Thing's I'd like to see after finishing X2 a couple times.

[x60mm]

First off, Goldhawk really knocked it out of this park with this one.  Best entry in the genre after the OG hands down!  Fixed all the quirks I disliked with the first Xenonauts and was great fun.  I saw few things I'd like to see improved, some of which I'm sure could be easily patched, which is a testament to how well developed Xenonauts 2 is.

1. Free camera panning would be a Godsend.  The cardinal panning often makes it very difficult to see tight corridors and between trucks/barriers.  This alone would be a massive QOL increase.
2. The mission variety early game was a breath of fresh air in this genre which I greatly enjoyed.  Was disappointed to see it go so quickly and be restricted to the norm for virtually the rest of the game.  Bringing in those alternate mission types (escort, save abducted humans, ambushes, etc) for the rest of the phases would add a lot of fun, reduce combat fatigue, and make repeat playthroughs more enticing.
3. In my two playthroughs it was quite rare to encounter landed UFOs.  Due to the plethora of UFOs to shoot down and the generous timeframe to salvage them with troops I never had to do a night mission.  Would be great if night landings played a greater role in the invasion.
4.  Some items have no graphics for ground placement which can be quite annoying in some circumstances.  Even just skewed versions of the inventory images with a mild shadow would solve this.  I'd like to see throwing items as well but it's not a big deal at all and I'm it'd sure quite a bit more work.
5. Would have been nice to get an improved grenade launcher at some point.  Not really because it needed buffs, but because it felt a bit off going from normal tech to high tech while we still had that one bit of old gear tagging along through the end.  Increased TU efficiency in changing grenade types would be very welcome on a higher tech version.  Would also be cool to see the grenade launcher have access to all the grenade types.
6. How training works is quite nebolous.  Would be nice if we had some clarity in game on this important mechanic.
7. There should be an achievement for completing an Iron Man campaign, and there could easily be quite a bit more achievements.

I really hope we see another entry sooner than later this time around as the current engine is perfectly suitable, I'd preorder yesterday!  Cheers to Goldhawk for this solid game!  This is a notoriously difficult genre to succeed in and as an X-Com player since 1995 who's played them all, I can say this is the first release I feel has done it solidly.

 

Edited July 24 by x60mm

[Chris]

4 hours ago, x60mm said:

First off, Goldhawk really knocked it out of this park with this one.  Best entry in the genre after the OG hands down!  Fixed all the quirks I disliked with the first Xenonauts and was great fun.  I saw few things I'd like to see improved, some of which I'm sure could be easily patched, which is a testament to how well developed Xenonauts 2 is.

1. Free camera panning would be a Godsend.  The cardinal panning often makes it very difficult to see tight corridors and between trucks/barriers.  This alone would be a massive QOL increase.
2. The mission variety early game was a breath of fresh air in this genre which I greatly enjoyed.  Was disappointed to see it go so quickly and be restricted to the norm for virtually the rest of the game.  Bringing in those alternate mission types (escort, save abducted humans, ambushes, etc) for the rest of the phases would add a lot of fun, reduce combat fatigue, and make repeat playthroughs more enticing.
3. In my two playthroughs it was quite rare to encounter landed UFOs.  Due to the plethora of UFOs to shoot down and the generous timeframe to salvage them with troops I never had to do a night mission.  Would be great if night landings played a greater role in the invasion.
4.  Some items have no graphics for ground placement which can be quite annoying in some circumstances.  Even just skewed versions of the inventory images with a mild shadow would solve this.  I'd like to see throwing items as well but it's not a big deal at all and I'm it'd sure quite a bit more work.
5. Would have been nice to get an improved grenade launcher at some point.  Not really because it needed buffs, but because it felt a bit off going from normal tech to high tech while we still had that one bit of old gear tagging along through the end.  Increased TU efficiency in changing grenade types would be very welcome on a higher tech version.  Would also be cool to see the grenade launcher have access to all the grenade types.
6. How training works is quite nebolous.  Would be nice if we had some clarity in game on this important mechanic.
7. There should be an achievement for completing an Iron Man campaign, and there could easily be quite a bit more achievements.

I really hope we see another entry sooner than later this time around as the current engine is perfectly suitable, I'd preorder yesterday!  Cheers to Goldhawk for this solid game!  This is a notoriously difficult genre to succeed in and as an X-Com player since 1995 who's played them all, I can say this is the first release I feel has done it solidly.

 

Thanks, it's great to hear that you enjoyed the game so much. Yeah, it probably won't take 11 years for the next batch of Xenonauts content to arrive - the X2 engine is a much more stable foundation than what we were using for X1

By the way, there is already a setting in the gameplay options that allows you to control the camera rotation if you find the fixed 90-degree angles a problem. Your second point is something that has been raised a lot in player feedback, too, and we'll be taking some steps to fix that issue with DLC in the future.

For point 4), were there any specific items that you can remember caused you problems by not having a 3d model?

[x60mm]

6 hours ago, Chris said:

For point 4), were there any specific items that you can remember caused you problems by not having a 3d model?

Automed I remember specifically not showing on the ground.

[Oldsmobile]

I'm loving X2 too.  The developers did an excellent job.
#4 I agree it's hard to see dropped items on the ground, especially grenades.  Even a destroyed Mars is hard to see.  (I've aborted a mission before where a soldier carried a Mars wreckage back to the dropship!)  It would be nice to have a simplified overhead view of the map showing locations of soldiers, aliens, and items.

Ability to throw items would be a welcome addition.

#5 Ammo for grenade launchers automatically upgrade when you build alenium and fusion grenades.  You can also arm with smoke grenades.

edit #3 You can voluntarily do a night mission!  I did that a couple of times for fun.

Edited July 25 by Oldsmobile

[Shotcrete]

1. Has always been in game.

2. Agreed. The UOO missions were great.

3. Agreed.

4. Further to this, I wish we could get a tooltip of items on the floor when hovering over or a square.

5. Tend to agree, though that would affect balance.

6. The tooltips explain this very well.

7. Achievements are always fun.

[x60mm]

On 7/25/2026 at 7:42 PM, Oldsmobile said:

#5 Ammo for grenade launchers automatically upgrade when you build alenium and fusion grenades.  You can also arm with smoke grenades.

I'm aware, smoke grenade launchers were an absolute staple in my runs!  Just wish the launcher itself got an upgrade somehow.

[x60mm]

Starting a new run, I remembered an important detail I forgot to mention.  Why is it that no matter where I shoot down a UFO, there are structures and often people?  There really should be wilderness maps for variety alone.  The civilians make maps much easier as well, giving away enemy positions and wasting their TUs so it be nice if they weren't everywhere.

[x60mm]

Some more stuff.

1. Am I correct in seeing that soldiers never gain accuracy unless shooting at enemies?  If so, this is an issue as I tend to run dedicated smoke grenadiers.  This means they'll never get more accurate even after landing dozens of shots which is a real bummer.

3. Still some cover issues here and there, which I will begin screencapping.  Here's an example.  This guy was shot from an alien within the UFO who opened the door despite the cover indicator saying he was safe from that angle.

 

 

4.  It would be nice if we could filter out injured soldiers as screens like this are annoying to use. 

Edited August 24 by x60mm

[leha]

On 7/24/2026 at 8:22 PM, x60mm said:

5. Would have been nice to get an improved grenade launcher at some point.

It would be nice to get a flamethrower and incendiary rounds for regular firearms  "Mahmud, light it up!" (c) crazy smile  

 

On 7/25/2026 at 12:35 AM, Chris said:

For point 4), were there any specific items that you can remember caused you problems by not having a 3d model?

It is difficult to see discarded small arms magazines and grenades on the ground.

 

On 7/25/2026 at 12:35 AM, Chris said:

Your second point is something that has been raised a lot in player feedback, too, and we'll be taking some steps to fix that issue with DLC in the future.

You could keep the existing missions of rescuing civilians from flasks, and also add missions of alien assaults on certain facilities (scientific research centers, for example) and the abduction of certain VIPs (politicians or the recovery of your own captured aliens from a third party, for example). In other words, you could make the missions "opposite" (compared to the existing ones—rescuing three sergeants, escorting a VIP and assaulting a Cleaner base).

Edited August 28 by leha