Xcom vs. Xenonauts

[veloper]

I decided not to check out Xenonauts, until the game's 100% completed.

That way if the game actually turns out to be good enough to succeed the original UFO:EU, I won't have a buggy alpha or beta experience ruin the rest of the game for me.

 

[Amaror]

I always thought that Xenonauts felt like a more unnappealing copy of the original, so i prefer XCom because it offers somehing different. The artstyle (I dislike the aliens designs, too predictable and generic) is a bit bland, it's chok full of bugs and the base building aspect is kinda confusing and illogical, but i like the gameplay and i think it offers something that differs enough from the original to justify its existence. I haven't had much reason to play Xenonauts because it looks and sounds shit compared to the original (Too grey and boring with unimaginative alien designs) and it doesn't really offer me that much new stuff, so i prefer to just return to the original instead.

I am sorry, but i think you may wear a bit rose tinted glasses for the original xcom. It's an awesome game, don't get me wrong, but the graphics are just as colorless as xenonauts. In my opinion it's one of the things that gave the original it's awesome athmosphere, just like xenonauts.

About the alien design, while the first two basic alien races might look generic, the terror units and later races are pretty damn cool. Exspecially since the different alien races have unique AI, making them act and feel vastly different from each other.

A comparison:

 

[MrBaskerville]

I always thought that Xenonauts felt like a more unnappealing copy of the original, so i prefer XCom because it offers somehing different. The artstyle (I dislike the aliens designs, too predictable and generic) is a bit bland, it's chok full of bugs and the base building aspect is kinda confusing and illogical, but i like the gameplay and i think it offers something that differs enough from the original to justify its existence. I haven't had much reason to play Xenonauts because it looks and sounds shit compared to the original (Too grey and boring with unimaginative alien designs) and it doesn't really offer me that much new stuff, so i prefer to just return to the original instead.

I am sorry, but i think you may wear a bit rose tinted glasses for the original xcom. It's an awesome game, don't get me wrong, but the graphics are just as colorless as xenonauts. In my opinion it's one of the things that gave the original it's awesome athmosphere, just like xenonauts.

About the alien design, while the first two basic alien races might look generic, the terror units and later races are pretty damn cool. Exspecially since the different alien races have unique AI, making them act and feel vastly different from each other.

A comparison:

Those screens show exactly what it is i dislike about Xenonauts. I think it's too small and sterile, it looks like something created by an engineer, technically impressive, but it lacks heart. The style just isn't for me, it's very unnapealing to me. But it's all subjective, it's two very different looking games, so everybody is going to prefer either the one or the other.

 

[MrBaskerville]

I always thought that Xenonauts felt like a more unnappealing copy of the original, so i prefer XCom because it offers somehing different. The artstyle (I dislike the aliens designs, too predictable and generic) is a bit bland, it's chok full of bugs and the base building aspect is kinda confusing and illogical, but i like the gameplay and i think it offers something that differs enough from the original to justify its existence. I haven't had much reason to play Xenonauts because it looks and sounds shit compared to the original (Too grey and boring with unimaginative alien designs) and it doesn't really offer me that much new stuff, so i prefer to just return to the original instead.

Do you use, perhaps, openXcom or the UFO extender to fix (at least) the difficulty bug?

Because that might improve your experience if you have a problem with bugs (though I can't really vouch for the total truth that they fix them).

Unfortunately i play it on Ps3, and it has never been patched so it remains a buggy mess to this day. Says something about the strenghts of the game, it's quite gripping een though you can't play for 5 minutes without seeing hilarious bugs, weird sound errors and slow loading textures.

 

[Pink Gregory]

I always thought that Xenonauts felt like a more unnappealing copy of the original, so i prefer XCom because it offers somehing different. The artstyle (I dislike the aliens designs, too predictable and generic) is a bit bland, it's chok full of bugs and the base building aspect is kinda confusing and illogical, but i like the gameplay and i think it offers something that differs enough from the original to justify its existence. I haven't had much reason to play Xenonauts because it looks and sounds shit compared to the original (Too grey and boring with unimaginative alien designs) and it doesn't really offer me that much new stuff, so i prefer to just return to the original instead.

Do you use, perhaps, openXcom or the UFO extender to fix (at least) the difficulty bug?

Because that might improve your experience if you have a problem with bugs (though I can't really vouch for the total truth that they fix them).

Unfortunately i play it on Ps3, and it has never been patched so it remains a buggy mess to this day. Says something about the strenghts of the game, it's quite gripping een though you can't play for 5 minutes without seeing hilarious bugs, weird sound errors and slow loading textures.

Oh, haha, wait a minute, wrong X-Com

 

[chimeracreator]

I always thought that Xenonauts felt like a more unnappealing copy of the original, so i prefer XCom because it offers somehing different. The artstyle (I dislike the aliens designs, too predictable and generic) is a bit bland, it's chok full of bugs and the base building aspect is kinda confusing and illogical, but i like the gameplay and i think it offers something that differs enough from the original to justify its existence. I haven't had much reason to play Xenonauts because it looks and sounds shit compared to the original (Too grey and boring with unimaginative alien designs) and it doesn't really offer me that much new stuff, so i prefer to just return to the original instead.

I am sorry, but i think you may wear a bit rose tinted glasses for the original xcom. It's an awesome game, don't get me wrong, but the graphics are just as colorless as xenonauts. In my opinion it's one of the things that gave the original it's awesome athmosphere, just like xenonauts.

About the alien design, while the first two basic alien races might look generic, the terror units and later races are pretty damn cool. Exspecially since the different alien races have unique AI, making them act and feel vastly different from each other.

A comparison:

You do know this example actually shows the massive difference in terms of color usage between the two right? Here are a few of the things that help XCOM stand out in this:

1. The units you are focusing on take up more screen real-estate thus indicating to the player that the are more important.

2. The colors used for all of the units clearly stand out from the terrain they are on. The XCOM unit's tan jumper on green grass, the floater's purple body against white and green, the reaper's orange body against grey and white. None of these colors are similar so the units instantly stand out. Xenonauts using grey and greyish-green on grey. The bulk of the colors are greys or pastels designed to provide equal visual emphasis and thus fail to draw the eye to the units, who are the more important elements.

3. All of the units have a similar silhouette. Now this may be because they're all humanoid, but in the XCOM picture all three units are visually distinct even if shown without any color and can immediately be told apart. In the Xenonauts picture I would need to squint to tell the difference and even then it would depend on the alien showing its tail.

 

[Amaror]

1. The units you are focusing on take up more screen real-estate thus indicating to the player that the are more important.

A lot of this comes down to the different resolution of both pictures. However, it is true that the screen is farther zoomed out in xenonauts, but this simply leads to a better overview.
I don't want to sound to harsh but the "indicating more importance" argument sounds a bit like an a**pull. Yeah, you can analyze it that way, but it doesn't indicate a superiour quality in one game, even if it were legit.

2. The colors used for all of the units clearly stand out from the terrain they are on. The XCOM unit's tan jumper on green grass, the floater's purple body against white and green, the reaper's orange body against grey and white. None of these colors are similar so the units instantly stand out. Xenonauts using grey and greyish-green on grey. The bulk of the colors are greys or pastels designed to provide equal visual emphasis and thus fail to draw the eye to the units, who are the more important elements.

I am sorry, but have you seen Sectoids on Streets in the original? Or Mutons in the forest? Most likely not, because they looked EXACTLY like the ground they stood on.

3. All of the units have a similar silhouette. Now this may be because they're all humanoid, but in the XCOM picture all three units are visually distinct even if shown without any color and can immediately be told apart. In the Xenonauts picture I would need to squint to tell the difference and even then it would depend on the alien showing its tail.

Now i don't know about you but the sebilian shape vs the human shape in xenonauts looks more distinct to me compared to the floater shape vs the human shape.

Now, your comments are all legit complaints towards xenonauts and if you dislike it because of them, then i won't argue against that. I do argue here, because you seemed to still have on your rose tinted glasses on over the original. It was an awesome game, but it wasn't as visualy impressive as you make it out to be.
Expecially when the grey energy armor rolls around.

An example of poor original xcom coloring. The fun game of "Find the muton":

 

[chimeracreator]

Now i don't know about you but the sebilian shape vs the human shape in xenonauts looks more distinct to me compared to the floater shape vs the human shape.

Now, your comments are all legit complaints towards xenonauts and if you dislike it because of them, then i won't argue against that. I do argue here, because you seemed to still have on your rose tinted glasses on over the original. It was an awesome game, but it wasn't as visualy impressive as you make it out to be.
Expecially when the grey energy armor rolls around.

An example of poor original xcom coloring. The fun game of "Find the muton":

Yep, mutons were one of the worst designed aliens in the original no argument from me there. As for the question of resolution, yep, the original had lower resolution but ultimately it worked in their favor even though it was unintentional. Also the grey armor for power and flying armor was a bad move on their part compared to the blue and teal of the other two armors. Also yes, the use of size does not dictate the quality of the game, but it is part of the GUI.

 

[TreuloseTomate]

So xenonauts, the unofficial xcom sequel, is now largely feature complete and will be released after another 2 months of polish.
...

Have you played Jagged Alliance 2 by any chance? I like the isometric style and turn based combat, and I'd like to know how it compares to JA2's combat. I've watched some videos of Xenonauts last year, and it looked pretty bland and unfinished, especially the animations and sound effects. How is the game now?

I have tried JA2, but i couldn't really get behind the clunky interface. I didn't really get beyond the first mission, so i don't think i have enough experience with JA2 to really compare it to xenonauts.
That being said, the graphics do have improved over the last year, so maybe you would like to give it another look.
Here's a video of the most recent stable build

I like the style and it looks good on screenshots. But in gameplay it seems a little sterile. Look at this JA2 video for comparison (jump to 16:00 for example).
All the characters have idle animations. Enemies are flashing red. Items on the ground have a flashing outline. You can hear the impact of the bullets. And imo the animations look more dynamic. When I looked into Xenonauts last year, stuff like this really bothered me. It sounds like nitpicking, because they're all very small details, but they can add some life to the battlefield.

 

[Amaror]

I like the style and it looks good on screenshots. But in gameplay it seems a little sterile. Look at this JA2 video for comparison (jump to 16:00 for example).
All the characters have idle animations. Enemies are flashing red. Items on the ground have a flashing outline. You can hear the impact of the bullets. And imo the animations look more dynamic. When I looked into Xenonauts last year, stuff like this really bothered me. It sounds like nitpicking, because they're all very small details, but they can add some life to the battlefield.

JA 2 does seem a little more deep towards the combat, but JA is also more combat focused then xenonauts, which has the overall strategy aspect to it.
Xenonauts doesn't have idle animations sadly. The Problem is that the devs sadly chose a rather bad engine to base the game on. It forced them to make animations for every equipment configeration. 1 Animation with weapon a and armor b. Another animation with weapon A and armor C. And so on. And there are a lot of weapons and armor in this game.
The enemys do get highlighted in red when you aim on them. Items don't have an outline, but are pretty good visible nonetheless. And they do have impact sounds of bullets and plasma, laser, etc.
Additionaly there's a lot of destructible terrain and advanced weaponry also leaves marks on the ground were they hit. This leads to the later maps getting absolutly wrecked, while you fight the enemies, which looks pretty amazing.
You should probably wait a bit till release and then watch a video of the game, that should get you a pretty good impression.

Gameplay wise, JA 2 does look deeper, but xenonauts has some cool combat, too. There are a variety of equipment allowing a variety of different tactics. Combat shields to block shots. Grenades, rockets and C4 to blow stuff up. Flashbangs to suppress, smoke grenades to give a bit of cover and so on and so on. There's also the suppression mechanic. Multiple shots near a unit can suppress them, meaning they are no longer able to reaction fire and only have half TU in the next turn.
On top of all of that there's a great variety in enemy AI.
There are Caesans, which are accurate shooters with far sight, but are more likely to flee.
Sebillians, which can heal themselves and are not bothered by smoke but cannot shoot very well, meaning they will most likely charge your troops.
Androns, which are really tough, but don't take cover and restlessly charge your positions.
Reapers, xenonauts chryssalids, which are just like the original chryssalids, not as weak as the new ones.
Wraiths, which can teleport around and will try and flank your troops at every possibility.
And many more.

 

[Guy from the 80's]

Soooo much better than the old school technique of checking corners by marching out into the open like a complete twit.

Thats what grenades or lazers are for son....thats how I scouted in the originals. Just blow a hole in a wall/floor.
Regarding the game itself, I didnt even know about Xenonauts and right now I'm exited!!

 

[TreuloseTomate]

You should probably wait a bit till release and then watch a video of the game, that should get you a pretty good impression.

That's what I'm going to do. The rest of the game looks pretty compelling. I never got around playing the original X-Com games, and this looks like a good alternative.

 

[moggett88]

I am a big fan of both, but I'm having to take a break from Xenonauts after two consecutive games getting to the stage where the aliens are sending carriers at you, then crashing and becoming unplayable. I think it probably is the better game of the two, but that doesn't count until it's a finished product.