XCOM: Chimera Squad

[The Martian]

[Nord]

How to parasitize on famous brand...

[kharille]

Avoided buying xcom 2012 until Julian Gollop seemed to give his endorsement.  Guess I did spend a lot of time on it but it felt bad, like binging on mcdonalds.  Xcom 2 came out on gog and I'm irritated with the 2nd mission.  Do I need to replay it?  Backlog of games as it is.

[WaldoTheRanger]

Xcom 2 came out on gog and I'm irritated with the 2nd mission.  Do I need to replay it?  Backlog of games as it is.

I'd recommend watching someone like Christopher odd to get a sense of the best strategies to use. I assume that's what irritated you? not doing well?

[WaldoTheRanger]

I think the game looks pretty cool. basically fireaxis's version of apocalypse.
the heavy focus on a prewritten story, and the fact that agents can't die apart from said story, I think be a turn off to old veterans like most people here, and lack of character customization could make some of the newer fans mad.

I personally don't mind those things too much, but what I do mind is the pro police state/anti liberty vibes I'm already getting from it. but that's another thing altogether of course.

[Bobit]

I'm actually super hyped for this. Chimera Squad seems to include all the systems from XCOM2, but remove pods, not waste your time on its mediocre geoscape/retaliations, make losses forgiving like OpenX, and add its own gimmicky abilities. Let OpenX handle the epics, XCOM2 could use a tighter format.

Story missions and lack of ironman support might be a turnoff depending on how it's handled. I'm fine with downed soldiers surviving, but not when it forces a savescum.

[imaus]

The only saving grace about CS might be that this is a sideshow for Xcom-3, but still, would I be interested? Not likely. I don't like the story of Xcom2 and CS and 3 will just be a continuation of that. I really don't like the alien designs (I never thought I would be sad for a Muton).

X-com was not a series that needed to be stripped-to-the-bare-bones, it needed a polishing. Maybe some streamlining. But not...this. Four new games in the last decade and the only enjoyment I got out of them were lets-players putting their spin on it.

[NancyGold]

I think most drama and butthurt generated by modern games (especially the remakes) is due to, surprisingly, the larger budgets. Imagine yourself being a video game producer. You got a nice multi-million dollar project funded (video game development costs now approach billions of USD). Now you need to waste all these money somehow. So you funnel them into creation of some overpriced assets, like hiring a some famous music stars to voice the roles, and motion capture all characters. Additionally you use some premade engine, like Cryengine or Unreal, geared towards FPS games. Because custom engine would be too much effort, and modern engines require very specific expertise and a lot of time to design (i.e. even given unlimited money it would be impossible).

Now it is all nice and dandy if you're making an FPS rail shooter game with a static movie-like experience. But what if you're making an XCOM like game? Unreal engine is not really suited for destructible environments or tile based games. So you use continuous static space with static objects and linear story-driven mission progression. That way you can indeed use all these expensive assets and cutscenes. Even hire the best sci-fi author to write the screenplay. The resulting game is very predictable, can be easily debugged and shipped on time. Corporate people in suits love that, but they usually hate video games (really not their fault modern customers demand this complex crap, instead of the good old booze). Same BTW happens with journalism today, when everyone, even your parents, have a youtube channel and some web-log (big media got very annoyed they have to be more fun, niche, dynamic and interactive, or just die).

Now original XCOM games up to Apocalypse had a very turbulent development history, and mostly depended on actual game design being composed of systems creating some dynamic, but ultimately fun holistic experience, instead of being a movie/book with static content (i.e. think Dwarf Fortress). Such product is very hard to design and debug. You need Gollop for that, not that random manager guy who can't program even a checkers.

BTW, DF devs finally decided to add some UI. And it is not pretty. Just some confusing 2d tiles. Can't believe they could not crowd fund a proper 3d UI. Still better than ASCII I guess.

[kharille]

I think the game looks pretty cool. basically fireaxis's version of apocalypse.
the heavy focus on a prewritten story, and the fact that agents can't die apart from said story, I think be a turn off to old veterans like most people here, and lack of character customization could make some of the newer fans mad.

I personally don't mind those things too much, but what I do mind is the pro police state/anti liberty vibes I'm already getting from it. but that's another thing altogether of course.

Made 1 attempt and it was a disaster.  Had to rush in to detonate something and ended up disturbing 3 alien groups.  4th one moved on me.  If I have to make 1 reload or more just to finish the 2nd mission in the game, doesn't reflect well on the game.

Its just nuts if the entire game is all about rushing.  I play turn based so that I can think about what I want to do.

[vadracas]

Errr... A single person having difficulty with the game does not reflect badly on it. This game is very much not the "xcom style," but is still a quite good game. Based on what you said, your problem with it is not being able to play a tactical game like you like to play them, which sounds like it could be a fun challenge.

[kharille]

Oh well, maybe I'll revisit later.  Must've spent 300 hours on 2012 version, but I'm finding it easier to get into battletech now that all the dlc are out.

[Solarius Scorch]

I don't know if it also applies to Chimera Squad (I'm not going to use say CS, this is troll level misdirection lol), but nuCom in general has one big problem for me: real tactics don't work. Reconnaissance? Bad idea, you'll just activate an overwhelming number of enemies. Flanking? Building a fire base? Using decoys? All these basic manoeuvres range from inconsequential to actively harmful.

So yes, I suck at nuCom. But not because I'm too dumb, it's because I refuse to switch to this play-pretend war. It's not fun, it's lame, it's disrespectful to basic military instincts. I want no part in this.

So I guess that's what Kharille meant.

[kharille]

Yeah, maybe I'd best rewatch metalcanyons game again.  Seems that timer happens often in xcom 2.  In xcom 2012 I wouldn't want to activate multiple parties if I could avoid it otherwise you'd get a flurry of alien activity before you get anything done.  Tried Roguetech mod on battletech and I lost interest since each turn seemed to take forever.

[NancyGold]

Reconnaissance? Bad idea, you'll just activate an overwhelming number of enemies. Flanking? Building a fire base? Using decoys?

To be honest original XCOM had no true recon. There were basically three options.
1. Using that huge tank, which took 4 cargo space.
2. Using cannon fodder rookies to bate aliens into exposing their positions. They took space, similar to tanks, but also got you penalized for losing operatives. In addition to their training cost.
3. Shooting the guided missiles into the fog of war, hoping they will hit something.

But yeah, it had no triggers, and the aliens were patrolling map unpredictable no matter what. That simple mechanics was actually very efficient at making AI challenging since a random pick covers very large decision space. So AI by extension can do anything not just what it was scripted to do.

But I guess new xcoms were inspired more by Fire Emblem, which indeed used various deus ex machina triggers.
https://feheroes.gamepedia.com/AI

All enemies in the game will wait until they are engaged by the player, after which the enemy will begin attacking the player units. An enemy unit is engaged if it is attacked or a player unit is present in its danger zone during the enemy phase.

Obviously such AI will result in a completely different, dumbed down, gameplay. No matter the game mechanics, which may as well be a perfect real world imitation down to atoms.

[Bobit]

NuCOM is certainly less tactically "realistic" than XCOMfiles where pretty much everything works as you would expect it to from peeking out of cover to reasons for spreading out, but saying flanking doesn't work in NuCOM is pretty odd. Flanked enemies effectively take 3x damage due to lack of cover and the crit bonus. Whereas in XCOMfiles many enemies don't even have extra frontal armor.

Maybe strategic-level flanking is possible in XCOMfiles, but it sounds incredibly risky. Tactical-level flanking isn't that prevalent in realistic chit wargames though, so it might be more realistic to make it weak. Also in Chimera Squad you can cross the entire map in a single turn so cover is very useless unfortunately.

Also weird that you say "decoys" which I assume is the more realistic version of "distractions/tanking". This is weaker in NuCOM largely because the AI knows to ignore units that are "tanking" and shoot the most vulnerable target. Not really something you can fault the game for. But there are a lot less ways to disorient a target: no  vision-based smoke grenades, no wounds, no leader-based panic/surrender, no CQB, overwatch can't be expected to oneshot.