]

If you like the fundamentals that are in place now, I think you'll like the final game. At the moment there's not much AI or game balance of any kind, and that's what the coming few months are going to be concentrating on. That sort of thing always has to be done last though, once all the game mechanics have been coded.

That said, I'm glad you're enjoying it!

[GizmoGomez]

Hi Raptor, welcome! As far as commanding locals, there are a few suggestions floating around about soldiers issuing commands to NPCs, you can look at mine on the suggestions forum. Someone, I forget who, was very helpful and posted links in a post on my thread to many other threads about issuing commands, so you can read up on all those ideas.

EDIT:

It was thothkins, he was the one that posted them. It's post #4, or thereabouts.

Edited February 7, 2013 by GizmoGomez