given that you apparently disliked xcom EU, why did you expect to like this?
No, I really liked X-Com:EU. I played the shit out of it. Steam records me at 120 hrs, and I know it was longer than that, because there was a bug during much of that time where it wouldn't record your hours correctly if you played in offline mode. Probably more like 200 hrs.
And I was so pleased to have a modern X-Com that I could look past its flaws, although I could still note they were there. I don't think I dislike X-Com 2, I just think maybe it could've been a better game than what we got. Disappointed.
They really needed to go back and examine their AP/cover systems and rework them
why? these systems work fine for what the game tries to do. specifically i don't understand what the problem with the lack of "AP" is, other than it being different from the original x-com. the 1 move + 1 other action system is a common mechanic in tactical skirmish games that usually works well in them. and it works well in xcom. nothing wrong with the cover system (which the entire gameplay dynamic is based around)
These systems do work fine. They're not elegant, and they're simple, but they work pretty satisfactorily.
or the free move aliens get either.
No, this was actually a major problem, because it forced the player to advance through the maps at all times as if they were under surveillance and play extremely cautiously, moving 1/2 speed per round (to sit in Overwatch). Later on you could get around this with a set of snipers with Squadsight and blunder into enemies with your assault units, to then get your snipers to hit them from afar, but the 'free move' is a silly gimmick that was introduced in order to make up for the extreme cover bonuses/penalties.
This problem of crawling through maps was also present in the original X-Com, but it added to the suspense. The aliens didn't get free moves, but you'd stumble into view of one, and then suddenly try to get as many of your guys to shoot at it as possible. Frequently, there was three or four of his buddies backing him out just outside of the fog of war, and if you didn't handle the situation correctly, you'd take losses. Statistically, you had to play the numbers of how many troops to advance and how far, since you had roughly twice (or up to four times) as many units as you do in the reboot - you could play better odds about taking shots and such, even if the troops were less accurate than they are in the reboot. And it was a lot more pleasing to the player, because it felt like if you fucked up, it was your fault. Not you potentially getting screwed over by a quasi-random scurry-move that maybe forces you to overextend or be insufficiently aggressive in response.
Now the scurry-move does work in the reboot EU and 2, but speaking from a design standpoint, it's ultimately frustrating because it removes player agency. The player has to play around it - which is the snail-crawl through the map.
the real problem is that EU doesn't pressure you to do anything at all (outside of timed missions), which is where the slowness comes from.
Kind of? But that's a results-oriented way of looking at the problem, instead of method-oriented. Yes, timed missions force the player to maintain speed, but that doesn't solve the initial problem of why a player would want to move cautiously - it's a gameplay hotfix, not a solution. Evidently, Firaxis agreed, because they introduced the concealment mode to try to help solve the problem and at least make players want to run in and feel safe.
But again, that's not an actual solution, it's a post-problem fix. Going back to their original implementation and reworking it so that this problem didn't appear at all would have been a smarter thing to do - because you can still run into this problem half-way through a mission, when both you and the aliens have lost sight of each other, yet there's more squads of them to take out, so you move slow like a snail on your way through cover until you spot something. It's also bad, I've noticed, on the urban maps with lots of corners, because you can frequently stumble into enemy vision without realizing it until too late.
I was thinking about this a little earlier as I was doing my job tasks, and I realized this is almost exactly what
Terror From The Deeps was to the original X-Com: If you wanted more X-Com, that's what it is. Not any real gameplay improvements, but the game's a little harder(especially in the strategy phase), has a new setting, some new enemies and stuff, but it's pretty much the same game as the first time around. X-Com 2 has the same BS arbitrary choice "which penalty/reward do you want to take?" missions, and so on.
I find I really miss all the troop voice accents that were in EU.
I do like the reworking of the Geoscape so that you're not just spending time, but actually
doing things. Even if it's nonsensical things like spend 7 days to pick up a monthly supply drop.
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