First, if you don't know what OpenXcom is, you should read this article:
https://openxcom.org/about/Now let's define some terminology used below:
1. OG = original game, i.e. X-COM: UFO Defense / X-COM: Terror from the Deep (by Microprose)
2. OXC = OpenXcom (by SupSuper & Warboy)
3. OXCE = OpenXcom Extended (by Yankes & Meridian)
OXC is a re-implementation of OG, making OG more accessible on a wide variety of platforms available today.
The goal of OXC is to keep the game as true to the original as possible.
This basically means that:
- all game mechanics are identical to OG (with very few exceptions, like better pathfinding)
- GUI looks almost identical to OG (with several exceptions, like a new Memorial GUI)
- there's only a few QoL improvements, mostly inspired by previous fan mods like XcomUtil (e.g. soldier reordering)
This is all perfectly in line with the goals of the project, so not a critique, but a praise!
OXC got popular also (or mostly?) because of the way the game "static data" is implemented. The attributes of various objects in the game are written in plain text files, so called rulesets. This allows everybody (read: also non-developers) to tweak various aspects of the game.
The possibilities of this modding concept were "limited" only to what's needed for vanilla, but with Warboy joining the OXC dev team (and with TFTD support), they evolved beyond that (we're forever grateful Warboy!). Still, there is a price to pay for such luxury (I'll let you figure out what it is on your own), so there's only so much OXC devs are willing to do.
And that's where OXCE comes into the whole picture...
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OXCE (by Yankes, since 2014) started by extending the game mechanics giving modders more of this "luxury" stuff. At first it was additional ruleset variables, more recently it's about scripts, which not only change parameters/values, but also allow adding formulas and simple logic. For a long time, OXCE didn't change the GUI or add any QoL, with a few exceptions.
OXCE+ (by Meridian, since 2015) jumped in to fill those GUI/QoL gaps; and added a ton of new ruleset too.
In Q3/2018, OXCE and OXCE+ merged together and are now known simply as OXCE.OXCE now offers extensions in all 3 major aspects:
1. QoL (Quality of Life) improvements (filtering, sorting, searching, indicators, shortcuts, cross-links, and much more)
2. GUI enhancements (GUI refinements to display more useful information, completely new GUIs, etc.)
3. New game mechanics (tons of new concepts like custom experience training, custom visibility mechanics and so on...)
Most of QoL and GUI enhancements originate from my personal needs and ideas, although many other people have contributed too. Most of game mechanics enhancements originate from modders, working on their mods and asking for functionality to implement certain features not available in OXC.
Tip: If you're a modder looking for new features, feel free to share your ideas. If I find them "suitable", they will be implemented.
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Which brings us to the summary:
1/ OXCE contains everything from OXC.
2/ The goals of OXCE project are:
- to provide QoL improvements for players across the whole spectrum (vanilla players!, vanilla mod players, non-vanilla mod players)
- to provide improved and new GUIs for players and modders alike
- to provide new game mechanics... based on both new ruleset and new scripts
3/ The following are NOT goals of OXCE project:
- we do NOT plan to re-implement OXC... features are only ADDED or improved, not removed or completely changed (that why it's called OpenXcom Extended, not OpenXcom Reinvented)
- we do NOT plan to stop supporting vanilla game-play experience... most of the OXCE features are optional (either user options or ruleset options)... there are a few things (mostly QoL), which (for practical reasons) are not configurable, but the difference between OXCE and OXC is not bigger than the difference between OXC and OG.
Once you try it, you won't go back
