Man up, fans of X-COM! [Xenonauts]

[Aklyon]

On steam now (early access) http://store.steampowered.com/app/223830/

Or here if you had it from previously and want it on steam now.

[Echo35]

On steam now (early access) http://store.steampowered.com/app/223830/

Or here if you had it from previously and want it on steam now.

I registered mine on Steam purely so I don't have to use Desura.

[Wingflier]

I'm a bit confused. Is this just like an improvement of the original XCOM games (kind of like Age of Empires II HD or whatever)?

The graphics seem rather dated, which is why I'm asking that.

I really enjoyed XCOM: Enemy Unknown, which I recently bought on a Steam sale.  Can anyone explain what the major differences are between that one and this game? Why would I buy this one?

[Mick]

My impression is that Xenonauts is made more in the camp of thinking that "change is bad", whereas the Firaxis XCOM was more fine with streamlining the game to modern standards.

What does that mean? Well, if you liked the new XCOM, there is probably not much here for you. If you liked the original XCOM and said "they changed *blah blah blah* so now it sucks!" to the Firaxis remake, then Xenonauts might give you what you are looking for (or it might not).

[Aklyon]

This one is less a remake of X-Com and more a similar game with improvements, but not the best of choices for the engine, which made things harder than they needed to be. For me, theres really only three notable points right now and several less notable ones.
1. This runs on my computer while XCOM doesn't, the graphics are some kind of 3d layered kind of thing if I'm remembering correctly. (its not 3d like XCOM 3d, but it doesn't have the awkward differentiation difficulty with fore/background you normally see in 2.5d either)
2. Its under 10gb, where I think the other one was something like 20 or so. (really only notable because I'm low on HD space right now)
3. This is in beta.

Also, theres certainly changes in Xenonauts. You've got infinite free ammo to start with for all of the basic weapons(including aircraft munitions) to equip with (during missions, you only have what ammo you sent them off with), though I'm not sure if that extends to later weaponry.

[Cyborg]

Why all the XCOM remake hate?

[Wingflier]

I don't think it's hate, it's just seems like people don't see the need for this re-remake.

XCOM: EU was already praised by critics and fans alike as being a wonderful sequel to the series with much improved graphics and game mechanics. From what I can tell, there's just no need for Xenonauts to even exist.

Take for example, Planetary Annihilation. PA is technically the "spiritual successor" to Total Annihilation. But remember than Supreme Commander was originally created to be the spiritual successor the Total Annihilation, sporting better graphics, and adding many mechanics which were (intended to) make it better than the original game. Personally I think it failed miserably but that's another discussion. This is also disregarding TA Spring as well, which is a free 3rd-party attempt to update the Total Annihilation engine while adding several important improvements.

Anyway, if Planetary Annihilation were supposed to be the "spiritual successor" to Total Annihilation, but basically just remade the old game with similar graphics and slightly improved gameplay, I dare say a lot of people would get frustrated and angry at the developer. Instead they are taking the game to the "planetary" scale, which adds an entirely new dimension that has never been tried in an RTS before. So in other words, there is something new and unique there. It isn't just a rehash of a rehash which is exactly what Xenonauts looks like to me.

[Aklyon]

Xenonauts has existed for a lot longer than XCOM has, as far as I know (having the idea hidden somewhere in firaxis while people bemoan the FPS idea doesn't count). This isn't a new thing thats popped up since/near the release of EU, its a thing thats not gotten a lot of attention because its only been in anything you'd call stable recently.

[KingIsaacLinksr]

I don't think it's hate, it's just seems like people don't see the need for this re-remake.

XCOM: EU was already praised by critics and fans alike as being a wonderful sequel to the series with much improved graphics and game mechanics. From what I can tell, there's just no need for Xenonauts to even exist.

I disagree that EU has better game mechanics to the point that Xeno doesn't need to exist. EU is certainly a very good attempt at bringing turn-based strategy to a more mainstream audience, but it suffers from a number of problems and issues (bugs and camera problems) that Firaxis doesn't seem willing to work on fixing. If an indie developer can take what EU did and really improve upon it to a polished shine, I'll be a lot more interested in the game. EU certainly sucked me in, but I disagreed with a lot of the mechanics laid in place. Mostly to do with the limit of soldiers, the difficulty cliff that shows up in the late-game, some of the ridiculous chance-based feeling to the game and a few other things that don't come to mind atm. Not to mention, everyone has an American accent and good grief does that bother the vanity part of me.

I think its great that both EU and Xeno exist at the same time. Both offer different experiences (from what I can tell of Xeno anyway, not bought it yet) and there isn't anything wrong with that.

[Aklyon]

As good as EU is as far as I've seen, Xenonauts starts you off with a proper squad of at least 6 people, and as soon as you've researched/built one (one of the earlier researches), an armed scout car. None of those RPG party-sized shenanigans.

[keith.lamothe]

EU is awesome.

Xenonauts is much closer to the "high-resolution-patch for the original XCOM" that I've been hoping for for a long time

[Wingflier]

As good as EU is as far as I've seen, Xenonauts starts you off with a proper squad of at least 6 people, and as soon as you've researched/built one (one of the earlier researches), an armed scout car. None of those RPG party-sized shenanigans.

At least for EU, the bigger the squad, the less enjoyable it was for me in general. This is because 75% of the time or more you're just moving your entire squad (1 by 1) from cover to cover without any battle actually occurring. You have no idea where the enemy is except for sometimes "sound". So basically you have to move slowly across the battlefield making sure you're in proper cover so that when you encounter them you don't get caught out of position and slaughtered. With 6 soldiers (as opposed to 4), this got very tedious after about 20 missions. Sure, the battles are actually enjoyable. And unlike King, I like the random aspect (it can be mitigated, and just like MTG and other chance-based games, skill ultimately decides the winner most the time) because it keeps it interesting and fresh. What I don't like is slowly moving my units around waiting for an engagement. Sometimes I get into an engagement, win it, then have to move around the map again looking for another big engagement. This was very anti-climactic to say the least. So unless Xenonauts properly addresses this, I can't see 'bigger squad sizes' as a good thing.

[Aklyon]

Well, technically you can start with 10. But you can't fit 10 and a scout car in the chinook, you can fit 6; I don't really need 10 people anyway when I have a fairly durable vehicle that can scout well and can shoot things if necessary. I'd just add more rocket launchers if I had the spare people anyway, explosive scouting isn't any worse than normal scouting and you get the bonus of the occasional dead alien instead of the drawback of the occasional dead lead soldier.

Aside from that though, Its less cover-focused than EU, a bit more like the original with added weapons: Cover is good, but you have the varied weaponry (and TU reserve slider) for a reason: if someone has a shotgun and extra TUs (or a pistol, though thats a rather bad idea until they fix and reintroduce the buggy combat shield), they aren't going to do better if they're just as far away as your riflemen, or snipers, or rocketeers. Bravely go further than the others and blast the xenos in the face if you find one. If you don't, then thats less space to check later with the slower/possibly less brave non-shotgun people. If you do and run out of ammo (I haven't, but I take extra ammo for a reason), pick up the dead alien's weapon and hope it doesn't run out of ammo before your team runs out of xenos.

Also the aliens don't not-exist and then pop out in clumps and take a free move on your behalf. They're usually relatively close to each other, but reaction fire not counted, they have to wait until it is actually their turn to move, and they exist on the map as soon as you get there in whats seemed like a somewhat random fashion. If you manage to get a reaction-fire rocket shot and kill the alien who walked into your vision during its turn on the second turn, then you're doing pretty dang great and I kinda wish that would happen for me more often than just the one time.

Also also, they recently re-added back in being able to take and hold the ufo instead of always having to go alien hunting. So if you find the ufo first and kill anything inside, if you can hold it long enough, you don't have to finagle cover and scour the map for aliens, you succeed.

[zespri]

Anyway, if Planetary Annihilation were supposed to be the "spiritual successor" to Total Annihilation, but basically just remade the old game with similar graphics and slightly improved gameplay, I dare say a lot of people would get frustrated and angry at the developer.

Uhm, this is not so obvious to me. There are a some old games that I'm hoping for remake with updated graphics. I would not be too disappointed if the mechanics would not be too different from the old game. I would expect *some* innovations of course, but mostly I want to play the same game that I knew and loved in the modern setting (read updated visuals).

Case in point: Dungeon Keeper 2. Recently I looked at the promo screenshots/video of war for the overlord and by the look of it, they are targeting folks just like me. There are so many things there recognizable from DK2. Given the lot of recent flops (Dungeons, A Game of Dwarfs, Impire) I don't have very high hopes, but that's beside the point. The point is "the old game with updated graphics and slightly improved gameplay" is exactly what some people are looking for, so there is no reason to be frustrated or angry. On the other hand, haters gonna hate.

[Aklyon]

Here's a list of stuff that I know about that seems improved that is currently working in some way compared to the original X-Com in Xenonauts to help with zespri's point:
-You're always guaranteed at least 2 early ufos to kickstart the research. If you somehow fail both you're off to a terrible start and should probably ponder why you've got such terrible luck recently.
-You don't have to buy ammo (or guns for that matter) for basic weaponry. Need an assault rifle and 3 magazines? You have plenty on hand. Pistols are also available.
Need a rocket launcher, 3 explosive rockets, and 2 AP rockets now? They're around here somewhere, if a bit heavy to lug all of that around.
Need an advanced medkit? No, you have to research that. But if you can spare the weight (and the backpack space) you can give everyone a bog standard medkit.
Grenades? Plenty. Shotgun? yep. Sniper rifle? Mhm.
Light Machine gun? I wouldn't recommend it over the rocket launcher but its there if you prefer bullets to explosives on your strong soldiers.
-Autopsies are automatically completed instead of eating up useful research time.
-Some items (like alien weapons, which you can't do anything with but empty the loaded clip) are auto-sold (or turned into extra alenium once you get to that point in science), although theres still items you can sell if you need to. Money can still a problem, but its not that hard to modify something in manufacturing to be slightly profitable if you want to bother doing so before you start.
-The text on the button is a bit broken in the soldiers screen (or isn't supposed to be in that particular spot anymore, they've been working on a new, better looking UI for the base screens like geoscape/research/manufacturing), but you can use it to train new Privates up a rank if you can wait for them to return in 10 days. Or you can ignore the safer, slow route and have the traditional trial-by-xeno for your new recruits