Essence of XCOM-UFO.

[Sirine]

Do you want to share some sweet memory of your UFO series of games?




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[Sirine]

Found at google...
X-COM is still being sold, let's not do that.
Please delete this tread..... if this should not be here.

[Ildamos]

UFO: AI isn't trying to be X-com. Though ya, your point about suggestions vs playability is a sound one though I don't think it's necessary --- BTAxis, Mattn, and Winter are doing a fine job of filtering the suggestions. Proof of that is the support this project is getting; there are a lot of satisfied players following its development.

Nice pic btw.

[Destructavator]

Where did the very first picture come from?  I don't recall seeing that one - is it because I have the original floppy disk version?

[Sirine]

UFO: AI isn't trying to be X-com. Though ya, your point about suggestions vs playability is a sound one though I don't think it's necessary --- BTAxis, Mattn, and Winter are doing a fine job of filtering the suggestions. Proof of that is the support this project is getting; there are a lot of satisfied players following its development.

Nice pic btw.

Sorry, if my post let you think that.. (I ammed it already).
The purpose of this topic is for everybody to share some good old memory...

[Sirine]

Where did the very first picture come from?  I don't recall seeing that one - is it because I have the original floppy disk version?

Well, I use to have the original floppy disk version too... but now lost to nowhere already...haha...
About the very first picture...I have no ideal...I just googling it out...
By the way Yesterday (Saturday & Sunday), I have a fun time playing that old game... you might want to try it at post#2, I've already included the link for you to download. Is about 3MB only... Just unzip and play.

Some sharing after playing that awesome game...
1) Reation fire is ... scary...
    The reation fire in the game... are ready exciting. When I first play the game, in tactical mission, I though I just woun't save in the middle of the fight. Well, I was terribly wrong. The alien is simply...too strong... a chain reation of reation fire is almost let you feel like you are playing a realtime combat. (although it is in turn base).
Every step of my soldier could triggle an reation fire. Most of the time. The alien fire at you at the first sign. You just hope they don't hit you...and most of the time. They do, and 1 shot kill. And you might think what is the fun here if your soldier just always die like that? well, here come the magic of x-com. It let you save in the middle of the mission. And more... the alien always act differently from each load-save of the game.
Some example of the thrilling reation fire:-
I have 2 soldier (a,b) standing side by side. 2 more soldier (c,d) in a room just not far away seperate just by a wall. Soldier (b,d) is handling an active grenate... Here is how it works.
Soldier (a) spotted an alien, [hover craft-a], snap shot, reation fire (miss), kill soldier (b), 2nd snap shot, kill the [hover craft-a], the craft explode, destroying the wall, revealing soldier (c,d), Another [hover craft-b], reation fire. Killing soldier (c), soldier (d) snap shot [hover craft-b] hit, and explode. [hover craft-c] reation fire killing soldier (d). ==".<---sweating.   Somewhere pop-up ANOTHER reation fire...alien fire at soldier (a)... die
End. (1 turn kill all my 4 soldier squard)

2) Fire... hide..
    The game design in such a way that, you can only fire ONE aim shot, TWO auto shot, and 2~3 snap shot per-turn. The TU's (time units) for firing a shot is counted base on %. example, In order to do a aim shot, you will have to spend 60% of your TU, if this shot is wasted, you will have another chance of snap shot 30%, after that you only left 10% of your TU. Let just say that you have 100 TU... now only left 10, turn and run to hide. only 1 step... cause turning (90degree) need 2 TU, walking need 4 TU. This game really need you to count your steps....

3) Kaboom..kaboom...
    There are a grenate call, Proximily Grenate in the game. Once activated, anything that near 2 tile to it. It will explode. Make it look like land mine... and most interestingly.... sometime it just fail to activate, maybe is a bug in the game, or the game purposly make it that way... faulty grenate...
     Time grenate... almost all the grenate in the game can be time. from 0 to 20 turn afterward. 0 means of whenever you hit the 'end turn' button, it will explode. 1 means after your turn, alien end turn. and before your turn.

4) Think of a plan...
     This is something awkward. You play the game. And you save often. You save often, just because you don't want something unexpected to happen. And if something did happend. You think of a plan... not before, but after something did already happend.... you reload the previous save... and think of a plan...

If you play the game... you get what I means...

(English is not my first language. Sometime, you might not get what I means. I am sorry, if this trouble you.)

[homunculus]

as for me, xcom apocalypse is my favorite, and that's mainly because of the real time combat.

the first xcom game, however, appeals most with the research topic texts, which is pure modern mythology.
almost each of those somewhat irrational and naive looking texts contains some deep psychology.

as for gameplay, in my opinion a good ufo game is where you try to anticipate the alien that could be round the corner, and of course, usually you find nothing there.
but when there really is an alien round the corner, your efforts will pay off.
it's been said many times that xcom is about some fear and a few little shocks, and that's to the point.

i don't like this save--reload thing too much, i think soldiers should be more replaceable instead.
the clueless rookie thing is nice, but i think they should max out more quickly, so that loosing your best soldier would be a temporary setback rather than a reason to reload anything.

i really don't understand why they did xcom apocalypse soldier stats the way that enables you to get each soldier with max stats (except psi stats if you picked humans) instead of basing the speed of progress on sum of all stats, creating diversity in the sense of specialization.
that, along with the way group movement was handled, is certainly one of the most serious flaws of xcom apoc in my opinion.

[nerf5000]

Destructavator:
The very first pic is from the loosing vid from the CD version (or PSX version, dunno)
vid here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=932WM42lRpE&feature=related

Sirine:
I don't think that percentage based TU usage is a good idea, the reason in my opinion for different ammount of TUs for different soldiers is because some people are faster and some slower. The guys that are faster because they just are, or because they've been on a trillion missions and are just -that- good are obviously going to shoot faster as well, and as such more often in a turn. A percentage based TU usage would mean that the slowest guy would be able to shoot as fast as a superhuman veteran of a million battles... not really fun nor does it make much sense

(short version: hey I got better! why is it harder for me to use my rifle?)

[A Few Good Mutons]

(short version: hey I got better! why is it harder for me to use my rifle?)

Because APs in X-COM are about how fast you are - they're fractions of a specific time interval.  They can't magically speed up a gun.

And it's not "harder to use your rifle".  Someone with 80 APs would use the exact same proportion of them to fire as someone with 40, the difference is the guy with 80 could run twice as far afterwards.

[shevegen]

I think the idea behind xcom 1 was the best

xcom 2 i didnt like much because although the gameplay was fucking great, the graphics were REALLY bad even for back then

xcom apocalypse was fine, i actually enjoyed it the most. switching between realtime and turn based was a great idea,
and I felt that the compleity increase of xcom apocalypse was very fine

too bad they stopped afterwards with these types of games

today pure 3D engines games dont interest me at all

[Sirine]

『homunculus』: I play the [xcom apocalypse] too. But not that good compare with Xcom1.
My reason:-
Innovative enought to switching realtime and turn base... But you lost the essence of Xcom1. Turn base but you ”FEEL LIKE“ realtime. You stop counting STEPS that much compare with Xcom1. Xcom1 you most probably will stuck with {opps...missing 1 point to throw that grenade....} The UFO appear in city view instead of the Earth globe is something very good.

As for the research topic, xcom1 stated mostly [how the thing works]...but not [why it being like that]... It explain little, so, it let you imagine yourself...  especially, how the hover craft float... how the floating alien float... it give no clear explaination... Which I like it.

Game play: The crown jewel of the game. Anticipate the alien around the corner...and most of the time. You end up die unexpectedly... I means [Most of the time]... in xcom1 ofcourse.

Save - Reload: I like it very much... I give me option to... [If I do this, or If I do that...what happend next]...kind of feeling... and most of all, the random seeds in the game generate enought non-stable feeling of fear... you shoot an alien...and you can't be 100% sure you are able to kill it.

xcom apocalypse: I still remember I have my own soldier shooting my own squard to increase the accuracy stat. It had the TOO obvious stat increase and calculation. Xcom1 shooting with 24% accuracy, and you still can hope it will hit and kill the alien. shooting with 80% accuracy, you still have the fear it will miss...

group movement: I never use more than 4 soldier in 1 squard, so, not much problem found.


『nerf5000』: No offence...but do you play Xcom1 before？ The percentage based TU usage is one of the true element of BALANCE... that you are able to control over the course of the game...
1) You have lots of TU. You can cover lot of area. But you can only do certain things...
2) The certain things include... fire 1 and only aim shot OR fire 2 auto shot OR 2~3 snap shot OR  activate and throw an grenade...etc...
3) You often run out of to TU unexpectedly... and it make you feel ... every steps taken must count... count it yourself...don't have the game to show you how many TU left... this will kill the fun of the game. One of the BALANCE element..
4) You have limited things that can be done in 1 turn. Hence it is important to have 'backup' around, incase that grenade does not kill that alien. And I think you don't have enought TU to run and hide after throwing that grenade. The game limits you to obey some rules, TU rules, and it is all about rules in a game, and that rules which make the game fair and fun.

It it just a game, so let's have fun and put reality a side for a while...

『A Few Good Mutons』: Xcom1 have the {energy} stat to further limit what you can do in 1 turn....so, not {twice as far afterwards}....you might miss out this and have APs left but still stuck and unable to run, due to lack of energy.... Another BALANCE element...

『shevegen』: Agree. Xcom1 is the best. The 3D engines do not give the 'fear', 'supprise', and 'unexpected' kinda feeling anymore. Especially missing the "blank black" unexplore area experience. You need to able to let your soldier to SEE it first before you know how the terrain look like. Walk to an dead-end corner before you already know it is an dead-end corner... AND with the element of surprise... reaction fire that always kick in whenever you unexpectedly stood infront of an alien.

The 3D Maps:...Beautify...look real...but [very much feeling unreal]... You threw a granade on the ground, and after it explode, you bearly see any scrach on it. Do you think this real?

1) Wall at xcom1 can fall, break, use plasma rifle to to shot a passage to walk thought. Affected by the explosion grenade.
2) Ground at xcom1, even come out with smoke...after explosion... it looks and feels more real.. compare with something so call 3D... phew...
3) Transportation craft at xcom1, if you purposely damage it... you will see damage on your craft. After mission you will have to repair your craft.
4) UFO at xcom1, if you blow the reactor, you get less material after mission. The game "Count" the things that you left on map. You can blow equipment to dust... and the game "Count" it. You will have less equipment. Especially UFO craft.
5) Basically, you can blow everything to ground in xcom1.
6) I will be impress with REAL 3D, like {grand theft auto vice city},{transformer x-box} but more real... more real means...I would love to have everything grounded... reacted to what I have did. and make it count....

btw. I love the bouncing grenate in UFO:AI. It looks real.

[homunculus]

well, it sounds like some other ufo game, not ufo-ai.

everybody is free to start an ufo game project with the rules and terrain they like, and to maintain the contributions and versions and a website and whatever else would need to be done.

i also think many things.
for example, i think that, an ideal ufo game would be real time, or at least the turns should be played out simultaneously.
even if the turns are not played simultaneously, there should be interrupts where you can control which reaction fire you use.
and there should be no grid, and there should be line of sight highlights when you move your cursor on the map while moving a soldier.
and.. whatever, i will not be maintaining any such project.

[BTAxis]

I also think some of those things have basic usability issues. For example, as I recall Laser Squad Nemesis has simultaneous turns, but that was pretty ill-received by the public. I can also mention the Growlanser series, which uses gridless, interrupt-based real time combat. The combat is pretty annoying, and I prefer classic turns. Anyway, that's kind of off-topic.

[Sirine]

Agree with BTAix, I like the classic turns and with super active reaction fire. Scary reation fire...

[nerf5000]

Muttons:

It won't make the rifle fire faster, but the 'shot' is not only pulling the trigger it also models the aiming/heft of the weapon etc. (hence the different modes of fire use different amounts of TU, the speed of the rifle doesn't change) so, if we are modeling all of the above, experience would HAVE TO impact how fast I can bring to bear/aim/fire the said weapon whereas a % based system says that no matter how skilled you are with that weapon you will always fire it at the same speed as a rookie that just barely figured out how it works... this is completely disregarding the fact that some of these weapons can be complicated (alien guns!)

Sirine:
I played the first XCom and loved it, and the % system always annoyed me.

Long story short: I like the current system of fixed TUs for firemodes, scaling the TUs for soldiers not weapons is best