4161

Jake Solomon continues his RPS post-mortem.

RPS: There have been quite a few people who’ve been saying ‘They don’t seem to care, they’re not doing anything about this.’

Jake Solomon: No, this will be the third patch, we’ve patched three times I think. I hope that people know that Firaxis has a long commitment to our products. People shouldn’t worry on that front because we are definitely committed to our products. I guess the only thing I can point to is Civ, but to take heart that we stay involved with those products for a very, very long time after their release.

RPS: Are you restricted in terms of how many patches you can push out due to the console versions and the limitations Microsoft and Sony put on you?

Jake Solomon: Yeah, it’s definitely different because you’ve got to go through certification when you do console patching, as opposed to Steam, you can sort of throw it out there whenever you want, but console you’ve got to go through certification, and all that stuff costs money. It’s something we’re committed to and this will be our third one. We’re long-term committed to the product.

Which backs up my pre-launch guess that patches for this game would be held up by the Xbox cert cost.

4162

Sure, but then you get slaughtered by RNG, which is the original argument against the groups. It changes the context of your slaughter, I guess.

4163

It would at least be a more realistic slaughter than running into endless groups of three who do nothing but wait for you to show up. And I get slaughtered either way, so why not die realistically? :-)

4164

It would also get rid of that BS “free move” the aliens get when you first spot them, in which they magically get to scamper to the closest available full cover. I absolutely hate that…especially when it’s my last soldier of the turn who uncovers them.

4165

Yeah, that’s one of my biggest pet peeves as well, since that lone solider is pretty much toast when it happens. I’ve totally changed how I move as a result. Now only the first solider to move in any turn reveals new terrain, and everyone else creeps carefully up behind them. It’s slow, effective, massively penalizes realistic maneuvering, and extremely dull. Replay value isn’t high in this game. I’m on my second playthrough, this time on classic mode (just shot down the Overseer’s ship), and I doubt I’ll ever touch it again.

4166

Okay… so I decided to give XCOM:EU another chance yesterday and installed the third patch. Reload my game, go into the first mission and BAM – a group of Thin Men teleports right in the middle of a very close and tense firefight (a handful of squares) between my men and a gang of Mutons that were hiding behind some rocks. The Thin Men just seemed to pop out of thin air among the trees in the middle, and promptly triggered the “surprised” cutscene. It was funny: they looked as disoriented as I was, and even after taking advantage of their free move they ended up all flanked by my soldiers. Alas, a couple of unlucky rolls and that slim advantage was lost. The standoff quickly turned into a knife fight in a phone booth with the newly teleported enemies.

Suddenly outnumbered and risking encirclement, my men tried to retreat in an orderly fashion but were picked out one by one by the emboldened mutons. This was a relatively minor battle with soldiers in training, but stunts like this affecting veterans in an Ironman playthrough can determine the outcome of the whole game.

So far the third patch is confirming that the “minimized bugs” business is the BS it sounded to be. Just read reports of people even encountering bugs they had never seen previously, or at least not this frequently. Just their imagination? I can’t know, but I have my own experience to go by and there’s no sugarcoating how unacceptable this thing is. I haven’t yet met my other best friend, the flanking bug, but I suspect he can’t be far behind. The joke’s on me for buying a Firaxis game at full price I guess.

4167

I’m still enjoying it but I completely agree. On most missions now I just move once and overwatch every turn until I see a group of enemies. It’s the only safe way to play in case you trigger a group and end up screwed. It’s a pretty dull way to play and doesn’t encourage much free thinking, which would be the main disappointment I have with this game. That’s not to say I’m not enjoying it, but I think it would be so much better with some freedom to position my squad.

edit: forgot the targeting through walls, the only other complaint I have.

4168

I don’t mind the free move on discovery the aliens get. It’s better than having them on constant overwatch (which would be more like the original).

4169

huh…I use a support or assault to activate groups then retreat and let them come to me.
I never fall into the fog of war trap that those sneaksy aliens use.

4170

That free move is a necessary part of the game design. Without it you would have free shots with huge flanking bonuses, or the aliens could get a Overwatch (Reaction) shot on you immediately. They also never fire during that move, it’s strictly to get them into cover, so while it’s a free move it’s never a free action, they only take their action at the beginning of their turn after you end yours.

I think it should be obvious that having the last soldier of a move expose new terrain is a terrible idea, and you learn that from experience.

Dave I suggest stopping your second playthrough and attempting to use a Classic Rebalanced mod of some sort, either Aetius or Warspace Extension

4171

I’m open to the idea, but I don’t know anything about either of them. What do these mods do that will give the game more appeal for me?

4172

Yeah, and at least wandering aliens would give Overwatch some meaning. As it is now, it’s completely useless 29 out of 30 times when you’re creeping forward to contact.

4173

Not to mention that there aren’t any options for overwatch, so usually it turns into everyone (including the shotgun dudes with like 10% to hit) blasting away at some distant enemy and all missing while it’s clear that a more dangerous enemy with only a sliver of health left is hiding somewhere just around the corner…

rezaf

4174

that is one of the reasons I don’t like ironman at all with this game. to be honest I don’t understand why so many people only play with ironman on.

4175

It boosts the power of your soldiers, adds the item slot, and tweaks hit/crit back to Normal settings, while giving slight extra stats to specific aliens that makes sense, and balances the strategic layer a bit.

Unfortunately I’m not sure it will work with the new patch.

4176

While I agree, it’s necessary as long as the aliens are just going to stand around and do nothing until activated, it certainly could be nerfed a bit to make it a bit less obnoxious. Halving the amount of movement, or only letting the aliens move away from the player as two examples, would help. Especially in situations where you detect an alien, and it gets a free move to flank right past you, or get right up in your nose.

Of course if aliens responded to their allies getting shot, the player would only ever really surprise some groups, and the rest would react, and the gaming the system to try to activate the least amount of aliens would be moot.

4177

True, but I think the core issue is the lethality of the shots of the aliens in Classic. It should be enough that you’re fighting 10 of them instead of the restricted 5 in Normal, but Firaxis didn’t do a good job of balancing that difference.

4178

For those who are considering buying the game in its current state.
The 2k forums users are uploading videos of the teleporting bug which supposedly has become more pervasive after the last patch (maybe for classic/imp), essentially breaking ironman mode. These are some of the best out there:
Teleporting bug
Teleport + remote “activation” inside the fow

The third patch introduced other bugs, like the landing zone disappearing at random (it happened to me on the next map after re-encountering the teleporting thin men).

My suggestion: wait for the next patch and see (apparently Solomon has promised on twitter that they have found a fix “for real”. No release date though).

4179

I never had any problems with this until the latest patch, now I got teleporting mobs all over the place. Its a bit annoying.

I also am sad that the second wind mode doesn’t include giving me more mobs per map to fight like the insane modus does…I should be able to fight more, without giving them insane targeting bonuses.

4180

Granted I’m still on my first playthrough, but I am having a blast with the game. I don’t mind the free move turn on discovery for aliens, nor do I mind uncovering them slowly on the map. I think it keeps tension up a little and forces you to use unit tactics like cover, covering fire (overwatch) and scouting. Whenever I have to go through a door I always end the turn before I open it with one guy on either side of the door, two guys in cover with clear shots through the doorway, and two more guys close to the door that can rush into the room in one action and snap off a shot in their second action if need be (or run and gun to cover and fire). It’s slow, but I rarely lose a soldier unless I get really unlucky or something new and ugly rears it’s head (like the first time I encountered a disk). I also have no qualms about quitting and reloading if things get wonky.

My complaints thus far would be more along the lines of wanting more variety of missions and environments, and probably slightly larger levels as well. When I assaulted the alien base it was the largest level I’d encountered by far, and it was a blast.