Strategical Layer - Interception and satellite coverage.

[heniv]

With this game being developed by Firaxis, the masters of strategical gameplay, I have wondered how this would affect the Geoscape. So far there is litte information but the bits and peices we got can give us a hint of what is to come.


UFO Interception
At the beginign of the game, I wonder if we have any interception at all or if this is highly limited. We might be limited to responding to alien surface attacks to begin with.

"You start by reacting to the alien invasion. But over time you are going to take that fight to the aliens, and that will probably start by intercepting alien craft that fly through your territory." - Pete Murray

This could imply that we have a limited area of coverage or limited numbers of Interceptors that you have to decide on what continents to put them.


Satellite Cover
We know of two base facilities that relates to "radar coverage" of the globe. The Satellite Nexus and the Satellite Uplink, these are not among the static facilities. And the GI Ant-Farm article states:

Satellite Uplink Facility (Not Pictured): The Satellite Uplink Facility allows XCOM to monitor the airspace over different countries around the world. Building multiple uplinks next to each other increases the number of satellites that XCOM can maintain.

It seems like we need to expand our satellite capacity as well as to manufacture satellites (could be multiple types) as the game progress to more effectively cover the Earth.


We can add a lot more speculation on this, but have anyone found any other titbits that I have missed on this subject?

[Inkidu]

I think there's probably going to be a lot more strategic choice in this one than in the original. They already revamped how you interact with the funding council so that's good (them giving you missions and possible tasks). There are more mission types, and missions have more set rewards than just killing and looting an area for ridiculous amounts of cash.

I don't think they've really been showing off the geoscape side of things because, well, it's boring to watch.

[Wrench]

Yeah, I agree with you Heniv. I think the initial coverage of Xcom will be the local areas that you set up your base, with limited satelite coverage. As we expand and move out to cover more continents/countries, things will then ramp up coverage wise. So we wont patrol the whole world straight off...

I'm hoping that missions have more rewards than just pleasing a specific country for vanquishing their threat and by doing so get a funding increase. I hope they have elements which you really have to make a tough decision over. Like if one mission is because a new alien or new piece of alien tech has been spotted and have to choose whether to do this mission to secure that new intel to research. But close by you have another mission in which you could protect an embassy which is under immediate alien threat, but by saving embassy you would recieve a stockpile of kit/funding from that country... so you end up with a decision to be made... Im sure the creatives will come up with much better examples of tough decisions you might have to make.. but you get the idea..
I'm just hoping they expand the missions to be more than the classic 3... crashed ufo, alien suburban incursion or base attack...
Maybe more missions which have story archs to draw out a long term narrative... So you progress one mission which starts out as a search and destroy, but during this mission something is discovered which will lead you down one or two subsequent missions in cover a specific story path which once completed provide you with a valuable bit of kit or intel..
This isnt to much of a stretch with contemporary gaming/coding techniques... basically the missions need to be more complex then they have been in past franchises of both X-com and UFO...

[Inkidu]

I think the strategic layer is going to be better because of historical fact. The geoscape was not a last minute add on by the Gallops, but it was not in their original plan. That was actually posed by Microprose who wanted to capitalize on the success of the Civilization franchise. A rare case of executive helpfulness.

So, Faraxis already gets a leg up because they're going into it with a geoscape layer in mind, and... well... they are the Civilization guys now. Strange, huh?

[Oathbreaker]

Thanks for posting, I'd missed that. I kind of dislike having the game toss "missions" my way, I'd rather the stuff be more sandbox than a linear-ish progression path. Oh well. Plus satellites, undefended, in orbit, when there's UFO's flitting around with technology that's light-years ahead of our own. Why wouldn't they just shoot the darn things down (up, sideways, whatever)?

But what the hell. Not like Jake doesn't have his nose straight up the essence of the original. I'm moderately confident that this will not interfere with my enjoyment of the new iteration.

[SectoidSquisher]

I think there's probably going to be a lot more strategic choice in this one than in the original. They already revamped how you interact with the funding council so that's good (them giving you missions and possible tasks). There are more mission types, and missions have more set rewards than just killing and looting an area for ridiculous amounts of cash.

I don't think they've really been showing off the geoscape side of things because, well, it's boring to watch.

Yep, it doesn't make for a good demo. I definitely agree with you - this one is going to have more strategic depth on the geoscape at any rate.

[SectoidSquisher]

Thanks for posting, I'd missed that. I kind of dislike having the game toss "missions" my way, I'd rather the stuff be more sandbox than a linear-ish progression path. Oh well. Plus satellites, undefended, in orbit, when there's UFO's flitting around with technology that's light-years ahead of our own. Why wouldn't they just shoot the darn things down (up, sideways, whatever)?

But what the hell. Not like Jake doesn't have his nose straight up the essence of the original. I'm moderately confident that this will not interfere with my enjoyment of the new iteration.

I'm with you, I don't want a linear progression path. I don't mind a story loosely, and I mean very loosely - as loose as a few thin threads, woven around what is essentially a sandbox strategy game, but if I wanted mission one, mission two, I'd play Call of Duty.

[Inkidu]

Thanks for posting, I'd missed that. I kind of dislike having the game toss "missions" my way, I'd rather the stuff be more sandbox than a linear-ish progression path. Oh well. Plus satellites, undefended, in orbit, when there's UFO's flitting around with technology that's light-years ahead of our own. Why wouldn't they just shoot the darn things down (up, sideways, whatever)?

But what the hell. Not like Jake doesn't have his nose straight up the essence of the original. I'm moderately confident that this will not interfere with my enjoyment of the new iteration.

Actually, barring the tent pole story mission, most of the missions tossed your way are procedurally generated. The example Game Informer gave was that you get a request from Japan for laser rifles comes from the fact that Japan feels threatened by the aliens and you have the ability to produce laser rifles.

I like that better than simple randomness of UFOs, but there's no reason that got cut either. I don't see why you just don't have random UFO landings and whatnot.

[heniv]

Thanks for posting, I'd missed that. I kind of dislike having the game toss "missions" my way, I'd rather the stuff be more sandbox than a linear-ish progression path.

You make "mission" sound like "assignment", but yeah... a linear-mission-path (even if there are several branchings) does not fit a strategical game like this. Otherwise I think there is no difference in this game or the original on how you receive missions.
The original actually did have a more linear mission-by-mission approach, this game seem to to have a similar approach only you get a set of missions to choose from at each point.

We know that there are both incident responses (from countries) as well as areal UFO interception. I guess the incident response missions will be global from the start since they are a request/cry for help from the funding countries.

Interception may become more important later in the game to prevent incidents and keep the panic-level of countries down.

[Inkidu]

I think that interception isn't as easy at least not in the early game. The G.I. article uses the example of two UFOs one is moving way too fast for the terran jet to catch, but the other isn't. I think speed plays a bigger part in interception than it used to.

[ShanDaMan]

As far as missions go, the original occasionally gave us a few. There would be a Terror Mission pop up even if your base was on the other side of the globe, and your "XCOM agents" would reveal the location of an alien base from time to time. They didn't happen very often so it wasn't intrusive as most missions were directly related to UFO activity.

Something balanced like that would be fine with me. I'd rather most of my missions be the results of my own actions.

[Zxc]

Actually, barring the tent pole story mission, most of the missions tossed your way are procedurally generated. The example Game Informer gave was that you get a request from Japan for laser rifles comes from the fact that Japan feels threatened by the aliens and you have the ability to produce laser rifles.

I think I agree with everyone. I prefer the traditional mission of intercepting random UFO's down and searching them for aliens and artifacts. Having said that, when I play, as I start to really advance, it sometimes gets boring, "...ho hum, I shot down another ship...I guess I have to go and clear it..." Having a few missions that do not require interception would be nice variety.

Having said that, not having a computer background, I don't actually know what "procedurally driven" means, despite seeing the phrase used in a few interviews. I assume it means "randomly generated by an algorithm," but given the conversation in this thread, does it really mean that the overarching narrative / plot requires that we follow a series of procedures or "checkpoint missions?" Given all the interviews I've seen, I have a hard time thinking that "incident-related missions" to satisfy the overall plot would be that common.

I don't someone could indulge a fool like me an educate me on the proper meaning of the phrase "procedurally driven?" Maybe I'm misunderstanding everyone?

[Steelsky]

As I understand the term procedurally driven it's a setup where you don't have, for example, all the levels made and mapped out beforehand but a stack of tiles where you can pick and choose what goes where.

The first XCom had this, you take a farm level, plonk down a grid of 3 by 3 big premade tiles and add a Skyranger and a Ufo and you're done.

This iteration will have all its maps premade, according to them there will be so many you can have 2 full playthroughs without seeing the same one.

If you have played the UFO: After..... series they had their maps premade, there were only a few of them they changed with the level of terraforming you had done.

So procedurally driven is basically you've made a framework and a way for the computer to randomly generate the content for you in order to have maximum possible varity.

/Yks

[Oathbreaker]

In the original you had your work cut out for you in order to A) find out that you *COULD* find out that there were alien bases on Earth, B) actually figure out how to find it, C) build up resources to go look for the damn thing (more hangars, more Skyrangers), and D) actually locate and prosecute with extreme prejudice.

Then you had a ton of research and trial-and-error to do in order to find out that there was an "endgame" mission where you could actually win. Unless you played on Easy Mode or had people or the internet tell you what to do, I suppose.

I'd prefer if the game very rarely held your hand as far as developing the story goes - I'd rather see a bunch of whiny kids screaming "NOW WHAT DO I DO, I'VE DEVELOPED EVERYTHING THIS IS STUPID DIS GAME SUX 111!!!" ...Than run around in a game world knowing exactly what missions are coming next.

Remember Elite? Ok, that was a bit too damn hard to find the missions in. But lets say there's game hints in the Research text, and then once in a while something crazy happens and you get a tiny hint, like say "There's trouble afoot in Mesopotamia." And you're like "wtf mate, there's been no alien activity there, maybe I should build a radar station close by, or park a patrolling Skyranger on top of the area for a bit."

[Inkidu]

I think I agree with everyone. I prefer the traditional mission of intercepting random UFO's down and searching them for aliens and artifacts. Having said that, when I play, as I start to really advance, it sometimes gets boring, "...ho hum, I shot down another ship...I guess I have to go and clear it..." Having a few missions that do not require interception would be nice variety.

Having said that, not having a computer background, I don't actually know what "procedurally driven" means, despite seeing the phrase used in a few interviews. I assume it means "randomly generated by an algorithm," but given the conversation in this thread, does it really mean that the overarching narrative / plot requires that we follow a series of procedures or "checkpoint missions?" Given all the interviews I've seen, I have a hard time thinking that "incident-related missions" to satisfy the overall plot would be that common.

I don't someone could indulge a fool like me an educate me on the proper meaning of the phrase "procedurally driven?" Maybe I'm misunderstanding everyone?

Don't misunderstand me. There's still UFOs, there's still interception, there's still terror missions. It's just there's more of it. More mission types, more interaction with the check-cutters, more strategy in general.

That's what I mean. Anyway procedurally generated is in basic terms some kind of process be it algorithms or some kind of scripts that trigger the event from an event pool. Procedurally generated doesn't exactly mean randomly, but it could. Mainly it means there there's some pool of elements that the game combines on some set of conditions. The most simplistic form of it is probably something like the Witcher 2. Pick one option get one part of the game, pick another get the other part of the game.

[Zxc]

As I understand the term procedurally driven it's a setup where you don't have, for example, all the levels made and mapped out beforehand but a stack of tiles where you can pick and choose what goes where.

The first XCom had this, you take a farm level, plonk down a grid of 3 by 3 big premade tiles and add a Skyranger and a Ufo and you're done.

This iteration will have all its maps premade, according to them there will be so many you can have 2 full playthroughs without seeing the same one.

If you have played the UFO: After..... series they had their maps premade, there were only a few of them they changed with the level of terraforming you had done.

So procedurally driven is basically you've made a framework and a way for the computer to randomly generate the content for you in order to have maximum possible varity.

/Yks

Don't misunderstand me. There's still UFOs, there's still interception, there's still terror missions. It's just there's more of it. More mission types, more interaction with the check-cutters, more strategy in general.

That's what I mean. Anyway procedurally generated is in basic terms some kind of process be it algorithms or some kind of scripts that trigger the event from an event pool. Procedurally generated doesn't exactly mean randomly, but it could. Mainly it means there there's some pool of elements that the game combines on some set of conditions. The most simplistic form of it is probably something like the Witcher 2. Pick one option get one part of the game, pick another get the other part of the game.

Thanks to both of you.