Who's preordering X-COM?

[SpunkyJones]

What are people playing now? It looks like posting on Xcom seems to have stopped or at least slowed to a crawl. So what are you guys playing now?

I'm trying out GTAIV again, never could get through it the first time. I put 95 hours into xcom, need a break till at least after the holidays.

 

[thespyder]

Post new-game shock. Especially notable with popular franchises. People buy a game, like it, put 100 hours into it, then burn out and play something else.

I picked up dishonored via the green man gaming black friday sale and am currently playing/replaying it.

Kind if right there with ya. Actually I have been considering Dishonored for a while now. I might have to break down and check it out.

Yeah, s far as Xcom, I finally got sick of the reversers that they kept on throwing. I'll keep an eye out for future DLC just to see if it is more robust than the first one. And I would play a sequel, should they make it. But right now, I am kind of burnt out on the whole thing.

Been playing BG myself. It's fun.

 

[Born2bwire]

Post new-game shock. Especially notable with popular franchises. People buy a game, like it, put 100 hours into it, then burn out and play something else.

I picked up dishonored via the green man gaming black friday sale and am currently playing/replaying it.

Let's be honest though, if you put 100 hours into a game you damn well got your money's worth.

 

[thespyder]

Let's be honest though, if you put 100 hours into a game you damn well got your money's worth.

Oh, absolutely. I think I personally got my money's worth. More's the shame that in today's environment, a lot of game publishers think that 15-20 hours of game play is "A worth while game". For me, if a game doesn't have at least 50 hours of game play in it, I almost feel jipped. Particularly at today's prices.

That's kind if why I am pleased that KoA:R made it onto Gamestop's Best of 2012 mashup. Even though it wasn't seen as a success, I felt it had staying power. Not quite Skyrim, but still well worth the time invested. Xcom as well. Although I had some disappointing moments, overall I think it was a very good game. And well worth the money in my book.

Sequel?

 

[Dijeangenie]

Oh, absolutely. I think I personally got my money's worth. More's the shame that in today's environment, a lot of game publishers think that 15-20 hours of game play is "A worth while game". For me, if a game doesn't have at least 50 hours of game play in it, I almost feel jipped. Particularly at today's prices.

I think it depends on the quality of the hours spent. I would happily pay full price for a 15-20 hour game such as Dishonoured, and I feel that I got much more value for my money then than in Skyrim which I played for 40 or 50 hours, because a lot of that time is poor quality, wandering aimlessly etc.

Also I am not quite sure what you mean by "today's prices"... It may be different for me in the UK, but games are cheaper than they were 10 years ago on release. I remember buying Warcraft 3 Frozen Throne for £33 on release (That is £43 in today's money) and PC games tend to launch for £35 max these days.

 

[Nvidiaguy07]

So i think i just got screwed pretty hard.

Played my first play through on ironman, so at the beginning, i was a little shaky, and lost like 6 countries. After I got a grip on how to play, i blew through it, and beat the crap out of any battles after that. The terror level in any remaining country never went over 2.

I played through the last mission, beat the last guy, saw the ending scene where

Spoiler

your psi solder sacrifices himself to save the world, and then it shows the xcom logo,

end of game right? Well then right after that it shows the scene where they tell you the project is closed, and game over , you lost. WTF!??!?!?! What a fucking time to have a stupid bug like that. Did i miss any other ending scene before it said i "lost"?

Is it possible the terror level went UP after i beat the last guy, and thats how i ended up losing?

 

[Daverino]

So i think i just got screwed pretty hard.

Played my first play through on ironman, so at the beginning, i was a little shaky, and lost like 6 countries. After I got a grip on how to play, i blew through it, and beat the crap out of any battles after that. The terror level in any remaining country never went over 2.

I played through the last mission, beat the last guy, saw the ending scene where

Spoiler

your psi solder sacrifices himself to save the world, and then it shows the xcom logo,

end of game right? Well then right after that it shows the scene where they tell you the project is closed, and game over , you lost. WTF!??!?!?! What a fucking time to have a stupid bug like that. Did i miss any other ending scene before it said i "lost"?

Is it possible the terror level went UP after i beat the last guy, and thats how i ended up losing?

That is a known bug and *should* be fixed in the patch. We heard about the patch over a month ago, but nothing since.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Yeah, if you see the Volunteer do his thing, you won. Period.

Congratulations, btw.

Poor bastard.

 

[thespyder]

I think it depends on the quality of the hours spent. I would happily pay full price for a 15-20 hour game such as Dishonoured, and I feel that I got much more value for my money then than in Skyrim which I played for 40 or 50 hours, because a lot of that time is poor quality, wandering aimlessly etc.

Also I am not quite sure what you mean by "today's prices"... It may be different for me in the UK, but games are cheaper than they were 10 years ago on release. I remember buying Warcraft 3 Frozen Throne for £33 on release (That is £43 in today's money) and PC games tend to launch for £35 max these days.

To a degree I understand what you are saying about quality. I may not agree with your example, but I understand the concept you are expressing. For me, there are very few games that have caught my attention enough such that a 15-20 hour game play would be rich enough to offset the shortness of the game. And I thoroughly enjoy sandbox games, Role Playing games and 4x strategy games. So maybe I am biased to the fact that most of them are guaranteed to provide (barring bugs or other issues) that much game play. Then the only question is if it is fun game play.

Prices here in the US are $59.99 at release. Granted, more often than not you can get some kind of sale or deal on launch day, or simply wait till it goes down in price, but the stock unit price is ~$60.

 

[ultimatebob]

Heh... I just played this game for 4 nights straight and beat it on Medium. Great game, but definitely easier than the original.

Spoiler

I thought that my strategy for killing the boss character was pretty creative... I had my PSI-Ops guy mind control one of the Ethereals standing next to it, and the Muton guards then focused their attention on it. I then had Ethereal deliver the death blow to the boss Ethereal after my Sniper got an awesome critical hit on em.

 

[Clinkster]

Heh... I just played this game for 4 nights straight and beat it on Medium. Great game, but definitely easier than the original.

That's an unfair assessment until you play Classic/Ironman or Impossible/Ironman. Normal was meant for casual crowd and/or those who did not play the original.

 

[Nvidiaguy07]

Heh... I just played this game for 4 nights straight and beat it on Medium. Great game, but definitely easier than the original.

Spoiler

I thought that my strategy for killing the boss character was pretty creative... I had my PSI-Ops guy mind control one of the Ethereals standing next to it, and the Muton guards then focused their attention on it. I then had Ethereal deliver the death blow to the boss Ethereal after my Sniper got an awesome critical hit on em.

Spoiler

I just had my two assault guys get close enough to stand right next to him and run and gun paired with the two shot ability. No chance.

 

[Dijeangenie]

To a degree I understand what you are saying about quality. I may not agree with your example, but I understand the concept you are expressing. For me, there are very few games that have caught my attention enough such that a 15-20 hour game play would be rich enough to offset the shortness of the game. And I thoroughly enjoy sandbox games, Role Playing games and 4x strategy games. So maybe I am biased to the fact that most of them are guaranteed to provide (barring bugs or other issues) that much game play. Then the only question is if it is fun game play.

Yep, it depends on what kind of games you prefer, while I do like grand strategy type games, they tend to have little story line and offer greater re playability meaning they offer many hours of play. I also like shorter games which have excellent story lines (Deus ex, Dishonoured etc) I will happily pay full price for a 15-20 hour game which has fantastic story etc, when you compare that to paying £10 to go and watch a 2hr film it really isn't that bad!

 

[Nvidiaguy07]

early in game question:

Right now I have 3 abduction sites to choose from. Two are in countries of 0 panic, and the missions are both easy, and offer rewards that I want (id prefer scientists early over other things). the third site is a very difficult mission, with a panic level of three, and a reward that i dont really care about.

I just had a tough mission before, and all my good guys are recovering. So it leaves me with just one non-rookie, and a squad size of 4. The mistake i made last playthrough was declining difficult missions early on and i lost some countries because of it (i didnt know difficult at the beginning was different from difficult at the end of the game). I have a feeling that I will probably get killed if i choose the tough one, and wont get rewards / increase panix everywhere if i do. SO whats the call here?

 

[Dijeangenie]

early in game question:

Right now I have 3 abduction sites to choose from. Two are in countries of 0 panic, and the missions are both easy, and offer rewards that I want (id prefer scientists early over other things). the third site is a very difficult mission, with a panic level of three, and a reward that i dont really care about.

I just had a tough mission before, and all my good guys are recovering. So it leaves me with just one non-rookie, and a squad size of 4. The mistake i made last playthrough was declining difficult missions early on and i lost some countries because of it (i didnt know difficult at the beginning was different from difficult at the end of the game). I have a feeling that I will probably get killed if i choose the tough one, and wont get rewards / increase panix everywhere if i do. SO whats the call here?

What difficulty are you playing? - If normal, I would go for the harder mission, whereas if higher than normal I would probably play it safe as it would be very easy to fail the difficult mission and have your squad wiped out.

 

[Nvidiaguy07]

What difficulty are you playing? - If normal, I would go for the harder mission, whereas if higher than normal I would probably play it safe as it would be very easy to fail the difficult mission and have your squad wiped out.

Playing on classic. Gonna go for the easier mission i think.

EDIT: turned out to be too easy, probably should have tried the difficult mission. Once the council report came up, i lost two countries on that continent. There were only 4 sectoids on the easy misson :/

How does the game turn the difficulty up? Does the computer play smarter, enemies get stronger, or are the probabilities just altered in favor of the aliens? On the next mission I went from having a full team to no one after 4 ridiculous shots pulled off by the computer...

 

[Born2bwire]

Playing on classic. Gonna go for the easier mission i think.

EDIT: turned out to be too easy, probably should have tried the difficult mission. Once the council report came up, i lost two countries on that continent. There were only 4 sectoids on the easy misson :/

How does the game turn the difficulty up? Does the computer play smarter, enemies get stronger, or are the probabilities just altered in favor of the aliens? On the next mission I went from having a full team to no one after 4 ridiculous shots pulled off by the computer...

Mainly from what I have seen the enemies get larger and more numerous. You start out fighting only Sectoids and Thin Men. Then they introduce the Floaters and later on the Drones. These are all pretty weak opponents but the Thin men and Floaters have Plasma Rifles as opposed to the Sectoid's pistols I believe. But you eventually get much stronger soldiers and robots while the number of weak diminish. I also found that the stronger enemies were a bit smarter too. One of the more annoying things is that too many of the enemies will mill around and wait for you instead of actively seeking you out or running to support other groups when you encounter them. But the toughest enemies, like the Mutons and especially the advanced Mutons, actually would seek me out when I encountered the first group or two. Made the missions less tedious when they all come to you. When you start hitting the larger UFO's you will also encounter more enemies, especially when you can assault the undamaged UFOs on the ground.

I am almost done with my normal playthrough. I have the last mission to do. My only real mistake on the normal playthrough was waiting too long to get the Firestorm. I lost two countries because, while I could easily take care of any ground mission, I could no longer shoot down the bigger UFO's that were coming in. Once I got a Firestorm that all changed and everything was gravy. Course I would assume "Classic" and "Ironman" levels to be rather different.

It helps that I have played the originals many times over the years. To get through those, especially early on, you have to learn to take things cautiously when you can (this is especially true in the new game with the limited squad size). Make use of cover at all times and keep your squad more or less together so that you can provide mutual support. I generally like to advance most of my troops keeping them on overwatch as much as possible. The biggest mistakes that I made would always be over extending a soldier or two without being properly supported. It makes it too easy for them to be ganged up on if the run into an enemy squad. I also liked sending a scout out forward for half a turn to reveal a squad, firing upon the squad or positioning with respect to it with the other troops, and then pulling back the scout to safety. That allowed me to get a few shots in, reposition my troops, and then put myself on a defensive position for the Alien turn. I find this better than pulling forward all of my soldiers in response to the squad because then you run the chance in coming into contact with other enemy squads. That pulls in more fire and makes it more difficult to end the turn in a good defensive position.

 

[Nvidiaguy07]

Mainly from what I have seen the enemies get larger and more numerous. You start out fighting only Sectoids and Thin Men. Then they introduce the Floaters and later on the Drones. These are all pretty weak opponents but the Thin men and Floaters have Plasma Rifles as opposed to the Sectoid's pistols I believe. But you eventually get much stronger soldiers and robots while the number of weak diminish. I also found that the stronger enemies were a bit smarter too. One of the more annoying things is that too many of the enemies will mill around and wait for you instead of actively seeking you out or running to support other groups when you encounter them. But the toughest enemies, like the Mutons and especially the advanced Mutons, actually would seek me out when I encountered the first group or two. Made the missions less tedious when they all come to you. When you start hitting the larger UFO's you will also encounter more enemies, especially when you can assault the undamaged UFOs on the ground.

I am almost done with my normal playthrough. I have the last mission to do. My only real mistake on the normal playthrough was waiting too long to get the Firestorm. I lost two countries because, while I could easily take care of any ground mission, I could no longer shoot down the bigger UFO's that were coming in. Once I got a Firestorm that all changed and everything was gravy. Course I would assume "Classic" and "Ironman" levels to be rather different.

It helps that I have played the originals many times over the years. To get through those, especially early on, you have to learn to take things cautiously when you can (this is especially true in the new game with the limited squad size). Make use of cover at all times and keep your squad more or less together so that you can provide mutual support. I generally like to advance most of my troops keeping them on overwatch as much as possible. The biggest mistakes that I made would always be over extending a soldier or two without being properly supported. It makes it too easy for them to be ganged up on if the run into an enemy squad. I also liked sending a scout out forward for half a turn to reveal a squad, firing upon the squad or positioning with respect to it with the other troops, and then pulling back the scout to safety. That allowed me to get a few shots in, reposition my troops, and then put myself on a defensive position for the Alien turn. I find this better than pulling forward all of my soldiers in response to the squad because then you run the chance in coming into contact with other enemy squads. That pulls in more fire and makes it more difficult to end the turn in a good defensive position.

I meant how does the game change from when you either choose "normal" vs "classic". I played through and beat the game on normal/iron man on my first attempt at it. (second overall try at the game - the first time i played easy and decided to just restart)

Im now on maybe my 4th attempt at classic/iron man, and it is very unforgiving. Things seem to be going ok, and then the computer will pull off crazy shots that decimate my whole unit. Which would lead me to believe that when you change difficulty, they just bend percentages in your favor, as opposed to adding more enemies, or making them smarter/stronger. This kinda sucks.

Im now at a point where normal seems too easy, but classic is just so damn frustrating. I do fine for the first 6-8 missions, then i get killed by some bullshit shots, or guys popping out of thin air.

What does everyone else play on here? Normal or classic? Impossible seems exactly that, so i wont even attempt it.

 

[nanobreath]

I meant how does the game change from when you either choose "normal" vs "classic". I played through and beat the game on normal/iron man on my first attempt at it. (second overall try at the game - the first time i played easy and decided to just restart)

Im now on maybe my 4th attempt at classic/iron man, and it is very unforgiving. Things seem to be going ok, and then the computer will pull off crazy shots that decimate my whole unit. Which would lead me to believe that when you change difficulty, they just bend percentages in your favor, as opposed to adding more enemies, or making them smarter/stronger. This kinda sucks.

Im now at a point where normal seems too easy, but classic is just so damn frustrating. I do fine for the first 6-8 missions, then i get killed by some bullshit shots, or guys popping out of thin air.

What does everyone else play on here? Normal or classic? Impossible seems exactly that, so i wont even attempt it.

Classic eliminates a lot of the hidden bonuses you get, like accuracy. And countries panic a little quicker. Impossible however adds hitpoints to all the aliens. Sectoids with 4 hitpoints instead of 3. It's a much bigger deal than you would think.

Classic/Ironman was my last playthrough. Never lost a country, not even close. Lost maybe 5 total soldiers the whole game, and didn't lose my first until I assaulted a base. That guy only died because the game likes to randomly teleport aliens around the map apparently. The alien literally appeared in the middle of my squad, and then another. After that some rookies etc died as I was trying to level them up against tougher opponents.

Classic/Ironman is toughest at the beginning before you start getting improved tech that can help when the aliens get some lucky shots in. Get body armor ASAP, then quickly get to laser weapons. Squad sight snipers are your friends. Move each unit no more than once per turn, and overwatch, but don't toggle overwatch until you have moved all your units. Do not be afraid to use grenades and rockets, even if you don't get fragments, it's better than dieing.

You need engineers, not scientists, but always look at panic and choose a mission that will prevent you losing countries. Do not only look at the panic in the country the mission is in, go and look at the panic at the rest of the countries on that continent. France may have a panic level of 4, but the rest of Europe is at 0. India is at 2, but the rest of Asia is at 4. You HAVE to go to India, or you will lose every other country in Asia. You can launch a satellite at France to save it. Save your satellites till near the end of the month so you can put them on the countries with 4 or 5 panic. For the beginning months (except the first), you really need to launch a minimum of 2 satellites, and try to get 3. Keep your satellite uplinks together, this will give you 3 launches every time you build an uplink. Make sure you build the satellites early, they take forever to build.

Work on your tactics within a mission. Do not be afraid to make the aliens come after you. On easy/normal you will find yourself in a tendency to always trying to get to and kill the aliens as fast as possible. If you do this in classic, you will die. Don't think you always have to move your guys their maximum range. Try to stay in FULL cover, even if it means you only move 3 spaces.

Hopefully this rambling helps...

 

[Nvidiaguy07]

Classic eliminates a lot of the hidden bonuses you get, like accuracy. And countries panic a little quicker. Impossible however adds hitpoints to all the aliens. Sectoids with 4 hitpoints instead of 3. It's a much bigger deal than you would think.

Classic/Ironman was my last playthrough. Never lost a country, not even close. Lost maybe 5 total soldiers the whole game, and didn't lose my first until I assaulted a base. That guy only died because the game likes to randomly teleport aliens around the map apparently. The alien literally appeared in the middle of my squad, and then another. After that some rookies etc died as I was trying to level them up against tougher opponents.

Classic/Ironman is toughest at the beginning before you start getting improved tech that can help when the aliens get some lucky shots in. Get body armor ASAP, then quickly get to laser weapons. Squad sight snipers are your friends. Move each unit no more than once per turn, and overwatch, but don't toggle overwatch until you have moved all your units. Do not be afraid to use grenades and rockets, even if you don't get fragments, it's better than dieing.

You need engineers, not scientists, but always look at panic and choose a mission that will prevent you losing countries. Do not only look at the panic in the country the mission is in, go and look at the panic at the rest of the countries on that continent. France may have a panic level of 4, but the rest of Europe is at 0. India is at 2, but the rest of Asia is at 4. You HAVE to go to India, or you will lose every other country in Asia. You can launch a satellite at France to save it. Save your satellites till near the end of the month so you can put them on the countries with 4 or 5 panic. For the beginning months (except the first), you really need to launch a minimum of 2 satellites, and try to get 3. Keep your satellite uplinks together, this will give you 3 launches every time you build an uplink. Make sure you build the satellites early, they take forever to build.

Work on your tactics within a mission. Do not be afraid to make the aliens come after you. On easy/normal you will find yourself in a tendency to always trying to get to and kill the aliens as fast as possible. If you do this in classic, you will die. Don't think you always have to move your guys their maximum range. Try to stay in FULL cover, even if it means you only move 3 spaces.

Hopefully this rambling helps...

awesome thanks!!! I think my biggest problem is where to put money at the beginning of the game. I try to build a few satellites, and only buy what i NEED, but somehow my last new games, i ended up facing mutons with pretty much the same gear as when i started (and sometimes with only 4 guys!)

I think i just had some bad luck, since i somehow lost a few counties without losing a battle.

I also think i need to take advantage of the sniper more (maybe early on at least). My ideal unit is 2 assault, 2 heavy, and 2 supports.

Whats a good country to start from? I have been choosing NA since trying ironman/classic, but i might go back to Africa because it seems i never have enough money.

 

[tential]

awesome thanks!!! I think my biggest problem is where to put money at the beginning of the game. I try to build a few satellites, and only buy what i NEED, but somehow my last new games, i ended up facing mutons with pretty much the same gear as when i started (and sometimes with only 4 guys!)

I think i just had some bad luck, since i somehow lost a few counties without losing a battle.

I also think i need to take advantage of the sniper more (maybe early on at least). My ideal unit is 2 assault, 2 heavy, and 2 supports.

Whats a good country to start from? I have been choosing NA since trying ironman/classic, but i might go back to Africa because it seems i never have enough money.

Complete a full game first, then play again. I only played on Normal though, but once you actually know how to play the game, it's pretty easy. IMO, I am disappointed a little. From what I remember from the old one, it was much more intricate and the maps weren't repeated so often. Also the "reinforcements" where they can literally drop in the middle of your troops is kind of annoying. The game needs to pick an angle and have them come from there rather than drop reinforcements down in the same spots every time. Even worse is enemies don't move until you see them and when they do they get a free move. IT makes it feel like an RPG. As long as you don't agro more enemies you can kill off each squad you find and move on which is kind of dumb.

I feel like all the games I've played have been dumbed down, or not for PC despite being on a PC. Skyrim and this game are prime examples. Seems like the death of true PC games is just about here and we're all playing ports now. Games are developed with the mainstream retarded gamer in mind then real gamers as an afterthrought. People were complaining that Easy was too hard on this game so much that they are making easy mode even easier. TBH, though they don't do the best job explaining a couple of crucial things which by the time you figure it out makes the game much easier. The game went from being painstakingly hard for me on Normal to a complete breeze once I understood how things worked. I pretty much figured out what nanobreath did and got bored pretty quick once I realized to only move a couple steps, set up everyone in tactical positions to ensure you don't get surprised and caught off guard and bombed to all hell, and you'll do great.

Overall, this is a fun series, but I think 90% of gamers won't be able to tolerate the slow pace of games like this and this series won't last too much longer. In the ADD age where people can't pay attention for long, people won't wanna take the time it takes to play this game correctly. I mean people are having trouble with easymode on the forums there,this game is only going to get more dumbed down which is a shame since it was so fun when I first played it so long ago.

Edit: Use a sniper.... They are deadly. My squad was 2 assaults (one shotgun which would run up and destroy things), and the other a rifle (which would run up and use lightning reflexs to take out overwatch and give the shotgun guy a clear path to destroy things). 1 Heavy which would clear things up if necessary with grenades and rockets, and would also provide accuracy bonuses, 2 supports, and 1 sniper which would take out a lot of enemies before they could ever get a chance to attack.

 

[nanobreath]

awesome thanks!!! I think my biggest problem is where to put money at the beginning of the game. I try to build a few satellites, and only buy what i NEED, but somehow my last new games, i ended up facing mutons with pretty much the same gear as when i started (and sometimes with only 4 guys!)

I think i just had some bad luck, since i somehow lost a few counties without losing a battle.

I also think i need to take advantage of the sniper more (maybe early on at least). My ideal unit is 2 assault, 2 heavy, and 2 supports.

Whats a good country to start from? I have been choosing NA since trying ironman/classic, but i might go back to Africa because it seems i never have enough money.

Losing countries without losing a battle is not bad luck, but poor planning. You need to pick which mission you run carefully. Do not just look at the panics of the countries the missions are in. Look at the panic of all the countries on that continent. Know how many satellites you can launch that month, and plan for it. Sometimes I would go for the money mission, even though that hurt more panic wise simply because I knew it would give me the necessary cash to get that last satellite. Likewise if you need more engineers to build that 3rd uplink. Asia, europe and africa is where you will typically do your missions, simply because there are more countries there meaning ignoring a mission there increases panic in 4-5 countries. Whereas ignoring south and north america means only 2-3 countries.

Also, try to consolidate your satellites early on, simply because you cannot afford to supply fighters in every continent that early. You do NOT want to ignore an alien craft. That alone increases panic, but then they send somebody to blow up the satellite, which greatly increases panic.

I usually run with an assault, support, 2 heavy, 2 snipers. I use a scope on both my heavies and snipers, and toward the end of the game when grenades do jack shit, scopes for everybody. Early in the game, the accuracy bonus on your heavy is very beneficial. You want to get heat ammo upgrades on the heavies, while not beneficial early in the game it is damn near necessary later.

Squad sight snipers. They are absolutely deadly. They will get the majority of your kills. You can send the assault or support forward, spawn the baddies, and then without even having to move any other soldiers into firing range of the aliens, the snipers can take shots. The guy you moved up can then even move back, with the heavies providing overwatch for when the aliens move to attack. You can also choose to retreat into two overwatching squad sight snipers, this allows you to take the overwatch shots for free, and then shoot again when it's your turn. The goal with the snipers is that you can take shots without ever being shot at. Greatly increases your survival potential.

I like to start from Africa. You are rarely building a lot of aircraft early in the game, and by the time you can build the firestorm, you will typically ahve full satellite coverage anyway, so you still get the bonus for them. Europe is pointless, as you typically get all the engineers and scientists you need doing missions. I might build one workshop the whole game. South america's instant autopsies and interrogations are nice, but easy to get with satellite coverage quickly. That leaves Asia and Africa. I think in the long run, Africa will net you more cash, but I haven't done a real comparison. Asia however won't really benefit you as much early in the game.

 

[mikeymikec]

A new turn-based version of the original UFO/X-COM games?

This will be the first time I've said this about a game for a long time:

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG!

My wife got it for me for Christmas.

My opinion on it is as follows:

The combat element - if it wasn't for the following stupidities, it would be amazing: Characters can shoot through each other, and enemies in the same shooting path as the first dead enemy will not be affected by bullets that flew past the first enemy (or say a sniper shot that totally shreds an injured/weak alien).

Combat element again - so let me get this straight, the scientist person goes on about how hardy the downed UFO is (still intact after being shot down), yet holes can be shot through the hull with weak weaponry?

IMO, two major let-downs. If it wasn't for these, I would have said the new version easily surpasses the original. The improvements with regard to tactics, flanking, etc easily outweigh the limitations "thou art a heavy, you cannot use any other guns", and not being able to pick up or drop equipment in combat is also irritating.

Next, satellites and uplinks. I realise what the makers were trying to achieve was to make you feel like you're fighting a majorly uphill struggle, but it feels like no amount of forward planning (even on easy, which is what I'm currently playing on now after failing at classic and normal).

Combat element again - I gave up on 'normal' difficulty after a 'very difficult' map where two mutons were surrounded by my team, one at close range, and I was constantly being given 15% chances of a hit while that muton was busy nailing each one of my guys every time. I'm not trying to play like I'm never going to lose any of my men, but considering I wasn't that far into the game and it had already turned that nasty, I gave up continuing it and started again on easy.

Combat element again - why is it that aliens can make vehicles start to burn but I can't, unless I pull out an RPG?

I'm entertained with it on easy.

 

[Born2bwire]

One of the most frustrating things about the original game was that your own team could, and often would, shoot their own teammates. If you had two people back to back, you would shoot the man in front of you, often by accident if your accuracy was as low as it was in the beginning. So I welcomed the fact that you can't mow down your own men indiscriminately.

Also, you can start fires on cars yourself without the use of explosives. I did that on many occasions myself, often unfortunately to the very car I was taking cover behind. By the time you reach the mutons though, you should have laser technology and scopes. That is more than manageable for the early mutons. If they are really entrenched behind cover, you can try to destroy the cover, flank them, use grenades, or use your rocket.

 

[dyna]

I beat the game on normal with the first run through but I was horribly inefficient. I didn't even get plasma weapons or the top tier armor for all my troops and only had 8 satellites by the end of the game and had them spaced around so I didn't get any of the additional bonuses. I did lose 2 countries but it didn't really matter.

I'm playing through again, knowing all the mechanics and I now have more money than I know what to do with. The biggest problem I have is not having enough weapon fragments which is limiting my ability to research.