Wish List (dated) 2nd revision Compilation., POSTS that I have read & My Suggestions. Options

[gb0]

Wish List (dated) 5th Revision Compilation.
POSTS that I have read & My Suggestions.

http://forum.ufo-aftermath.com/index.php?showtopic=196
http://home.online.no/~oand-a/UFO_AS_FAQ.doc
http://home.online.no/~oand-a/UFO_AS_FAQ.txt

http://forum.ufo-aftermath.com/index.php?showtopic=140&st=21

After Playing UFO:AM here are my Suggestionsfor UFO:AM&AS.

The Technology on UFO:AS will be Advance enough to Include some (Mobile RECON Robot Tank.)
<scout soldier= has inverted Parabolic Hourglass view kinda like what what the UFO:AM has but have the height aspect covered better advantage compared to L.O.S. of a camera Recon.>

2.9 = Will the Research Tree be able to be seen?

3.1
I guess having a control on the numbers is GOOD, the people here have no idea if you endup commanding an army there's going to be a VERY Messy Battalion instead of a Squad.
Better ask the millitary whats the best number of people in a Patoon/Squad/Group/Troops/etc...
Plus you guys have to compensate to the large MAP to contain these large number of people and the time it would take to finish a single Mission with the added buildings and to patrol the map and kill all the monsters.
The Game engine Can NOT Handle the numbers!

How about a MAX of 10 Members so ALL the number keys can be used?

Having the reservers is already tough enough to manage is the a way to Group your men in categories that you can make? (Tabs/Folders/Dorm Barracks)

3.3-3.4
Hopefully you can CHOOSE on how to distribute your Stats rather than random for at least your initial Soldier as your Character. BUT when it gets Killed it just goes to the Hospital for a R&R and takes longer to heal.

AND While Training, show which skill is being Trained and have a more Vibrabant & Distinct Colors. and during LEVEL UP show the Train Tree so well know how to distribute the stats.

Speaking of colors the Yellow and light Colors are hard to see troops path hopefully have the lines be wider or animated lines

Or change the soldier boxes @ the bottom for a smaller animated facial pictures.

4.1
Besides Abush & Rescue missions how about rescue missions of dignitaries and people in Urban & Rural environment also Escort missions. like some Farmers wondering around in the present missions. and Fight with other military forces or resistance forces.

4.5
Speaking of monsters making it more Biological than Sci-fi (reticulans) is a BETTER approach for realisim.

4.4 & 4.6
Enable 2 pistol/gun wielding YES , I agree. Weapons with Grenade launchers or Bayonets and Hand-to-hand Combat AND MECH punches and Exploding and Thrown Vehicles,barrels,citizens. and increased damage % at closer range.
<Additional Perspective Soldiers being found in missions, Locals with guns & pitch forks.> I wonder if BIO weapons are added on top of the Alien Technologies & Jump jets.

Hopefully you can Reload a shot gun when you have a extra shot gun on your pack and transfer the ammo of the shot gun on your pack to your present one on hand to prepare for a rapid fire SAME GOES FOR ALL GUNS LOADED.

AND Can remove a clip from an exsisting gun; so i don't need to bring the whole gun around.

AND when switching Guns like placing the Gun1 on top of a Gun2 in the BackPack it Knows to Swap it so it takes less time.

Also if the THROW command can also be a Pass Command so it would be faster.
So if a soldier runs out of ammo the other soldier can throw/PASS a clip to the other soldier member.
1st to the hand if it's free and then the belt and the backpack and last on the ground if all other space is used.

Pendragon's Idea of Claymores, Mines and Non-Lethals! add some more variety and we can arrange the Weapons in the order we want!

• Foam
• Glue
• Tazers
• Stun Rods
• Rubber Bullets
• Tear gas

Have a shorter Priming time for Smoke granades! & Flares; so it will be more usefull. So i can hide my troops when we get out numbered! or when we Start Running! especially when you just drop them to the ground.

4.7 Power Source for alien Weapons be used interchanged with Mechs & Recon Bots.

Heat Detectors in Binoculars, then Motion Detectors, then Psi-Locators that have a Full 360° View arc.

4.8
Gun Enplacements & Defence Turret are NOT bad; Also ADD RECON Tank/BOTS! And have the Transport Carriers have a CASE of ammo in the Landing zone and the RECON Bots a mobile Ammo carrier and when it EXPLODES it has a wide blast radius.

And for Identify How many items that are stored in the (Chinook) Transport Carriers and scavenged weaponry & clips from total missions and Alien bodies.

4.10
Add the Floors in a building. & Height of the mountains & hills indicator also GRID availability. MINI MAP? Cause having sticks pertruding up is not my idea of HEIGHTS

during BASE Infiltration have the Back Ups take care of it like the ones in Training or R&R and Fight as is on which is stationed on a base and what their Equiped and renforcements arrive when they choose to abort or number of turns till it ends.

I also like the idea of having to deploy more than one Squad Carriers. More missions to take than having a Squad in waiting after R&R. to do scout missions.

And if possible to have a Quicker .exe to run Go directly to the PLAY GAME option and we can just ESC back IF we want to load a game to Skip the intros.

1.) View map down to the Point-of-View of the Soldier NOT a FPS but a Third person View over his/her/it's head.

2.) Win2k Compatible for me; XP sucks even the Pro version.

More Shortcut Keys and have ONE (1) window for "Next Level" & "Abort" and Esc = Next> there's alot of times i click the abort key instead of next, and viceversa.
Hopefully there's one button for the NEXT Phase then the window have all (3) three buttons present => [ABORT] [NEXT] [CONTINUE]

the Queue system for Research & Manufacture & Training; so it immediately starts on the next project, and only prompts you when a new Project becomes available or done. Beter yet the EXACT schedule of when DEVELOPMENT, TRAINING or RESEARCH will be done!

FIX THE LETTERS and SOME NUMBERS. They are ALL BLURED!!! The Pics you used for it are to Graphic hence a low resolution makes it blurry make it simple (1) one color scheme NOT Gradient so it's Readable.
=====================================================

to Pfelpensson:
Boy, adding terrain specialty is going to more dificult. what else Acrtic and under water armor?

to X-comFreak:
I guess the Production is like the Real time where you can choose to create 2 Mech suits and 2 Rifles and 1 More Mech suits in Queue.

General Snoopy's MORGE Idea is not that BAD also keeping track of the Aliens and Civilians killed Could hit a cord of Morality to be a reminder to take care of the people than going on a balistic rampage. besides you being the AI, you are also the Moral Factor. Soldier Morale is a PISS OFF for me I'd rather shoot my own troops for insubordination.

<to Tortanick>
Maybe one of the advantages of your Char presence is ALL have HIGH morale NO matter what until your Char get's sent to the Hospital.
Morale also makes them better to go lone wolf during a mission and green can stay with a group so not to lose morale.

Excursion's Fatigue Idea hopefully we can still use them in a diminnished capacity and able to Rest During Missions (Bench Warmers)

And For Soldiers to Lay Flat to the Ground for Increase Hit and Dodge Rate and Fix the AI to be suseptible from cover fire while other Units Fall back.

Space Bar = PAUSE! & Enter = GO! » Seperate the Functions!

Have the TURN Units in decimal. show the Queued commands better and having more control and view of the initiatives. on who is going to be able to shoot first.

How about having Tactical missions every movement recorded so you can run them as an observer? the FPS view of each soldier going thru the mission till the end and re-running it being viewed in the other Soldier's POV.

Then we can trade savegames and see each dumb commands, suprise attacks,ambush and other stuff. even as an overhead observer.

SCENEMODE is GREAT‼ Faster to process in video card make this an option.
NO Shadows!

-----------------------------------------Italics are already answered and done by Altar http://forum.ufo-aftermath.com/index.php?showtopic=140&st=94

This post has been edited by gb0: Dec 25 2004, 07:35 AM

[gb0]

Jump Jets

[gb0]

updated

[Sanjiyanukara]

Hello all I just want to state that I loved X-Com perhaps the best game of its kind but I could go on and on so I wont start. I would like to start with things that I did like about X-Com that are not found in UFO: AM.

1. Map Exploration and Lighting. I dunno about you all but when I played UFO:AM the map being fully explored and the lighting I could hardly tell visually not saying that in game it didnt matter just saying visually. In X-Com part of the tenseness of the game was exploring a dark map and when it was night time it was really dark and those light flares were EXTRA important so you can find and see the aliens in the dark. I think it adds mood and plus you get an idea of where you've been and not been.

2. Being able to enter buildings and interacting with the environment. Now you can do this UFO: AM BUT you just do not do it to the extent of X-Com where if you destroy things stuff can fall down on you or see an alien behind a wall so you decide to blast the wall to get at the alien on the otherside. This is just one example of the environment playing a roll in the game.

3. This is one thing that gets over looked a lot even by other games of this type but knowing who sees what is important. If stealth is part of the game this becomes especially important because if you are sneaking and one of your men has scoped an alien or enemy you want the guy who is sneaking to not be seen. If you have the enemy visible then what is there to tell you that the guy who is sneaking around the corner is visible to the alien or not? Alot of times lately its when they start shooting but in the original X-Com which I dont know why other games havent adopted there were numbered squares that told you exactly how many aliens they see and if you clicked on the squares it centers on the alien they see. This way if you can see them its a good bet they can see you.

4. Unlimited Expendable Men. This is debateable but seeing as how there are levels and such I dont see this being a bad thing. In the X-Com 1 and 2 not 3 you can literally purchase as many men you can afford. In UFO:AM its a great loss when you lose more than 2-3 men but in X-Com losing 2-3 men can and does happen early on which in a way is more realistic. The fact your men improve provides enough incentive to want to keep all your men alive but FORCING it in UFO:AM is something I think should be shyed from. To its credit if you lose a man here or there in UFO:AM the new recruits came fast enough so it isnt that big of a loss.

5. Crouching should improve aim and also be harder to hit. I am reasonably sure unless there is a glitch that crouching while aiming in UFO:AM yields the same percent accuracy. Another benefit of crouching in X-Com was being a harder target to hit especially behind cover which does exist to a certain extent just harder to tell in UFO:AM.

6. NPC's that are not just the enemies. In X-Com there were bystanders, innocents, women relaxing, men going to the bathroom etc. In the first two X-Com's these NPC's played a major role in it that you have to keep as many of them alive as possible or else your mission didnt go so well and your funding MAY be cut. It added an interesting dynamic and provided variety to the missions where its not just search and destory. To UFO:AM's credit they did have the downed pilot mission which was neat .

7. Different shot settings. This isnt that important as aimed shot and burst shot are sufficient but having that less timely snap shot is a nice option to have.

8. Morale. Can be annoying at times so I can see why it was taken out but knowing your men have a certain extent and can crack under pressure is an interesting thing and I feel should be added. Having things like running in panic or going berserk and running out to fire out in the open are possible things of happening.

Now I would like to go into the things that I did like that was in UFO:AM.

1. The realism mood and atomsphere was done well. The music added to the game and gave that scientific feel.

2. The combat for not being turn based was as close to turn based and real time as I've seen in a game of this type and the best I've seen it pulled off. I'm a big fan of turn based and always will be but this system doesnt let down although I liked the tenseness of the "Enemy Movement" screen with the occasional shot from the dark and screams of pain hehe.

3. Not having to hire scientists and engineers is a plus. For the most part in X-Com if you have a research or engineering facility you are gonna fill it to max so really hiring them is kinda irrelevant only the quantity of facilities was the important factor.

4. Base to Base Teleport. A nice feature to have as since the helicopter flies so damned slow and well lets face it the world aint such a small world afterall.

5. Gear and equipment options were nice. Having your choice of armor and/or helm was nice as well as choosing weapons and secondary weapons made preparing for a mission nice.

6. Being able to abort when you want to and a mission ending if only 1 alien was left. Nice features to add when you get sick of looking for the last alien who was over in the shower stalls taking a bath or if you bit off more than you can chew you DONT need to fight it out.

Well thats about all the things I can think of for that. Now I want to go into some things I would like to see in UFO:AS aside from the first list which I think should be added.

1. War Machines and or scout probes. Doesnt need to be a flying tank although that would be nice but a little floating probe that flies around to scout for you would be nice to see especially when in a base of UFO and you need to know whats around the corner.

2. Stealth be more involving. This can be done an option of sneaking and stealth suits. If say the greys or there underlings see with infrared vision you can have thermal masking or if they see color then a visual camoflouge could be in the game to make it more feasible.

3. Autosaving before and after each mission would be great.

4. The glossary addition to the description of weapons saying what type of damage they do and also a description of the different types of damage types would be helpful. I know most of the time its self explanatory but a noob might not find it so.

5. A mouse over the alien saying the name and type of alien which is there already BUT also say what weapon they have. If the weapon is unknown then put "???" if it is known then say what weapon it is. Helpful when just looking at it from a glance otherwise you literally have to zoom up or worst of all what its shooting at you to determine the kind of weapon.

6. Already stated but you should be able to manufacture any kind of ammo that is manmade(I.E. if you find a sniper rifle with one pack of bullets you should be able to manufacture more of those bullets).

7. Driveable vehicles like a tank, jeep, or armored car.

Well thats about all I can think of. I'm sure there is more but I'm tired so I'm gonna leave it at that for now.

-Sanjiyanukara = Three-Eyed Monster

[Stobor]

4.  Unlimited Expendable Men.  This is debateable but seeing as how there are levels and such I dont see this being a bad thing.  In the X-Com 1 and 2 not 3 you can literally purchase as many men you can afford.  In UFO:AM its a great loss when you lose more than 2-3 men but in X-Com losing 2-3 men can and does happen early on which in a way is more realistic.  The fact your men improve provides enough incentive to want to keep all your men alive but FORCING it in UFO:AM is something I think should be shyed from.  To its credit if you lose a man here or there in UFO:AM the new recruits came fast enough so it isnt that big of a loss.

This is something that gave X:COM so much of it's flavor. Sending in a team of 15 soldiers armed with the best earth produced and those first few missions where still a blood bath. It gave you this scence of doom fighting an enemy that had such an advantage over you. It took work to keep men alive, the penalty if you lost someone was their experience a green recruit just wouldn't compare (an excellent integration of the combat and RPG models). I had my favorites as well, those people that lived through 10 missions where special, I had learned their names and they generally had special roles to fill in the missions. It's like those war movies you see, the ones that have been there for a while are tight nit. The new guys are shunned because no one wants another friend that's going to die tommarow.

Games of this nature can give the AI a huge leg up with technology and make some very hard and interesting scenarios, in most other genre that would be considered an "AI cheat". In the original X:COM I really never started a mission with the expectation that all my troops would survive the encounter ... in UFO:AM I did, I think that diffrence hurt the mood of the game.

[Sanjiyanukara]

Me again and thought up some more things.

Something I liked in UFO:AM.

1. Stratification of your men. I like having your heavy weapons specialist and medic etc. This was cool and people had avenues of direction other than just being the kick butt sniper or psionist.

2. The men and women that get recruited arent totally green and that although generic which is ok absolutely nothing wrong with that had some personality to them which was nice.

Something I liked in X-Com not in UFO:AM.

1. Being able to take more men on a mission. This lends itself to the above init that if you have your medic/psionist thats a pretty low gun. You can also have your grendier and or heavy weapons which in some cases dont fit in situations well so essentially they would be a wasted spot not much of a problem if you are allowed to have a dozen men but gets to be a problem when you only have 7 slots open.

Something New that should be added.

1. Being able to store extra ammo and or weapons on the helicopter or transport. Going from mission to mission with some weapons very easy to run out of ammo quick. This isnt just relugated to just weapons and ammo but grenades and medi-paks would be helpful too and conceiveably be there but more of a convenience to the player as opposed to realism.

2. Being able to hover over a mission site until day break. Sometimes certain missions are really just too dangerous to be going out at night and fighting in the day is a tremendous difference especially to the sniper types.

3. Withholding injured men from a mission and having them stay on the helicopter. Sometimes when the mission starts the aliens are right there from the get go. If you have injured men you would prefer not fight in the mission why not just stay in the helicopter in safety instead of risking his neck for nothing?

4. Add troop deployment in base missions or at least one centralized place. If indeed there is in base troop transport then it would be conceiveable that when they transport they all transport to a singular centralized location and not scattered throughout the base.

Well thats about it for now. If there is more there wont be too much more. I hope these ideas and suggestions are being looked at otherwise they would be a waste of time. Well wish you all luck.

[gb0]

[General.DOT]

to gb0:

So. I agree with the pulling gunclip thing.. And also the usage of robots, and even the firing from chinook.. If I remember that part correctly...

BUT I do not agree with your statement: ''I guess having a control on the numbers is GOOD the people here have no idea if end up commanding an army there's going to be a VERY Messy Battalion instead of a Squad''

I'm sorry, but learn from the greatests! For example GROUND CONTROL 1. Player selected the desired number of units, held down CTRL and pushed a number button, for example ''1''. (And released CTRL) And thus the player assigned those units to the keyboard button ''1''.

Complicated, huh?

And with the maintained formations your soldiers will never be confused. Which I have already discussed in the ''Angry'' topic.

It ought to be ORDER, like on the real battlefield. And you get the battle won.


EDITED BY MODERATOR

[General.DOT]

Stobor!

You are absolutely right man!

You should write 30 instead of 15... But still youre right!

[General.DOT]

Sanjiyanukara

You write about map exploration and lighting... Hey. It surely was an interesting thing. But a god-forsaken nightvision-google cannot be the option??? This is ridiculous. Advanced technology, and such.. blabla.. And not a single NW google in any of the games. In AFTERMATH I think It WAS, because the terrain was bright also at nighttime, and they explained this with the soldiers's built-in-helm nightvision system.

Following the parts's starting sentences which I agree with:

''3. This is one thing that gets over looked a lot even by other games of this type but knowing who sees what is important.''......
Hm.. Yeah.. Maybe it made the players work easier.

''4. Unlimited Expendable Men. ''...... Yeah!

''5. Crouching should improve aim...''...... YEAH!

''6. NPC's that are not just the enemies.''..... YEAH, YEAH!

''1. War Machines and or scout probes. ''.... Agreed.

''6. Already stated but you should be able to manufacture any kind of ammo that is manmade''........ HELL YEAH!!!!

''7. Driveable vehicles like a tank, jeep, or armored car.''
VERY good idea.

[eukatae]

Realistic implementation of weapons and armor would be swell; I think I said this about aftermath too but... 1911s and MOOSE are a must have! Floppy hats would be nice too.

Again I offer my aid in this department, as was discussed on the old forums.

[Pendragon]

If everything Sanji said was implemented, it would be a great game indeed. Oddly, they are nothing new in the genre so theres no real excuse not to include these features. Number one on his list was the 'map exploration and lightning', also very important for me. General dot brings up the night vision angle. Yes, it would be realistic to have night vision, but remember, there are alot of elements in games which surrender realism for the sake of game play. Does having night vision and ability to see so easily enhance game play in any way? No, it doesnt, though it may make coding easier. The game would be alot more fun to play with darkness and flares in it. If you must have night vision, you could also have thermal sights and see through smoke, or get blinded by the bright lights of the alien laser guns. But the question is not what is most realistic, but what is plausible and what is more fun.

Three things on Sanjis list I could do without however, base teleportation, just silly .

Also the number of men. This is a RPG squad level game, with too many men, the soldiers loose their identities and it becomes a strategy game, as general dot mentions, like Ground Control. I'd prefer to stick to the platoon/squad size and know each of my soldiers rather than them be anonymous cannon fodder rookies. There is ofcourse something to be said about 'loosing' battles and soldiers as being part of the game. Sure, and its common in strategy games, but shouldnt be any where near that level in tactical games. Whats far more important is comming close to losing, such as having most of your guys knocked out, but carried back to the drop ship and recuperate in hospital for a few days before comming back later. The mission is a loss in that respect, but it doesn't have to be total and is alot more challenging.

Driving in a tank or APC. Vehicles are distracting from a tactical point of view, and the game moves towards armored warfare. If we have vehicles, then the aliens get 'em too, and suddenly were playing tank commander instead. I did appreciate the little under water tracked rover in terror from the deep though, but it was very limited. Wish it could carry my wounded though. As part of the militaries 'future' force, they are developing a platoon level robot 'mule'. It follows the squad around, carrying equipment and recharging energy packs. This would be handy .

[gb0]

to gb0:

So. I agree with the pulling gunclip thing.. And also the usage of robots, and even the firing from chinook.. If I remember that part correctly... 

BUT I do not agree with your statement: ''I guess having a control on the numbers is GOOD the people here have no idea if end up commanding an army there's going to be a VERY Messy Battalion instead of a Squad''

I'm sorry, but learn from the greatests! For example GROUND CONTROL 1. Player selected the desired number of units, held down CTRL and pushed a number button, for example ''1''. (And released CTRL) And thus the player assigned those units to the keyboard button ''1''.

Complicated, huh?

And with the maintained formations your soldiers will never be confused. Which I have already discussed in the ''Angry'' topic.

It ought to be ORDER, like on the real battlefield. And you get the battle won.

EDITED BY MODERATOR

Sorry I wasn't able to read your original post. i wonder why it didn't send an e-mail notice to me untill now? Like the PD said:

Also the number of men. This is a RPG squad level game, with too many men, the soldiers loose their identities and it becomes a strategy game, as general dot mentions, like Ground Control. I'd prefer to stick to the platoon/squad size and know each of my soldiers rather than them be anonymous cannon fodder rookies. There is ofcourse something to be said about 'loosing' battles and soldiers as being part of the game. Sure, and its common in strategy games, but shouldnt be any where near that level in tactical games. Whats far more important is comming close to losing, such as having most of your guys knocked out, but carried back to the drop ship and recuperate in hospital for a few days before comming back later. The mission is a loss in that respect, but it doesn't have to be total and is alot more challenging.

Driving in a tank or APC. Vehicles are distracting from a tactical point of view, and the game moves towards armored warfare. If we have vehicles, then the aliens get 'em too, and suddenly were playing tank commander instead. I did appreciate the little under water tracked rover in terror from the deep though, but it was very limited. Wish it could carry my wounded though. As part of the militaries 'future' force, they are developing a platoon level robot 'mule'. It follows the squad around, carrying equipment and recharging energy packs. This would be handy .

Your turning this to a Red Alert and Starcraft. i suggest to stick to your GroundControl. (this is a diffrent game) or better yet create a MOD for youself!

And I'm already have a hard time keeping track of 7 when they are going lone wolf and surrounding some transgenants and having multiple encounters. i have keep switching from one soldier to the other.

[gb0]

http://forum.ufo-aftermath.com/index.php?s...st=0&#entry4435

[gb0]

http://forum.ufo-aftermath.com/index.php?showtopic=140&st=94
updated