If there was going to be an XCOM: Enemy Unknown sequel, what changes would you like to see?

[SonOfVoorhees]

I want a combination of Xcom and Xcom 2 (underwater one) - that way you can fight them on land and in and on the ocean - lots of variety in backgrounds and weapons.

1. What about gaining the ability to board UFO's in the air stealthily before they land/crash?
2. Or find that certain classes of ship (ones with commanders?)that have teleporters that take you to an alien base on other planets. That would at least give a great excuse to find artifacts of dead civilizations the UFO conquered - would be a great way to build up lore for future games.
3. Add gentics to the mix, turn your characters part alien to gain speed, psi skills or just armour?
4. Maybe with the teleport idea you could gain targets to visit from artifacts or interrogation and visit them. This could then lead to new weapons, armour and technology thats not connected to the attacking UFO's.
5. Mini tanks, had those in the original. Maybe should add air drones that fly above the enemy and attacks them......similiar to when you gained the flying armour and would hover over the battle field.
6. Chemical/bio weapons? Once you researched enough bodies you could gain a bio weapon to kill them, though this would make you lose points from some countries.

Not played the re make yet, but it looks great and the demo was awesome. I'm just going by things i would like added.

 

[Savagezion]

Ideas left out from the original that should be put back in

1. More destructable environments. Quit trying to make this a cover based shooter!
2. Allow me to shoot at a wall if I want to.
3. Stances is what kept the original from being a cover based shooter, put em back in and add prone.
4. More than 1 base.
5. Base defense.
6. Ability to pick up gear on the battlefield.
7. Larger Squads. (10-12 at least)
8. Multiple Skyrangers.
9. Let me be able to shoot then move, or shoot twice. Only allowing move twice or move then shoot defeats the purpose of taking out the AP system.
10. Intercepting terror missions as UFOs. Currently UFOs only show up to be shot down, they have no purpose. I haven't even seen one land yet if I don't intercept it. It just goes away. I used to wait for them to land so that I could get more from the mission than debris.
11. More Mission Maps, getting tired of playing the same ones over and over again.

I am probably missing a couple things above but on to the new stuff.

1. Either make the story more flexible or remove the story missions. Story missions only serve to make each playthrough feel the same. The idea is kinda neat but this was a problem in UFO:Aftermath as well. They should look more to Diablo 1 where certain things may pop up but they are randomized. When you first start a game of XCom, you know you are gonna have to go escort some informant within the first month and it only gets more linear from there. One of the great things about the original formula is that each playthrough felt vastly different even if you played with the same tactics, nevermind if you switched them up.

2. National origin plays a role to your soldiers. Higher panic levels in China mean less soldiers avaiable from china and/or are more expensive. (EDIT: At least have it so that you aremore likely to get soldiers from countries with lower panic levels.) However, a chinese soldier gets a 1 turn per mission buff when fighting in asian territory missions. (You can pick the turn)

3. Romantic Realtionships between soldiers. Just kidding.

3. Fix the bugs. Seriously this is annoying as hell.

4. The ability to choose a soldiers class when promoted to squaddie.

5. Use DLCs AND expansions to address things of this nature instead of shoving some bullshit mafia hunt with hats at us instead. Get on focus of what this game is and always has been about and quit trying to make it a story centric cover based shooter with a tactical game disguise on.

 

[teqrevisited]

Multiple bases, choice of soldier class, more customization options, randomly generated maps, more tile sets, the ability to shoot at anything from anywhere, base invasion and multiple alien bases. Oh and the old interception music.

 

[Ardenon]

Inventory management during combat

 

[Noswad]

Just a small thing but I missed it quite a bit, the ability to gradually move your troops from the Skyranger one by one, some of the landing zones just don't have enough cover at the beginning.

 

[Pink Gregory]

Snippety snip.

I agree entirely; I can handle basically it being implied that I'm a **** for enjoying this one more than the old one, I saw some guy comment somewhere that Xenonauts had 'more heart' than the Firaxis one. What's that even supposed to mean? It more closely resembles the original X-Com means it has more heart? What?

I've not really seen any justification for not taking out some of the more overcomplicated features other than 'That's what the original did'. The original is still there, it has considerable replay value; this is a different game, and remaking it with a new coat of paint would be largely pointless for a non-independent developer that needs to shift copies.

 

[scorptatious]

- humanoid chryssalids.

yes, you read right, the ones that turn their victiom into a zombie and these zombies become after a short while chryssalids themselves.

But the chryssalids in the new game do exactly that. Although from what I've seen in gameplay video of the older game, the victims become zombies immediately and only turn into chryssalids when you kill them. While in the new game, they turn into zombies after a turn and then become chryssalids only if you take too long to kill them.

As for the design, well that's personal preference so I can't argue with you about that.

You're supposed to be some elite organisation whose goal is to stop the alien invasion right? So how is it that a group with that kind of money and backing can only have a single group out at a time?

So yea, the ability to field multiple squads on multiple missions. Maybe have the ones not under your control succeed or fail on a probability influenced by the experience and equipment of the soldiers you send out.

I like that idea. It allows you to keep the whole hard choice system while still being able to try to save other countries. Do you risk sending some of your better soldiers out on their own without your guidance while you try to defuse another situation? Or do you just simply not take the risk and leave that country to it's fate?

It can also force players to invest more money into buying troops. Which, I'll admit, wasn't really something I did much as I didn't really lose too many soldiers for it to be a major problem.

 

[ZZoMBiE13]

I'd mostly be happy with more of the same. Only a bit more polished the next time around. It is a sin to have included their Ironman mode in a game that was so bugged out. If I screw up and lose a squad, fine. My bad. But when I clear a room and then the Giant Robot Death Wagon drops in through the wall and can target me while I cannot target it, that's a load of horse shit on toast right there.

 

[Akytalusia]

just let me build more than 1 skyranger. seriously. who's brilliant idea was limiting it to 1? that military tactician and the one responsible for hiring him should be fired immediately.

 

[BakedZnake]

Why a sequel? Why not like the good old days, and bring out an expansion pack every 6-12 months, less of these stupid mini dlcs with 1 new character or more ways to colour in your rookies before sending them off to die. Also, FIX YOUR DAMN GAME

 

[shrekfan246]

Larger, less linear maps would be nice.

Eight squad members instead of six could be cool, but more than that would feel unnecessary to me unless they completely retool the balancing.

More missions/more randomized missions to keep subsequent play-throughs fresh.

More weapons/armor/soldier customization options.

More skills to pick from in the leveling trees.

Different naming system for the ranks. I don't know about everyone else, but I always think it's weird in these military-style squad games when you've got a squad completely comprised of Colonels just wading in on the front lines with no backup. Especially since the military (at least in the US) has a freakin' ton of different ranks. That's just a personal preference thing though.

Having "Fire" not use up both Actions if you haven't moved yet would be nice, if the Action system doesn't change. Maybe give an extra Action-per-turn to fully-leveled soldiers? That would require a bit of rebalancing as well, of course.

Also, change the camera. The cinematic camera while firing is neat and works for the most part except for the times you're just looking at a wall, but
A. Have the AI actually fire out of the correct direction to get a decent bead on the target
and
B. Having guns clip through cover is hilarious, but really pulls you out of the experience when they're firing through three walls and still kill the enemy.
Also the camera really likes freaking out inside of multiple-layered buildings/UFOs, that could use some work.

 

[triggrhappy94]

Game Informer had a pretty good interview with one of the X-Com guys, and they brought up some really points.
I can't remember all of them but I know one of my favorites was the ability to get heavy weapon (even if they were limited) and straight destroy the enemy.

Air support would be really nice--or they could at least have a bit that explains why we can't just carpet bomb some of the downed space ships.

Defense--not just base defense, but it'd be fun to have to defend all the workshops you build. It'd be fun to be dropped into a zone and have to defend it.

More customization. I can really only choose between (at least for caucasian) Norris God, Jonah Jameson, generic white guy. I'm already playing Norris God, but I have more than two white friends.
Also, the ability to change gender and nationality would be so much better, I was surprised to find it wasn't included.

Do some thing with the SHIV. I really felt like it was a waste--I didn't have that many engineers though. It was expensive, super inaccurate, and got shot all the time because it couldn't use cover or duck behind walls. I think it should be that the SHIV can't "die" just taken out of service and repaired aftered the mission--after a long time, and with a possible cost.

Fix the graphics pop in problem. There's no reason it should take so long to render the holo-globe.

More mission types--in addition to defense. Deffenately would help with long play.

More research branches. Research is one of the key parts of the game there should be more to do.

A suburbia ("Nuke Town") style map would be really cool.

One or two large skirmishes would be really cool.

Steal some ideas from Evil Genius. Maybe have to change base locations, or gather representatives from different countries.

 

[triggrhappy94]

- when in panic, soldiers should just shoot around them and not target only allies.

I've had a heavy panic and almost kill one of my snipers.

 

[Irridium]

1: More map diversity. Maybe have the city maps reflect the culture of the country their in, some farmland maps, some arctic/desert maps.

2: Some more enemy variety would be nice.

3: Something like their "second wave" mode they didn't get to finish, to make replays more diverse and interesting.

4: Base attacks, or perhaps have live aliens you capture attempt a jailbreak.

5: More accents for soldiers.

6. More countries.

7. Ability to choose where the Skyranger lands. Just think it'd be a cool feature to have.

8. A bit more customization options in the forms of scars and tattoos for the soldiers.

9. Ability to play as the aliens invading Earth. You know, maybe part of that "second wave" thing. Could be fun to crush the tiny humans.

10. Some more mission variety would be good.

And yeah, that's it. I really liked everything else. Even the small squads. Anything bigger and it'd just go the old XCOM way of rushing rookies and then mopping up the rest with your good soldiers.

 

[perkl]

The next game should be pausable realtime. I estimate there is slightly less chance for this than a squadron of flying monkeys delivering the turn-based sequel in stores everywhere.

At least have the decency to make more interesting maps. If you're gonna have flying suits, you could very well have an assault on floor 98 of a skyscraper. Part of your team enters from roof, part flies around the windows to provide sniper support or make surprise flanking movements. There's also no reason the fights can't take place around famous landmarks, such as Kremlin, Pentagon or Canberra opera house.

Unfortunately the game was a disappointment to me, so I don't expect the sequel to change the fundamental things I dislike.

 

[scorptatious]

And yeah, that's it. I really liked everything else. Even the small squads. Anything bigger and it'd just go the old XCOM way of rushing rookies and then mopping up the rest with your good soldiers.

I agree somewhat. I kinda like the idea of having a squad of elite soldiers a bit better than having a large group of cannon fodder.

I do wish the squad was slightly larger though. Not too big, not too small. Just right.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

1) A larger squad size.

2) More accents.

3) More bases.

4) Patrol routes for fighter craft.

5) Air Support in the form of missile strikes.

6) More countries.

7) More varied maps.

8) An actual inventory for your soldiers (or at least more slots at higher ranks or better armours).