Stuff learned about X-Com 2 (vanilla)

[Ethereal_Medic]

Don't hate me plz; deep in my heart I still love the original (and piratez-extended) more.

Story: Believable (yet a bit rushed towards the end)
Graphics: Awesome (max details and stuff)
Gameplay: unless you activate 2-3 groups at once it's rather easy to dispose enemy squads. Sadly no air-game (getting intercepted and shot down doesn't count)
Technologies: 3 tiers of weapons only (and mostly upgrades for damage-values; most utility comes from grenade-types ammo-choice)
Game Length: Way to short; I beat the game in 4 days (~ 6h per day)

"Overwatch" is a rather simple solution to get rid of reaction-score check.
Your soldiers miss all crucial "Overwatch"-shots but hit max-range shots with shotguns/pistols.
The AI is rather stupid to run in obvious overwatch-fire.
Sectoids can screw up your day @ the very first mission. (Mindcontrol and stuff)
Enemy reinforcements get dropped onto your current position for your team to mow'em down in one volley of 'Overwatch"-shots.

Trivia:
Bradford can't fly the Avenger and everyone is bitching about it, yet no one steps up to take the pilot-seat.
How does Tygan managed to get rid of the chip-implant in his neck by himself?
Shen's daughter is your Chief-Engineer now.

Trying Long War 2 -Mod right now and this is alot harder to play.

[Meridian]

Bradford's still alive? That sonofagun...

[Ethereal_Medic]

Considering the tutorial-mission he leads the charge to extract you (refered to as "Commander") from an ADVENT Hasmat-Suit.
Always a giggle when Bradford talks to you and says "Commander" in your face with such grace.

[Meridian]

So you failed terribly in xcom1 as a commander (aliens won, no?)... and yet they put you in charge again... makes sense

[Ethereal_Medic]

Somehow the outcome of X-Com 1 (20xx) was non-canon.

Aliens won by building a giant observation network and forging alien-hybrids as peace-keepers.
Mass broadcast and lies via television made the remaining humans believe, that everything is fine.

The game-over movie for X-Com 1 (20xx) with the sectoid MC-ing the council dude is canon.

This leads to the conclusion that the big bosses are mental wimps and the world fall into a zombie-like slave situation to the alien overlords.
Shit is real with snake-women and sectoids moving freely around in public.

Besides the termination of the X-Com project they kidnapped the commander to learn from your commanding skills and implant these data into the ADVENT officers.
Oh yeah and the aliens melt humans into long-livity serums for the elders (=Ethereals) to stop them from dying.

[legionof1]

There is clear implication in the cut-scenes in 2, that the failure was of the base defense level from Enemy Within DLC. Xcom loses the commander(kidnapped) and primary operations is ruined leading to 2. The officers survive but with nearly all equipment lost and a severe command and control disruption.

There was an article, back near the release of 2, that stated that they went with the most common result of logged first time playthroughs of 1.   

[Ethereal_Medic]

Thx for the correction. 

[karadoc]

I find the whole mechanics of 'pods' being 'activated' a bit weird in the x-com reboot games. It feels like a forced an unnatural solution to a non-existent problem.

[ohartenstein23]

I've heard the novel that was written explains it, with the TL;DR on reddit being that MC'd council cut funding early, there was some betrayal, and the base defense happens in month 1 before you even get lasers. Supposed to make you not lose confidence in the commander since it wasn't your fault or something...

[Ethereal_Medic]

I find the whole mechanics of 'pods' being 'activated' a bit weird in the x-com reboot games. It feels like a forced an unnatural solution to a non-existent problem.

At least it solved the problem of getting cross-map nuked by rockets/blaster-launchers. In other news yes it's unnatural for the other 'pods' to stay out of thier teammates business while a loud firefight happens 1-2 tiles away out of the player's vision range.

[Ragshak]

New X-COMs without Long War mod are very shallow.

[Dioxine]

Graphics, 'awesome'? Average at most IMO, with crappy clipping issues. Story - BLEH. Gameplay - clunky at places, but generally good. Air game - you mean building sattelites? The game is fun to play despite all that, but it's quite casual.

[Ethereal_Medic]

New X-COMs without Long War mod are very shallow.

Yup.

Graphics, 'awesome'? Average at most IMO, with crappy clipping issues. Story - BLEH. Gameplay - clunky at places, but generally good. Air game - you mean building sattelites? The game is fun to play despite all that, but it's quite casual.

Instead of sattelites you build radio-stations now. Clipping issues and wierd camera shots, yup - QA-Staff takes the minority of workplaces lately.

[Ewokgod]

All you need to know about Xcom2 is in the tutorial.

You failed in Xcom1 but, for some reason, the aliens think you are Napoleon and Patton rolled into one.

Bradford shows up carrying a neat rifle that you will never see again. He won't even lend it out to your teams, he's selfish.

Bradford messes up your rescue by not giving all his team grenades. 4 guards at the door, all in blast radius, tutorial tells you to shoot one with a rifle. That's why Bradford wants you back so bad, he's not good on details, like "Everyone got grenades? Cool!" Only you think like that for some reason.

But the one thing people REALLY need to know about Xcom2 is that it is better than Xcom1, and that wasn't all that hard to be.

[legionof1]

snip
Bradford shows up carrying a neat rifle that you will never see again. He won't even lend it out to your teams, he's selfish.
snip

If you have the Alien Rulers dlc he breaks it out one more time on the snake cave stage.