Bay 12 Games Forum

"I lack the programming to do that."

"Shame. Mind if I add it?"

((Xans biofeedback is a lot easier to deduce than Aurons as he uses amps which would display a very distinctive pattern of nueral activity, Auron was still reeling from being electrocuted so his nueral patters would be all scrambled and hard to decipher.))

((What makes you think that Steve's sensors are anywhere but in one's own skull? Or that "I'm going to kill/maim Simus" could be mistaken for "Argh the pain"? Steve isn't stupid.))

I'd prefer one at a time. Especially given the probability that Playergamer would do the "Turn Right" thing.

You don't say...

Relax, ye of little faith.

((Oh, okay. So nothing happening in Tinker, so Grate won't be alt-tabbing.))

Quote from: GreatWyrmGold on January 30, 2014, 09:48:14 pm

Quote from: MetalSlimeHunt on January 30, 2014, 08:08:18 pm

Today's report won't be for a few more hours, but I figured I'd post this. It's an early combat concept trailer by Firaxis that shows some interesting things, like X-Com soldiers communicating and idle fighting during turns.

Holy crap! That's awesome! I mean, varied action cams, combat that feels like a movie, melee combat (including a soldier killing a muton in a knife-fight)...why the hell did they change it?

Well, it's just a concept trailer, and a lot of those elements did get in in some format. You can notice how young it is by the menu that comes up, it has a lot of Old-Com style options because Firaxis hadn't found their grounding yet (to make you even more jealous, Firaxis actually made a tactical boardgame for Enemy Unknown because they had no idea how to make combat happen, but alas, this remained an in-studio tool). Action Cams did make it in, albeit not as varied. The idle combat remains in the form of Suppression and Overwatch. And as for melee combat, it took until Enemy Within, but now we have Kinetic Strike Modules (complete with unique kill animations for large enemies!).

Oh, I thought that was an actual game thingy.
And somehow MEC weapons can't compete with killing aliens using a knife.

By the way, I read a great name for a sequel today: Enemy Beyond. Though I would hope any sequel to Enemy Unknown/Within would continue to expand upon the existing theme of "oh fuck, X-COM has crossed the Rubicon" in regards to humanity. Centuries if not millennia of technological advancement within the space of just a few years is not something that happens without problems. As Shen puts it, nothing will ever be the same after the invasion; the old world is gone forever even should humanity defeat the aliens.

I'd say "Enemy Beyond" would be more suitable to an expansion pack than a sequel. A sequel should have an all-new subtitle pattern.

Another aspect is how EXALT is "going too far" with gene augs. This is a good idea, except the Elite EXALT augs aren't very different from what X-COM fields, so it comes off as silly. EXALT should have had a third tier, employing plasma weaponry and truly posthuman augmentation (genetics, mechanics, psionics, the whole shebang). The kind of thing you would look at and go "oh god what the fuck". The kind of thing you'd have to autopsy. And that would be when Vahlen should have given her opinion that X-COM should never go that far.

Quote from: MetalSlimeHunt on January 30, 2014, 12:15:38 am

To-do list for tomorrow:
-Murder EXALT
-Reprimand Chinese Council rep
-Shoot down the Overseer
-Mindjack an Ethereal
-Top off tech tree and foundry tree
-Convince Vahlen to stop replaying the recordings of her interrogations over the base speakers
-Prepare for the return of Sectopods
-SHIV-COM
-Gene-hack everybody during SHIV-COM
-Inform the Alliums they came to the wrong fucking planet

You might want to get that second one out of the way, low-hanging fruit and all. I hear she doesn't even realize they're playing over the speakers.

Re: "Enemy Beyond" I have lately developed the conviction that the endgame of XCOM landing on the alien mothership could be greatly expanded seeing as how that mothership is the size of a mid-sized nation. As in, it turns into a bit of a larger-scale strategy game with XCOM taking territory on the ship and defending against alien incursions by posting different squads at chokepoints and eventually finally working towards the reactor that blows up the ship, instead of just being invited there by a particularly unclever Ethereal.
I was also imagining a cutscene where Bradford reveals a whole fleet of Skyrangers ready to start the counter-invasion.

...That.
Is.
Awesome.

Quote from: OREOSOME on January 30, 2014, 10:13:54 pm

I still think that there's SOMETHING going on behind the scenes. What happened to the Outsiders? What if they weren't really supposed to be there to begin with, considering their lack of appearance at the end. Like... The Crystals were supposed to be there, but... the Outsiders themselves might not have been entirely there on behalf of the Ethereals.

The Outsiders are just psionic projections of the Hyperwave Beacon. They stop showing up because X-COM steals it, but lacks the Outsider Shards or psionic experience to use it themselves.

I wonder if future expansions might allow innovations in that direction..."Solid Energy" mooks one could summon...

Canada has requested some Arc Throwers to quell unruly spectators at boxing ice-hockey matches, while the Nigerians have requested a couple of Plasma Pistols for a different kind of quelling.  I know which country I'd prefer to visit.

No offense, Nigeria, but it's always going to be Canada.
Except maybe in winter.

And how much do we want to do, and how do we want to do it?