More on the Storyline/Game mesh

[Destructavator]

If you want the main story updated with any new ideas, you'll need to take it up with Winter and BTAxis, and see what they say.

[DiDiT]

there just aren't that many people who are both able to serve as the tip of the spear, and who are capable of quietly disappearing without arousing suspicion.

Well, since quite a few civvies do get to watch:
1. The drop ship land.
2. Phallanx troops hop out with tons of advanced earth tech e.g. lasers
3. Some aliens get their ass’s pwned.
And finally, 4. The Phallanx troops lifting off in that sweet drop ship again.
Plus the amount of money being funnelled to them via the government would sorta raise some suspicion. Unless, all the civvies get rounded up and made to sign a government silence form I'm pretty damn certain that at-least a few public rumours of Phallanx's existence get around. they don't know who they are, but they know about them, is what I'm saying...

sorta like the power rangers... 

but, anyway, a few 'spearhead' missions cant possibly hurt, could they?.

[Hertzila]

Well, since quite a few civvies do get to watch:
1. The drop ship land.
2. Phallanx troops hop out with tons of advanced earth tech e.g. lasers
3. Some aliens get their ass’s pwned.
And finally, 4. The Phallanx troops lifting off in that sweet drop ship again.
Plus the amount of money being funnelled to them via the government would sorta raise some suspicion. Unless, all the civvies get rounded up and made to sign a government silence form I'm pretty damn certain that at-least a few public rumours of Phallanx's existence get around. they don't know who they are, but they know about them, is what I'm saying...

sorta like the power rangers... 

but, anyway, a few 'spearhead' missions cant possibly hurt, could they?.

PHALANX would most likely end up as an open secret after a while, since you can't really keep it that well under wraps. But all the secrecy is targeted much more against the aliens and possible infiltrators. Most people would know it exists but nothing else, so it's likely that the aliens wouldn't know much else either. This is one of the advantages PHALANX has over military, aliens don't know where they are (at the start anyway).

[homunculus]

PHALANX would most likely end up as an open secret after a while [...]

i guess it would be like batman.

phalanx income could come from patents, from selling mangled alien corpses to exhibitions, and from selling their battlefield footage to show-business, maybe television (without a clear trace where the video came from).

anyway, to play the game you don't need to read the starting story, afaik.

[Hertzila]

i guess it would be like batman.

More like the NSA. If I have understood correctly, for a long time everybody knew the "No Such Agency" existed but nobody knew exactly what they do or where they are located (aka it was an open secret). This status would suit PHALANX well. Nobody knows exactly who they are and what they are doing but everybody knows they exist. This will keep the morale up or, at worst, do nothing to it while keeping possible infiltrators puzzled and lost and giving PHALANX fairly free reign over where and at what time they can fight the aliens.

phalanx income could come from patents, from selling mangled alien corpses to exhibitions, and from selling their battlefield footage to show-business, maybe television (without a clear trace where the video came from).

PHALANX gets its money from the different supranations as a form of black budget. And the happier the nation is, the bigger their cut from secret funding will be. If ever implemented by a mod though, secret patents would be another conceivable form of income, by registering research patents to front-companies.

anyway, to play the game you don't need to read the starting story, afaik.

You don't have to but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be well-written .

[homunculus]

yeah, but selling mangled alien corpses to museums, that would be more sinister.

[...]You don't have to but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be well-written .

as far as i understand, that would be hopeless.
the main points of the story are arranged in such way that... well, you see it in the forum how some people try to write 10 pages explanation about something that is unreasonable in its core.
no matter how many pages those people write, they still cannot make it sound reasonable, not even in the forum.

[Hertzila]

yeah, but selling mangled alien corpses to museums, that would be more sinister.

Why would PHALANX be sinister ?

[Legendman3]

Hey guys i dont know how many people even have a clue of popular science but please check these links out they seriously made the storyline of the game offically false in mabye 5-6 different ways or not oh well just check them out and maybe change the storyline of the game to fit these a little?

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2009-11/fermi-telescope-finds-antimatter-particles-lightning-storms
http://www.popsci.com/environment/article/2007-08/its-my-antimatter-box
http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2009-11/boeing-tracks-and-shoots-down-uavs-laser-weapon
http://www.popsci.com/category/tags/boeing
and theres another article on the site about antimatter in minnesota but i cant find it

yah these are cool and make the games storyline look outa wack.  

[Hertzila]

Hey guys i dont know how many people even have a clue of popular science but please check these links out they seriously made the storyline of the game offically false in mabye 5-6 different ways or not oh well just check them out and maybe change the storyline of the game to fit these a little?

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2009-11/fermi-telescope-finds-antimatter-particles-lightning-storms
http://www.popsci.com/environment/article/2007-08/its-my-antimatter-box
http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2009-11/boeing-tracks-and-shoots-down-uavs-laser-weapon
http://www.popsci.com/category/tags/boeing
and theres another article on the site about antimatter in minnesota but i cant find it

yah these are cool and make the games storyline look outa wack.  

What it exactly makes look out of place?
I do remember hearing that the chemical lasers used in UFO:AI would not be state-of-the-art according to todays progress (some forumpost in here somewhere) but what's with all the antimatter news   ? What's wrong with AM?

[Legendman3]

you know what i forgot must of been still high at that time sorry for the AM links oh well i meant with the lasers is that it says we have laser planes and trucks(In testing) so wouldnt we of had laser guns by 2084? oha and only the antimatter in the box idea alters the game a bit it shows that the guy is storing antimatter with sound waves(?) not with electromagnets that affects the antimatter storage chamber thingy for your base. Oh well but its cool that theres antimatter in lightning right?

[homunculus]

Why would PHALANX be sinister ?

huh, for fun, of course.

and there would be protests against such behavior by alien lovers (like animal lovers).
misleading term, i think, because as with animals, it seems to be more about what humans consider acceptable.
so, alien lovers would just demand that alien corpses should be given a formal christian burial (if the particular alien lover is himself or herself christian), rather than exhibited in show business context.

btw about the mumbai story getting rewritten i believe what the devs say in the forum (= no).
maybe i am naive to believe that, but i think it's alright to be naive sometimes.
i think the story not only desperately fails to make sense but is also long like some lengthy license agreement.
but when i play the game and see the geoscape and tactical battles i don't think it makes very much sense to complain too seriously about some intro story.

[Legendman3]

i think the story not only desperately fails to make sense but is also long like some lengthy license agreement.

I agree its a little long but if you go to the ufopedia all the info about the history is there and once reading that it all makes sense

[homunculus]

been there and read it, and it didn't help with the 'makes sense' thing.
how could i have been discussing it without even reading the story?
i believe the reason why the story is so long is because of trying too hard to make it sound reasonable.

well, maybe you could explain the 8 people squads in a different way.
say, it is not really 8 alien busters on the field, but more like 80 thousand.
the battle screen is just a fraction of the whole battlefield.
it would be like a typical situation.
you solve this average situation and it is assumed that the situation with the 8 people is representative of what happened to all the 80,000 agents.
but see how this explanation would be unintuitive, and kind of unnecessary for playing the game.

[Legendman3]

Yah know some times i think thats happening but sometimes when its a crashed ship i think its only eight dudes because there cant be alot of aliens on one ship