XCOM: Enemy Unknown - Strategy Game - Developed by Firaxis

iaintgotnopants wrote:

What happens if you ignore an abduction mission? Does that panic go up in all three places or does it just go away? I'm in a bit of a bind because I wasn't focusing on making satellites and the next abduction mission is going to screw me unless I get a council mission before the end of the month. If I can just ignore the abduction though and not have panic increase anywhere, that would be super awesome (but I'm guessing that's not the case).

Is it possible to change somebody's class? For some reason, it keeps turning my recruits into snipers and I picked one up as a reward. I've got like five snipers and only one assault. That seems non-ideal.

Panic goes way up every time you fail or ignore a mission, plus the aliens advance in their secret plans and you miss out on the experience...

And I don't think you can change classes... Need to recruit and level up rookies for that.

I'm going to try and play this again, last time my super awesome Alpha Mega-Killer Squad got super wiped out (except for one tough chick who managed to escape), and I was left with nothing but rookies : /

No class changes are available. What you want is the upgrade which makes all of your new recruits automatically get the first promotion. That way you know what classes you're working with before spending mission time grooming them.

Ignoring missions by choice is confusing to me. It's like the warp whistle from Mario 3. Don't you WANT to play the game? (smiley face)

I believe that it's how you use the rookies that determines their specialization. So if you want someone to be an Assault, move them up into the fight. If you want Support, give them a medpack, and so forth.

maverickz wrote:

Ignoring missions by choice is confusing to me. It's like the warp whistle from Mario 3. Don't you WANT to play the game? (smiley face)

When the mission guarantees that you're going to have max panic in either all of North America or three quarters of Europe, it would be advantageous to ignore the mission if that doesn't result in increased panic until the next month when I'm due to have more satellites available.

Robear wrote:

I believe that it's how you use the rookies that determines their specialization. So if you want someone to be an Assault, move them up into the fight. If you want Support, give them a medpack, and so forth.

That would explain things since I tend to be really passive with new recruits since they're so much weaker than my main dudes.

Robear wrote:

I believe that it's how you use the rookies that determines their specialization. So if you want someone to be an Assault, move them up into the fight. If you want Support, give them a medpack, and so forth.

Nope. It is pseudo random. Random, but weighted towards classes you have few of. What the rookies do before they are promoted has no bearing on what class they become.

Tkyl wrote:
Robear wrote:

I believe that it's how you use the rookies that determines their specialization. So if you want someone to be an Assault, move them up into the fight. If you want Support, give them a medpack, and so forth.

Nope. It is pseudo random. Random, but weighted towards classes you have few of. What the rookies do before they are promoted has no bearing on what class they become.

I sort of figured that. Especially after the whole "the new guy" perk shows up in OCS.

Just announced they're bringing the full game to iOS this summer.

Two things I'd love:

1) Put the Win 8 touch interface on top of Xcom like they did on Civ V. I've been playing Civ V a lot on my Lenovo Yoga while I've been traveling, and it works surprisingly well. Xcom runs on the Yoga. Not great, but it's playable if I scale down the resolution. I've been playing it with an Xbox controller plugged up to hotel TVs via HDMI, but having touch would allow me to use it as a plane game, too.

2) Android as well.

EDIT: And they're putting Xcom squads in Civ V!

Tkyl wrote:
Robear wrote:

I believe that it's how you use the rookies that determines their specialization. So if you want someone to be an Assault, move them up into the fight. If you want Support, give them a medpack, and so forth.

Nope. It is pseudo random. Random, but weighted towards classes you have few of. What the rookies do before they are promoted has no bearing on what class they become.

It does seem to have improved somewhat since launch. Were there any changes made or did I just get unlucky? I remember one game that I simply quit because I ran out of money and had literally one assault and one support in 20 odd soldiers.

My XCOM directory is 12.7 GB. My iPad only ever has a couple of GB free. How?

That'll be mostly textures, video, audio, and the like. Solution? Lower-resolution textures, less audio, less video.

I wish they would stop ignoring Android.

Edwin wrote:

I wish they would stop ignoring Android.

Agreed. Maybe if they sell enough on ios, they'll port it there, too.

I'd still take Civ Rev on Android.

This is not the XCOM news I would even hope for! :/

Duoae wrote:

This is not the XCOM news I would even hope for! :/

Why? I don't even have an ios device myself (we have an ipad in the house, but I don't use it), but I think it's great.

Yes, I want a full blown expansion, too. But this is kind of cool

MannishBoy wrote:
Duoae wrote:

This is not the XCOM news I would even hope for! :/

Why? I don't even have an ios device myself (we have an ipad in the house, but I don't use it), but I think it's great.

Yes, I want a full blown expansion, too. But this is kind of cool

I just don't enjoy playing on or using touch screens. They're, to my experience, imprecise and laggy - not conducive to something that requires dense command interfaces or fiddly sensitivity and reaction time.

Even without that, I would still hope for a sequel - not even an expansion. I don't think they could/would add in the features I'd really like in an expansion for an expansion's price range.

Duoae wrote:

I just don't enjoy playing on or using touch screens. They're, to my experience, imprecise and laggy - not conducive to something that requires dense command interfaces or fiddly sensitivity and reaction time.

Even without that, I would still hope for a sequel - not even an expansion. I don't think they could/would add in the features I'd really like in an expansion for an expansion's price range.

I've been playing Civ V on my touchscreen Ultrabook flipped over into tablet mode on the plane a lot lately, and it works surprisingly well for turn based gaming where you have limited space.

Also going to Civ V, God and Kings was a great expansion to a good core game. I'd take some of that for Xcom while I assume they work on a full blown sequel a couple of years out.

And a port of the existing game to a new platform shouldn't really have to slow any of the above much. Look at it as a way for them to make more money from this franchise, which makes it much more likely to be a franchise they continue to invest in.

Duoae wrote:

touch screens. They're, to my experience, imprecise and laggy - not conducive to something that requires dense command interfaces or fiddly sensitivity and reaction time

Great! Then you agree it will be perfect for XCOM.

It's so cute watching the new people learn about XCOM game mechanics. Try not to get all of your rookies killed ha ha!

I'm hoping that Firaxis focuses on making the campaign more varied rather than more predictable. That's the main reason why I wasn't excited about the Slingshot DLC. I guess what I'm hoping for is a map pack and a chance to shoot down (or fail to shoot down) more than 1 UFO each month.

Keithustus wrote:
Duoae wrote:

touch screens. They're, to my experience, imprecise and laggy - not conducive to something that requires dense command interfaces or fiddly sensitivity and reaction time

Great! Then you agree it will be perfect for XCOM.

I was talking to DocBadWrench about his perfect tablet and he lamented the same thing with regards to accuracy.

MannishBoy wrote:
Duoae wrote:

This is not the XCOM news I would even hope for! :/

Why? I don't even have an ios device myself (we have an ipad in the house, but I don't use it), but I think it's great.

Yes, I want a full blown expansion, too. But this is kind of cool

They showed a teaser video at the end of their PAX panel that strongly alluded to an expansion, so I think we'll see one.

Edwin wrote:
Keithustus wrote:
Duoae wrote:

touch screens. They're, to my experience, imprecise and laggy - not conducive to something that requires dense command interfaces or fiddly sensitivity and reaction time

Great! Then you agree it will be perfect for XCOM.

I was talking to DocBadWrench about his perfect tablet and he lamented the same thing with regards to accuracy.

Do want!

Seriously, if I could get that on my phone - even the 10ms example - that'd be awesome. Having to wait to type and or use the interface is my main gripe about it... especially if you've got a screen password or "gesture" to unlock the phone.

As an aside, I actually think it would make sense for them to mod back in that "confirm move" button in to the core game on PC as a choosable option. I think at least some people would use and appreciate it. I mean, you have to confirm shots and skill activations.... but if you mis-click on a move it's a wasted movement.

Koz wrote:

They showed a teaser video at the end of their PAX panel that strongly alluded to an expansion, so I think we'll see one.

They did? I'll have to search around for that video then. Didn't see it in the one above.

[edit]
Found it!

Interesting.

Terror from the deep! Terror from the deep! Terror from the deep!

Yuck

maverickz wrote:

Terror from the deep! Terror from the deep! Terror from the deep!

I would definitely get that, even if they don't tweak the replayability/linearity issues from the first one. It's just too damn fun!

I would really like to thank Oily Penguin for gifting me this game. It came from out of nowhere into my heart and I will name him George and I will hug him, pet him, and squeeze him. And pat him and caress him!

Ok, after getting sick monday, I spent some time yesterday while recovering to fire this game up via Steam (thanks again, mrwynd!). First, someone please please point me to a interface patch (can't find one after a quick search) that makes it so I don't have to have giant sized icons for things, making so you have to scroll when there's more than 5 items to be viewed.

Second, and I never thought I'd be saying this, but I can already see myself playing this once or twice, ever, and then just going back to the original unless things get way more free form than what happens in the first month (a few make a choice missions, recover abductee, diffuse bomb, 2 alien craft including 1 landed, and captured 3 of the 4 aliens I've encountered). It seems like it will be great fun and all, but I already sorta miss a ton of the things the old game let you do, that were taken out for simplicity.

Also, please don't ever talk about Terror From the Deep except in complete disdain. That game managed to change so little, yet make so much wrong. I still can't figure out why I despised so much in that game.

I quite liked TFTD. I think it was the first CDROM Game I ever bought. I was young enough that I found it hard as nails, and the 'civilian scream' sound effect stays with me to this day..

Mid you, I also didn't mind Apocalypse, but I treated it like a different franschise to get to that feeling..

TFTD is unfairly maligned because it was released so soon after UFO. It fixed some of the gameplay issues (like being able to open doors without walking through them), although some folks didn't like that gauss weapons were nerfed compared to the lasers in UFO. TFTD also had more "plot" missions, which some people liked and other people didn't.

The TFTD tech tree was sometimes problematic, since you needed to capture a live Deep One to conduct psi research. The problem is that they only showed up during early-game terror missions, which left few opportunities to snag one. Also, those TFTD cruise ship terror missions were soooo tedious.

I'd be okay with TFTD. Ideally, I'd like to see TFTD and UFO integrated into the same game.

I never got into Apocalypse; the real-time stuff didn't appeal to me, and I didn't like the art style.

I miss proximity mines

They way I worked the real time in Apocalypse was, I'd hit pause, then give all my guys orders, then resume until the got there/completed my task, repeat. So it was semi-real time for me. I just disliked the setting being in one city, and really struggled for any kind of air-superiority, other than early-game. Maybe time to revisit UFO:AI to scratch the itch properly, before giving XCOMEU another bash.