'>>1729824
underdeveloped in several areas (factions). otherwise best x-com game in many ways';

'I'm pretty sure brainsuckers filtered many people. Imagine if chryssalids were the first alien you meet in the original';

'>>1729824
Rushed and buggy.';

'>>1729824
>What went wrong?
Insanely overambitious original idea (dynamic world with corporate politics, espionage, targeted VIP kidnappings, sabotage etc). The amazing part is they managed to salvage a decent-to-solid game out of the mess.
>>1729833
>I'm pretty sure brainsuckers filtered many people.
That's because many players were retarded and insisted on playing battles in TB mode ("because that's how X-Com should be played"). Apocalypse's TB mode is utter shit, the only thing which works better in TB mode is psionics. Literally everything else is better in RT mode.';

'>>1729824
The reason you don't see discussions about this game is that it's not 1997 anymore.
>>179954
Yeah half the game was MIA.';

'>>1730092
>The reason you don't see discussions about this game is that it's not 1997 anymore.
Also because there's no OpenApoc stable release, it's all various flavors of beta.';

'>>1729824
This game is a huge mess but it’s so kino it’s the best X-com';

'>>1730146
That's some projection right there anon';

'>>1730146
>/v/
go back';

'>>1729824
As someone who got it at launch, it felt like a late alpha. It ran like complete shit, it looked bizarre and there was a SRPG boom on the PS1 so why obsess over it like the older games?

Then Interceptor came out which was even more bizarre.';

'>>1730101
Every once in a while I check how OpenApoc is doing. Unfortunately it's progressing at a snail's pace. 1.0 release will take another decade

>>1730178
Interceptor was fun at least. But I absolutely could not stand Enforcer';

'>>1730265
>Unfortunately it's progressing at a snail's pace. 1.0 release will take another decade
Unfuckening that spaghetti code would be a full-time job. So I'm not surprised it's taking a couple of part-time hobbyist devs half an eternity to clean up.';

'>>1729824
Offensively ugly art style.';

'>>1729824
I don't play X-com for real time combat.';

'>>1730265
>Interceptor was fun at least. But I absolutely could not stand Enforcer
Enforcer killed the IP, just like Brotherhood of Steel did, until someone else picked it up.';

'>>1730544
I pray for its release. Apoc was genuinely such good ideas, but you can tell they ran out money.';

'>>1730669
I'm pretty certain they never had enough money to implement all that stuff in the first place. They just overreached with the initial concept.';

'>>1729824
>What went wrong?
Ironically x-com: Apocalypse's development what nothing short of an apocalyptic disaster. Like the "everything that could go wrong did go wrong" type of disaster. The game had 5 different producers over development time which is already a terrible sign.

It's ambitions were over the moon, they wanted full 3D scanned models, the wanted dynamically self adjusting difficulty, different AI for the factions of the city, each faction having its own agenda and income that fight each other and buy/sell buildings in the city, they wanted multiple alien dimensions that were randomly generated and so on. Utterly unrealistic crap and all of this with a target dev time of 6 months.

Mythic Games and Microprose were constantly confused with each other. Espcially on the graphics where it was a back on fourth on how things should look like. The they finally hired and unnamed pro "sci-fi artist" that did the job on creating the aliens to the point of even building detailed real life sculpts of them that likely looked good for a movie so they could 3D scan those sculpts. The UFOPedia art were likely based those sculpts. But those detailed sculpts looked like same-y featureless blobs when scaled down to low rez pixels so it was a ton of money and time wasted again.

Obviously all that was never meant to be as 90% of didn't make it into the final game and development was way longer. It is a small miracle the game was functioning as it was when it came out.';

'>>1730902
>It's ambitions were over the moon, they wanted full 3D scanned models, the wanted dynamically self adjusting difficulty, different AI for the factions of the city, each faction having its own agenda and income that fight each other and buy/sell buildings in the city, they wanted multiple alien dimensions that were randomly generated and so on.
Yea, that was some ultra-high-end design for the era, and tech wasn't really there to support all that functionality. Parts of the inner city politics and economy were kept, however. So was the adaptive AI, however it only works on some releases, and almost invariably breaks when loading a savegame.
>Espcially on the graphics where it was a back on fourth on how things should look like.
Mythic Games wanted a retro-sci-fi feel, hence the blobsuit look of many aliens, the 1950s-esque styling of the vehicles, and other visual details. Unfortunately, many designs looked like utter crap when downscaled for the combat map.';

'>>1730902
>>1730912
The aliens are the ugliest in the series, even outdoing the knockoff games in terms of looking like shit. They're easily the worst part of the game.';

'>>1730958
>enemy you need to kill that looks ugly and the worst part of the game
sooo... working as intended?';

'>>1730959
One of the main draws of X-Com as a series is that you don't just kill the enemy. You interrogate them, dissect them, find out all the cool shit they keep secret and use it against them. Engaging enemy design is vital. When every enemy is a veiny blob with holes you kill any interest in exploring what they are.';

'>>1730967
This, tbdesu. Aliens looking like that isn't cool design; it's lame, and decreases engagement. Also, their weapons look bad, straight-up shit in some cases. The Devastator Cannon looks like a long snout stuck on a hairy ballsack.

OTOH, human weapon/item design is one of the strong points. Militech/opr8r-punk is played-out and boring. The "1950s raygun" style is much nicer.';

'>>1729954
That also answers why nobody talks about the game.
Nobody wanted a real-time X-Com.
>>1730146
Based, cringe, and turquoisepilled.';

'>>1730984
If they wanted to go with the raygun gothic aesthetic they should have applied it consistently. Problem is they also wanted to reference 2000AD and Judge Dredd and all this dissonant stuff.
The aliens should have been 1950s style little green men, bug-eyed monsters, eyes on stalks, tall women with weird colored skin etc. They were probably worried people wouldn't take it seriously but the ballsack aliens aren't really any better.';

'>>1730992
>The aliens should have been 1950s style little green men, bug-eyed monsters, eyes on stalks, tall women with weird colored skin etc.
That would've been a massive mood whiplash after EU and TftD. I can understand why they tried to keep it more grounded.';

'>>1731048
As opposed to the whiplash it already was? That ship sailed. I mean look at this fucking thing.';

'>>1731060
While I won't dispute the ugliness of its model, it at least looks more purposefully dangerous than some [insert theremin weewoo] beep-boop-blinking-lights-era rubbersuit.';

'>>1730984
The fucking ballsack gun. Reason alone to go all in on toxiguns.

The autopsies were the worst. First game had the dissection table, second had the tubes with the mangled bodies. Then the third came with this shit. Monsters in my Pocket rejects with 10 minutes of Photoshop.

>>1731072
It doesn't even look like it can move. Does it waddle? Have little wheels under its feet?';

'>>1731074
Lets see what the autopsy tells us.

Oh no, he's fallen and he can't get up.';

'>>1730967
>>1730984
Well probably that is also the fault of the original design idea behind the aliens. In Apoc the aliens are 100% biotech all from the goo hivemind up to the Kaiju sized Overspawns. They do not use machinery in the way humans do, that is why no hand crafted items and no metal, glass, plastic etc. in the design, so they made everything to be fleshy vein covered cock, balls and tentacles with holes teeth and and claws sometimes that shit missiles at you.

Clearly they had a well set art direction towards body horror and infestation the Thing/Body snatchers and shit instead of the raygun holding sectoids. Since this was (supposedly) a continuation of the previous games and Sectoids/hybrids were already integrated into human society and you start the game out with laser and plasma weapons are available to buy in the market from the start.

Granted this wasn't exactly practical for the game's theme but it was a clear design choice considering they did the classic aliens in Xcom1 then Cthulhu underwater stuff in Xcom2 and they did not want to do the same. After humanity has canonically already encountered and defeated sectoids TWICE a 3rd time will likely not be as interesting.

>When every enemy is a veiny blob with holes you kill any interest in exploring what they are.
I mean no offense but personally I found them fascinating probably cause I am horror movie fan too. I agree at the start it was out of the ordinary but it grew on me when ships and advanced aliens started to appear instead of them just teleporting into people's houses randomly.';

'>>1731060
>>1731074
>>1731075
Obviously these were photos of the static sculpts the (supposed) artist they hired to make. They likely just took pictures of them and called it a day.';

'>>1731078
Yeah ok, so do a couple of aliens like that. Not all of them. And you can make that stuff look good. The EDF games do 50s sci-fi 100x better than this and if you're going in a more 70s horror direction then Giger shits all over it

What we got were at best boring and at worst, total embarrassments.';

'>>1731078
EVEN THE PUDDLE OF GOO HAS VEINS';

'The general idea I'm getting is Apocalypse is the Fallout 4 of X-com. Am I correct?';

'>>1731099
No? It's more like an overambitious but kinda promising early access game that suddenly becomes a 1.0 and the devs run away. If want to compare it to Fallout the closest is Fallout Tactics. Both mechanically and somewhat in spirit. Highly questionable choices and all. Although Tactics is a lot more finished than Apocalypse ever was.';

'>>1731074
>>1731075
>>1731089

Oh man, the autopsies. They make no sense, like they're purposefully destroying the body instead of clean cuts in relevant areas';

'>>1731089
The EDF games are BATSHIT INSANSE and they revel in the comedic absurdness because it is their thing. The EDF game started out as just making a minimal effort 3rd person shooting game with a bunch of random 3D assets thrown in as enemies but it was sol hilarious it became its own thing.';

'>>1731099
No that would be The Bureau XCOM Declassified';

'>>1730958
The aliens look awesome.';

'>>1729824
wtf
I only just started playing this again last week. How'd you know?

>What went wrong?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-COM:_Apocalypse#Development
>Just about everything that could go wrong did go wrong

Fucking ugly, poor progression (you start with armour that never goes out of style), two unbalanced modes, shitting pathing like Rimworld but agents do random U turns at the start of their route, you can't see aliens or figure out where you threw a grenade thanks to high walls, unstable/crashes.
Imagine using ground vehicles.
Politics does nothing mechanically. There's no Marsec-vs-Megapol. There's no shop changes. According to the wiki raids and demolishing buildings just hurts you.
>>1729833
>brainsuckers filtered many
They're impossible to deal with in tight buildings.
>>1729954
>Apocalypse's TB mode is utter shit
Does it get worse the longer you play?
I'm losing 1-3 agents per mission, Multiworms HAVE to be stunned (and then babysat because they wake up?) because Hyperworms start with full TUs (reaction acid fire) and can traverse several rooms to kill someone, Brainsuckers are fucking atrocious and force you to put agents on Aggressive so they don't turn around, close their eyes and pretend brainsuckers aren't in the room and cannot hurt them... blah blah blah.
I'm finding raiding Sirius to be casualty-free on turn based. I can use stuns, motion scanners and grenades. And ammunition supplies aren't evaporating.
>>1731048
>mood whiplash
Reminds me of the change between Firaxis' XCOM and XCOM2. I hated the anime-anarchist-tittysnake-multicult-independent-underage-woman-of-colour theme after the first game's government soldiers versus aliens feel. Even the music in XCOM2 was shitty as if hit by budget cuts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GX4AXxKzvLA';

'>>1731404
>Does it get worse the longer you play?
I remember by the end of the game, I had agents with over a hundred TUs. The best anti-alien weapon in the game needs 4 TUs for an aimed shot. No, not 40, 4.';

'>>1731099
Closer to the Master of Orion III of X-Com.';

'>>1731404
Real-time mode allows you to dual-wield weapons, which by itself is a massive advantage compared to TB. Plus some other tricks you can pull in RT, which are impossible to perform in TB.';

'>>1731099
More like the Heroes 4 of X-Com';

'>>1731404
>They're impossible to deal with in tight buildings.
I always had a guy with two of smgs or whatever they were just hanging out in the back ready to burst fire anyone who got jumped. There's plenty of time on real time shoot someone in the head even if sucker lands, AND they fail the suck like half the time on their own AND androids were straight undetectable to the suckers so you could just use them.';

'>>1731404
>Imagine using ground vehicles.
The Wolfhound is actually a decent APC. Good troop capacity (14 soldiers - no troop module needed), cargo module is standard, enough extra space for a bio-transport module, decent speed (after engine upgrade).
Stormdogs are good money if you decide to start a chop shop.';

'>>1731529
>The Wolfhound is actually a decent APC.
I do use it for that, as I assume the fuel economy is better.
Is there anything you can do about stray shots breaking a road and instantly deleting vehicles?';

'>>1731535
Sadly nope, just keep all your road vehicles away from any fighting.
Don't bother with Stormdogs or Griffons, and only use Wolfhounds to clear out infested buildings, never for actual combat.';

'>enter warehouse
>go down lift
>drop down, start shooting at blues
>turn agent right to go around first agent
>HOSTILE UNIT SPOTTED
>pink spitter
>hiding in a tiny dead end with potted plants
>walk towards
>HOSTILE UNIT SPOTTED
>HOSTILE UNIT SPOTTED
>2 more pinks, that's fine
>gun them all down
>turn back around
>crawl to survive the brainsuckers
>continue shooting at blues

>HOSTILE UNIT SPOTTED
>agents sees popper
>it's coming from the dead end where the pinks came from
>why didn't it run up to my agents?
>turn around agent with gun
>HOSTILE UNIT SPOTTED
>multiworm
>ugh
>kill popper
>multiworm almost murders an agent despite being miles away (1 health)
>kill it and its spawn
After-the-fact I believe they all came down the lift from the top floor, as I wasn't sitting in the lift to keep an eye on my behind.
I also hate warehouses now because ending my first turn without moving and getting brainsucked sucks.

I've learned that Marsec flying suits are great with how inventory shuffling, arming grenades, and dropping them seems to cost zero TUs. They're cheaper than buying new agents. Even if a green worm is going to kill one of my flyers from across the map someday and I'm going to scream about it.

I wish I knew how many enemies are infesting a place. To comb it inch by inch with 14 squaddies gets tiring when it's only a secondary infestation.

I bought a number of hoverbikes but they all died in their first fight against UFOs 3 & 4.
What weapons should I be equipping? The starting ones are... not scratching them... and I'm hesitant to buy anything because half of them seem to say "Really slow missile, expensive waste of time, don't use me".
Are my craft dying because they're B-lining it towards the UFOs, directly into fire, so will manually telling them to zig-zag do anything?';

'>>1730146
Work up on your media literacy a tad more and touch grass once per day, or else you're NGMI and I'll have to accept your concession.';

'>>1731099
it's literally Fallout Tactics of X-com';

'What's the best way to play this in current year plus 9 and on a windows 10 machine?';

'>>1732085
Steam version. OpenApoc is years away from completion and the GOG version apparently has some broken files that makes the AI behave in unintended ways';

'>>1731958
>I bought a number of hoverbikes but they all died in their first fight against UFOs 3 & 4.
Replace the standard engine with the largest one they can carry (it's the starting engine on the hovercar), and replace the shitty pew-pew gun with a Rendor (IIRC you can't buy Lineage in the first week). The wiki says targeting computers don't improve guns, but I throw one in anyway, for good luck. Set stance to Evasive (I think that was what I used).';

'>>1732162
Is there a mod that scales the UI for modern resolutions?';

'>>1732235
Thanks';

'I hated these guys when I first found them.
Now I simply shrug and send whoever they hit off the field.
Worms on the other hand... fuck worms. Infinite TUs. Destroying terrain is preferable.

Capturing one is hard, so I savescummed to do it in true X-COM fashion.

Diablo likes me... I don't know why. The aliens haven't been blowing up their buildings.

The main raised motorway was blown up week 1 and still isn't fixed.

I love Marsec armour. I wish I could afford more.

>>1732235
Thanks again. I can't believe how much difference it makes.
Lost both my flying cars which is an expensive pain.';

'>>1733020
Phoenix hovercars are a bit risky to use before obtaining small disruptor shield tech. Even with the biggest engine and all-Prophet missile loadout (for max distance), their survivability is dodgy without a small shield module.
That said, losing a Phoenix is less painful than losing a Valkyrie.';

'The game is preaty easy once you know the counter to every enemy.

brainsuckers: just equip torso from floating armor , stay on level 3 levitation

worms-slugs : kill fat worms with flame rockets. the fast slugs will burn once they hatch';

'bump';

'>>1729954
>That's because many players were retarded and insisted on playing battles in TB mode ("because that's how X-Com should be played")

They were right, and that is why this killed what was left of the series until EU came out.';

'>>1731535
>Is there anything you can do about stray shots breaking a road and instantly deleting vehicles?
There definitely was a mod that made the roads invulnerable, but this was so hideously long ago I'm not sure you can even find a valid link anymore.
>>1733020
>Diablo likes me... I don't know why.
They don't like Osiron or Psyke. If you've been raiding either, your relationship with Diablo goes up.
Alternatively, the ayylmaos wrecked some of their buildings with stray UFO shots. This makes Diablo hate them, and thus they start liking you because you wreck the ayys. You can actually exploit this by ordering your craft to fly at lowest possible altitude so all the ayy stray shots will hit something and make the owner mad at them.
>Lost both my flying cars which is an expensive pain.
Phoenixes and to a lesser degree Valks are mediocre because they lack the agility of hoverbikes and the durability of larger craft. Stick to hoverbikes or, if that ruins your immersion too much, buy every Hawk you can as soon as you can.
Also, don't make a habit of chasing after every UFO you see, you're not going to win consistently until you research shields and ayy weaponry. Just make a note of where they drop their load and send a cleanup crew there later. Focus on shooting down the ones you need for research, you can soft lock your run if you don't bring down certain UFOs before they stop spawning.';

'>>1743880
>Ayys summon kaiju
>they chose the one place where everyone hates me
Feels great, every time.';

'>>1744079
Watching them summon it right next to the Cult of Sirius always is a great time.';

'>>1729824
I've tried playing it 3 separate times. Real Time mode is REALLY fun but the aliens dropping infestations is tedious to keep track of during a dogfight, especially with how big the map is, and (the critical thing) every time my playthrough died because my save got corrupted.

I really want to like this game, the battlescape is fucking great, but the geoscape and stability is just kinda shit.';

'>>1744427
>the aliens dropping infestations is tedious to keep track of during a dogfight
That's not really that much of a problem, only certain UFOs act as transports and even if you miss a drop you can just watch the alien infiltration graph and go investigate buildings the moment that line goes up.
>every time my playthrough died because my save got corrupted.
Never encountered that myself but that's not unexpected given the general state the game released in. It's a miracle it can be completed from start to finish.';

'>>1744427
>corrupt save
What version are you playing? I heard the GOG one has some issues';

'>>1744535
Steam's. With Dosbox.
>>1744485
>you can just watch the alien infiltration graph and go investigate buildings the moment that line goes up
I mean yeah, I guess you can do that, but it falls under the tediousness thing. Especially since you can investigate a lot of buildings without finding shit, which is just annoying.';

'bump';

'>>1744485
>if you miss a drop you can just watch the alien infiltration graph and go investigate buildings the moment that line goes up.
Or you could do it the oldfag way: pause the game and write down a quick note regarding which building got infested.';

'This is like the only game that plays itself, you lie down and watch as the world runs itself without your input, sure the aliens will take over eventually but that's the interesting thing, the corpos will struggle by themselves without your help, the world will be lost.';

'>>1733020
>pupper';

'I dislike proximity mines.
They're always armed it seems so are deleting all equipment I wish to recover and make stunning enemies a bad idea. Very sad.
I now entirely use alien guns and plasma pistols so poppers, even when there are 4+ spawning, are not as scary because only ballistic weapons blow them up.

A slum dweller alerted X-COM to an infestation because he thought "Huh, that's odd, no-one ever comes or goes from that room, I wonder if there's anything worth stealing?" and from the building's CCTV it's clear he pushed the door open, it got stuck, he poked his head through the crack, and screamed as a chrysalis was blocking the door. All aliens were stuck in there waiting for their mate, Steve the Alien, to finish gestating in his pupa.
Coincidentally I have discovered flats in slums are very flammable.

>>1743880
>Alternatively, the ayylmaos wrecked some of their buildings with stray UFO shots.
This was probably it.
The Mutant Alliance now loves me too and I hate it because all my recruits are USELESS hybrids.
>Stick to hoverbikes
This went well with plasma and upgraded engines. I downed an entire wave of Assault ships and Fast Attack ships.
Then the aliens decided to send 5 Scouts and 1 Transporter... and I did literally no damage for some reason and lost several bikes. I am not sure how the game works though I'm not focusing on if my shots are connecting when I'm watching for drops.
>you're not going to win consistently until you research shields and ayy weaponry
That is a shame.
>you can soft lock your run if you don't bring down certain UFOs before they stop spawning.
I remembered this so looked up beforehand. I believe I have everything "necessary" to win and am just waiting for new types of UFOs to come out now.';

'>>1748321
Alien missiles fuck hoverbikes up something fierce, so you might've run into them.';

'>>1750386
I haven't fought against missiles yet, I meant that I didn't understand why, when the aliens downgraded back to starting UFOs + a purple, my kitted out bikes blew up and no aliens took any damage.';

'>>1751068
That's weird. Did you switch stance, perhaps? Hoverbikes should always be set to evasive, they just too fragile for anything else.';

'>>1729824
No OpenXcom for it (yet?)
If there was it would probably be considered the best with the possibilities for mods';

'>>1752775
OpenApoc is in the works, but this game is a completely different beast than the original, so it's taking much longer to finish. I don't think it's even in its beta state. Maybe we'll see something in a decade';