It's here!!!

[The Veteran]

Well if you'd got it for the PC you know you wouldn't need a tv right

[NKF]

Nah, if I did that, I'd not be playing the game until the first quarter of next year. Actually I'm quite serious about that.

 

Well, launched into classic (I'll regulate my own Ironman rules thank you), and through every tutorial-period mission so far, I've left the battle with only one living soldier - mainly on account of my soldiers panicking just spotting the aliens, seemingly. Hands-on-hips-man bugs me, I love the folding wings on the Midget-Skyranger, the All-American cast for our Nations-Of-The-World heroes is odd. I do like how they evaded the UFOPaedia/Ufopedia debate by just calling it the bland ol' database.

 

I'll be contradictory here, it is X-Com, but not what I'd deem an X-Com-like. Well, not enough of one anyway to please the purists, but it looks spiffy and I'm many magnitudes more excited about this than I ever was when I first tried the After- titles, and that's only through what I've seen so far.

 

Oh, and green sweaters. Green sweaters. They're green, and they're sweaters. Yes... er, yes.

 

- NKF

 

Green sweaters... *shakes head*

[Pete]

Green sweaters FTW!

 

If your playthrough gets any better you'll be loving things like the research tree and the multitude of manufacturing projects. Much more going on in both areas by the later game

 

I'd buy one of those sweaters if they sold them

[silencer_pl]

Remember that this game puts you on constant pressure - one failure on tactical level and your game might be screwed on classic or higher. In original you could take a breather but here - forget about R&R. The game constantly slaps you in the face and shoves right into that big pit hole.

 

On Impossible - first it kicks you in the balls, then it kicks you in the rear end. After that you get double slapped in the face and then when you are on the ground you get juicy spit on your face.

[FireWarrior]

I dislike alot of things about this game immensely. Ther are too many issues and odd design ideas. There are too many bugs and simplifications.

 

So why am I sitting here counting the hours like some goddamn addict? I'd just gotten clean off Apocalypse again, damn you all!

 

And I can't even play when I get home because I need to get up early tomorrow *whinewhinewhine*

[The Veteran]

What do you dislike FW? Especially curious with regards to the odd design ideas depending on what you mean by that...

[NKF]

Had my first UFO recovery and by its shape I'm guessing it's the modern equivalent of the large scout. But what surprised me more was that these Sectoids not only look feral, but they seem completely nuts. I think they were only armed with pistols but they blew up several large chunks of the UFO hull just to get at a soldier huddling up to the UFO outside. Are the UFOs really that flimsy?

 

- NKF

[Zombie]

But what surprised me more was that these Sectoids not only look feral, but they seem completely nuts.

 

Classic NKF-speak. I nominate this as XCOM quote of the year.

 

- Zombie

[FireWarrior]

The limitation on two actions in combat, regardless of effort is an issue for me. If I move one square, then another I can't move again until next turn, which makes absolutely no sense to me. I understand the concept, and the logic behind it, but I disagree with it being good design for a game of this type, I needz my freedom.

The limitation on team size and bases. If we are the most elite, well-funded unit in the world, then why are we limited to one base and one sodding skyranger? A max of 99 soldiers in the base, but no matter how many aliens invade or how large the enemy base is, only 6 will ever be deployed at the same time.

 

Make the alien invasion feel less like an invasion and more like the occasional birthday party gone out of control, at least for me.

[NKF]

I'm not finding the two action thing to be too bad, though do wish the 'move' command was still an action-point based system where you can move as much as you want until your meter runs out. What caught me off guard was when I got into a situation where I wanted to shoot first then move. You can't, at least as far as the starting rookies are concerned. I guess shooting and bravely running away is not encouraged in this game.

 

- NKF

[The Veteran]

The limitations do take a little getting used to but I think it's a pretty well implemented sytem all in all, especially with the addition of certain skillsets later in the game. I think it shows a certain amount of simplification when compared to the original TU system but that's not an inherently bad thing as long as it doesn't detract from the game itself and I personally don't think it does...

The only negative thing I have to say about the movement system is that we should be able to choose whether or not to stop the current move order when a new contact is spotted. You know when you order a ten space move forward and spot a hostile after 3 tiles then move another 7 just for the hell of it while simultaneously losing sight of said hostile?! So none of your other troops can attack it as they don't know where it is and the trooper that spotted it is screwed either way!

 

I do agree about the limitations on squad deployments and the like. It's workable on normal because the aliens have made a pretty half-hearted attempt at invading but on higher difficulties when you get more harshly punished for non-attendance of missions it would be nice to at least be able to field a second team! A good solution would've been further upgrades in Officer facility to station secondary 4 man teams in the other starting countries. But of course then difficulty would need changing drastically to accomodate that and the balance would be thrown completely off. Not a problem had they done it that way from the get go though...

[FireWarrior]

Oh, it's dfinetely a well-implemented system, I just don't like it very much

Purely mechnically speaking, it works fine, even with the limited options the game gives you.

 

What I find rather sad is that placing satelites in other countries made me loose a game. If you discover a UFO and let it leave (ie not interceptors are ready in that continent) it actually costs more in score than not discovering the UFO at all, and simply responding to the mission that pops up.

Had an A score reduced to a D on a monthly report because I had to let 2 UFOs go as the 'ceptors weren't ready in that continent yet (Classic, Ironman Mode), which immediately ended my game as half-a-dozen countries decided to bail because of it.

[ricardo440]

I'm not finding the two action thing to be too bad, though do wish the 'move' command was still an action-point based system where you can move as much as you want until your meter runs out. What caught me off guard was when I got into a situation where I wanted to shoot first then move. You can't, at least as far as the starting rookies are concerned. I guess shooting and bravely running away is not encouraged in this game.

 

- NKF

 

I wished you could shoot and move. Expecially as you can move and shoot (2 actions) but shooting on its own (2 actions)

 

I also wished there was a snap shot (one action) and aimed shot (2 actions) Just think that would have been so easy to implement with their system

 

As for moving. I like the new movement. You have to commit. When a soldier gets up from a crouch to dash for a piece of cover they have to commit, you can't advance one inch at a time and peek for enemies, you dash across and hope you survive.

 

The 6 soldiers thing seemed harsh. There is no room to put expendable losers in your squad in order to try to make them any good.

[The Veteran]

Agreed, the existence of UFOs in the game seems to be similar to that of aliens in the battlescape in that they don't actually exist until you find them for the first time... By not having satellites you can't find the UFOs and therefore they don't really seem to exist at all! It's not like the original when supply ships made bases and terror ships create terror sites after all so really there is ZERO importance to detecting UFOs in this game. When you think about the fact that the only negative points you get with regard to UFOs is the ones that got away then you realise they don't even DO anything. Seems to me the only thing ever done by UFOs is satellite hunting...

[silencer_pl]

That is not true - the more you do the more money you get in next month. Also covering nations with satelites also give you money.

[The Veteran]

That's not what I said... I said the UFOs don't DO anything so if you don't know they're there you don't miss out on anything and there are no negative effects. Just like FireWarrior said initially, you can be punished for detecting a UFO and not dealing with it but if you don't detect it at all there's no punishment so from this we can assume that only the UFOs you detect are actually deemed to exist by the council and the game in general...

[NKF]

Came to the (scripted?) Tokyo terror mission that introduces the Chryssalids. My impressions are thus: The Chryssalids in appearance disappoint me, as they look like your typical dime-a-dozen generic Starcraft alien. Not skully-enough and lacking in carapace and claws. Cosmetics aside, you cannot fault its behaviours. That's spot on.

 

The start of the mission was a breeze and I though it was going to be easy. But suddenly dozens of these things and floaters surrounded and systematically left most of my troops standing, while drooling and dragging their feet. A golden X-Com moment right out of the original. Since I didn't have enough money to hire more troops, it was a restart. Good learning experience though.

 

As for the floaters, I imagine the design team went through this process:

 

Designer 1: The floaters in the original were quite pathetic. They looked dumpy and even though they could fly they just floated about like idiots and didn't do much. How do we make them better?

 

(Silence)

 

Designer 2: Er, stick a jetpack on it?

Designer 1: Brilliant!

 

And it is - sticking a jetpack on them makes them extra menacing. However, I didn't like the fact they could suddenly teleport (well, jump) to a predetermined hidey-spot on the map. They did this and literally surrounded the soldier I had sneaking around what was otherwise an unoccupied edge of the map. At first it was just one. Not a problem - point blank assault rifle attack. Missed. (I'm starting to hate assault rifles - I'm getting better hits with the pistols!) Then several more dropped in on the enemy turn... ouch.

 

Fun times - in the second run I'm learning to appreciate using the assault trooper and heavy trooper together. What a nice pair they make.

 

- NKF

[silencer_pl]

Add S.C.O.P.E to your soldiers - also AIM improves with rank.

 

That's not what I said... I said the UFOs don't DO anything so if you don't know they're there you don't miss out on anything and there are no negative effects. Just like FireWarrior said initially, you can be punished for detecting a UFO and not dealing with it but if you don't detect it at all there's no punishment so from this we can assume that only the UFOs you detect are actually deemed to exist by the council and the game in general...

 

That is still wrong - by not detecting UFOs and by not shooting them down (or detecting them landed) you don't get enough Alien Alloys for armour, weapons, projects. Also excess of their stuff can be sold like Nav systems or Power sources which leads to money.

[The Veteran]

I reserve the scope for snipers only, everyone else should have grenades for those sticky situations! (though I keep forgetting that the standard frag only does 3 damage so I keep leaving half dead floaters in my new game ) I love the floater teleport thing as it uses their whole turn and always leaves them out of cover, but then I NEVER split up my men so for me it's a free kill when they do it. Plus I've rarely had more than one or two of them do it on the same turn...

 

Remember, slowly does it, uncover one group at a time then fall back and kill them before you look for more

[silencer_pl]

Except on terror mission when you must hurry up - the more civilians you save the more panic it reduces. You can lose 4 civilians to have excellent - 8 to have good. Excellent should lower 3 bars. I've never used grenades after first mission with rookies. If I need to destroy cover - heavy is the man.

[The Veteran]

You don't use grenades? seriously? I love 'em

 

And yes you're right on the terror mission, the only casualty I had on my easy game so far was on a terror site with only 6 aliens yet I managed to save about half of them because I was being so careful not to get myself swarmed! Couldn't believe it when the thing ended with just 6 kills, I could've rushed in and saved all 18 ffs

[silencer_pl]

I'll start Let's play probably today on classic ironman - I am doing well with battles except when alien hit you on 25% and you miss on 98%.

[The Veteran]

I'm seriously pissed now... Took that France mission to reduce panic there to 3 knowing full well I would lose India. But panic increases across the whole continent, not just the one country I missed... Funny though how when you DO complete the mission, panic only goes DOWN in that one country. Where's the balance in that???

 

Now I've left out the India mission I'm going to lose India China AND Egypt at the end of the month and this is on EASY ffs!

 

I'm going to try reloading my last base autosave and doing the India mission as well, see if that gives me slightly better results but I'm not sure if it will. This playthrough is turning into a real joke though, I've done every single mission and am flying through R&D yet half the world wants to give up on the project because someone got abducted in India? wtf...

 

Still not a much better result, got FIVE countries on four bars and still got Egypt and France leaving the project in a weeks time... What a pile of crap, I said from the first time I played this that there need to be better ways to combat panic...

 

Somehow managed to keep Egypt despite their 5 bar panic level but France is gone (just like in my other game the cheese-eating surrender monkeys...) Now I have another shitty abduction option though. 4 bars in russia or 5 bars in egypt... Whichever I choose, a minimum of 3 countries will reach 5 bars of panic and there's no way I can stop 4 countries from deserting at the end of the month!

 

Conclusion : the panic system SUCKS! This is an easy game and I'm now convinced it's unsalvageable... I easily wrapped up the Normal game with only 2 countries lost (same month and my first time playing) but this game is just shitting all over me and it's only set to easy! Clearly the difficulty level isn't taken into account for panic and mission locations. Time for some damage control I think...

[silencer_pl]

This game is made to keep you on your toes with every move - it doesn't forgive you errors you do. Before you do any mission - try to evaluate how many countries are in critical state (3+ bars on panic level) in given continent - if there are 2 or 3 you must use mission in that system because the other 2 you will deal with satellites or terror mission or council mission. The easy settings is more for battle rather base part except you should have more money, scientists and engineers which makes advancement easier.

 

The whole region panic is like this. A murderer is on the lose. He kills everyone on your street, house by house unchecked. After few days your house would be next. I guess your panic level would be high that day.

[The Veteran]

Houses on the same street is a bit different from countries on the same continent though If an attack in austalia is going to panic people in India then why do people in Russia not care? It's stupid, especially as Australia is it's own continent anyway

 

But that's exactly my point, I know how to keep panic levels in check as effectively as possible but this game just isn't making it possible. In the original you only lost when you messed up, missed UFOs, left bases unchecked, failed terror missions etc. But this game places more stress on you than you're physically able to respond to thus making some games literally unwinnable! My big problem now is that despite being on Easy and a fair few months in I still have less than 20 engineers so can't even build another satellite array, let alone the nexus I need so badly! Money is easy to come by and missions are a cakewalk but the panic mapping is worse here than my other games (even the Classic one I started off on!) so I can only assume it's completely randomised regardless of difficulty level... Would be nice if they at least gave me more event missions to lower panic in the 3 countries I'm about to lose!