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[Vanguard]

To be fair, about that brownish/greyish palette, it seems from the interview that they're consciously trying to avoid that and go for a more stylized aesthetic (Norman Rockwell and Team Fortress 2 gets mentioned).

If they're trying to avoid a brown palette, they're doing a really bad job.

[Inane]

Fuckers, making sunsets red and yellow!

[ToothyMang]

I recently did some beta testing for 2K Marin, and I was hoping SOOO BAD that I was going to be playing X-COM. But nope, wasn't that lucky

[Vanguard]

making sunsets red and yellow!

And people.  And their clothes.  And the cars.  And the buildings, both inside and out.  Seriously, watch the trailer.  If they didn't want to use an all-brown palette, they shouldn't have set it in the land of the eternal sunset.

Yeah it's not 100% brown and gray with nothing else like gears of war, but it's not nearly as colorful as real life is.  Look at the original X-Com, it had a lot more color than this, and its atmosphere wasn't harmed by it.

[allen]

you're right to an extent, but you have to admit it looks less brown than fallout 3 or gears of war.

[MisterX]

You can't judge a whole game's look based on a 2-minute-trailer that showcases part of a single level, with an ingame time progression of maybe 15 minutes. Maybe the whole game will be brownish, but you can't in any way know it based on only that.

[Dragonmaw]

I believe you are saying that it doesn't look washed out.

The colors in those screenshots (when in focus) are not washed out. You have reds and blues and yellows and browns and oranges and what have you.

This is a direct contrast to, say, Gears of War, which has a very washed-out color palette.

[Gnarf]

Yeah it's not 100% brown and gray with nothing else like gears of war, but it's not nearly as colorful as real life is.  Look at the original X-Com, it had a lot more color than this, and its atmosphere wasn't harmed by it.

YES TOTALLY THIS GAME IS 21% TOO BROWN

[dEnamed]

Are you guys serious? First Diablo 3 gets flak for having too many colors, now the next X-Com game gets shot upon for not having too many of them. Maybe they'll go Arcania on its ass and provide an option to have a "shiny bling bling" version and a "bleached out emo" version. :O

[allen]

http://kotaku.com/5564696/xcom-screens-are-dripping-with-goo/gallery/

Looks colourful to me, not washed out at all. Here's hoping, at least.

[Eric McQuiggan]

Are you guys serious? First Diablo 3 gets flak for having too many colors, now the next X-Com game gets shot upon for not having too many of them. Maybe they'll go Arcania on its ass and provide an option to have a "shiny bling bling" version and a "bleached out emo" version. :O

Yes, because we want a consistent art style throughout all games.

Seriously though, The X-com games were vibrant, having a non vibrant sequel seems to fly in the face. Inversely Diablo 1 and 2 had very muted tones, having a vibrant forest scene again, seems to be the opposite.

Marine tan works for some games, just not all of them. I worry more about X-Com turning Rockwellian 1950's, but I love that style, so I'm all kinds of conflicted about it.

[jwk5]

It could turn out to be a good FPS, but it probably won't turn out to be a good X-Com game. The setting isn't really what makes X-Com what it is, because that setting is generic and has already been done to death, it is the game play that really defines X-Com. Why they would take the one part of the series that the majority of people enjoy most and throw it out?

That seems to be a common trend with these "remakes" and it makes absolutely no sense. Granted, there are instances where it sometimes works (for example, Fallout 3 worked out OK because the setting is pretty rich and defined in the Fallout games so it transfered well even when stuck on an Oblivion template) but in most cases it just doesn't work out well at all.

[Türbo Bröther]

Yeah it's not 100% brown and gray with nothing else like gears of war, but it's not nearly as colorful as real life is.  Look at the original X-Com, it had a lot more color than this, and its atmosphere wasn't harmed by it.

YES TOTALLY THIS GAME IS 21% TOO BROWN

And 100% less Image Comics thievery on top of that.

[Vanguard]

It could turn out to be a good FPS, but it probably won't turn out to be a good X-Com game. The setting isn't really what makes X-Com what it is, because that setting is generic and has already been done to death, it is the game play that really defines X-Com. Why they would take the one part of the series that the majority of people enjoy most and throw it out?

This is pretty much dead on.  It may or may not end up being a good game, but even if it does turn out well it'll be for totally different reasons than why people liked X-Com.

For example, there's no way the developers are going to have the guts to put the player through having their teammate zombified chryssalid-style or mind-controlled so the player has to kill them or die.

If they did do something like that it'd probably be a scripted boss battle after a cutscene shows it happening or something lame like that.

[Gainsworthy]

For example, there's no way the developers are going to have the guts to put the player through having their teammate zombified chryssalid-style or mind-controlled so the player has to kill them or die.

Not only is this ridiculous conjecture, but it's inaccurate ridiculous conjecture. Games do do this, even now. Named characters are gleefully done away with, grunts are often cannon fodder for... well, anything needing to prove a point. Stuff like that would be marketed as a feature - "meaningful realtime battlefield decisions" or something like that  . The mainstream industry makes some sloppy choices, but they're not all bad.

Besides, the existence of game is not denying anyone a True Sequel to X-COM. Judging by the amount of displeasure expressed toward the half-dozen odd sequels, history has done that just fine. At this stage, it's FPS XCOM (which will get people talking simply due to its name) or no X-COM at all.


As the self appointed XCOM cheersquad, I think it could still keep a whole lot of X-COM flavour.