This has been brought up earlier and I agree. It’s not just about realism/simulation, as I generally don’t mind abstraction; but I’m definitely not a minmaxer, so Firaxis’ ultra-narrow take on strategy certainly hurt my experience.
Papageno
1623
For anyone playing this with the Steam Controller: is there a way to get it to start every time in Big Picture mode (without which the Controller stays in Desktop configuration), or barring that, to start Big Picture without having to quit out of the game that’s running?
I believe you would need to have Steam itself default to Big Picture (Settings -> interface). Of course, that would mean that everything would be in Big Picture mode.
Ah, thanks. I guess I’ll have to do that. You’d think you could set the game’s launch options to auto-start BP mode first.
In other news, I’m kind of disgusted that the game has basically robbed me of half of my next supply drop–I was looking forward to a 340-some payday and then the “rural checkpoints” dark event went active 6 days before the upcoming drop. There’s no way to counter that now, right?
I think I’m still in May 2035. Just did the landed UFO mission and thereafter managed to up my squad to 6 on a mission, and before that the 1st Black Site mission, where I got my last 3 people away while the Advent dudes were holding their, er, guns. Needless to say I’ve only gone this far on Veteran by saving like a madman and occasionally reloading.
Speaking of Advent, I know there have been many humorous interpretations of what the human-hybrid dudes are yelling, but has there been any official word on how those barks were made?
EDIT: And on the last mission Scott Lufkin (whom I trained as a Ranger and speaks Castilian-accented Spanish for some reason) got roped in by Vipers not once but twice, and ended up only “Wounded” but not gravely so. Also got a couple of clutch kills in.
The supplies should stack, they don’t expire. So you’ll have 600+ supply waiting.
MikeJ
1628
I actually did run out of things to research at the end of the game, and I hadn’t put much focus on fast research.
On the broader question, I think there are more viable strategies than the previous game, though it is hard to tell from one campaign. I don’t think expanding communication coverage is as important a priority as satellite coverage in the first game.
The most important feature:
Ending
Underwater grenades!
PCGamesN has an interview with lead producer Garth DeAngelis that covers a lot of topics people have mentioned here.
-Todd
Hotfreak
1632
I started a new campaign on Legend with the Max Squad Size Increase and Improved AI mods on – hoping they would balance out a bit – and, 2 missions in, had basically lost. For the 3rd mission I had only 2 rookies to field; everyone else was either dead or out for over a month. I need to figure out a better setup.
My Commander run I did with 4 levels of squad size increase (i.e. starting with 4 upgradeable to 8 soldiers) and the mod that adds 1-2 (mostly 1) enemies to alien pods. This was fun but became pretty easy by the end game. Having 2 maxxed-out Psi Operatives and 3 mimic beacons on every mission plus 6 other Colonels made me close to unstoppable. Still, it was a blast for most of the campaign.
TurinTur
1633
There are already AI mods?
Finally won after two campaigns and around 85 hours (but only veteran difficulty). Super fun though laggy and crash prone as many have mentioned,
The first time through was mostly a learning experience about what to do / not do. In general the geoscape strategy seems more flexible / variable than in the originals. But there are some things you practically MUST do to survive. The guerrilla tactics school seems essential to enlarge squad size. Keeping up with the gun and armor upgrades as well as communications are important.
I DIDN’T worry as much about the avatar project the second time apart from ensuring that it didn’t complete before I could reach the last mission. Obsessing too much over each avatar site seems like a waste of time / resources after a certain point because it just keeps you from doing the necessary story / shadow chamber missions.
The turn limits were REALLY bad the first time around but usually not a problem in the second campaign. Some of that is due to the procedural maps, but I think it was MOSTLY because I had too few guys and was behind on the tech power curve the first time through. I should have realized earlier that getting bogged down and barely (or not) making the turn limits consistently meant there was something fundamentally flawed in my geoscape strategy,
Next time I’ll have to try PSI troopers. Never got to them this play through.
Man that final mission is CRAZY hard and also kind of buggy. Seems impossible until you figure out a defensive strategy. You can’t wade in and work through the bad guys since they keep coming from all angles. The difficulty jump for the last mission was a bit much IMO. Could do with some balancing and perhaps a few lead up missions the are more difficult than average.
Great work Jake and Firaxis and team!
Looking forward to the inevitable deeply terrifying expansion.
Diego
Jinsai
1635
I have tried Legendary + Ironman a few times now. It is BRUTAL.
Jake Solomon on the turn limit controversy.
Adam: The turn limits have been controversial – some people really don’t get on with them. Did you expect that?
Jake Solomon: I’ve obviously heard that too. This is the honest-to-God truth, I was very surprised. I hadn’t had an inkling of that yet. That was not something that was really on our radar as something that would irritate some people. Then when it does happen, obviously a designer can’t ever or nor should they ever, defend the decisions they’ve made. You go “OK, some people really don’t like the turn timers.” And so you think first of all, ‘why don’t they like it, what can we do to make it better, what can we do to make everybody happy.’ I think it’s blind allegiance to mechanics that probably led us to that, because I think the experience is better for turn-timers. I’m talking in a very abstract sense, because I think that the game is at its best when the player is taking risks.
Risks are what lead to loss and what lead to triumph, however the downside is that if you feel the game is just pushing you into risk, then it’s how you perceive the necessity of the risk. Some of them, maybe there’s a clumsy thematic wrapper on the turn-timer. There’s a mod right now where the turn timer doesn’t start until concealment is broken. Thematically, that’s much stronger, no question.
Definitely, definitely that was the first idea that we had, but mechanically there are number of issues with that, I would say. It can be seriously exploited, and it also leads to the player use stealth instead of using Concealment as an ambush system. That’s what we saw, is that people thought that “if a turn-timer popped up at the end of stealth, that means I just fucked up. If I get detected, I really fucked things up.” And we could not get past that mindset; “no, no, you didn’t fuck up. We don’t want you to play this as a stealth game.” We didn’t build this as a stealth game, it doesn’t work as a stealth game, but when players were Concealed and then the turn-timer didn’t start until they’d lost Concealment, then obviously it felt like falling off a cliff when you lost Concealment. It just felt like, “fuck this, I’m reloading. I didn’t want to get seen then because I don’t want the pressure of this turn-timer.”
So instead, the mechanical solution was that turn-timers start from the beginning of the match. Use Concealment however you want, don’t feel like you fell off a cliff when you lose it. Mechanically, I think it’s a much better system, however thematically maybe it sticks in some people’s craw, coupled with the fact that some people just don’t like turn-timers. They don’t want to be pushed into risk, which I certainly understand, so now the question is how to address that in a way that doesn’t lose the fact of pressure and risk, forcing the player to make suboptimal decisions, perhaps. And at the same time not just beating them over the head with a turn-timer. So I will say that one surprised me, but it doesn’t mean it’s in any way incorrect.
That’s … odd. It really took him by surprise? I mean, plenty of people complained - rightly or wrongly - about the timers on meld, didn’t they?
Yes, some people had issues with the timers in the meld missions for the expansion. They were pretty vocal about it.
I’m not sure how Jake Solomon could’ve missed those complaints.
Quaro
1639
Well there were quite a few people on the opposite side of that, myself included, who complained about how the most effective strategy in XCOM 1 was excruciatingly slow and plodding and the game never rewarded active aggressive play except on the occasional bomb mission. And meld didn’t do enough. Timers are a pretty blunt way to address that but they do improve that aspect IMO.
This and the performance issues? Not a chance.
