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« on: October 19, 2012, 12:45:07 am »
*sigh* Well, I posted a list of my problems with the game when talking to a guy on N4G... and it took forever to write said list. Well, time to write one again!
Let's see, I think 6 members at most is too few. 10 -12 is the sweet spot, which helps maintain the idea that every squad member is important without limiting the players or making each turn take too long. I think 3 actions per operative per turn is probably better than just 2. Besides, there are problems with this little system anyway. Like pmprog said, not getting a second action because you fired/reloaded on your first is ridiculously stupid. When the developers say you have two actions, then let us have two actions. Better yet, I'm actually in favor of using the Time unit system again. I'm not sure how many other people would prefer the TUs now, but I do.
When it comes to base management, I have a number of problems here as well. Why do we need to manually excavate every damn tile? Why do we need a certain number of engineers to build something rather than just making it take longer to build it? Why does your base, the headquarters of an international group of elite operatives (never mind the fact that in all X-COM games, you start out with rookies that can't shoot for shit, which would be stupid in real-life. Wouldn't be find the best of the best of the best, sir, in real life? Whatever...) dedicated to fighting off a mysterious extraterrestrial threat feel so damn small? Speaking of which, why is the hanger only large enough to support one Skyranger? And if we can only have one Skyranger, why can we have numerous Interceptors? Why can't we build more bases in the world? Why can't we pick a precise location in the world to place our base? If I'm not mistaken, placing your base on some tiny island in the original kept aliens from attacking you so easily, but you would have less of a chance of detecting aliens. I may be wrong about that, but back to the main topic. Why don't aliens EVER attack your base, anyway?
Enough of the base, let's think about the inventory system. Why does a fiber vest or whatever keep you from carrying a grenade? Why can you only carry one grenade? Why can't you carry both a medkit and some grenades of your belt (or wherever they pull this out from)? Why can't you stick anything in a backpack, as in the original game? Oh, you wanted to carry a shotgun and a rifle? Hahaha, too bad. -_- And when referring to the weapons and armor, why are they just strict upgrades rather than "side-grades"? This just reduces the tactical depth in general of outfitting your squad. And why can't you sell some equipment that you think is useless in comparison to your soldier's medkit? And when customizing soldiers themselves, why aren't there any accents outside of the "Default American" accent? It just feels weird to have a chick from China that sounds like she's been an American all of her life. Though, I appreciate the fact that they included the original games' famous hairstyle and shade of blond. A little bit of fanservice never hurt anybody.
Now the geoscape. Where's the time buttons? All we get is "Scan for Activity." And the geoscape brings other problems. So, you can detect random UFOs and can go shoot them down, but you'll never be able to see those UFOs that are exclusive to certain locations. You know, the UFOs that keep bringing up the abduction missions? I shouldn't have to go to the XCOM Nexus or alter the .exe itself to activate a fully functional part of the game that I think adds to their whole, "Every choice you make is irreversible" thing they have going on. Since, as I said, there's just one UFO per country that stays neatly inside of said country's borders, choosing to get rid of a UFO gets rid of one of the abductions missions you're tasked with choosing between, but at the cost of never getting the benefits that country would provide if you completed an abduction mission there. And why is the air combat so limited? More so, in fact, that the original's, which is REALLY REALLY saying something.
Now back to combat's problems. I've already mentioned the problems the 2-action system comes with, but there's still quite a fw other issues. As has been stated repeatedly, why is there only one way to fire with the exception of some special equipment like rocket launchers or grenades. Limiting free-aim is just stupid and not allowing more precise single-shots is a missed opportunity. And on Classic difficulty, why is the AI so cheap. Oftentimes, your basic Sectoid can critical one of your soldiers from across the map turn after turn. And such a problem is more infurating when a fully-leveled soldier can't target the Sectoid (or whatever alien it is) because said Sectoid is actually TOO FAR AWAY. 0_o Oh, and the camera is just horrendous. Absolutely horrendous. There's also a ton of bugs here, as they are in the entire game. Clipping is in abundance, too.
And, finally... why is Second Wave disabled by default as well? Because some of the modifier's don't work? Okay, then scrap those and include the ones that do work, dammit.
Still, you know what the really weird thing is? Even though this game has problem after problem after problem after problem... I still REALLY like it. It's a good game, perhaps on the border of being great. But the thing is... it says XCOM on it. And when you compare it to a game that's constantly considered the best strategy and/or tactics game ever created, you REALLY start to notice a lot of problems. Regardless, it's a very fun game in my opinion and it's managed to rip me away from my game of the year, Dishonored. That takes some miracle.
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