Xenonauts

Собственно, зайду с места в карьер: ни разу это не старый-добрый ХСОМ. Играл и в оригинал, а потом прошел с модом X-Divison, надеясь, что вот он то превратит однообразный геймплей во что то динамичное и развивающееся. Нифига. Действительно интересно играть где то до середины второй волны: вы изучаете механики, открываете технологии, занимаетесь менеджментом баз, осторожно воюете с пришельцами. Идет развитие как игрока, так и противников, и ты ждешь, что с развитием игры появятся новые механики. Но нет, если вы пройдете миссию в лейтгейме сразу после миссии в начале игры, то совершенно никакой разницы не почувствуете: все будет совершенно одинаково, только раз в 10 ДОЛЬШЕ. За всю время игра практически не презентует ни новых механик, ни новых испытаний. По сути, вы сталкиваетесь с более толстой версией врагов под другими скинами, но ведут себя они совершенно одинаково. Ваше собственное развитие точно также лишь прибавляет цифры к уже известным механикам. Т.е., вы стреляете точнее, бьете больнее, гранаты взрываются жестче и т.д. Но не более того. Там, где ремейки ХСОМ давали возможность игроку действовать по-иному, представляя новый инструменты, новые механики, действиетльно новых врагов, которые умеют то, что не умели до них, Ксенонавты лишь талдычат одно и то же, одно и то же, почему то надеясь, что вам это не надоест. Ручной менеджмент базы - классная штука, вот только прибить надо того кто придумывал интерфейс перемещения и продажи предметов. Надо тебе две винтовки перекинуть на одну базу, и еще две - на другую? Найди их в длиннющем списке, выбери одну базу, перекинь, список сбросится, так что надо будет найти их еще раз. А представьте, если вам нужно раскидать 40 предметов по 4 базам? Для меня очень логичным решением была бы автоматищация этого процесса, когда при попытке производства, к примеру, самолета, детали для которого лежат на другой базе, вспылвало бы окошечко "деталей на базе 1 нет, есть на базе 2, траспортировать их на базу 1 за 100баксов за 5 часов?" и ответ "да/нет", после чего производство бы начиналось автоматом через пять часов, т.к. задача уже поставлена. В конце концов реализм - это когда у Коммандера есть гребанный завхоз, который распределяет все блага туда-сюда, не бегая к главному при покупке каждой отдельной шариковой ручки. Описания предметов в энциклопедии - прикольные. Воздушные бои - очень понравились. Они сложные, но когда стартовыми рапторами удается размансить крупный корабль - это очень классное ощущение. Разные корабли пришельцев вооружены по разному и иногда действительно требуют разного подхода. В основном же, правда, надо давить массой, отвлекать одним и заходить остальными в хвост. Тем не менее, именно такой должна быть прогрессия механик: ваши инструменты улучшаются, вместе с инструментами противника, но противник должен предъявлять к вам совершенно новые требования. Если проводит аналогию, представьте, что всю игру вам пришлось бы разваливать один и тот же скаут из начала игры в каждом воздушном бое, у которого бы просто становилась больше скорость, хп и урон - вот такие однообразные и нелепые в Ксенонавтах наземные бои в средине и конце игры. Разделение урона и сопротивляемости врагом - хорошая механика, если бы только она была не единственной, определяющей ваши собственные действия. Из-за неё, кстати, ультимативным оружием в X-division является антиматериальные мушки, так как им плевать на любые сопротивления. Да и таскать с собой несколько стоволов совсем не сложно. Дрогой вопрос в том, почему прямо во время боя нельзя сказать, какой именно противник перед глазами игрока, при условии, что он уже встречался ранее и был исследован на базе? Почему нужно зазубривать визуальные отличия одних от других, если, опять же, вполне реально, что специалисты с базы сразу определят, кто это. Многие враги тупо сильно похожи друг на друга, поэтому весьма часто я забивал шоковыми дубинками чуть ли не весь экипаж НЛО, через миллион загрузок и страданий, чтобы обнаружить, что никого ценного среди них не было. Итог: это игра завлекает многим и первые десятки часов (а мне было реально интересно) отлично вводит вас в заблуждение. Однако потом четко становится понятно, что это совсем-совсем не ХСОМ. Это очень бедная на механики, кривая во множестве мелких моментов, раздражающая совершенно бесполезным и необоснованным микроменеджментом, умноженным на неудобную его реализацию, игра. Она не сможет вам предложить практически ничего нового. Считайте, что после первого воздушного боя и последующего за ним наземного вы увидели практически все. Дальше вы будете лишь сотни раз все повторять с постоянно возрастающей сложностью. Да, в ней хороший задел и проработанные тактические сражения. Вот только разнообразие в них совершенно отсутствует. Воздушные бои, повторюсь, мне пришлись по душе. Лучшие найдите другую стратегию, или поиграйте Open X-Com. Ксенонавты - это очень "ТАКОЕ СЕБЕ", без кардинальных улучшений (и даже с ними, в виде моды X-Division, в котором всего гораздо больше и духоты, соответственно, больше) не способное выглядеть полноценным произвидением. Максимум 5/10. Отдельный минус, который в оценке отсутствует, лично от себя: отсутствие кастомизации бойцов. Создать свой отряд и заботиться о нем, получается гораздо сложнее, чем в ремейках ХСОМ. Я запоминал бойцов и привязывался к ним, но совсем не так и, по ощущениям, только на первых порах.

The original XCOM still exists. Xenonauts isn't that much of an improvement that it would be worth playing this over the original. I've heard the argument that the UI is more user friendly.... I completely disagree. It's about as ugly and unintuitive. So if you're patient enough to learn the controls for Xenonauts, just get XCOM UFO DEFENSE instead. A lot of the problems the original had could be tweaked in the mod OpenXcom, allowing the game to be about as intuitive as Xenonauts. The graphics aren't updated enough compared to XCOM that it is a direct improvement either. I honestly found it more ugly than the pixelated graphics of it's spiritual predecessor. XCOM's lack of graphical fidelity may have actually worked in it's advantage. It not being crystal clear what something looked like made aliens feel more uncanny and let your imagination sort of fill in the gaps One of my biggest criticisms is how similar it is. It's like they made a carbon copy. The original XCOM spent a lot of effort through its soundtrack, sound effects, graphics, and design to set a unique atmosphere of paranoia and anxiety which really complimented the gameplay and scenario. You really felt like there was some unnatural threat that you could just barely meet head on. I'd say that's the thing Xenonauts is lacking the most. It's like they copied XCOM's homework and forgot to inject any of the soul that was in the original. The only thing gameplay wise that has seen major improvements is the interceptor minigame. Rather than an overly simplistic and predictable minigame like in UFO Defense, the intercept missions actually have you moving around your aircraft manually and actually takes a bit of skill to take full advantage of. It's just that overall I wish this game tried to stand out on its own. It is too similar to XCOM, playing it just feels like I'm having an objectively worse experience. It makes me wonder why this game even exists to begin with. Artistically, story wise, setting wise, style wise, they should have done something original. Instead they have a clone of XCOM that while sucessfully capturing many of the same gameplay elements, fails to capture any of the soul the original game had, leaving Xenonauts 1 and 2 as hollow husks that seemingly have no reason to exist.

If you enjoyed the X-COM or XCOM series, there's absolutely no reason to buy this game. It offers virtually no improvements. It lacks the originality that an indie game should have, and instead relies solely on the X-COM formula for success. This game is soulless. Playing the game feels incredibly dry, almost like working in an office. There's no dialogue, no cinematics, no cutscenes. There's absolutely no interesting feedback. Communication is all you do via the Xenopedia. Even the background music isn't engaging. The story unfolds almost identically to X-COM, lacking any intrigue or motivation to keep playing. UFOs appear, they harass humanity, and the gradual progression and response are all the same as in the X-COM series. The air combat, while real-time, quickly becomes tedious. The alien ships' simple movements make them easily countered by the player's basic fighter. Ground combat is also marred by the unintuitive reactive firing mechanic. The aliens in the UFO are stupid beings who run towards the soldiers who are sitting and aiming and kill themselves one by one. --- pros: - The graphics not only look good but also provide good visibility. - Many bugs are hard to find thanks to community patches and mods. cons: - It's annoying that the camera doesn't rotate. (Xenonauts 2 improves on this.) - All UFO missions except the last one are the same and boring. - The ending is vain. My practical conclusion is this: If you're completely new to X/COM, this game might be worth a try. The game is pretty difficult. Buy it when it's on sale. If you are a fan of XCOM, use the X-Division mod from the beginning and enjoy your first game.

If you've ever wondered what X-COM: UFO defense might look like if it were remade with modern polish but without losing its soul, Xenonauts is the answer. The strategic layer is old-school. You're managing a global defense network, building bases, intercepting UFOs and researching alien tech. Basically the same as we've seen in UFO defence. The tactical combat is where Xenonauts shines. it's gritty, and unforgiving. Soldiers are vulnerable, line of sight matters, cover is your best friend, and a single wrong move can spiral into disaster. There's no cinematics here, just tight tactical gameplay that requires real thought. And when a plan comes together, it feels earned. A huge part of the appeal for me was the atmosphere. The Cold War aesthetic gives the game a unique identity, and the grounded, militaristic tone makes the alien invasion feel real. It's not a flashy game, but it nails the mood. This isn’t a game for everyone. It doesn’t have the slickness of newer XCOM titles, and it doesn’t try to. But if you wish for a spiritual successor so the original UFO defence then this is it.

Did I have fun playing the game? Yes. Is it a good game? Yes. If you liked X-Com, you would love this game as well. But when you have completed 156 ground missions, it becomes painful to see new ground missions to pop up. I find myself lack the motivation to finish the final assault mission. Should have air-struck all those downed UFOs ground mission before.

[h3]In brief: highly competent remake of Gollop's [i]X-COM[/i] with solid community mod support. An understated classic, though probably too old-school for the younger generation.[/h3] Way back in 1994, an up-and-coming game designer named Julian Gollop led the independent Mythos Games studio in the development of [i]X-COM:Enemy Unknown[/i]. That game became a global success and launched a franchise which has seen sequels, cash-ins, reboots, and imitators both good and bad ever since. The most famous is of course the Firaxis reboot [i]XCOM[/i] from 2012 (note lack of hyphen), though the most recent and most significant is 2019's [i]Phoenix Point[/i], which is Gollop's own next step in the saga (and which I strongly recommend). In 2014, a full 20 years after the original, a new indie studio named Goldhawk Interactive published something that was not quite remake and not quite reboot - very close to the original, but different in plot and presentation. [i]Xenonauts[/i] borrowed the core concepts from [i]X-COM[/i] whilst ignoring the various releases in between; in particular, they did not take anything from Firaxis' [i]XCOM[/i], so fans of that game should be aware that you will not find the same experience here. What you will find is no cutscenes, no FMV, no voiceovers, and no Magic 4 Supermen. Instead, you will find a gritty and unforgiving secret war simulator with beautifully clean lines and very solid mechanics. [i]Xenonauts[/i] locates its action in 1979, drawing on the paranoid and fearful atmosphere of the Cold War. The game's text-delivered backstory briefly explains that alien incursions began decades earlier and created a new fear for a set of world governments already staring each other down over the barrels of their ICBMs. Now, an alien fleet has moved into Earth orbit and is reconfiguring its spacecraft for atmospheric operations; abductions and random attacks have begun, people are scared, and the lack of mutual trust amongst the world's governments results in a disjointed response. The only coherency comes from the Xenonauts, an organisation formed clandestinely outside of formal military structures. The game presents the same global/local dualism of the original with a real-time Geoscape and Battlescape missions played in turns. The Geoscape is more dynamic than the original: reports of attacks and atrocities pop up here and there, providing hints about alien activity which your interceptors can make use of. As in the original, you begin with a single base with limited radar coverage and only a couple of standard fighter jets plus a platoon of soldiers and their transport chopper. The alien craft are similarly basic at first, but they soon develop; the player needs to keep pace by hiring scientists and building labs for them so they can research vehicle and weapon upgrades, then hiring engineers and building workshops for them so they can build the products of that research. Additional bases should be constructed, and the player is required to think carefully about location and coverage in order to maximise their investments. Aerial clashes with UFOs result in shootdowns, and it's also possible to catch alien craft when they land. The air war is crucial to success, and requires close attention from the player - there are no big honking warning signs, you must use the information available to direct your meagre forces. Hitting a crash/landing site with a chopper full of troops results in a Battlescape mission in which your squaddies must kill or capture the surviving alien crew, after which the wreckage and its artefacts can be salvaged and (in part) sold off to increase funds. Captures of aliens and artefacts feed your research options and are essential to progress through the game's plot. New options emerge from research in terms of weapons, armour, light tanks, transport and attack planes, base facilities, and so on, until the ultimate solutions to the alien problem finally emerge. By 2014, [i]Open X-COM[/i] was well developed and the flaws of the original were fully understood. Goldhawk did a competent job of presenting a Battlescape similar in style but trimmed of its clunks and sharp corners. That doesn't mean they made the game easy (unlike Firaxis); [i]Xenonauts[/i] is hard, requiring abundant caution and a willingness to sacrifice from the player. Maximum squad size ranges from 8 to 16, plus light vehicles, and you will need to use all that capacity, because people are gonna get killed along the way. This is a tactics game, and sacrifice is a tactic. The aliens have many advantages: they see perfectly in the dark, some have longer sight ranges than your troops, some have very accurate weapons, some can absorb terrifying amounts of punishment before going down. You must apply proper tactical principles to succeed: avoid overstretch, always aim to outnumber, use cover and smoke and manipular movement, and never make assumptions about what you're facing. The vibe of this game - exactly like the original - is of approaching blind corners with the sole surety of something nasty lying in wait. The game as originally published wasn't perfect. Its writing was serviceable rather than good. It was still enjoyable, and could be played to its conclusion, but the version which emerged as the Community Edition - essentially a sanctioned modding process which became a collaboration between fan-coders and studio - is very solid, very well-written, and remains one of the best squad tactics simulators I've ever played. It's not all that pretty, it's certainly not flashy, and it rarely polishes your ego. The music is understated and menacing, not bombastic. The soldiers' outfits are mundane and functional, not hench-looking and awesome. There is a chance-to-hit system which you do have to take seriously - 90% chance to hit means 10% chance to miss, and nobody should ever forget that. If you're relying on your one star uber-sniper to wipe the board for you, you'll lose, simple as that. I've played this game a lot ever since it first came out. I'm reviewing it now because the sequel is due out soon, and people may come looking at this one to check its antecedents. I won't speak for the sequel here - at time of writing I've only played the demo - but I will say this: play [i]Xenonauts[/i], by which I mean this one. If you can live without flashy graphics and FMV you'll find a genuine example of solid, clean-cut game design which doesn't mollycoddle the player. You will have to read the manual, as it doesn't do tooltips. You will have to accept defeats as well as victories. If you're equal to that task, you will find a true challenge with true spirit and a satisfying plot trajectory. If you want whizz-bangs and Batman-style gravelly narration, you should head back to the Firaxis webpage, kid.

Why instant negative? The game does not provide larger fonts in 4k resolution, I cannot read any description texts.

👾 *Xenonauts*: il gioco che ti fa dire "E.T. torna a casa... ma con le maniere forti!" 👾 Immagina di essere nel 1979: i pantaloni a zampa, la disco music e... un'invasione aliena? Esatto, in *Xenonauts* ti ritrovi a comandare l'equivalente di una squadra di "Men in Black" internazionale, ma con meno occhiali scuri e più baffi alla moda. Il tuo compito? Gestire una crisi globale con un budget che farebbe piangere un contabile e una tecnologia che sembra uscita da un episodio di "Star Trek" girato in un garage. Ma attenzione, non è tutto un gioco di numeri e grafici: quando scendi sul campo di battaglia, è il momento di mostrare ai visitatori interstellari che il "made in Terra" ha il suo valore. Le battaglie a turni sono come una partita di scacchi, ma con più laser e meno cavalli. Ogni soldato ha le sue mosse, e devi essere il Kasparov della guerra galattica per portare tutti a casa sani e salvi. E se pensi che gli alieni siano l'unica sfida, aspetta di vedere i tuoi soldati cercare di mirare con quei fucili che sembrano tubi di PVC! Ma non temere, con un po' di ingegno e molta fortuna, potrai trasformare la tua squadra di reclute spaventate in una forza d'élite pronta a salvare il mondo. E se le cose si mettono male, ricorda: c'è sempre la Community Edition del gioco, dove i fan hanno aggiunto più contenuti di quanti ne possa digerire un Grays dopo una cena terrestre. In conclusione, *Xenonauts* è il gioco perfetto per chi ama i titoli strategici e vuole rivivere l'epoca d'oro dei giochi a turni, ma con un pizzico di umorismo e un sacco di alieni da mandare al tappeto. Preparati a difendere la Terra con stile... e un po' di ironia! 🛸💥 *🎩✨ Sei invitato a entrare nella TANA DEL BIANCONIGLIO! 🐇✨* Sei appassionato di giochi e alla ricerca di consigli ? Vuoi condividere le tue idee e trucchi con altri appassionati? Allora unisciti a noi! In *LA TANA DEL BIANCONIGLIO*, non solo scambiamo consigli sui nostri giochi preferiti, ma ci immergiamo nel divertimento e nell'avventura del nostro hobby. *Entra nel gruppo se:* - *Ami i giochi* e vuoi scoprire nuovi mondi. - *Hai idee brillanti* da condividere. - *Cerchi un posto dove il divertimento non finisce mai.* La TANA DEL BIANCONIGLIO: dove il gioco si fa serio