- Joined
- Sep 5, 2019
Only until I get banned
X-COM, XCOM and their derivatives - Including: Xenonauts, Phoenix Point, and assorted tactical turn-based alien shoot-a-thons
- Thread starter Corn Flakes
- Start date
- Joined
- Feb 10, 2019
- Joined
- Apr 25, 2020
That's the reason why I like the new XCOM games (Enemy Unknown far more than XCOM 2). Sure, sometimes I'm in the mood for a lot of complexity and micromanagement and then I go back and play UFO Defense (or TFTD if I'm feeling particularly masochistic), but when I'm not in that mood the old games feel... I think fussy would be the best way to describe them. Because they expect you to realistically prepare, but they don't give you a realistic setting to play with, and punish you for it regardless.
We just flew over the damn farm in order to land on it, even if we can't see the aliens holed up in the farmhouse or in the corn fields, we should at least know where the buildings are instead of being so deep in fog of war it might as well be a Civilization game. Meanwhile, the pilot should have more than two braincells to rub together and not land us in the middle of an obvious ambush. And the soldiers (humanity's finest, amirite?) should remember to bring their gear whether or not I told them to. The reboot removes a lot of complexity, but at the same time it removes all that infuriating fussiness and those "oh, right. I forgot about that tiny thing that fucked me over, time to savescum" moments. After all, who would have thought professional, well-trained soldiers would automatically take cover behind... cover?
- Joined
- Jan 28, 2018
xpirates looks like a 90s feverdream I could've had when I was playing way too much enemy unknown/defense.
Dark Edea
kiwifarms.net
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- Jul 20, 2020
- Joined
- Sep 25, 2019
Those missions are on the low end of the starting spectrum. I mentioned the Crackhouse mission in the LP thread because not only was that where the game grabbed me, but its also indicative of the majority of the early missions.
Its all that and more.
- Joined
- May 25, 2020
I've been playing the everloving hell out of XCOM2 ever since I dug into the mods. Way more enemy variety, smarter enemy AI, random raiding factions that may make a mission easier or may instagib several members of your squad, and most importantly a Rich Evans voice pack.
XCOM2 at higher difficulties with these mods enabled is still plenty challenging, though it can't approach the old ones. But it's just so fucking cinematic. There are so many voice packs, it's insane - I've got the complete cast of Seinfeld, Rich & Mike, the Nostalgia Critic, DSP, CWC, Doctor Robotnik, Samurai Jack, Aniki/Gachi, the stellar voice acting from Dawn of War, JC Denton, Goro Majima, Ryo Hazuki, L4D & TF2, tons from Mass Effect, Donald Trump, Francis York Morgan... the list goes on and on and on. That's the real charm of the game - plug those difficult mods in, throw in the mods for stat & growth randomization on all characters, slap in 'flanks that hit = crits for everyone, slap it on Commander or Legend, Ironman it, and you'll get some real stories of heroism and the deck being stacked against you.
In my current campaign, Zoey has become a shinobi killing machine that can solo Chosen, General Sturnn from DoW: Winter Assault is capable of killing 8 people in a single overwatch because he got the god-RNG, DSP is a lifesaving medic alongside Shrek, and Joey Wheeler commands a drone from his duel disk while shouting "inferno fire blast!" when throwing a grenade. That's the real draw of the game right there to me - fantastic presentation, fantastic camp, and cinematic fun that still punishes you heavily for playing like a retard.
XCOM2 at higher difficulties with these mods enabled is still plenty challenging, though it can't approach the old ones. But it's just so fucking cinematic. There are so many voice packs, it's insane - I've got the complete cast of Seinfeld, Rich & Mike, the Nostalgia Critic, DSP, CWC, Doctor Robotnik, Samurai Jack, Aniki/Gachi, the stellar voice acting from Dawn of War, JC Denton, Goro Majima, Ryo Hazuki, L4D & TF2, tons from Mass Effect, Donald Trump, Francis York Morgan... the list goes on and on and on. That's the real charm of the game - plug those difficult mods in, throw in the mods for stat & growth randomization on all characters, slap in 'flanks that hit = crits for everyone, slap it on Commander or Legend, Ironman it, and you'll get some real stories of heroism and the deck being stacked against you.
In my current campaign, Zoey has become a shinobi killing machine that can solo Chosen, General Sturnn from DoW: Winter Assault is capable of killing 8 people in a single overwatch because he got the god-RNG, DSP is a lifesaving medic alongside Shrek, and Joey Wheeler commands a drone from his duel disk while shouting "inferno fire blast!" when throwing a grenade. That's the real draw of the game right there to me - fantastic presentation, fantastic camp, and cinematic fun that still punishes you heavily for playing like a retard.
Stop using half cover and don't dash unless you're absolutely sure it's safe/necessary. Use overwatch for people you're pretty sure aren't exposed, hunker down for those that might be exposed, and don't bring tired people on missions unless you want them to panic or get mind controlled. Also, remember you can lose a level and retreat if absolutely necessary.
- Joined
- Aug 23, 2018
It would feel wrong to have the first playthrough of a game be mods, but I'm tempted for XPiratez.
It's not helped by me finding the optimum way to play the games boring. They added timers to most missions to reduce the overwatch creep, but the grenade spam tactics still work (lure the enemy to destructible cover, grenade it and then focus fire once it's exposed). There's also optimal builds and tech tree progression that I can't be bothered with. eg. I like using SHIVs in EU/EW, but they take XP from your squad members.
That's part of the problem. Half cover is useless due in part to enemies on Classic+ getting an additive +10% to hit. Iirc the enemies get more health, your soldiers get less. I've seen difficulty mods that remove those bonuses and just have the AI changes, though I don't know if they work.
It's not helped by me finding the optimum way to play the games boring. They added timers to most missions to reduce the overwatch creep, but the grenade spam tactics still work (lure the enemy to destructible cover, grenade it and then focus fire once it's exposed). There's also optimal builds and tech tree progression that I can't be bothered with. eg. I like using SHIVs in EU/EW, but they take XP from your squad members.
- Joined
- Apr 25, 2020
So, Phoenix Point.
As I mentioned in the OP, this was Julian Gollop looking at XCOM: Enemy Unknown and saying "oh yeah? Then I'll make my own X-COM! With blackjack! And hookers!" and then proceeding to demonstrate what happens when a game designer stuck in the late 90s tries to make a game in the 2010s. I didn't bother buying it myself (EGS exclusive, and by the time it came out on Steam I had forgotten about it) but I did watch a good few gameplay videos and it looks like an overdesigned, unbalanced mess. Too many plates to spin, too many "gotcha!" moments when you finally find a strategy that works, and a world that just isn't very interesting. Which is an achievement considering how much I like Lovecraft-inspired crap.
Any Kiwis around who actually played it and would like to share their experiences with that one? Any memorable moments? Did the Year One edition improve it in any way?
As I mentioned in the OP, this was Julian Gollop looking at XCOM: Enemy Unknown and saying "oh yeah? Then I'll make my own X-COM! With blackjack! And hookers!" and then proceeding to demonstrate what happens when a game designer stuck in the late 90s tries to make a game in the 2010s. I didn't bother buying it myself (EGS exclusive, and by the time it came out on Steam I had forgotten about it) but I did watch a good few gameplay videos and it looks like an overdesigned, unbalanced mess. Too many plates to spin, too many "gotcha!" moments when you finally find a strategy that works, and a world that just isn't very interesting. Which is an achievement considering how much I like Lovecraft-inspired crap.
Any Kiwis around who actually played it and would like to share their experiences with that one? Any memorable moments? Did the Year One edition improve it in any way?
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- Joined
- Jul 25, 2016
Phoenix Point was okay. It was by no means bad and appreciate the features like the vehicles and the better aiming system, but I still prefer XCOM 2: War of the Chosen. I haven't played the Year One edition yet.
On a different note, does Othercide count as an XCOM derivative? It's basically XCOM meets Claymore written and directed by H.P. Lovecraft. And I love it.
- Joined
- Apr 25, 2020
That one feels a bit more like a Tactics-style game. You have a main character as opposed to a X-COM-style squad of nobodies. Or am I getting that wrong and that's just the tutorial?
Also, if I were going to be perfectly honest, this thread would be titled "Laser Squad and its derivatives", but that game got completely overshadowed by its spiritual successor, X-COM.
Just Some Other Guy
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Mar 25, 2018
- Joined
- Jul 25, 2016
You play as the "Mother" in the tutorial mission. She then later becomes something akin to a "mission control" while you use "daughters" that are germinated from her blood.
Here's a summary of my experience:
Othercide is fucking amazing! The lore, the gameplay, the artstyle and the absolute banger of a soundtrack (the Surgeon boss fight theme being my favourite). It came out last year almost unnoticed from what I've seen and is one of my personal choices for GOTY. It's a shame it didn't get the love and attention it deserves.
- Joined
- May 25, 2020
I played the base XCOM2 without any mods, and from what I can tell of AI improvements, the mods have made the enemies smarter in WOTC. I found in my base game playthrough that most enemies would try to get closer to you if it meant that they had a better shot, regardless of cover or your units' position; since I threw in the patches, they've been much more prone to sit in heavy cover and plonk away from a far distance. The stun lancers have also become more prone to actually firing their gun rather than trying to run through no-man's land to tickle someone.
I might enjoy that for the challenge, but something more "fair" would be the Second Wave mods. I have the stats of my soldiers as well as enemy soldiers randomized, so it is that I both have a handful of naturally-beefy boys (who still get gibbed in 2-3 shots outside of cover) and the enemy has shieldbearers with like 5 armor and 7 health in the early game. One brief campaign playthrough, this gave the Nostalgia Critic such low will that he would immediately panic if anyone took any damage - it adds to the natural storytelling, imo.
There's a mod that makes grenades and especially rockets far less accurate, which makes this tactic far less reliable. I've always been bothered by explosives being guaranteed hits/damage, so I would recommend this one even if you want to keep things otherwise the same.
No real way around that one, although I will say that it helps to have an expanded class arrangement like Long War. I don't know exactly which one I grabbed, but it extends the number of classes to 8, offers 3+ choices per tier with the ability to spend squad points to get them even more abilities, and broadly rebalances some of the more busted shit to later tiers. In the base game it takes forever to get psionics going, but you can get lucky and have a psi op get domination out the gate and trivialize a lot of encounters with it. Psi ops are a base class in whatever mod I have, but they're basically just rookies with a few tricks until they've significantly upgraded themselves.
- Joined
- Sep 25, 2019
I'm not so sure about that to be honest. I'm probably the biggest fan of Laser Squad on this website and I still haven't played it once. I just downloaded the music circa 2013 and have had that theme song stuck in my head since. I guess I'll try it out at some point fairly soon just to say I did, I'll let the thread know if I do.
In other news, OpenApoc appears to have unfucked itself:
It looks like its still mostly the work of one dude who struggles with English but hey I'll accept this damn thing in Klingon as long as somebody can get it working.
- Joined
- Jun 2, 2020
I will always advocate the Mechatronic Warfare mod. Having SPARKs be as useful as nuCOM 1's MECs, and sooner, is just too good to pass up. In fact, the mod is probably busted as shit in the player's favor, but I don't give a fuck - I just want my big stompy robot to saunter over and ram its fist so far down the Warlock's throat that he'll be shitting gears for a month (because he rolled Weak to Melee, also fuck him) and not instantly die in the attempt.
There's also a favorite of mine that makes the alien rulers and the pod they spawn with hostile to everything. Yeah, it means they get their bullshit reaction turns every time ADVENT moves, but it also means that, usually, they're going absolutely ham on the same alien troops due to proximity - and also getting shot to hell in the meantime. And the times when the ruler decides to use its gorillion turns and flatten half my squad on ADVENT's phase? Meh, can't win 'em all.
- Joined
- Dec 16, 2019
Isn't there a mod that removes that absolute bullshit? Free reactions are an absolute disaster for action-based mechanics like XCOM. Imagine fighting a boss in a TTRPG who got to pull off some bullshit every time a PC moved.
- Joined
- Sep 7, 2016
Alright newbie, we see that the stats indicate that you can move very far in a single turn. Here's your jumpsuit and stun baton, you're going to rush an Etheral. No you don't get any weapons, too dangerous around psionics. If you see a Chryssalid just keep running.
It blew my mind the first time that my base was invaded and for the first time in the game I was fighting in an environment that I knew very well(sort of).
It blew my mind the first time that my base was invaded and for the first time in the game I was fighting in an environment that I knew very well(sort of).
- Joined
- May 25, 2020
There's one that simply gives the Chosen like 3-4 moves in a row alongside one that significantly reworks the alien bosses, giving them reaction moves on every offensive turn-ending action, a chance to react to non-offensive actions, and no chance of getting a reaction on moves or something -- all of which I think you can tweak, including the percentages.
Chosen getting a lot of moves in a row is still stressful and hard to deal with, but you're at least able to plan a little better. I don't entirely know how I feel about it, though, as it makes them fairly easy to mow down in a single turn provided you have a squad capable of that.