Xenonauts 2 February 2025 Update!

[Chris]

Hello everyone - we're now into March, so here's our regular update on what we got done during February!

Milestone 5 Progress:
As always, our focus has been on getting Milestone 5 ready for public release. I said in the last update that we're hoping to do this in March and we're still on track for that, although the exact date depends on how smoothly the bugfixes go over the next few weeks - we're expecting mid-March if all goes smoothly, and late March if we run into issues.

In coding terms, a lot of this month was spent ironing out gameplay / stability issues and tidying up some loose ends regarding new features added in Milestone 5, so although our programmers have done a lot of work there's not much in the way of exciting new headline additions for me to talk about here. However, we did find a few days to improve the shooting path calculations in the tactical combat so the permitted fire paths better match what the player would expect, particularly around doorways and corners, as community feedback suggested this area needed more polish (turns out the system had a couple of subtle bugs that needed fixing).

Writing & Art:
Last month was a big month on the writing front - the writing in the game is now largely complete. This means that all research projects now have research text, the phase briefings have been revised, more tactical missions have introductory character conversations, and there should be a more consistent narrative thread running throughout the whole game. Hopefully it's now much clearer why all the factions in the game are acting the way they are.

Finishing this allowed us to send all the new game text off for translation, and we should have localised text in Milestone 5 in the next week or two (which was one of the main barriers to the public release).

We've added some new illustrations to the game over the past month, most of which are just adding flavour art to the new UI popups related to the new Geoscape mechanics in Milestone 5. In our recent 5.13 Experimental update we also added unique illustrations for three of the five strategic operations (which should make it easier to tell them apart) and we're expecting to have the remaining two done shortly.

Community Suggestion Review:
Once Milestone 5 is done we'll be starting work on Milestone 6, which should be our final major update before then 1.0 launch. Alongside the last remaining features on our roadmap (Air Combat Revamp, Ending Cinematic, Soviet Town Biome, Mod Tools) we've been reading through the many, many community suggestions that have been posted on Steam, our Discord and our forums during the Early Access period.

We're now reviewing all these suggestions as a team and looking at which ones we can include in Milestone 6. Although we can't add every suggestion to the game, there's a lot of good ideas here and we want to thank everyone who has given us feedback and suggestions during development - we may not always have responded immediately, but we did read them all eventually!

That's everything for this update - thanks for reading, and hopefully we'll have a big announcement in the next few weeks about the public release of Milestone 5!

[gG-Unknown]

Hello Criss,

2 hours ago, Chris said:

 

Community Suggestion :

 

Regarding Air Combat Revamp, best solution is automatic auto-resolve.

Here is a quick story : A game company produced inovative pices of art, like :"group RPG- with CityBuilder-withCampaign - with a rich story-with integrated FPS shooter on dragons". For somee reason people didnt buy this mishmash. Product was so over-complicated  and full o various bugs that very few dare to dive into this ocean. After 12 years, company full o hardened developers with empty treasure chest made a last attempt to commercial success. They thought would be a last title before bankruptcy. A very simple RPG, simple combat system, simple story, simple stylised low poly graphics , simple camera ( dungeons were not even full 3D, some battles were made as a theatre scene to save man-hours, etc. etc. ) Cutting corners whenever possible. Game name is Original Sin. Result was Comercial hit which over-fill their company treasure chest and catapulted them to the monster game of the  decade Baldurs Gate 3.

 

I think that current development status of Xenonauts is on a crossroad. Game has main game Tactical turn based combat, then  another game RPG development of soldiers, then other game building base, then other game story,  then  supporters management on the map.

Then  you thinking about a another minigame air combat. Well, .... history teaches us lesson -

simple is the  best way.

Game have to be understandable and bugless. to make a hit.

I would seriously recommend, go deep rather than wide. Spend your man-hours to make current sub-games deep and bugless, rather then trying to improve mediocre  (at the best ) air combat.

Just cut it out. You could say, that air combat will be part of a DLC. It is ok to add something to a game, when majority o customers are  familiar with rules. However air combat for 1.0 release  is counter-productive.

 

Wish  you well,

gG

 

Edited March 5 by gG-Unknown

[Alienkiller]

The automatic Airfight is in all Games of that Gerne not good. The best example is the new XCOM: Enemy Unknown / Enemy Within Airfight, which is the modernst in all existing Strategygames. That get still today disruptet after more then 12 Years.

If someone of the Gamers want to use the automatic Fight, then she / he can do it. But the remaining Gamers wanna have manually influance. To befriend all, the Devs have to integrate both Options.

The Result if only automatic get in: Bad sales, bad Feedback and no income about the Reason nobody buys the Game! That Result we don´t wanna have for Xenonauts 2.

Xenonauts 2 have a lot of Potential left and that can be seen since the big Improvements with Milestone 4 and 5. That Improvements and a lot more with Milestone 6 shouldn´t be destroyed with an very bad automatic Airfight-System, which makes the 90% of the Gamers totaly aggressive about no Influance in the Airfights.

Edited March 5 by Alienkiller

[Skitso]

I hated air combat in X1 but have learned to like it in X2. No reason to get rid of it  - it's a nice change of pace.

Edited March 6 by Skitso

[Alienkiller]

I´m interessted to see what the Devs try to bring in the refited / reworked Air Combat for Milestone 6 with the best Ideas from the Beta-Testers and long testing Communtiy from the first Day on to bring in more cool Elements to refit existing Fighter Crafts, Transports, Equipment etc. and to upgrade the Geoscape.

[Pyroblaster]

The air combat revamp is defiantly the thing I'm most hyped up seeing done. The system as is good as is but there is so much that could be done to improve it, like the possible inclusion of: Terrain boundaries/mechanics.
Stealth attack options for your interceptor to not be detected.
The option to launch chaff/flares for dodging locks and incoming fire.
Possible AA support if the encounter is over a protected area.
Active civilian air traffic that can wander into or even be the point of the encounter.


and so forth...

On a side note is there any word on if and when the soundtrack for XN2 will be released?

Looking forward to milestone 5 done and out, good luck on the progress.    

[gG-Unknown]

I am quite glad for reactions on my cut-out reccomendation.

Dear Chriss,

non of the commenting players consider amount of time and money needed to polish  the product.  In my first post I highlighted that bugfree state is THE MAIN reason for cut something out.  Look at today satisaction :

It doesn not smells like success isnt it ?

Recent changes introduced a lots of bugs. It is not easy to solve them even with your decent bug report system. It is all about balance , choose volume of content your small team can deliver  in the given time AND bugfree. Rather focus at deep, fun and polished gameplay of current package than add more and more messy content.

Thank you

Edited March 11 by gG-Unknown

[Chris]

Just so everyone is clear - the plans for the air combat are not massive gameplay changes. It's bringing in the new UI and the tutorial, which will keep the same basic mechanics but will make everything look much more polished. There's going to be a few smaller changes to the mechanics but they're minor ones.

We're obviously not going to cut out the air combat. It's connected to loads of other parts of the game; it'd probably be more work to remove it than to finish it.