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taking the story-background more seriously


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Hello community, Hello designer,

xenonauts hase a nice story with some significant changes compared with the original xcom. One of the major changes is the timeline, which affects almost the whole background. I want to suggest some minor changes to the game, to make a better use of the storyline and hence improve the feeling ingame.

summery of the storyline

The storyline told us, how the first contact was made 21 years (not 30 as the homepage suggests) before the start of the game, which is the autum 1979. For the first years after the Iceland Incident major ressources where put into the xenonaut-project from both blocks, east and west. With the years pasting the funds where reduced, the backers vanished and the whole project was about to be shut down. Then the aliens apeared again.

conclusions out of that storyline

The xenonauts have an advanced knowledge about the pure existence of the aliens, an ideas on their superior technology and the alien tactics. They are prepared, compared to the rest of the world, but fallen back to almost marginal logistics.

The Xenonaut-Project has done something for 21 years, it has databases, sleeping networks, mothballed hideouts, retired officers and soldiers which can be reactivated. And much more.

It is all in all comparable to the gladio-project (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Gladio)

transfer out of the storyline into the game

The Project is an 21 year old advanced military project. That should be more noticeable when the game starts. The player should have both feelings: beeing overwhelmed by the alien superiority on the one hand; beeing somehow more prepared on the other hand. The player should be able to reactivate easily the old status and networks of the xenonauts-project.

ingame suggestions

The suggestions which I am bout to make have the major purpose to change the ingamefeeling without changing the present mechanics to much. They are more cosmetical than anything else. But they should make the game more spooky, more tense and more ambientic.

  • training facilities; the single squad left should have own facilities, which should be able to make use of for the new recruts. Put 2 officers into the facility as military instructors and put new recruts into the drill; which should be easily made by the retired squads.
  • aircraft carrier; a kind of mobile basis which hase the advantages to be better protected against detection and alien aggressions. In the Year 1979 aircraft carrier are the world wide major and most advanced military unit. Make use of it!
  • submarines; as the second idea of mobile bases / rocketlauncher against the alien air superioirty.
  • mothballed radar stations; the player should put some ressources to reactivate already existing logistics more than building new ones
  • mothballed bases; same here with bases. if the player builds up a new base, there should be lot of stuff ready, just needed to dust.

There are more thoughts to come, I am still about to think all of that through.

Edited by Sherelian
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hi, good to see posts on the game background.

being overwhelmed by the alien superiority on the one hand; being somehow more prepared on the other hand.

I think some of that hope, despite fear, does come through in that Xeno-planes are able to take down a UFO that no other air force can manage.

training facilities; the single squad left should have own facilities, which should be able to make use of for the new recruits. Put 2 officers into the facility as military instructors and put new recruts into the drill; which should be easily made by the retired squads.

Training looks likely to be phased out in the builds to come. A shame really. A military instructor role formed part of previous discussions on it. Here's my thread on it, that has links to previous ones.

aircraft carrier; a kind of mobile basis which has the advantages to be better protected against detection and alien aggressions. In the Year 1979 aircraft carrier are the world wide major and most advanced military unit. Make use of it!

Like EU1994, Xenonauts is firmly landlocked (apart form handwavium about being able to retrieve your Xeno-planes from anywhere) This is to keep the scope of the game, and the developer resources focused, as well as EU1994 being the one they wanted to reimagine. There's a thread on flying aircraft bases somewhere too.

submarines; as the second idea of mobile bases / rocketlauncher against the alien air superioirty.

Pretty much the same as aircraft carriers, really. There are lots of suggestions for plane types and modularity within the focus as it stands now, never mind going into TFTD territory. :) There were suggestions for missile bases previously.

mothballed radar stations; the player should put some resources to reactivate already existing logistics more than building new ones.

Much like the missile bases, all the facilities are much like EU1994, rather than as separate facilities as per UFO:AI. Some pros and cons either way on that one. A recent base building thread is this one.

mothballed bases; same here with bases. if the player builds up a new base, there should be lot of stuff ready, just needed to dust.

My reasoning of this is that the technology in the bases from the late 1950s/ early 1960s has been superseded by later developments. Likewise research labs and manufacturing plant has also changed in that time. Not to mention that key components may have been transferred and the repair work necessary to get the bases functional. In other words, it allows the player to pick a brand new location, rather than unveiling an older base.

One suggestion was to offer a very limited older location at a reduced cost, with limited upgrade potential. But that was before base costs fell.

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Well, ok.

But still there is the missing feeling of somehow beeing prepared. And beeing able to shot down 1 UFO does not generate that feeling. Even less if you are not able to feel something which happend, before you start the game.

As I pointed: I am looking for cosmetical changes, for the ambient and the atmosphere of the game. There should be more touch to the back-ground-story.

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Sherelian, EU1994 had ZERO back story. There were about 3 cut scenes in the entire game, one of which was for you failing. The only story was in the manual for the game and amounted to 'Earth is under attack! Nations of the world have appointed you to lead this newly formed and super secret task force to fight back!'

Xenonauts is already well ahead of the curve on story, you just need to read it yourself. Sure they could spoon feed it to you in cut scenes or in game dialogue, but that can get in the way once you're familiar with it and just want to have a good time playing the game.

As for how that all translates into the game, think about what the situation really is. The Xenonauts organization has been around since the Iceland incident 21 years ago. In that time they made no major breakthroughs and sucked up millions of dollars worth of funding from nations around the world. By the time the game starts they're probably looked on more as a joke or a failed experiment in multi-national cooperation. Their funding has been reduced to next to nothing and their facilities, whatever they were, have been shut down and probably reclaimed by the military of the nations they had been built in. They've lost access to 'special forces' type recruits and are scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Then the aliens show up. Do you really think that after a decade of continued reduction in funding and being looked on as unnecessary that the nations of the world would unanimously decided to throw everything they have into the Xenonauts program again? Highly unlikely. It's far more likely that they'd try to handle things themselves and give little more than token support to the Xenonauts. $100k/month is a joke when it comes to a military organization's funding...and that's where you're starting, every nation is only giving that much to the Xenonauts when the game starts. You need to prove to them you're not a joke, that you're capable, that they can't handle it themselves, that they NEED you. If you do you get more funding, if you don't you lose funding and nations withdraw completely.

The dire situation is there, you just need to look for it :)

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It is curious to argue with the flaws of a 20year old game, while there is a remake on the start to take out those flaws.

The changes suggested are mere cosmetic nature, with a huge improvement on the side of the storyline and the ambiente. That is the thing about good games: a story witch catches the player. That is what made goog games great ones. In the original xcom it is i.e. the horror of the unknown.

Now to your second thought, and I am still repeating: I am not suggesting changes in the balancing of the game, nor to the technology, nor to anything else but the tweaks of how things are told. I am suggesting changes to the narration. Here som direct answers:

In that time they made no major breakthroughs and sucked up millions of dollars worth of funding from nations around the world.

Yes, that is the point about military facilities. It is called "Cold war". If you are interested, check on wikipedia the STAR-WARS Programm of the USA back in 1980. Or the "GLADIO-Programm".

Their funding has been reduced to next to nothing and their facilities, whatever they were, have been shut down and probably reclaimed by the military of the nations they had been built in.

Yeah. Lets reactivad those things.

Do you really think that after a decade of continued reduction in funding and being looked on as unnecessary that the nations of the world would unanimously decided to throw everything they have into the Xenonauts program again?

Right. And still you missed to answer to the crucial point, that topic has: there IS a 21-year old history, which canbe more realiable and visible in the game as it is right now. Put some random into the things, give the player a noticable thing, he has something special in his hands.

All in all: put some detail-effort into the story as a very importand part of every game. It is all bout story in the first place.

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EU1994 presented it's backstory pretty briefly - Japan had an organisation. It got thumped. Now it's your turn. However, the developing storyline through the game drew on over 40 years of UFOlogy. Thousands upon thousands of sightings, contacts, abductions and a touch of cover up for good measure. That's evident right through the game and adds a great deal of depth to it.

For anyone who's come across this sort of material be it through X-Files, sci-fi movies, books, or repetitive abduction & probing the back story is enhanced as the game progresses.

Xenonauts has more back story. Iceland (with novella). No artefacts. Spike of interest that declines over decades etc. It's the developing story that's nowhere near as strong as yet. Parts of this thread touch on the mothballed Xeno-bases

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They've lost access to 'special forces' type recruits and are scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Except they haven't. We're drawing guys from the SEALs and shit, and we can apparently purchase from someone these "modified" F-16s and have them up and running in three days or so. The whole thing about "modifying" them so they can engage UFOs feels kinda weird, too, considering there's really not much you can do to armor an aircraft that still has to go fast; an aircraft's armor is countermeasures, and failing that, speed. So the only apparent difference between the Xenonauts' aircraft and those of a national military are that ours have extended range (on a short-range interceptor craft), are slower, and have not only fewer weapon systems, but only carry enough ammo on the cannon for what would be a single gun burst.

Considering that we're drawing what are apparently the crappiest SEALs and Spetsnaz guys we can find, and that the rest of the world ostensibly has better aircraft than we do (based on what whoever came up with the story and vehicle/weapons backgrounds is telling us) the question comes to mind as to why the Xenonauts are needed in the first place.

It's not a fail of mechanics, it's a fail in writing, and a massive dissonance in what we're being told in-game and how things play out in-game. Here's a few pointers: don't tell us that we're getting super-elite troops with combat experience and then depict them as having a rough time carrying a GPMG, a first aid kit, and a spare ammo can. Don't tell us we're getting these super-advanced versions of fighters that would be outperformed in an aerial battle by fighters made 20 years before the game takes place. If things are that bad for the Xenonauts, show that we're not getting the cream of the crop. Depict some boot-ass guys that just got out of boot camp and their infantry school, and are totally fresh. Show us the baseline fighters that we're saving from the scrapyard (cuz the fighters we have in-game would get their ass kicked by just about anything with two wings and an engine). As it stands with the current depiction, national militaries should be kicking ass all over the place.

Some familiarity with the subject matter being depicted would do wonders for tying together a cohesive story and elements depicted in-game.

Edited by EchoFourDelta
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Even SEALs retire or get discharged. There's nothing saying they're active duty soldiers being recruited, just that they have combat experience. Is it hard to imagine a soldier getting sacked and then being approached by a Xenonauts recruiter? Most mercenaries are trained soldiers from various special forces branches around the globe as well, there's nothing saying we're not poaching from a PMC either.

And the modifications to the F-16 to turn it into the Condor are done at the Xenonauts base by their personnel. That's a good enough explanation for me to believe in a 3 day wait time. The channels are already in place to make the purchase so all you need to do is make the order and some nation will ship you one of their F-16s. First day your people are ordering the craft and getting it shipped to the base, sometime on the 2nd day it arrives and begins conversion, end of the 3rd day it's ready to fly.

Suspension of disbelief is important, especially in a game where aliens are invading earth but are spending more time terrorizing the population than wiping them out with a bioweapon or simply bombarding the planet from orbit and a small team of 8 soldiers and a few dozen support personnel at a secret base are the best line of defense the entirety of humanity can muster.

Would it suit you better if the counter for the aircraft cannon started at 1250 and just counted down in 25 round bursts instead of starting at 50 and counting down in 1s?

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Suspending disbelief is a whole heck of a lot easier when people get the little things right, or at least something approaching the general area of being correct on some things. That's all I'm (and a lot of other people) saying.

I mentioned somewhere else that of course, fantastical is to be expected. It's fiction. We're not looking at a recreation of an event in real life. But what we are doing is being presented a concept that uses a whole truckload of things that either existed directly or were taken from real life and tweaked a bit. If the stuff doesn't make sense in the first place, or the tweaking takes it even further off-base from what makes sense on the non-fantastical, mundane side of things, then all it does is make the suspension of disbelief more difficult to hold up, and makes the eyebrows go up even easier.

Edited by EchoFourDelta
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Hello,

nice... commentary. did not realize that Xeno had 21 years (iceland to invasion). but makes up for "why" game play is designed...

Xeno knew projectile weapons works, even grenades works. probably been able [for better choice of words], "force nations to give their weapon-armory", along with (probably with reluctance) hiring their soldiers out of their armed forces.

with the point made here placed on 'modified equipment' [aircrafts]. same goes with missles, xenopedia indicated homing device must be changed.

This base mothballing and reactivation would clash with the story (and game design), is only 20 years, I suspect is cheaper to upgrade right away, if if if... big IF... nations knew of changes needed to be made to bases.

perhaps better way to say this, with respect of storyline; iceland incident, Xeno did not have "best" alien materials, just sparse materials to research. Thus sparse does not reveal needing special bases.... The "nations" that was not aware of Iceland incidents, are the one that might be... ahem saying "Who are you, egghead. What? xenonauts?? guards get rid of those crazies!!!". Then the invasion begin. probably already shitting in their pants, wishing they had contributed or built bases.

Also by 1958, very few nations had space programs of their own.

Hey, I just realized there is a possible "between the storyline"....

The reason why there is only one xeno-base versus hundreds of normal [military] bases. This story would be establishing quantity of nation-aware (knowing iceland incident) versus large number of nation-suprised (xeno is crazies until invasion). Thus to xeno perception, is world leaders doing full-blown verbal accusation & fighting (with b--- kissing tossed in as well). thus the lone xenobase is "armory stockpile of modified weapons".

R

Edited by rynait
grayed out parts now un-necessary
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There are ways to make use of such a story, to explain what such an organization did for 20 years.

One of the greater problems is to explain, how humanity will research within a couple of weeks a technology, which is nothing but alien; still less re-engineering and building the most advanced prototypes.

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They were prepped for a war that didn't come. They had space races to run, arms races to run, democracies to overthrow and run out of town.

From the background

But without a looming threat against which to defend humanity, the organisation fell into decline. Powerful backers retired or lost their positions, replaced by people unaware of the events in Iceland. Geopolitical considerations clouded the judgement of the major alliances, each coming to distrust the organisation formed to unite them because of its close ties with the other. Funding was reduced to a trickle.

That's not to say that both superpowers weren't aware of what could be out there. It's just as time passed, they paid more and more lip service to it. With no advanced technology to reverse engineer, they had no defence contractor buddies to share the profits with. So, back to building their own munitions.

One of the greater problems is to explain, how humanity will research within a couple of weeks a technology, which is nothing but alien; still less re-engineering and building the most advanced prototypes.

The aliens are bipedal with digits that operate guns in roughly the same fashion we do (see Crimson Dagger for examples). The technologies that the Xenonauts produce were mostly underway in 1979, but have been enhanced by Alenium and Alloys.

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I m entirely with Sherelian there.

Xcom is about an Alien invasion, backed by research, soldier turn based ground combat and aerial combat.

Thats the core of the game.

Thegame must contain the above improved, modernized and above all make sense. I.E have a minimum of "plausability"

I ve already said it before, and will repeat it, this game has major logical flaws and is totally unplausible inside the settings it set to itself, and unfortunatly commit a capital crime: it feels crude.

And it really make me sad when people jump on the horse with the "the game 20 years ago didn t had that" bad excuse but accept the improved aerial combat...Yeah right.

Some feature should be inside without a blinking:

Plausible sight and weapon range

Tweaked weapons (aiming devices, grenade launchers, IR/NV googles, etc,etc,etc)

Variety of weaponry (Warsaw/NATO)

Before entering the extraordinary weaponry, reshearch to modernizing terrestrial weaponry should be there

Assets existing in the timeline should be there

Military adapting to the alien threat in resonance to Xenonauts discovery should be there.

Shared Radar array covering instead of just our tiny radar should be paramount

Modern military look should be there not some bluebelly generic uniform, military looking should be there even in later armors. Damn the fact that we still cammo most of military assets speak for itself.

Prone crouch and standing should be in all those with drawbacks and advantages.

and many more.

A game nowaday should make a minimum of sense, and being a ressucitation of an already made game should mean something advanced and not feel like a zombie.

The game in itself right now is a bit weak, it become good because its a genre and setting that happens to have pent-up demand.

I know modders can solve a lot of those issues.

So i m still in hope that modders work/concepts will be incorporated and that the dev are mainly working on stability and performance issues, and that the engine can deliver more than the perceived limitations.

Edited by Mordobb
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Um, Xenonauts is an extra-national group. Pale blue is as good a choice as any for a uniform color, in fact it's the color of UN troops today.

Camo uniforms didn't become the standard in the US military till the 90s, and even then it was issued on deployment to match the area you were being sent. Many militaries around the world still don't issue camo as standard equipment and colors vary widely for the basic uniforms they do issue.

There's nothing about the Xenonauts uniforms that don't fit the situation or the era.

As for some of the other issues:

Sight and Weapon range is difficult to balance in a game like this. Using more realistic ranges would mean needing much larger maps to accommodate the longer sight range and longer ranges for rifles and precision weapons along with adjusting pistols and shotguns/carbines to be far more effective in close encounters causing them to be ignored except for indoor combat (ie base invasions or assaults and larger alien craft assaults).

Modifying weapons sounds like a cool idea, but would require many more hours of development. Hours they probably can't afford to spend on the game if they ever plan to release it. Besides, most of what you mentioned wasn't really around in the 70s. Aiming Assistance (ie laser sights) didn't exist till the late 80s. IR/NV goggles didn't become a combat ready man-portable device till the mid 90s. Grenade launchers are very appropriate for the time and setting, but are extremely situational and if you've ever tried to aim a weapon with one attached and loaded you'd know it doesn't make things easy having that extra weight on the barrel. Also they require specialized ammunition, you can't just load a hand grenade into one.

A better variety of weapons sounds great, but there's a reason militaries use standard issue gear. It allows for standardization of maintenance and ammunition as well as being able to share between soldiers. You can't toss your partner a magazine if he's using a different weapon even if the weapons use the same ammunition.

Why 'modernize' existing weapons when you can build lasers? The weapons you start with are as 'modern' as they can get. Man-portable lasers were (and still are) the dream of most weapon designers and militaries around the world. It makes sense that research that would allow such a thing would be pursued instead of taking small steps to advance existing tech...new metals would only get you a slightly better gun, combat ready lasers are far more attractive.

What assets that exist in the timeline aren't there? Do you want them to have tanks? Jeeps? What exactly are you asking for that isn't already there?

The militaries of the world should adapt to the aliens along with the Xenonauts and I've suggested that before along with the ability to choose who you share (sell) that technology to and having that sharing improve relations with nations.

The radar range we get is already WAY unrealistic. No radar system in the world today has the sort of range they're giving us already in the game and you want more? Build more bases.

Crouching and Standing are already in the game and that's all that was in EU1994. Prone didn't come around till Apocalypse and I don't know about you, but I never used it. There's no reason to crawl if you don't have to get past an obstacle, and there are no obstacles in the game that would allow you to crawl under them. Being prone may grant extra accuracy, but with the cover system in the game it would also mean you'd very rarely have a clean shot while being so. Heck, most of the time just crouching costs me a shot because I end up with a greater chance of shooting cover between the soldier and his target.

The game doesn't need more bells and whistles, it needs to be balanced and finished.

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"Many militaries around the world still don't issue camo as standard equipment and colors vary widely for the basic uniforms they do issue."

The ones that still haven't figured out that camouflage can keep you from getting dead as easily, or that haven't at least figured out that being bright powder blue isn't exactly beneficial to not being noticed aren't exactly movers and shakers of tactical doctrine.

Being "international" doesn't make blue any less obvious of a target.

Edited by EchoFourDelta
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Hello,

interesting line of thinking on weaponary or equipments. remember we were in cold war before 1979, until somewhere in 80's. Perhaps it is more of what their army was already equipped, rather than force upgrade entire division.. would be like this...

New orders; 7th division dump those m-1941 johnson in this can. Grab those sparkley m-16. practice time squaddies now march to shotty range... 1 week later, 7th shipped to some battle place.

that approach obviously would "paralyze the division"

perhaps this line of thinking should be more like countries thought xeno is doing research (too secret to announce), then find out what the F***; those xenonauts did not do any research those g** d*** aliens are coming? Here use those weapon [from stockpile] and hope you s***ty catch up. oh yes i spent 20 year fortune for lazy a** wipes. my government decided drastic funding cut until they catch up researching (incrementing as game play is now doing).

R

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Um, Xenonauts is an extra-national group. Pale blue is as good a choice as any for a uniform color, in fact it's the color of UN troops today.

Camo uniforms didn't become the standard in the US military till the 90s, and even then it was issued on deployment to match the area you were being sent. Many militaries around the world still don't issue camo as standard equipment and colors vary widely for the basic uniforms they do issue.

There's nothing about the Xenonauts uniforms that don't fit the situation or the era.

Wrong, wrong and wrong.

Pale blue is not even a good choice for a police force, thats why they tend to go black. Blue is a good way to be detecded and shot, that what happened to the french armymen on the field during ww1 with their stupid red and blue uniform, Napoleonian era is gone along time you know.

This blue choice is inspired on SWAT. Bad thinking period. I agree totally cammoed is hard to do due to QTT of terrain, but nobody asking that we are asking only a generic camoed uniform, even the AI soldiers looks better.

Elite forces use camoed in the US since the Nam.

Speaking about elite, we re an elite force, a worlddefending one, you don t expect such an organization looking so badly equiped when the entire specie face annihilation.

There s absolutely NOTHING that justify the plain blue color.

In the middle of cold war youd expect each block would be eager to show off to the other, so only NATO side like equipment would be an afront removing the warsaw pact block out of organization from day 1.

The uniform would have to 1)look generic 2) look military.

Right now it looks like Mr Jhon got a knife and want to cut the troat of his wife dog for overbarking...OMG !! Send the nearest blue shirted cop car !!

As for some of the other issues:

Sight and Weapon range is difficult to balance in a game like this. Using more realistic ranges would mean needing much larger maps to accommodate the longer sight range and longer ranges for rifles and precision weapons along with adjusting pistols and shotguns/carbines to be far more effective in close encounters causing them to be ignored except for indoor combat (ie base invasions or assaults and larger alien craft assaults).

I agree... in part. Not even FPS use that much realistic ranges.

Longer sight range doesn t mean hitting a target. There s a diference between detected and shot down.

We can detect a target at hundred of meters, placing a centimeter and hlaf wide piece of lead inside it is another matter.

You also don t expect with a 201X game to have exactly the same settings short sighted range, crampled maps as a 199X game do you. Do you expect arma3 or metro to be same crampled map as castle wolfeisntein 3d or quake 1 ? How would you regard the product ? such issue should have been issued before going Beta.

And whats the problem about each weapon having its terrain and/or situation of choice ?

Isnt that the real meaning of specializing weaponry ?

I dont get where you want to go with your kind of argumentation.

Even the developers go that way in the game begining. Analise the preset that come with each letters, the problem is thats its not balanced at all for the game.

The preset are nice but totally offset for the game mecanics.

A clear sign something went wrong from idealizing to implementing.

Modifying weapons sounds like a cool idea, but would require many more hours of development. Hours they probably can't afford to spend on the game if they ever plan to release it. Besides, most of what you mentioned wasn't really around in the 70s. Aiming Assistance (ie laser sights) didn't exist till the late 80s. IR/NV goggles didn't become a combat ready man-portable device till the mid 90s. Grenade launchers are very appropriate for the time and setting, but are extremely situational and if you've ever tried to aim a weapon with one attached and loaded you'd know it doesn't make things easy having that extra weight on the barrel. Also they require specialized ammunition, you can't just load a hand grenade into one.

Why 'modernize' existing weapons when you can build lasers? The weapons you start with are as 'modern' as they can get. Man-portable lasers were (and still are) the dream of most weapon designers and militaries around the world. It makes sense that research that would allow such a thing would be pursued instead of taking small steps to advance existing tech...new metals would only get you a slightly better gun, combat ready lasers are far more attractive.

What assets that exist in the timeline aren't there? Do you want them to have tanks? Jeeps? What exactly are you asking for that isn't already there?

Stop doing this cheap argumentation of what you don t know, go inform yourself.

Aren t we supposed to have top notch material and HR ressources, or a wimpy low E1 soldier class.

That could explain a lot on the game and would make much more sense for the game as it is.

But thiswould open another discussion that would come to the same point...

Insuficient game thinking, this game hasn t been suficiently planned to become a very good game, a lot of game before it in the same style implemented a lot of good features that aren t present here and missing.

A better variety of weapons sounds great, but there's a reason militaries use standard issue gear. It allows for standardization of maintenance and ammunition as well as being able to share between soldiers. You can't toss your partner a magazine if he's using a different weapon even if the weapons use the same ammunition.

The militaries of the world should adapt to the aliens along with the Xenonauts and I've suggested that before along with the ability to choose who you share (sell) that technology to and having that sharing improve relations with nations.

The radar range we get is already WAY unrealistic. No radar system in the world today has the sort of range they're giving us already in the game and you want more? Build more bases.

Crouching and Standing are already in the game and that's all that was in EU1994. Prone didn't come around till Apocalypse and I don't know about you, but I never used it. There's no reason to crawl if you don't have to get past an obstacle, and there are no obstacles in the game that would allow you to crawl under them. Being prone may grant extra accuracy, but with the cover system in the game it would also mean you'd very rarely have a clean shot while being so. Heck, most of the time just crouching costs me a shot because I end up with a greater chance of shooting cover between the soldier and his target.

The game doesn't need more bells and whistles, it needs to be balanced and finished.

Finish the game and launch it.. Rush it ? Do it and expect the buyers review t trample it.

All your blah blah blah only show off how the game is lacking in cohesion.

its not because you don t use a feature effectively others doesn t, i used prone from the moment i could, it was very usefull not to get shot and added to undetected approach, even if, in theory, in this kind of game it seems a bit useless as we can run to the face of the alien and shoot it in the face without reaction. I tried it here and i wasn t succefull due to totall inability of the soldiers to hit a bottle at qo paces. so i miss a lot prone, especially when no cover is around.

Amunition? Only clip i ever was able to finish off are lazer clips.

Diference of ammo. Nice for for an army irrelevent for for Specops. And why american weaponry and not russian anyway. Ak74 has better characteristic for the ranges we use compared to western side, same for RPK agaisnt the model pictured, western snipers were more accurate on western side. Again are we a multilateral org or fenced stringed toy ?

Wouldn t you prefer a more damaging ammo on some situation that travel less, than a lighter less damaging ammo ?

Why can t we players choose ?

All this can be done and is done by modders...and could be incorporated into the game before release.

Radar range IS unrealistic just to gimmick an old feature, brought up by maybe lack of tech in the time being. If you defend the planet you use the earth total array to feed the xenonauts sistem info. Thats what is done since WW2.

Lets be logical.

That we research another kind of radar to be able to detect more easely UFO sign is another matter and would make sense, but would also be widespread among all earthian forces to create a defence grid and unified sistem.

Build more bases ?

Where are our old bases ? Weren t we rich and spread once ?

Do you really think that if earth is treatened in mild cold war terrain and some instalations won t be given for free ? Each side wanting to shine as savior of the earth ?

Why would you want money anyhow when money become irrelevent if earth loose ? Isn t that the thinking behind free ammo and earthian weaponry? Or this feature a simple result of eliminating some management ?

Same for plane they would be given free, and we would have to retrofit them inside our base.

Anyway why isn t the tech spread to the world so the world can defend itself better ?

Each side have thousands of mil planes from that era rotting away wouldn t those in that era be retrofited ASAP to fit the defence need it ?

Wasn t VVS scenario during WW2 enought to teach us that ? Field mod ? Ever heard ?

The problem is only one, if you think about the game setting which affect the mecanics.. its quite poorly thinked. It looks like noone tought out of the box, just tough the same again.

Same culprits as 15 years algo, same shortcomings that shouldn t even exist today.

Ask yourself this question:

If there was half a dozen of game with those settings and gameplay in last 3 years, would xenonauts shine ?

I still play it and will play for sometime, probably until i reach the end.

There isn t enought features that make it a quite replayable title, especially if beaten insane.

Edited by Mordobb
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And why american weaponry and not russian anyway. Ak74 has better characteristic for the ranges we use compared to western side, same for RPK agaisnt the model pictured, western snipers were more accurate on western side. Again are we a multilateral org or fenced stringed toy ?

Wouldn t you prefer a more damaging ammo on some situation that travel less, than a lighter less damaging ammo ?

Ehhhhhhhhh. The ballistic firearms are about as international as you can get.

The pistol's from Italy (apparently a 92S), the machine gun's from Belgium (FN MAG), the precision rifle's from Germany (G3 variant), and the "rocket launcher" is Israel's B-300. That's not to say the United States didn't eventually adopt these weapons, but so did a great deal of NATO in some form or another, in whole or in part. I don't know who in the world could tell which engineers and scientists worked on our laser, plasma, and MAG weaponry.

The only two weapons from America are the assault rifle and the shotgun.

And the thing about the Russian stuff... at the ranges we see in-game, about the only advantage of using the Warsaw stuff would be perhaps better barrier penetration if you weren't firing the appropriate sort of ammo from the NATO stuff; the "american" weaponry would be more traumatic on the target when it actually hit.

Edited by EchoFourDelta
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Oh wow. I'm getting flashbacks to the Cyllan Cycle. Mordobb, you want a different game to Xenonauts. An entirely different game to Xenonauts. A "start again from basic principles" game. You don't want to play a spiritual sucessor to X-Com: Enemy Unknown. You want to play Xenonauts: Total War. That's alright. That's a great concept for a game (I'm not being sarcastic. I genuinely mean it). It would be all kinds of cool if Creative Assembly did that (and not fuck it up like they did with Stormrise). But what you want has nothing to do with a spiritual successor to EU94. Sorry, but it's true.

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Diference of ammo. Nice for for an army irrelevent for for Specops. And why american weaponry and not russian anyway. Ak74 has better characteristic for the ranges we use compared to western side, same for RPK agaisnt the model pictured, western snipers were more accurate on western side. Again are we a multilateral org or fenced stringed toy ?

Wouldn t you prefer a more damaging ammo on some situation that travel less, than a lighter less damaging ammo ?

Why can t we players choose ?

All this can be done and is done by modders...and could be incorporated into the game before release.

I'll go a little further than Echo. Russian weapons offer literally zero advantages over western weapons(which is why you see even some Chinese units operating license-made M4s now). The AK platform is heavy, the stock configuration(specifically the amount of drop it has) makes effective automatic fire with it much more difficult due to increased muzzle rise, the RPK has those problems and a low capacity for a SAW, none of them can readily mount optics in a way that will retain zero when removed and reinstalled(AK sidemounts are possibly the only thing worse than the G3's claw mount, and that's really saying something). Reliability is a nonissue(both Western and Warsaw Pact weapons tend to be considerably more reliable than tthe internet would have you believe), although the mechanissm that supposedly makes the AK "more reliable" in fact results in increased felt recoil. In addition, the AK platform weapons have extremely clunky manual of arms, making anything you haave to do to operate the weapon that much slower. Paddle releases and mags that have to be "rocked in" are slower than STANAG compatible mags and require more operations. Putting the charging handle on the right hand side requires you to reach over the top of the weapon to charge it.

As for ammunition, the AK74's 5.45 is less accurate than it's western counterpart, while actually being less effective terminally in the short term(tissue death due to temporary cavity is irrelevant in this aspect, and even then the 5.56 does it better), it penetrates cover less effectively than 5.56 does(M855 ball and M856 tracer are both pretty decent penetrators), while being every bit as prone to overpenetration of sofft tissue as 5.56.

If you went to the even more obsolete 7.62x39(out of the 47), you do gain penetration over the 5.56, at the cost of increased recoil, decreased accuracy(it's even less accurate than the 5.45), and massively decreased terminal effectiveness. Even the Russians abandoned this round, and that should tell you something when the same country that has been clinging to the same obsolete design for 60+ years drops something.

Neither the 5.45 nor the 7.62x39 are more damaging than the 5.56 is, for the task at hand.

Russian calibers are substandard for nearly all applications. Period.

Ammunition commonality is important, even for specops. If you can't reliably get ammunition, you are up shit's creek without a paddle, and exotic calibers(say, China's new 5.8, or H&K's 4.6) and weapons that take different magazines and parts than the rest of your team has is a good way to end up up said creek.

There's a reason any country who can afford to buy western arms uses them, and not russian weapons that were obsolete 40 years ago. And that's because Russian weapons are inferior in every regard(except cost).

Edited by Firebeard
Typos.
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Oh wow. I'm getting flashbacks to the Cyllan Cycle. Mordobb, you want a different game to Xenonauts. An entirely different game to Xenonauts. A "start again from basic principles" game. You don't want to play a spiritual sucessor to X-Com: Enemy Unknown. You want to play Xenonauts: Total War. That's alright. That's a great concept for a game (I'm not being sarcastic. I genuinely mean it). It would be all kinds of cool if Creative Assembly did that (and not fuck it up like they did with Stormrise). But what you want has nothing to do with a spiritual successor to EU94. Sorry, but it's true.

I want an upgraded game yes, Same principles but better. Steam already give the old games you know. And no i don t like total war anymore after playing it for a decade it always the same Shogun2 was the coffin nailer for me.

What is so abherant to give a background that stand on his feets and some more options done in others games and improve ?

I wonder...

Edited by Mordobb
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Balllistic test speak agaisnt you when it comes to range penetration and damage but you state it yourself later so i don t get your initial statement.

Muzzle rise is controlable as long you dont burn the full clip in one press, just adapt.

The RPK is more capable at defeating armor than the saw AKA Minimi AKA M249.

Agree on the optics but unless damaged would you remove them on the field ?

Agree on recoil, but auto and only 3rb is so screwed in the game they are usefull only in Point Blank. I hope that will change.

Since when AK74 have side magazine or RPK, i m lost here ?

Strange, M14 is back to the specops, modernized of course, its a 7,62, sure its NATO. But the the ANP90 called AK100 is back with 7,62...So its not SO dead, it has it uses it seems.

And i already heard a lot of USA soldiers, inclusive ballistic tester saying shit about the 5,56 compared to some aspect of the 7,62... So who do i believe ? Nice propaganda by the way.

All is simply a trade off question brought for in by the Nam, number of round versus effectiveness. Basicly the 7,62 is more damageing and has greater stoping power while the 5,56 has more penetration and in know to go trought the body leaving the combatant able for some time, while this rarely happens with 7,62.

On the counterpart 5,56 travel further and has better penetration. Since penetration doesn t exist in the game.

M14 had a 90% killing rate before being replaced. But in patrols soldiers tended to get out of ammo due to carrying weight limitations. This tended to be a problem especially when CP streched much farther than the counterparts.

And comparing modern cartridge agaisnt 30 years old one is that smart, ballistic and ammo have evolved a long way.

But all this is useless what i want is a bit more options. Maybe this seems useless as you develop other weaponry very early in the game, assuming your lucky enought to down enought UFO to make enought money, but options tend to bring something called replayability... which tend to be good for games.

As for my ideas i already found other people post that tag along those. Plausible cenario + more options. But hey modders are for such, right ? Why bother the developers with such things....

Let people have more of the same if they want.

Some people like modern cars, some people prefer vintage ones.

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Balllistic test speak agaisnt you when it comes to range penetration and damage but you state it yourself later so i don t get your initial statement.

Muzzle rise is controlable as long you dont burn the full clip in one press, just adapt.

The RPK is more capable at defeating armor than the saw AKA Minimi AKA M249.

Agree on the optics but unless damaged would you remove them on the field ?

Agree on recoil, but auto and only 3rb is so screwed in the game they are usefull only in Point Blank. I hope that will change.

Since when AK74 have side magazine or RPK, i m lost here ?

Strange, M14 is back to the specops, modernized of course, its a 7,62, sure its NATO. But the the ANP90 called AK100 is back with 7,62...So its not SO dead, it has it uses it seems.

And i already heard a lot of USA soldiers, inclusive ballistic tester saying shit about the 5,56 compared to some aspect of the 7,62... So who do i believe ? Nice propaganda by the way.

All is simply a trade off question brought for in by the Nam, number of round versus effectiveness. Basicly the 7,62 is more damageing and has greater stoping power while the 5,56 has more penetration and in know to go trought the body leaving the combatant able for some time, while this rarely happens with 7,62.

On the counterpart 5,56 travel further and has better penetration. Since penetration doesn t exist in the game.

M14 had a 90% killing rate before being replaced. But in patrols soldiers tended to get out of ammo due to carrying weight limitations. This tended to be a problem especially when CP streched much farther than the counterparts.

And comparing modern cartridge agaisnt 30 years old one is that smart, ballistic and ammo have evolved a long way.

But all this is useless what i want is a bit more options. Maybe this seems useless as you develop other weaponry very early in the game, assuming your lucky enought to down enought UFO to make enought money, but options tend to bring something called replayability... which tend to be good for games.

As for my ideas i already found other people post that tag along those. Plausible cenario + more options. But hey modders are for such, right ? Why bother the developers with such things....

Let people have more of the same if they want.

Some people like modern cars, some people prefer vintage ones.

You speak an awful lot of the same tired, overly repeated myths.

In ballistic testing, 7.62x39 does considerably less in terms of permanent cavity damage than either the 5.45 or the 5.56, wich 5.56 being consideraboly more effective due to fragmentation effects(compared to the tumble effects of the 5.45, which creates a considerably larger temporary cavity, which is fairly irrelevant in terms of immediate effectiveness, even though it may render a much larger area of dead tissue in the long run).

5.45 out of an RPK74 has less armor penetrative capacity than a 249 firing 5.56. 7.62x39 penetrates a thicker layer of steel, yes, but atthe cost of significantly less effective terminal ballistics, significantly reduced range(7.62x39 has an effective range of 350yds roughly, compared to the 500-600 for either of the other two rounds). The RPK is also considerably less accurate as a platform, due to the shoddy machining tolerances it is manufactured towards, and as much as loose tolerances is spun as a design feature, when it gets so bad that you have to number and sort your parts based on how in-spec they are(AK platform weapons parts all have small numbers on them, indicating whether they are slightly undersize, in spec, slightly oversize or very oversize), because otherwise you can't put them together and have them work, it's not a feature, it's shitty quality control.

The AN-40 and AK-100 in 7.62x39 are offered for export use, and are not used internally. Or, for that matter, by ANY military force in the world. At all. Ever.

The 7.62x51 was not brought up, but there's a reason NO nation uses it anymore for a main line rifle. It suffers from excessive recoil, while being entirely more weight than is needed. The M14 was not a wonder rifle, it was a rifle that was dropped from main line infantry use very rapidly on account of it being underperforming compared to either of it's contemporaries(the G3 and FAL platforms). It did not have a "90% killing rate". I can't think of any round that fits into an infantry rifle with that kind of performance, or even close to it.

Have you ever shot an AK or AR platform weapon on auto? If so, you would know immediately that your claim about controllability. I've shot both(several variants of both, actually). An AK on auto groups absolutely terribly, with hitting a man size target with all rounds of a burst at any reasonable difference being nigh impossible. While an AR pattern weapon on auto is extremely controllable, albeit still less acurate than it would be on semi, keeping all shots in a burst in a head size target at 100yds on auto is entirely doable.

It is worth noting that even Russian and Chinese special forces uunits operate M4 platform weapons(either purchased, license-built or clones). Literally every special operations force in the world that has the money(meaning all the competent ones, plus the Russians and Chinese) run M4 platform weapons now. There is literally zero reason for any country to be using a substandard weapons system except for cost reasons, and absolutely no reason at all for an elite paramilitary unit(like we're discussing) to run such a substandard weapon.

Edited by Firebeard
typo
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