Something to add a little uncertainty

[ladlon]

Bear with me on this!...

One of the things I loved about the game STALKER was that not everything was immediately hostile towards you, or at least wouldn't always drop everything and attack. For example, you'd be walking along, already tense, and you'd hear wild dogs barking somewhere in the distance. You'd swivel around, trying to spot what direction they were at, and how far. Often, you'd finally see them in the distance.

They may or may not initially spot you, and at that distance, you were never quite sure if (when they were moving) they were headed towards you or not. You quickly evaluated the situation, and decided whether to keep moving, or stand your ground (with the assumption that they were going to approach you).

Even if a dog would approach you, it would be unpredictable... it would move towards you, but then stop, maybe move the other way, circle you a bit, move a bit closer, then seemingly loose interest, but then stop and look your way again.

With ammo being scarce, and combat generally being quite risky, this often resulted in extremely tense moments of you constantly keeping an eye on the dog(s), occassionally moving forward, re-evaluating. I'd often have my gun pointed at the 'enemy' all the while, but not pull the trigger unless I had to. It was an interesting situation where it being LESS hostile created more tension... rather than it being the standard 'I see him, I immediately shoot him' type of thing.

So, why do I bring this up? Well, I have yet to actually play the game myself (and can only judge things based on the vids I've seen), but perhaps you could have some aliens that are disguised as civilians (...kind of a Carpenter's 'Thing' type of deal). So, you'd have a civilian in the combat area, but would have a bit of paranoia about it maybe being an alien.

On one hand, you don't want to just kill the 'civilian', as you really don't know if it's 'real' or not. On the other hand, you would be keeping an eye on them, getting a bit nervous when they are close to one of your guys.

If they were aliens, then at some random (or strategic) point, they could shed their disguise, and 'change the playing field' a bit.

Not sure how difficult that would be to code, nor if it would throw any balance off. But, I figured I'd throw it in as a suggestion, as that might create some serious tension and throw some unexpected panic in a misison.

I just love the idea of something that you are reluctant to immediately shoot, but are constantly worried might 'go off' while near your troops.

Any thoughts?

Edited May 29, 2013 by ladlon

[Commissar Pancakes]

While it might make for a more exciting (or bowl-voiding horrifying) experience in terms of terror missions, I think the devs have moved passed onto the bug-fixing stage.

Plus, how would you go about discovering them? They would need to take a free shot at your troops, who are already outgunned by the xenos that are actively hostile.

[ladlon]

Yep, I hear ya... Just throwing the idea there, as it might inspire some similar or other concept. Maybe for a mod or update. No harm in throwing the idea in, just so it's known.

Good point about how they are revealed... Maybe after a while, they just drop the disguise (can't maintain it forever or something). Maybe they blow their cover randomly somehow... like their disguise glitches, or they do some sort of behavior. Not sure, but I figure someone might think of something, if the idea grabs them.

[thothkins]

Actually, I was all for doing this later on. The game starts with a single Xeno that looks like a civilian. It then zombifies other civilians who end up looking, just as they were.

If possible, AI for civilians set to go towards xenonauts as often as possible. Hiding in their midst are the aliens trying to zombify them.

Other option is to have alien infected locals shoot Xenonauts on sight. There would have to be a few of them for this.

Perhaps on being wounded the sprites then change to Sebilians to show some alien traits - kind of like unmasking one of the lizards from V.

Back when secondary objectives looked like they might be more numerous, a game fail would have been if all civilians are taken over, forcing an abort and nuke from orbit.

[Crowst]

I'm not sure aliens disguised as humans fits the lore currently. There would have to be another alien type added. All of the current aliens are heavily genetically modified and look nothing like humans.

[Gauddlike]

Just give them all hoodies and the terror missions might be mistaken for an all human riot.

[thothkins]

I'm fairly sure those reptiles in V didn't really fit the skins they were shown in either. Just have to play with what we have.

The embarrassment of a Xenonaut getting mugged in a terror mission by a gang of hoodies before they even get to the aliens .