XCOM: Enemy Unknown - Strategy Game - Developed by Firaxis

I'm waiting for Certis to come in here and say "Now? Yup. HAHAHA! SUCKERS!"

Vector wrote:

I'm waiting for Certis to come in here and say "Now? Yup. HAHAHA! SUCKERS!"

That's already been implied by Edwin and Tykl a few times... :/

After reading everything I've missed this past week and those videos!(Jake undercover was great) I can hardly listen to my own rule about pre-ordering on Steam and not seeing the point. The incentives don't nab me just because I already have Civ V and don't really care too much about add on skins and weapons, (unless they break the game, then it makes me frown) but I'm almost to the point where I'm sold on this game before looking at any reviews or watching any game play footage. And on top of all that, I have to be on the road working Tues-Thurs, so the bulk of my extra time after work won't be able to game. So I guess what I'm saying is: Is it better for anyone to pre-order or just wait till I'm back and buy it then after some more discussion is in the air? Don't think Firaxis cares either way as long as I buy it, heh. But just thought I'd put my own fretting up on here. Thanks Tykl for pushing me over the edge on a game I was always on the fence about! I'm all the way in at this point and it's not even out! Firaxis did something right with their hyping this thing up IMO.

If you don't care about the extras, it will only get cheaper. It's not like they can run out of digital copies.

Is $50 going to be the base price then on Steam? Because that is another thing that just makes me love Firaxis! And yea, knew it would only get cheaper, but I plan on getting it either this weekend or by Friday when I get back from the road. Don't think the price will go down between now and then.

Assuming no weird last minute technical snafus, I'll be putting up a video Rob Zacny and I recorded talking about the game and playing multiplayer tomorrow morning around 8AM EST. Set your watches!

Pre-ordering would let you pre-load the game, but that's really the only tangible difference if you don't care about the perks. Personally, I normally buy games only during Steam sales, but I pre-ordered X-COM the first day it was available and if there were a stronger message I could send to say that I think it's awesome this game was made I'd do it. I'm on the verge of the "send the team a case of beer" mark. YMMV.

Sweet.

Did anyone other than me order from Amazon? I feel like I'm the only one here who's not been able to pre-load. I was just wondering if anyone got an email from Amazon telling them to go for it.

Looks like I might be spending my first 2-3 hours after release downloading.

complexmath wrote:

Pre-ordering would let you pre-load the game, but that's really the only tangible difference if you don't care about the perks. Personally, I normally buy games only during Steam sales, but I pre-ordered X-COM the first day it was available and if there were a stronger message I could send to say that I think it's awesome this game was made I'd do it. I'm on the verge of the "send the team a case of beer" mark. YMMV.

Ayup. This for me too. I don't buy many full-price games any more but this was worth it. The last one was Skyrim....

D-Man777 wrote:

Did anyone other than me order from Amazon? I feel like I'm the only one here who's not been able to pre-load. I was just wondering if anyone got an email from Amazon telling them to go for it.

Looks like I might be spending my first 2-3 hours after release downloading.

Oh boo-hoo. Maybe you can wait 3-4 days and join the rest of us being able to play it!

Spoiler:

Seriously though, the servers may be overloaded anyway on release day/morning/whatever as they authenticate and decrypt all the various copies. Seems to be that way with all the big releases and this feels like a big release even though I think they weren't sure it would be...

Duoae wrote:

Oh boo-hoo. Maybe you can wait 3-4 days and join the rest of us being able to play it! ;)

Heck, I may not even be playing it the first week.

I ordered Amazon and chose free shipping (3-5 days). I'm already knee-deep in Borderlands 2 and just couldn't justify spending $8+ to get it faster when my plate is already full.

Duoae wrote:
D-Man777 wrote:

Did anyone other than me order from Amazon? I feel like I'm the only one here who's not been able to pre-load. I was just wondering if anyone got an email from Amazon telling them to go for it.

Looks like I might be spending my first 2-3 hours after release downloading.

Oh boo-hoo. Maybe you can wait 3-4 days and join the rest of us being able to play it!

You're right. But when you're finally able to play it, just sit there and stare at your computer for three hours more instead.

My greater concern is with regard to server status. By pre-loading you avoid (at least the bulk) of the release hour rush and c*ck-ups.

D-Man777 wrote:

You're right. But when you're finally able to play it, just sit there and stare at your computer for three hours more instead.

Haha, will do! To be fair, I usually meet up with friends on Friday evenings so I probably won't play it until Saturday anyway.

My greater concern is with regard to server status. By pre-loading you avoid (at least the bulk) of the release hour rush and c*ck-ups.

Sure.... but not really. Every major release I've had on Steam has had authentication issues regardless if I pre-loaded it or not. Maybe it's just my timezone and my playing times but every time I wonder how the hell Steam/Valve haven't sorted this out yet... Even some sort of temporary "Let everyone play!" signal from the server would be better.... though I have no idea about the technical feasibility of this potentially terrible idea...

Aaron D. wrote:
Duoae wrote:

Oh boo-hoo. Maybe you can wait 3-4 days and join the rest of us being able to play it! ;)

Heck, I may not even be playing it the first week.

I ordered Amazon and chose free shipping (3-5 days). I'm already knee-deep in Borderlands 2 and just couldn't justify spending $8+ to get it faster when my plate is already full.

To be fair, you're playing something else instead. :p

The only thing I'm doing is the GWJ:Aftermath AAR. Which isn't bad, of course, it's just time-consuming.

D-Man777 wrote:

Did anyone other than me order from Amazon? I feel like I'm the only one here who's not been able to pre-load. I was just wondering if anyone got an email from Amazon telling them to go for it.

Looks like I might be spending my first 2-3 hours after release downloading.

Pre-ordered from Amazon, opted for the disc-based console version. Prime shipping means free and on release day, however.

Vector wrote:

I'm waiting for Certis to come in here and say "Now? Yup. HAHAHA! SUCKERS!"

Certis wrote:

Assuming no weird last minute technical snafus, I'll be putting up a video Rob Zacny and I recorded talking about the game and playing multiplayer tomorrow morning around 8AM EST. Set your watches!

Aaaaannd there it is. Jerk.

Vector wrote:

Aaaaannd there it is. Jerk.

But he was pretty subtle about it... almost as if it wasn't that good.... OMG, XCOM is sh*t! I'm cancelling my preorder! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, I'M CANCELLING MY PREORDER!!

Duoae wrote:
Vector wrote:

Aaaaannd there it is. Jerk.

But he was pretty subtle about it... almost as if it wasn't that good.... OMG, XCOM is sh*t! I'm cancelling my preorder! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, I'M CANCELLING MY PREORDER!!

I see you've been on the 2K Games forums.

So what difficulty is everyone going to be playing on for their first play through? I never got too far in the original X-Com, but I like hard games. I am kind of torn between doing Normal Ironmode or Classic difficulty. What about everyone else?

I really don't think MP was a big priority. Put in the framework and enough to legitimize the idea then expand upon it in an expansion. Personally, I don't think I will even touch MP. The bulk of the game is the single player experience.

Only five maps is dissapointing for multiplayer. I understand that there should be many variations in teams for MP, but unless you have a thriving tactical community (i.e. one that treats the maps as football pitches and where richness comes from teams and tactics), then five maps may not be enough of a draw.

Unless you can recruit aliens in SP, then you'll be missing out on, I hope, all sorts of interesting variations in MP. For example, I think there's an alien that knocks down cover as part of his attack, which would be useful for a sniper.

All I know is I'm playing the sh*t right out of this game. I'm even considering taking a sick day on Wednesday (ordered the disc-based version from Amazon. No point in wasting a day waiting for the postman). Haven't done that in about twelve years.

I've got a bad history with preorders. The games I fully paid for the most months in advance (6+ or 12+ where possible) were *drum roll* Tabula Rasa, Spore Collector's Edition, and Elemental: War of Magic. So while XCOM is the game I have been most hyped about since its announcement, and despite me postulating that this release may be the only game more important to the strategy world than multiple Civ releases, part of me is afraid of it joining my wall of failed expectations and embarrassing preorders. But I am tempted by, lol, custom-colored armor, so we'll see if they've gotten my money by Tuesday or not. Go listen to 3MA's XCOM preview episode if you've not done so, because Rob & Bruce's gripes do concern me, as does the possibility of completing missions without having soldiers die, which is a painful break from the past.

Too few multiplayer maps? Don't worry, modders fix everything...in time.

Ironman Classic. Soldiers will earn names and the right to remove their helmet once they've been promoted once. (Someone on some podcast or preview vid came up with that rule. Thank you!)

Assuming they allow modding, I'm sure the PC version will have some exciting stuff. But I'm playing on the 360.

EriktheRed wrote:

So what difficulty is everyone going to be playing on for their first play through? I never got too far in the original X-Com, but I like hard games. I am kind of torn between doing Normal Ironmode or Classic difficulty. What about everyone else?

Ironman Classic right out the gate. It will be epic watching Goodjers die again.

Though the likelihood of me finding time to play this is low, I've officially been swept up by the hype/early impressions and will likely pre-order from Steam today. I want to be part of the conversation.

Keithustus wrote:

Soldiers will earn names and the right to remove their helmet once they've been promoted once. (Someone on some podcast or preview vid came up with that rule. Thank you!)

My rule is: You start with the basic customization until you level up once. Once you get promoted, you get your squad colors and a helmet. Once you get a nickname, you get a class specific color set. Once you reach max promotion, you get to lose your helmet and take a unique color set.

Prozac wrote:
EriktheRed wrote:

So what difficulty is everyone going to be playing on for their first play through? I never got too far in the original X-Com, but I like hard games. I am kind of torn between doing Normal Ironmode or Classic difficulty. What about everyone else?

Ironman Classic right out the gate. It will be epic watching Goodjers die again.

Same here. Classic Ironman to start with, with possible reduction to Normal if things get hairy.

Slacker1913 wrote:
Prozac wrote:
EriktheRed wrote:

So what difficulty is everyone going to be playing on for their first play through? I never got too far in the original X-Com, but I like hard games. I am kind of torn between doing Normal Ironmode or Classic difficulty. What about everyone else?

Ironman Classic right out the gate. It will be epic watching Goodjers die again.

Same here. Classic Ironman to start with, with possible reduction to Normal if it makes me cry.

FTFY. That's the attitude I'm going in with, anyway. Starting on easy mode feels cheap: I don't want to save the world from wimpy aliens.

Tkyl wrote:

My rule is: You start with the basic customization until you level up once. Once you get promoted, you get your squad colors and a helmet. Once you get a nickname, you get a class specific color set. Once you reach max promotion, you get to lose your helmet and take a unique color set.

Is it okay if I'm a bit lazier? How about if they get class-specific armor and a helmet once they've been promoted once so I can eyeball-identify them more quickly. From there I won't change them until they've gotten a nickname OR max-promotion (COL?), at which point I will face them up.