The problem with saving the world from an alien invasion is that it’s hard to know what to do next.
Transforming a secret global organization from an alien sniper clay pigeon into the kind of force capable of taking down an extraterrestrial mothership is an experience hard to beat, and every successful X-COM game , has worked to follow such a compelling premise. Julian Gollop looked to the sea for inspiration and the result was his 1995 Terror from the Deep. His XCOM 2 from Firaxis, on the other hand, solved the problem with a little cleverness. “Surprised man lost!” it shouted with a bewildered look on the player’s face. “You are now fighting a guerrilla war against a mixed human-alien dictatorship! What about those bananas?”
Both games are ingenious ways of building sequels that logically follow on from the first, while also reinvigorating the whole concept. By comparison, Xenonauts 2 The answer is, “What if you could save the world again? But… more?”
There’s a reason its premise has stood the test of time, and Xenonauts 2’s variant has a wider canvas and more detail. But when I carried the Nth DropShip of gray-suited soldiers to presumably death, I couldn’t help but feel like the novelty wore on. teenager A little thin.
2014’s Xenonauts was born out of a desire to restore all the 90s tactical remnants that were surgically removed in Firaxis’ XCOM reboot. Like its predecessor, Xenonauts 2 mocks his XCOM initial troop size of four soldiers, packing a dropship with his nine sentient blood bags from the first mission. Overwatch is not an ability you activate, and its range and spread are delimited by obnoxious blue cones. This is a phenomenon that occurs when any unit has enough time his points to spare, making every step towards an alien foe a heart-stopping gamble. Soldiers should be directly instructed to face the enemy and crouch behind an object. All of this consumes precious time points and can mean the difference between life and death.
As someone who has played the new XCOM but not the old X-COM, I found these differences difficult at first. And challenging means fucking infuriating. Didn’t you check the corner of the barn you just entered? You’re dead because a lizard the size of Dave Bautista is hiding behind a wood splitter.
Did you forget to replace the ammo clip when you gave the sniper that fancy laser rifle?
Don’t you have X-ray vision to see through the fog of war that obscures all unchecked tiles on the map? goodwas simply shot by the entire shipyard for failing to predict the future.
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Firaxis was 100% right to remove this element from the reboot. If I had to deal with such finicky troop management in 2012, I would have thrown it in the trash faster than a birthday card from Hitler. butas classic X-COM fans say at every opportunity, there was a reason for this extra layer, and the more I played, the more I understood why.
advanced tactics
Sure, it would be a nuisance to lose an alien pilot for not rotating it 45 degrees. But the same system will help you defend your flanks as you progress through the map. Orientation affects the alien’s ability to react as much as yours, so it helps you navigate deftly around alien surveillance. Most of the game mechanics work this way. Enemies that explode on death are dangerous to everyone around them, no matter how many limbs, nostrils or pancreases they have.
There are some elements in the tactical layer that I definitely dislike, including being shot at by enemies in a black void from half the map. But there are elements that I like over his Firaxis design as well, such as the wide range of fire modes that most weapons have. One of the great satisfactions of Xenonauts 2 is switching from high accuracy single shots to low accuracy 3-round bursts and seeing all the bullets thud on their targets just before they hit the ground.
New elements have also been added to the tactical layer. The way vehicles are implemented in the game has been adjusted. Replacing Xenonauts’ bulky manned reconnaissance vehicle is an automatic weapons platform that occupies one of his tiles, much like a soldier. It’s easy to maneuver, useful for initial reconnaissance of mission areas, and its missile bank is great for dealing with large groups of enemies. These platforms are also modular and can be equipped with new and upgraded weapons just like soldiers. It’s a big metal target for aliens, easily destroyed, but much easier to put back together than it is for humans.
Once the Xenonaut completes the mission (or dies attempting it), the game zooms out to a global view of the geoscape. Here you’ll research new technologies, manufacture new weapons and equipment, manage and expand your base (and build new ones), and watch the skies for sightings of UFOs and other alien activity. This is a very well known one, but we’ll get to that point in more detail later. But one of the advantages of Xenonauts is versatility. Missions range from thwarting kidnappings and terrorist attacks to retrieving the wreckage of increasingly large and dangerous UFOs. Nearly every new mission will have you facing new threats and trying out new weapons and gear. Objectives are also presented neatly in breadcrumbs in the game, even if many of them are typical of capturing UFOs and alien events.
The constant curiosity about what happens next is both a unique design of Xenonauts and a testament to XCOM’s enduring premise.
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I have two criticisms of Xenonauts 2. The first is unfair, but true nonetheless. It lacks the dramatic flair found in Firaxis games. The Goldhawk is reminiscent of all fireworks, with artistic decorations everywhere. The music is appropriately foreboding, and the text reports you receive about alien dissections and major story beats are evocative and detailed. I also like short summaries of world events that appear and disappear over time on geoscapes, missing journalists, political assassinations, and vast “dead zones” that appear at sea. It feels appropriately creepy and threatening.
But while I love XCOM’s pulpy bombastic creations, Xenonauts’ more austere presentation doesn’t come across to me in the same way. One issue that particularly bothered me was that the weapon audio effects were subtle. Sure, the M16 rifle is practically prehistoric compared to the alien plasma gun, but tearing through sectons with the M16 should still be satisfying. It’s more like spraying foam into a bag of flour. Later weapons are a little better, but not by much, and none of Xenonaut’s actions have a very physical feel.
My bigger concern is the one I alluded to at the beginning. All Xenonauts are good, but there’s very little new or surprising here. The biggest difference between Xenonauts and XCOM is the ability to control UFO interception, with fighter planes dancing around alien spaceships trading missiles and Gatling gun fire in a top-down, radar-like experience. The point is that you can command the fighter from the point of view. However, as Goldhawk Interactive itself admits, this feature is not ready for the Early Access version. It’s technically playable, but the developers recommend skipping it for now, as it requires a lot of balancing and refinement.
Goldhawk, meanwhile, seeks to spice up the familiarity of the first few hours by adding the Cleaners, a mysterious human clique that works in tandem with aliens. Much of the early game revolves around dismantling Operation Cleaner, raiding offices to steal data, assassinating regional leaders to sabotage operations, and eventually raiding headquarters. Great idea. The problem is that cleaners don’t feel that threatening. Every encounter with the Cleaners put me in an aggressive stance. I didn’t have to react to or protect myself from the Cleaners’ actions.
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The Early Access version, which will be released on July 18th, will provide a near-complete campaign experience, but will noticeably fall short as it progresses, lacking descriptions of certain events and objectives, and leaving a lot to be desired in the second half. Phase feels poor right now. If you still want to play XCOM again, Xenonaut 2 It’s a perfectly acceptable way to do it.
The loop of shooting down a UFO and then sending in weak humans to secure the crash site still works for me, and Xenonauts’ classic-minded tactics are as rewarding as they are ruthless. . But I couldn’t say no to a more daring attempt to put a new twist on an old foe.
