KickStarter Phoenix Point - the new game from X-COM creator Julian Gollop

[Mustawd]

edit: he's not liking free aim. alright, he's a retard.

He’s not liking free aim because it’s the default and there’s no regular aim to center mass. IF he’s right then I agree with him. Forcing me to use free aim is dumb.

 

[Stavrophore]

edit: he's not liking free aim. alright, he's a retard.

He’s not liking free aim because it’s the default and there’s no regular aim to center mass. IF he’s right then I agree with him. Forcing me to use free aim is dumb.

Of course there's a regular center mass aim, you just designate target and shoot. No need to enter free aim. But don't expect hitting anything if the target has a shield. The problem he rightly pointed is the lack of traditional CtH when you don't enter the free aim, still the potential damage is an indicator of CtH albeit differently presented. The guy just need to adjust from his numeric CtH experience with XCOM 2 to what PP uses.If you enter free aim you can guestimate how much bullets will hit the target.Beside it's clearly not a game for him -he wants a game with more abstract mechanics, like in XCOM 2, not more simulationist/realistic approach.

Point is, the guy don't understand why there's free aim, when you have limbs, locational damage, locational effects. He don't understand that in CQB or with right angles, he can maximize damage. I thought the guy is intelligent, but clearly he's just complaining because he dislike something, just for the sake of disliking, because it's unfamiliar for him. Wonder if he complained about XCOM 2 not having TUs like the original one. "Why would i need TUs? They just slow the game, it's retarded, i want more abstraction just run, and then shoot" -just worded his complaint about free aim, in context of first XCOM.

I find it funny how this guy is afraid of loosing on his stream, because he built a retarded cult of personality about him being the XCOM god. I really want a hard tactical game that would dick slap the shit out of him.

Edit: Yeap i've watched it until queen, the retard still don't understand the free aim and real physical bullet simulation. He don't understand there's no fucking CtH because it's not a chance of all shots hitting the target with multishot weapons, you have a chance of getting all 45 damage but the chance is almost nill, or you have a chance of doing just 3 damage with one shot connecting, but its also unlikely. That guy is a joke, he probably was super bad at math. Of course it's harder for min maxing since you don't have such an easy time like in xcom 2, where a creature have 8 health, your weapon deals 8 damage, and have 50% chance to hit. So its easy to see you have 1/2 chance to kill the creature, and nothing will ever change that, even if a fucking building is between you and target[xcom 2 is known for funny shootthrough building and obstacles...]. With phoenix point, having a gun that deals 3x6 damage[will two shots connect? Do i make the shot with this huge aiming circle, and gamble for hits? Or do i move closer to get the aiming circle smaller? Do i maneuver to gamble for hitting exposed weak parts?], its not so easy, since depending on the target size and your aim, you can either kill it or not, and there are many factors contributing, which makes it more dynamic, harder and more enjoyable decision wise.It's also a less deterministic system for sure.

In original XCOM hit chance was also useless, since it used real physical bullets. For example going in the face and bursting showed a chance of 20-30% of hit, while in reality all shots hit in the cone of fire. The problem was that the CtH calculation was based on the baseline gun CtH for each mode, and that was misleading as hell.

There should be a button to disable return fire though.Good point is also with enemy figures twitching behind cover, so you wait sometimes several seconds for a body part to come out of cover for you to shoot. That's quite bad. Like he said enemy shouldn't twitch/move.Also lack of reaction fire when moving right in front of enemy suck balls, since i don't see any thrilling in breaching ufos/CQB building combat. In original XCOM you have to acknowledge the danger of reaction fire when assaulting ufo. Here its only reaction fire you have to be afraid, so you can position yourself perfectly inside ufo, just right in front of enemies, and just shoot them.And enemy reaction fire still needs to be buffed, the guy just shot several times at enemy with a pistol from bad cover, and enemy had a rifle returning fire, and did almost nothing.That has to change, since its way to easy.

Go back to easy retarded XCOM 2, with rolling dices or guaranteed explosive damage. So MUHHH tactics.

 

[Mustawd]

The point he was hammering is twofold:

1. There should be a default cth mode without going in free aim mode.
2. A paperdoll would work better instead of having to try and select, say the torso, in the middle of an idle animation.

Personally, I find #2 not a huge deal, but only if we have #1, in which im not in some free aim mode every time I’m firing.

 

[ArchAngel]

Stavrophore
I don't agree with your post. Beaglerush had valid criticism that will affect how the game is played. You on the other hand make assumptions based on nothing. He is not asking it work like Xcom 2, he is asking the game to flow better.

The free aim mode is bad, makes the game slower and more irritating than Open Xcom and nuXcoms.
And there is no penalty to using it and only benefits, so you are encouraged to use that interface and aim method.

Also the enemies still moving while in free aim was mentioned as a bad by multiple people.

As for his multiple confusions about how the pre alpha works, that is normal for a game with no tutorial and with UI that hides mechanics as much as it shows it (but kind of UI is also normal for a pre alpha game).

I don't see why you needed to go on this rant.

EDIT: Also as I watch more, he is learning mechanics fast (mostly with help of his chat) and he is generally very positive about the game.


EDIT2: Also that rant above is even more hilarious when Beagle won the map in first attempt... I have not seen anyone do that... not one streamer or youtuber.

 

[Grotesque]

The free aim mechanic should be kept but the first person camera should be ditched in favor of a more abstracted visual representation and integrated into the UI.

 

[ArchAngel]

The free aim mechanic should be kept but the first person camera should be ditched in favor of a more abstracted visual representation and integrated into the UI.

I would say the first person camera is even good but it should cost willpower to use. Anything that does not make it free will force players to not use it all the time but have it in the game for when one really needs it.

 

[luinthoron]

I can see where you're coming form, really, but do we need to speed up the game and encourage players not to use free aiming when at the same we complain that the game is not simulationist or complex enough? There's nothing wrong with taking your time and making sure you take the most of every shot in a turn based game, especially with enemies whose armor keeps soaking up a lot of the potential damage.

 

[PanteraNera]

but do we need to speed up the game and encourage players not to use free aiming when at the same we complain that the game is not simulationist or complex enough?

This nails it pretty much for me.

 

[ArchAngel]

I can see where you're coming form, really, but do we need to speed up the game and encourage players not to use free aiming when at the same we complain that the game is not simulationist or complex enough? There's nothing wrong with taking your time and making sure you take the most of every shot in a turn based game, especially with enemies whose armor keeps soaking up a lot of the potential damage.

When the gameplay is slower then Open Xcom yea we do.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

a paperdoll of the enemy you're hovering on while in free aim which autocenters in parts. maybe recalled with rmb. enemies should stop wobbling in free aim. i know they're proud of their own vats and all, but with turns and dynamic cover it just doesn't work.

 

[luinthoron]

As nice as your idea sounds, free aiming allows you to adjust the target so that even when you're trying to hit a certain part, you'll still have as much of the enemy in the target cone as reasonably possible.

 

[HansDampf]

Freeze when? When you enter free aim mode? Then exit and re-enter it a few moments later and hope you caught a better animation frame this time.

 

[udm]

To be honest it didn't really bug me that much in the demo (yet), but yeah I'd prefer to have them put into a permanently frozen idle position once a character's turn begins (edit: or once a character begins aiming)

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Don't forget that when playing against human faction that "peeking over cover" -animation could render cover useless for AI faster than anyone can say "BOOM, headshot."

 

[Ezeekiel]

a paperdoll of the enemy you're hovering on while in free aim which autocenters in parts. maybe recalled with rmb. enemies should stop wobbling in free aim. i know they're proud of their own vats and all, but with turns and dynamic cover it just doesn't work.

I think a JA2 style thing would work fine. Aim directly on the enemy without first person or paperdoll. Aim at the upper part for a headshot, lower part for legs, center for torso. Maybe sides for arms as well, I don't remember.
Not as many areas to shoot at, but trying for the eyes or antennae or whatever is kind of silly anyway unless your guy is some crazy cyborg with aim assist.

 

[luinthoron]

As much as we might bemoan the free aim (or not), I doubt it'll go anywhere, seeing how it was one of Gollop's plans already for Dreamland Chronicles.

 

[Mustawd]

if this thing has free aim as default I'm not going to buy it. Period.

I don't care who the dev is. If they don't realize having this as a default without an ability to have a regular center mass aiming shit is stupid, then I don't have hope for the rest of the game.

I really do hope this is just an early version. Otherwise, how fucking retarded is this? Or rather how do they not realize this is a problem?

Again, I'm hoping it's just an early build thing.

 

[ArchAngel]

UnstableVoltage people are about to riot. Do something!

 

[PanteraNera]

if this thing has free aim as default I'm not going to buy it. Period.

I don't care who the dev is. If they don't realize having this as a default without an ability to have a regular center mass aiming shit is stupid, then I don't have hope for the rest of the game.

I really do hope this is just an early version. Otherwise, how fucking retarded is this? Or rather how do they not realize this is a problem?

Again, I'm hoping it's just an early build thing.

But it is not the default.

I just played it, truth be told, most of the times I did just small adjustments to the default aim and that was pretty quickly done.
Trick-shots are a whole other level, for example waiting for the idle animation that the head pops out of cover.

Regarding free-aim being OP, so far it certainly doesn't feel OP to me, even with careful free-aiming you can not kill a melee crabman with one shot. Do not forget, disabling the head is not a instant kill, but just an "disabled head".

As with the different armors stats of different body parts of the enemy, I actually think free-aim adds something to the gameplay.

But I agree on trick-shots, it slows down the game pace quit a lot to wait for the right moment of the idle-animation.
On the other hand, without the idle-animation the scenery might look to static.

Just my two cents after 15 minutes of gameplay.

*edit* and what really amazes me, Phoenix Point runs way better, loads faster and looks better than Battletech while being pre-alpha, it is insane, both use Unity, I run Battletech on lowest settings and it looks fucking terrible and I only play one to two missions and than do something else because I fear the heat-death of my GPU. Phoenix Point runs smother with better graphics (currently there is only the fantastic preset for graphics)

 

[Trithne]

*edit* and what really amazes me, Phoenix Point runs way better, loads faster and looks better than Battletech while being pre-alpha, it is insane, both use Unity, I run Battletech on lowest settings and it looks fucking terrible and I only play one to two missions and than do something else because I fear the heat-death of my GPU. Phoenix Point runs smother with better graphics (currently there is only the fantastic preset for graphics)

Because Unity, as flawed as it is, is not automatically the kiss of shitty performance. It's just that a handful of Bulgarians are better are better at coding and optimising than all of HBS.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

if this thing has free aim as default I'm not going to buy it. Period.

I don't care who the dev is. If they don't realize having this as a default without an ability to have a regular center mass aiming shit is stupid, then I don't have hope for the rest of the game.

I really do hope this is just an early version. Otherwise, how fucking retarded is this? Or rather how do they not realize this is a problem?

Again, I'm hoping it's just an early build thing.

But it is not the default.

I just played it, truth be told, most of the times I did just small adjustments to the default aim and that was pretty quickly done.
Trick-shots are a whole other level, for example waiting for the idle animation that the head pops out of cover.

Regarding free-aim being OP, so far it certainly doesn't feel OP to me, even with careful free-aiming you can not kill a melee crabman with one shot. Do not forget, disabling the head is not a instant kill, but just an "disabled head".

As with the different armors stats of different body parts of the enemy, I actually think free-aim adds something to the gameplay.

But I agree on trick-shots, it slows down the game pace quit a lot to wait for the right moment of the idle-animation.
On the other hand, without the idle-animation the scenery might look to static.

Just my two cents after 15 minutes of gameplay.

*edit* and what really amazes me, Phoenix Point runs way better, loads faster and looks better than Battletech while being pre-alpha, it is insane, both use Unity, I run Battletech on lowest settings and it looks fucking terrible and I only play one to two missions and than do something else because I fear the heat-death of my GPU. Phoenix Point runs smother with better graphics (currently there is only the fantastic preset for graphics)

This has been pretty much my experience too so far.
Free aim gets used occasionally for some light adjustments; not all the time. There's completely usable center of mass aiming that quickly snaps from one visible target to another.

Those exaggerated idle animations are a problem though.

 

[Mustawd]

But it is not the default.

Do you not get sent to the FPS/VATS screen by default? It seemed that way from the stream I was watching.

UnstableVoltage people are about to riot. Do something!

I was just annoyed last night so I was being hysterical. Still, it’s dumb.

 

[PanteraNera]

Do you not get sent to the FPS/VATS screen by default? It seemed that way from the stream I was watching.

No, you do not.
Standard aim is center of mass, if you scroll in with your mouse-wheel it becomes free-aim. But you do not have to. It is totally optional and the players choice.

 

[Shog-goth]

I haven't any particular problem with current free aim implementation, maybe idle animations are a bit overdone.

 

[Mustawd]

Do you not get sent to the FPS/VATS screen by default? It seemed that way from the stream I was watching.

No, you do not.
Standard aim is center of mass, if you scroll in with your mouse-wheel it becomes free-aim. But you do not have to. It is totally optional and the players choice.

Wait...so when you click on an enemy and you go to fire, you are saying you can stay in the isometric viewpoint?

Because what’s triggering me right now is the idea that I go into first person view every time I shoot.

Can you clarify that point?