Messages

1

The X-Com Files / Re: A question on aircraft

« on: April 10, 2025, 08:44:20 am »

Hope you don't mind me reviving this thread.  I'm in late-game X-Com Files and just got the AIRCAR.  What's it good for?

I'm still using Rovers for undercover missions, which can hold 1 more agent.  For regular missions I've got Skymarshall (cheap fuel), IronFist and (soon) Avenger.

2

OXCE Suggestions DONE / [DONE][Suggestion] Remember touch buttons show/hide status in battlescape on Android

« on: April 09, 2025, 02:09:52 pm »

Every time I start a new tactical mission or load a battlescape savegame on Android, the first thing I find myself doing is showing the touch buttons.

Is there already a way to force them to always be shown by default (eg. options.cfg flag)?  Or would it be hard to remember your preference from the last time the battlescape was shown?

Not a deal breaker, but I figured worth inquiring/suggesting.

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OXCE Suggestions DONE / Re: [DONE][Suggestion] Base Touch buttons (RMB/MMB/Ctrl/Alt/Shift alternative on Android)

« on: April 09, 2025, 01:45:55 pm »

Understood, thanks!

4

OXCE Suggestions DONE / Re: [DONE][Suggestion] Base Touch buttons (RMB/MMB/Ctrl/Alt/Shift alternative on Android)

« on: April 07, 2025, 02:28:45 pm »

This is a great feature, it really improves things on Android.

But I think it's not quite working right on the Transfer Items screen.  I've tried Middle-click and Right-click on Gillman Hero, and nothing comes up.  I can't fully test on desktop at the moment, but am pretty sure it does come up there.  It does come up on desktop.

The other screens I tried so far work fine (including middle- or right-clicking the same item on the Sell/Sack screen).

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OXCE Suggestions DONE / Re: [DONE][Suggestion] Select next soldier by proximity

« on: April 04, 2025, 09:09:43 am »

Thanks! 😀

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OXCE Suggestions DONE / Re: [DONE][Suggestion] Select next soldier by proximity

« on: March 31, 2025, 01:58:42 am »

Proximity Select is awesome.  Out of curiosity, is there any option to make that the default behavior when you click the Don't Reselect button?  Would save the 2 extra taps on mobile to depress/release the middle mouse button every time you cycle to another unit.

7

OXCE Suggestions DONE / Re: [Suggestion] Right-click inventory item for UFOpaedia on mobile

« on: March 31, 2025, 01:48:03 am »

You can test it using this build: https://openxcom.org/oxce/misc/oxce815.apk

I gave it a quick test and it works great!  I'll keep it installed, play with it some more, and if you don't hear from me it means I didn't find any issues.  Thanks!

8

OXCE Support / Re: [Suggestion] Option to hide globe panning/zoom buttons on Geoscape

« on: March 30, 2025, 10:50:16 am »

Can already be moved by ruleset.

Cool.  I found the element in interfaces_XCOMFILES.rul and changed it from -22 to 155.  Works for me, and I can live with the buttons being there behind it.  Request solved!

9

The X-Com Files / Re: [submod]Cryptic Butchery(0.4.0)

« on: March 30, 2025, 08:51:52 am »

The current version 0.4.0 of Cryptic Butchery does not load in Open X-Com Extended (OXCE) 8.0 or later, due to a Rapidyaml error parsing its Language\en-US.yml file.

The issue is caused by a trailing <tab> character on the first line of the file.

For guidance, see https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php?topic=12367.0.

The error presents as:

Code: [Select]

[29-03-2025_22-30-37] [FATAL] Error loading file 'C:/Games/OpenXcom/user/mods/Cryptic Butchery/Language/en-US.yml'
[29-03-2025_22-30-37] [ERROR] Rapidyaml ERROR: parse error
en-US.yml:2:25:   STR_MONGORN_ANZUG_GLAS: "Mongorn Anzug(from living specimen)"  (size=63)
                                        ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  (cols 25-64)
Here's the file in question, in a text editor showing the extra tab character:



Attached (immediately below this post) is an updated version of the mod which fixes the problem.  All I did was remove that tab in en-US.yml and bump the version number in metadata.yml.

Ordinarily I wouldn't presume to make a "release" of someone else's work, but I'm not sure how actively this mod is being maintained and it's a trivial enough thing that it feels pretty harmless.  Hopefully I just saved you a few minutes of time .  If you release a new official version, please skip the 0.4.1 minor version number to avoid any confusion.  I'll be happy to edit this post to remove my attachment once you make an official release.

Cheers!

p.s. I was tempted to remove the extra blank lines as well, but wanted to minimize the footprint of my changes and was only 99.99% sure they aren't there for a reason.

10

OXCE Suggestions DONE / Re: [DONE][Suggestion] Option to show quick search box on Android

« on: March 30, 2025, 04:13:47 am »

I noticed all the affected screens have the filter boxes shown when you bring them up on mobile, except for the Equip Craft one.

In this screenshot there's a "secret" textbox on the top right which you can tap into:


In the other ones the textbox is visible (so a little more discoverable):


It's not a big deal.  I wasn't sure if this is intentional (e.g. if you need the space because craft name might overlap it) or accidental, so thought I'd mention.

I can't praise enough how much this feature has made gameplay more pleasant on mobile!

11

OXCE Suggestions DONE / Re: [Suggestion] Right-click inventory item for UFOpaedia on mobile

« on: March 30, 2025, 03:48:04 am »

How about something like this (see attached video).

YES, that would be so, totally awesome! 

I think I might even have tried doing exactly that once, out of exploration / desperation.  (If you wanted to make it more obvious, you could temporarily change the hamburger to a "?" or "ⓘ" / info icon while the user is holding a piece of equipment, but that could get distracting and I don't see it as necessary myself).

2) doesn't exist (unless you are playing some other fork) ...
Are you confusing it with Ctrl+L-click?

I was, for the case of #2.  Sorry about that.

• It can be considered on a few selected places based on community feedback...
• I was waiting for feedback first, but obviously nobody from the community plays on mobile, or nobody cares about it, or nobody reads the forum.
• I have a life too.

Totally fair.

I'm actually really blown away by how playable it is on Android.  I've spent more than 50% of my The X-Com Files gametime on that platform, out of convenience.  And this is coming from someone who generally shuns doing things on mobile in favor of a "real" platform like desktop.

The change you made a while ago to show filter boxes had a HUGE impact on playability.  It's really nice not having to repeatedly scroll through huge lists like inventory at a hoarder base, the UFOpaedia, etc.

I feel like if it was more accessible to get started (...imagine if a deal could be cut with Take-Two or whoever to bundle the copyright IP so you could install and launch XCF with a single tap), and with a few more quality of life tweaks, that could be avenue to bring in lots of new players.  I can easily state that coupled with that mod, this is the deepest game I've ever played on any mobile platform, and it certainly competes in terms of "fun factor" with other, much more popular titles I've played.  I realize I might be a little biased due to nostalgia.  Maybe one day I'll do a little how-to writeup with screenshots on how to install it, set up the mod, configure savegame syncing with other devices, etc.

In the meantime, the tweaks you've already made have really improved my own experience and I thank you for that sir!

I made a separate thread to list a few screens where a middle-click (and potentially right-click) could be helpful:
 https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php?topic=12574

12

OXCE Suggestions DONE / [DONE][Suggestion] Base Touch buttons (RMB/MMB/Ctrl/Alt/Shift alternative on Android)

« on: March 30, 2025, 03:37:00 am »

This is a follow-up to another thread, to document some key screens where it would be helpful on mobile to be able to access functions normally provided by middle-click and right-click.

Namely to check if a particular type of alien is safe to sell or still needed research purposes, whether an item or corpse is a component in known/unknown manufactured items, etc.

They are:

• "Sell loot" screen right after completing a tactical mission (this would be the most impactful one)
• Sell screen where you sell items from your base inventory stores
• Prisoner / Animal / Alien containment list

I'm not sure what the best way would be to provide access.  In most cases I think a long-tap could work (at least for the middle-click function).  Or maybe a hamburger button, mouse button icon(s) like you have in the tactical map, color coding for "still needed" vs. "safe to sell", or something else.

While trying to solve this myself, I even looked for some kind of app that can send keystrokes from a notification drawer widget, with the intent to subsequently bind them somehow to in-game mouse buttons.

I've been playing an X-Com Files campaign on mobile and desktop.  On mobile I find myself reluctant to sell the last of an alien/corpse/etc. after a mission, until I can go to PC and check the tech tree viewer / dependencies list to confirm whether I still need it.  The Auto-Sell Manager helps a lot, but its usefulness is impeded on mobile because you can't check items in the place you really need to (i.e. the post-mission sell loot screen).

Earlier in my game, before I discovered the Auto-Sell Manager, I wound up maintaining big lists like this (it goes on for a few pages...):

13

OXCE Support / [Solved] Option to hide globe panning/zoom buttons on Geoscape

« on: March 30, 2025, 12:55:28 am »

On Android, the buttons to pan / zoom the globe are not needed, since drag and pinch-zoom gestures are intuitive and do the job just fine.

After endless hours playing on that platform, I've never once needed to resort to those buttons.

I've also noticed the Slacking indicator is not shown when I play on mobile, even though the OXCE option Show slacking indicator is turned on.  I'm not clear if it's a bug, a result of the screen resolution / ratio on my device, or intentional.  Either way, removing those zoom / panning controls would make room for it, and if it's a bug or missing implementation it would be awesome if that could be addressed at the same time.

I realize removing them would make the game look a bit less X-Com... the new option can be defaulted to off.  (Come to think of it, I don't use those buttons on desktop, either, since grabbing the globe to pan and using the scroll wheel to zoom are quicker.)

Below are some screenshots to compare and show what I'm referring to (sorry the annotation is messy).

14

The X-Com Files / Need other radars after HyperWave Decoder?

« on: March 30, 2025, 12:04:40 am »

Is it safe to get rid of older radar installations once you roll out Hyperwave Decoders?

I've built Hyperwave Decoders in 5 of my 6 bases, with near-global coverage.  I thought I read somewhere that you no longer really need Large and Small radar facilities once that's in place, so I dismantled most of them to regain space.  But I noticed a couple new alien bases spawn this month, which were detected by my Hawkeye (one Hybrid Embassy, and another Alien Colony).  I didn't used too get much in the way of bases spawning before, certainly not two at once.  Am I'm missing some UFO's due to lack of the older radars?  Or was it probably just a coincidence?

15

The X-Com Files / Re: RPG Launcher to Advanced Rocket Launcher upgrade vs. Armor

« on: March 29, 2025, 11:56:46 pm »

That's awesome, I will have to try it out.  Thanks for that thorough rundown.  I've moved beyond Nitro's now, to mainly TurboLasers, but jotted it down for another run-through or when I simply just want to have some agents to play and compare on another runthrough.