UFO: Enemy Unknown, remake by Firaxis

[sherbz]

Ah yes. That game. We have dismissed those memories.

Like a bad dream?

I must be honest, I was entertained by it, and i dont even own it. I just cannot believe how someone could release something so bad.

 

[Arakhor]

I've never played it either, but it's famously bad, worse even than Erotica Island, which PC Gamer famously gave a 0/5 rating and called it a freak.

 

[kgoodrid]

Take away the differences in graphic quality, and honestly I prefer the older style. The new Muton looks like a villain from a superhero comic, while the Floater looks like a Games Workshop Necron.
And in the original they could ask for a trained sniper and get someone with accuracy 40...

Think of it as an emergency response - they probably have limited resources to draw from. After all if the nations of the game universe had armies or even special forces they wouldn't need to send 6-man teams armed with basic weaponry to do the job...

Seriously? Art and graphics are largely a matter of taste, but come on...you are calling the new Muton cartoonish compared to the old one? Just look at the attached pic. A purple guy in a green suit. Not exactly the most serious looking bad guy. THAT is super villian-ish in the most negative way.

The original X-COM had a great rogue's gallery, but they were fairly cartoonish. Remember the grinning snakemen and chryssalids? Great enemies, but acting like the new alien depictions are somehow cartoonish in comparison seems a little over the top. Subjective, but still...

As far as the Soldiers and equipment provided, I have always seen it as the nations keeping their own forces busy to protect themselves while sending support to X-COM as well. The new game supports this because you actually see national forces on the battlefield, mostly blown up already.

I would like it if you could request specific classess of Soldiers if you have enough influence, demonstrating the increased support from a nation. Moderate support would mean that they would send you troops, but it would be random. Low support means no troops.

 

[sherbz]

Im off to play. Finished work, clocked out, off to lock myself in my room, not to surface until I have been cooked dinner, which i will take back to my room to consume whilst destroying alien scum

 

[PhilBowles]

Seriously? Art and graphics are largely a matter of taste, but come on...you are calling the new Muton cartoonish compared to the old one? Just look at the attached pic. A purple guy in a green suit. Not exactly the most serious looking bad guy. THAT is super villian-ish in the most negative way.

The green's fur from the description (and I don't need to see the image, I've been fighting old-style Mutons for several days) - they always looked like green gorillas to me rather than guys in superhero costume (the old Floater's closer on that score, but I think they were aiming for a B-movie vampire look rather than a caped supervillain). They look cartoonish more because they're pixels than because of the style.

The original X-COM had a great rogue's gallery, but they were fairly cartoonish. Remember the grinning snakemen and chryssalids? Great enemies, but acting like the new alien depictions are somehow cartoonish in comparison seems a little over the top. Subjective, but still...

For me a lot of it lies in context. What X-COM did superbly back in the day was take all the alien abduction and B-movie cliches and tie them together into a story (while the second game's gillmen were a straight rip-off of Dr Who's Silurians, themselves I believe inspired by David Icke's infamous space lizards). B-movies have bugs, monster monkeys, space vampires and all the rest - I think snakemen were probably taken from alien abduction/UFO conspiracy lore along with Sectoids and element 115.

The thing with the new ones, I suppose, is that they're cartoony but without that context - they look like someone (and, sadly, not a particularly imaginative someone) decided to make these monsters "their own" rather than homages, and so all that remains is the cartoon divorced of the context.

I would like it if you could request specific classess of Soldiers if you have enough influence, demonstrating the increased support from a nation. Moderate support would mean that they would send you troops, but it would be random. Low support means no troops.

Actually, I'd like that. It would also be a way of reflecting in the new system a tendency in the old one for the average stats of your new rookies to increase as the game went on.

 

[AlpsStranger]

Well, since I'm not seeing this degenerate into a bashfest, I do actually have some criticisms.

- Soldiers should "remember" what equipment you gave them without requiring you to manually take it off of them. The way the new game is set up you never need, for instance, more than 6 Laser Rifles ( Don't worry though, they can be quite expensive to get. ) Sometimes, though, you have to back out and take on off of a soldier you have in reserve. It's annoying and unnecessary.

- I really wish that the forge was more extensive. I'd love to be able to increase the clip size on a laser rifle or increase the radius of grenades.

- The maps need to have a more legitimately international flavor. Perhaps this could be an expansion or DLC? Anyhow, I'd love to deploy into the middle of the savannah, a desert in Egypt, or in the middle of a bustling Japanese city.

- Similarly, soldiers need to have noticeable accents. Maybe we need Varietas Delectat for X-Com

 

[AlpsStranger]

I just had to share a great review from Metacritic. It's a little crude, but I think it's spot on.

First of all, ignore any metrosexual hipsters who rate this game 6 or less. On its own, XCOM is an amazingly solid turn-based strategy game with compelling story elements. If you like squad-based tactical games, you’re not going to find anything better in the last ten years. For fans of the original XCOM – and I am one of the biggest XCOM nerds you’ll find anywhere – this game does lack some of the micromanagement features that added depth to the first title. This bothered me at first, until I remembered how much I hated having to go in before every mission and make sure every pixelated man had the appropriate pixelated gear on his pixels. Prepping for a mission could take half an hour, and managing how many clips I had on hand for each of my many weapons was more of a pain in the ass than fun. Seriously, do you want to spend time counting clips, assigning engineers to useless projects, and juggling all the inventory boxes for your 18 troops, or do you want to get in the trenches? XCOM is all about the combat, and everything else revolves around that. If we spend less time micromanaging and more time melting faces, I’m all for it. Also, anyone who says this game is dumbed down for consoles has no appreciation for elegant design. That you are clicking fewer buttons does not mean the game is dumber. GTFO.

 

[Maniacal]

All I see is whining about other people whining.

 

[scratchthepitch]

All I see is whining about other people whining.

Turn the game's sound off, or turn off your speakers.

 

[Maniacal]

I don't think we are referring to the same things buugus the champion of karzath.

 

[PhilBowles]

I just had to share a great review from Metacritic. It's a little crude, but I think it's spot on.

It doesn't seem to have anything much to say about the new game, only criticisms of the old one that to me at least seem misjudged. You never had more than 15 or so liens in a mission, and 10+ soldiers. You'd need very inaccurate soldiers to need to reload regularly with anything but blaster and small launchers. In my current runthrough, I haven't needed to reload with plasma weapons once.

 

[Maniacal]

Look, from what I have read the new xcom seems pretty decent and they didn't screw it up. its not perfect, and neither should people refrain from criticising it, but can we please move on to more actual game discussion and less whining about reviews and which xcom is better?

 

[scratchthepitch]

Look, from what I have read the new xcom seems pretty decent and they didn't screw it up. its not perfect, and neither should people refrain from criticising it, but can we please move on to more actual game discussion and less whining about reviews and which xcom is better?

Let's all whine about others whining. That will surely move the discussion forward.

 

[PhilBowles]

I've started seeing reports that the campaign has already been beaten, which alarms me somewhat - according to Steam, I'm 35 hours into the original since getting a Steam copy, all devoted to the same campaign (now November 1999, and I'm researching the final two techs needed to reach Mars). How long does the new one tend to take?

 

[AlpsStranger]

I apologize for my hijacking activities.

Please, ignore the entire meta debate I started and just focus on discussing this awesome slice of gaming we've been served.

Honestly, multiplatform or not, this is a far better offering than Civ5.

 

[scratchthepitch]

How long does the new one tend to take?

In a video posted several pages back, the designer said it should take 20-25 hours on one of the medium levels of difficulty (I think).

 

[Maniacal]

Normal diff is apparently pretty easy.

 

[AlpsStranger]

Normal diff is apparently pretty easy.

It may be "Chest beating PC-Strategy gamer" easy, but normal difficulty is definitely pretty hard by wider audience standards.

EDIT: Ironman makes a big difference as well. If I can save scum then I agree that normal is easy, but ironman turns even normal into a nailbiter. ( IMO, anyhow ) The experience of having a cyberdisc "transform" and then immediately annihilate your most seasoned medic is not one you soon forget.

 

[AlpsStranger]

Does anyone else feel like Dr. Vahlen "misplaced" the family cat once or twice growing up?

EDIT: If the goes M. Night Shyamalan or something please don't mention it, or put it in spoiler tags.

 

[Maniacal]

Please stop double posting.

EDIT: Wow, scumbag firaxis/2kgames region locked the game in the latest patch after release. That is pretty bloody ridiculous and dumb.