Canageek
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CanageekParticipantProbably WASD + Mouse to be honest, scroll to zoom, and simply the options a lot.
I’m expected to use the Insert/Page Up/Page Down/Delete cluster for jumpjets? No. Just stop. That is nuts.
CanageekParticipantThanks. Would work if I had a joystick, but it seems to really want you to have a hand on the keyboard (it turns out my girlfriend played a LOT of Mechwarrior 2 when she was younger and says that is pretty essential, so a controller probably wouldn’t work very well)
CanageekParticipantThe only other Mechwarrior game I’ve played was in an arcade, where you sat in an actual cockpit, so I didn’t know most of them focused on the Inner sphere, my apologies. I’ve mostly read the lore and books when I could get my hands on them.
CanageekParticipantMost of lore I’ve read was set before the clan invasion. The invasion always felt to me like “welp, we got board with the setting we made, so lets knock things around a bunch and see what happens”
CanageekParticipantMarch 20, 2022 at 9:41 pm in reply to: How to play Mechwarrior 2 + information resources on the game #5876Can someone post the doxbox.conf they get out of that tool? For reasons, I wrote my own file, which works, but might not be optimal.
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CanageekParticipantWell, given that it turns out I don’t like Quake, I’d be up to try a new FPS.
CanageekParticipantI mean, either of those would be good choices. I’ve played a lot of Nethack v3.4.3, though the nethackw.exe version for the most part. But I’m sure you could ask some experts to come on; you could ask the Roguelike Radio people to mention the podcast for either one, to get more people playing along.
CanageekParticipantI actually know the person who first hexedited the ZZT executable to allow the use of more colours. (She is mentioned in the DavidXNewton video on the topic. Could ask her if she wants to comment on what ZZT was like back in the day if we ever do this.
CanageekParticipantI picked this up on GoG a few years ago, enjoyed the first few missions and then failed at the later ones due to the UI. Would love another crack at it with the forums to help me out ^^
CanageekParticipantI would totally be willing to come on the podcast for this one. I only ever got anywhere beyond the first few levels with cheatcodes though. >.>
CanageekParticipantOh, I forgot to note that I played it with THAT SPECIFIC joystick! I think we got it at a garage sale?
CanageekParticipantWoof, that one is a BIT heavy for DGC, isn’t it? I mean, that is very much a messed up game. (Second most of any DOS game I can think of, behind only Harvester)
CanageekParticipantOK, first: I forgot in games this old you had to manually save, so I needed to use cheat codes to get back to the level I was on.
Then, knowing that the lightning yeti was highly explosion resistant, I used the super-nailgun and beat it pretty easily.
The next level is switch hunting in a maze of traps. Nopenope nopenope.
Ok, once again it is reminding be of Oblivion, but each encounter isn’t interesting, and I already have most of the weapons, so I don’t actually see any reason to keep playing unless it is about to get a lot cooler.
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CanageekParticipant“Quake’s weapons felt lacking in comparison”: 100% agree, though I think it is largely the mobs being bullet sponges. The nailguns feel pretty sweet to use, until you fire and fire and fire just to do anything.
I haven’t gotten far enough to comment on the mobs, but even as far as I got in (First lightning yeti) I agree on the design: Really lovely, but damn repetitive already. Something about that colour palette just makes it feel really repretative right off the bat.
CanageekParticipantThe game devs did a stream a few years ago, in which they encouraged people to use mouselook if they want to play it.
CanageekParticipant+1 Gizmos and Gadgets, I’d love to be on that show, I played a TON of it as a kid.
One of the easy adventures like Fatty Bear’s Birthday Surprise would be great- I played the HECK out of that as a kid.
CanageekParticipantWell, not the exact right thread, but I’m finding there are lots of aliens that never leave. Or do they come out after 20 turns when the map is revealed to them?
CanageekParticipantFair point. I did some testing and there is a noticeable accuracy dropoff. The issue isn’t hitting the target two tiles left of where I aimed, it is hitting the wall or a tree fifteen plus tiles away and doing nothing or knocking my own people out.
CanageekParticipantThanks. My big issue was in X-COM you can use sensible tactics like sweeping the map slowly, with cleared areas entrances being watched so aliens don’t move back into them.
The other thing I learned about X-COM (2016) vs X-COM (199X) is that in the old ones all aliens on the map are active, if you can see them or not. So in some maps (Terror missions) it makes sense to move around and rush as civilians are getting killed and turned into aliens. However, in the modern one, encounters don’t activate until you see them, so you should keep your forces bunched up, so you only see one encounter at a time.
CanageekParticipantI recall playing the demo of Terror from the Deep. What I recall was you’d finish a mission on the docks then spend ages trying to find the FINAL alien that was stuck in a 1×1 room somewhere. Also if you even leave ONE alien alive, you lose the mission.
CanageekParticipantOh, UFO:AI also has a much more sensible ship design, where troops leave it from either side, like a military helicopter, instead of by a ramp at the back. However, a big issue I have is that its got some very complex maps (which is good), but you get less people then in X-COM (I want to say eight or ten) instead of 14, so it is harder to actually cover your back and have a team cover unexplored areas and whatnot.
They did a cool thing with overwatch though. I never could figure out exactly how it worked in X-COM, but in UFO:AI you save a set number of TUs based on the type of fire you want to do. Then if an alien is in your field of vision for more then that number of TUs (eight for snap shot, for example), your troop takes that type of shot.
CanageekParticipantI helped kickstart Xenonauts so actually have a copy, though I’ve never played it. I kept saying I’d finish X-COM first….
CanageekParticipantI was actually introduced to X-COM by UFO: Alien Invasion. I would have been playing it in high school, I think. The graphics at the time where a lot better, as was the UI. Plus: Free, and I didn’t have a lot of money in high school, and GoG and Steam were not around yet. That said, in 2005 or so, the graphics where not bad. They have aged poorly in the last decade though, as 3D models do, while the X-COM graphics are still charming 2D work.
The biggest flaw is that you can’t do damage to buildings or UFOs. Also now that OpenXCom has fixed up the UI, I’m noticing some rough spots.
On the plus side, they got someone who is pretty good at writing to do the UFOpedia entries, and those are quite nice. They give much more of sense of weight and background as to why you are the only ones responding, why you don’t have a network of bases and whatnot.
It also cleans up some stuff like having to assign research through each base, instead making research assignments a global issue.
CanageekParticipantThere is an option in OpenXCom to change that. It is taken from a mod for the DOS version, as are a lot of the options.
CanageekParticipantI have it, and couldn’t figure out what to do in it very well. I should give it a try in Sept with a guide of some sort.
CanageekParticipantI’m a scientist in real life and I make…less then that. A lot less. Not counting for inflation or US/CAD dollar conversion.
CanageekParticipantOh yeah, the mod is good, I might turn it on. Also a note: If you like destruction, you can hold control to override the no line of sight error, and just blast away at an alien inside a house on full auto. 😀
That strategy came from experience: They mind controlled someone who had already panicked and dropped their weapons and it made them a LOT less dangerous. After that, I kept them on stun launcher duty, so if they got taken over they would usually just knock people out.
CanageekParticipantI figured you where the most elite, best weapons, troops. I might be being biased by UFO: Alien Invasion though (Open Source spiritual sequel) which I played first and read the UFOPeadia very heavily.
CanageekParticipantYeah, grenades will make you NOT want to use that formation pretty quickly. Small launchers and Blaster Launchers will make you REALLY REALLY not want to use that formation.
CanageekParticipantActually, then they move on. The best defence is to have the troops with the weakest anti-alien defence drop their weapons and get enemies to use up their psi attacks on them.
CanageekParticipantWindows has a built in screenshot tool you could use quite easily for this purpose. https://www.howtogeek.com/226280/how-to-take-screenshots-in-windows-10/
CanageekParticipantThere is a mod that adds armed civilans. I didn’t think it made much sense, since if it was that easy to kill them, why aren’t the world’s normal militaries taking care of it?
CanageekParticipantOh yeah, that is really annoying.
I thought of another one: That civilians don’t run away, hide, or anything else. They just move randomly. Would it be that hard to have a ‘move in a direct line away from the last alien seen, or last gunshot heard?
CanageekParticipantTips: Drop a smoke grenade first turn right outside your plane.
Don’t move first turn: Every alien hasn’t moved yet, and thus can do lots of reaction shots.
CanageekParticipantNice to see someone else from there here! I really need to catch up on it and The Adventure Gamer.
CanageekParticipantI would love to see this game covered. I had a demo of it as a kid. The only time I actually got anywhere was as a Monk, but I so didn’t understand what was actually going on at the time. I hear some of the classes are broken (the one that should get XP for exploring, doesn’t as I understand it), so I’d love to hear a deep dive on it.
CanageekParticipantYes, I would back this or Tie Fighter. There are a lot of version differences though, I think the release you want to play is the one after Tie Fighter came out, as it incorporated a lot of the upgrades. As I recall one video I watched said the first version was almost unplayably hard. I played a ton of this as a kid, though I think I played Tie Fighter more.
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CanageekParticipantI’d favour either of these. I played more Tie Fighter, but they are both great. That said, be careful of the version. I think they re-released x-wing using the tie fighter upgrades, and that made it a much better game. There is an Ancient DOS games video on it, I think, where he talks about the versions.
CanageekParticipantOh and the TU saving buttons? Needed. They did work to make them fit the original interface though.
CanageekParticipantI’ve played a decent amount of the original in DOSBOX and the OpenXCom version. From what I can tell, you are basically playing what X-COM would have become if they’d been told to do an HD remake two years after the original.
That said, I’m not into playing exact copies. I use filters, I use patches, I want the best game possible. I just like a lot of the ideas and concepts of older games.
Features I quite enjoy:
-Easy resolution changes.
-Can swap in music files. I use the MT-32 versions recorded on real hardware (which you could have used with the DOS version if you where very rich) or the UFO: Cydonia’s Fall soundtrack.
Links to the music you can easily swap in. Also includes versions made to sound like a ton of different sound cards. https://openxcom.org/downloads-extras/ (I wish there was a mod to randomly swap between them, as boy does the music get repetitive. Swapping between Soundblaster, Adlib, MT-32, etc would help a little).-Autosaves
-Scroll wheel usage
-It sends craft on the actual shortest route around the globe.
-Fixed a LOT of inventory issue (though I still find the limits on how much you can hold kinda silly. I’ll make a thread about this.)
-I use the explosion height mod (So explosions are round instead of flat. I’ve foozled myself with it a few times)
-SoldierName mod, which I think adds more names from more cultures to show it is a global effort.
-Celebreate Diversity Mod, that might be the one to add more names? Or might be adds more accurate national boundaries to the map and flags to the game?
-BasicArmorPediaUFO: Ads basic armour to the UFOPedia as it was missing
-Improved Handobs: Accurately shows what your troops have in their hands, rather then a generic ‘not gun’
-Extra explosions: Makes lethal explosions look different to those from small launchers.
-I’ve started using Expanded Terror Reworked as I got a bit bored of seeing the same maps all the time.
CanageekParticipantWithout counting compression, graphics size goes up on the square of the resolution. You have a 10×10 image, that is 100 pixels you have to save. You have a 20×20 image that is 400 pixels. Back in the 90s, I had an 800×600 monitor: 480,000 pixels. Today I have a 1920×1200 monitor: 2,304,000 pixels. So every image you make is going to take a LOT more space. Plus, you have to make a lot more of them, as you have to texture every part of a 3D model.
Now, compression technology has gotten a LOT better, which helps. There have also been some amazing work done in generating graphics through algorithms, check out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.kkrieger but so far hard disk space is cheap.
CanageekParticipantOh, can I have someone named after me? I’ve been listening to the podcast for ages, since near the start, but this is the first game I love enough to join the forums for.
CanageekParticipantHey, there is a really useful site for X-COM that covers all the games, from the 90s to today. https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/X-COM is the link to the details on the original.
