/xcg/ - XCOM General

I'll still burn you alive in a pile of tires. All collaborators must fucking hang.

So what tis shit like shadow of mordor now

>> Well the Alien Hunters are apparently noncanon anyways. According to Jake Himself.

Also... Was XCOM 1 an alternate reality where they won? Which is Canon?

remove snek fuckers

Never used 1 grenade in my commander play through respect me faggots

Anyone else love the new music so far in WOTC? I especially love what seems to be the Chosen's theme, given it suddenly takes over the normal combat music for the mission in Lost & Abandoned. It feels sinister and powerful, unlike the main game's OST which is half generic heroic music and half wubwubwubwubwubKssssHHHHwubwububwub

Shadow of Mordor was a great game.

Everything is canon in the multiverse. I just want Vahlen back gdi.

Well the Alien Hunters are apparently noncanon anyways. According to Jake Himself.

I bet you used bombs to avoid the technicality didn't you faggot

Both, alternate universes apparently.

Although all this is based one a single tweet where somebody said he was told that the Volunteer in XCOM 1 is still alive.

Got a sauce on Big J saying Alien Hunters is non-canon? Seems unlikely to me as it confirms things about Vahlen, just like SLG does for Shen.

>XCOM 1
XCOM:EU was just a simulation, pay attention to what flashes on the screen during the scene where Tygan explains what the Aliens were doing with the commander for 20 years.

→
fuck I fucked that up. I was trying to do this

Don't you start this again

no i mean with te traits n shit

Something literally in the game vs. Age-old tweet from before the game was even released. Pretty sure I'm right.

Jake confirmed that was the inspiration, and it's a welcome one. Chosen would be jokes without the element of chaos in their progression.

Pretty sure you're an idiot

Rich Evans voicepack when?

I don't necessarily disagree user, and I don't think that XCOM 3 is going to be a follow up to 1 (since they're using 2 to set up a new enemy etc), but people get real touchy about thinking that their victories in XCOM:EU are non-canon simulations that helped the Ethereals kick the resistance's ass.

It's not from a tweet, it's from an interview concerning X2 with Jake.
I'll lay it out one more time in case you honestly haven't seen this before.

XCOM 1 is canon
But in XCOM 2, XCOM 1 isn't canon and is mostly a simulation.
Because they are alternate universes
But both are canon in their own universe.

>Solomon: Yeah, I view it as – you can already hear the designer bullshit coming out in my voice, but – this is the way I view it, and I think it’s fair, when we were talking about this idea we were like,"You know, the setting for XCOM 2 is actually going to be if XCOM lost the first game." And I think a lot of people had this reaction of, "Wait a minute, I just invested all this time and I beat XCOM." To me it feels like every time you start a new game of XCOM, you’re kind of spinning off an alternate universe – and so, in the worlds where you beat XCOM, there just never was an XCOM 2, you know? This is just in case somebody actually lost a game of XCOM, which has happened, and this is a chance to go to that world and try it out.

usgamer.net/articles/interview-the-death-of-interceptors-iron-man-mode-and-xcom-2s-next-step

Nice job not offering any retort to explain why I'm wrong, despite EU literally being in the game. :y

Jake has also said all your victories still count, they just wanted to explore a new angle of xcom.

IGN saying ironmeme impossible is canon is not evidence of the contrary.

He laughs everytime he gets a critical hit
youtube.com/watch?v=yTEdf5VS3EA

>Supposedly significant bug fixes and performance fixes
What are the chances they release a non-buggy product at launch considering their previous track record?

They took trailer clips and put them in a five second clip. Never mentioned again.

It's completely meaningless.

Yeah, but chronologically and going forward, XCOM:EU is non-canon, its victory is only canon for that game itself, as the XCOM game timeline advances, that victory is non-canon, because XCOM 2 is pushing the story forward.

Jake's comments were basically (very expertly) set up to stop people raging about the fact that XCOM 2 assumes that XCOM lost the war.

50% to hit. I'm more concerned if they can Fix LOS bugs (See through walls, broken cover.)
Minor stuff can easily be patched.

Certainly possible. We might see a sequel to EU/EW yet.

35%

hopefully they've had enough time with the engine now that it sin't a complete shitshow

I wish we get to see what a botched cover mission looks like, Jake said it's just gonna be 2 soldiers sneaking past lost and ADVENT with just pistols.

Well the dlc was pretty bug free right?

Patience user

>Enemy Within
>Suddenly you have Gene-Modified soldiers and MECs
>Fighting against a bunch of humans who do covert ops against you and field basically the same tactics as XCOM

It's a retcon, doesn't change it's what's implied by the game, especially with the Ethereal mocking you by saying "defeat them as you did before" in the final mission.

>Solomon: Yeah, I view it as – you can already hear the designer bullshit coming out in my voice, but – this is the way I view it, and I think it’s fair, when we were talking about this idea we were like,"You know, the setting for XCOM 2 is actually going to be if XCOM lost the first game." And I think a lot of people had this reaction of, "Wait a minute, I just invested all this time and I beat XCOM." To me it feels like every time you start a new game of XCOM, you’re kind of spinning off an alternate universe – and so, in the worlds where you beat XCOM, there just never was an XCOM 2, you know? This is just in case somebody actually lost a game of XCOM, which has happened, and this is a chance to go to that world and try it out.
Seems like a bandaid to stop people from being upset.

>What the devs said doesn't mean what they said
Don't be a faggot user. What the devs say is canon, is canon.

Not likely, they're definitely pushing the "Incoming 2nd enemy that terrifies the Elders" angle even harder with WotC (Watch the cutscene with the Chosen getting their orders in ChristopherOdd's video) and have a more interesting set up going forward in 2, especially now that we have hybrids fighting with humanity etc, which is starting mirror the story progression of the original x-com games, with the hybrids in Apoc etc.

It's hard to be patient when they're drip feeding all these great vids.

Am I the only one who wants to not kill any of the chosen so in the Water World level you not only fight 3 avatars but also the 3 (Max level) Chosen.

>Am I the only one who wants to not kill any of the chosen so in the Water World level you not only fight 3 avatars but also the 3 (Max level) Chosen.
No that could be pretty fun. The last level is already insanity.

I think it was? I don't remember

I guess I figure there's a much higher chance of bugs given the overhaul nature of this expansion

iktf bro

This. They're not going to drop the XCOM2 universe, especially as they have no reason to - they even have a terror from the deep tease (which is followed up in the cutscene you mentioned, we see a dark psionic power coursing through the earth's crust).

Except Jake and the team literally said that xcom 1 was not a simulation.

It was on a stream some time ago. I think someone brought up that Xcom was killed off early so why did the downed Skyranger in Alien Hunters have laser weapons.

Jake was pretty much like "lol Alien Hunters is not canon"

It's not worth arguing over, we'll just have to agree to disagree

The metric is simple:
>EU/EQ: No sequel tease.
>XCOM2: Two sequel teases, with the WOTC chosen cutscene..

XCOM2 is the main universe from here on out, boys.

Watching the lost and abandoned vid already got me pumped for the lost (small areas with huge swarms holy) so after seeing what the lost can do, i can already see covert missions will be 20 times the insanity, would also be fucked up if the Chosen can spawn during the botched Covert mission.

>defeat them as you did before
That was 100% Asaru the ethereal talking

No fuck that faggot.
>Here's proof that shows what you are saying is false
>hurr I don't feel like it's real evidence because of my own personal interpretation

Perfect voice for an assault specced for crits.

>would also be fucked up if the Chosen can spawn during the botched Covert mission.
rip operatives

What if in XCOM 3, the greater threat is multiversal and threatening both universes?

>>EU/EQ: No sequel tease.
Part of that was definitely lack of certainty of a sequel period.

I mean we don't want a HL2EP2 or beyond good and evil type situation here.

Aren't all the weapons you loot from the downed skyranger alien though? I got the impression they were supposed to be the 'native' equipment of the Vipers, hence why the young ones use boltcasters etc.

I suspect specific details of AH might be non-canon, but given it concerns Vahlen, I'm guessing the "She got up to dumb mad science" is canon.

>Asaru
Does Asaru have the greebly XCOM;EU voice in the Bureau? I never actually played it because I hate the concept of a shooter XCOM game and the entire metafiction angle seems pretentious, but I'm just asking since that mysterious voice sounded a lot like the Uber Ethereal from EU, I would expect with Asaru's graceful design he'd have less of an ugly voice, but once again I haven't played the game so please inform me!

XCOM 3: Apocalypse from the Deep when?

Haven't played Bureau in years but iirc Asaru has a smoother voice compared to the other Ethereal, he is also much younger (thousands of years younger) and in the end of the game his essence just vanishes from the host you pick.

I personally see the Bureau as "broad strokes" canon, I believe that the commander is an Ethereal but I doubt that it's specifically a male one, since they outright cut lines from the Commander in XCOM2 so that the player, no matter their gender, could project onto them. Alternatively maybe unlike in the Bureau, the Commander and Asaru are actively communicating with each other from beyond the scenes instead of Asaru mostly controlling them.

Well not according to Jake Soloman. He would have answered it like that then.

Bureau is awful, but it does explain alot about the xcom universe. Asaru actually literally is the manifestation of the player. You start playing one character the entire game then when asaru leaves that one character and manifests another character and... whelp you play as that character he manifests. It is pretty on the nose. The commander is literally bonded with Asaru and that is why he is tactically capable of leading such a group.

I mean... the Elders are basically screaming at the Commander to join them and the death of them means that they are the death of everyone. The Elders know he is an Ethereal.

Well, we don't actually know if psychic space ghosts (which the Ethereals in The Bureau, which seem to be some kind of ascended form of them since Asaru had no physical form but that which he inhabited) actually have a gender/sex, so Asaru could still be a self-insert.

Whether the Commandy-One is host to an Ethereal is up for debate, but I'm also pretty convinced that they are too.

>Well, we don't actually know if psychic space ghosts (which the Ethereals in The Bureau, which seem to be some kind of ascended form of them since Asaru had no physical form but that which he inhabited) actually have a gender/sex
This is true, especially since Angelis seems to have both a female and a male voice. Odds are weird psychic space gods are just odd in general.

Don't forget that the Avatars seem to be designed to be androgynous. It's very unlikely the Elders fit into puny human gender dynamics, especially with their body-hopping tendencies.

>Avatars seem to be designed to be androgynous
Are they though? I haven't seen any evidence of this, and ADVENT hybrids have genders.

They're pretty thin, but don't have breasts or thighs. I think they're smaller than male soldiers.

Space ghosts/ethereals are basically the evolution of Elders that you fight in Xcom. They can live without form and I suspect that they are the elder's masters that they keep going on about. Except they cannot do what ethereals do to live forever so they basically are invading planet to planet to find a host to replace their dying one.

>They're pretty thin, but don't have breasts or thighs. I think they're smaller than male soldiers.
This. They don't share a body model with male or female humans or ADVENT troopers. They look very much like they're designed to be genderless, which would make sense from a practical perspective, as they serve no function other than being fresh hosts for the Elders.

Yeah. It wouldn't surprise me of the Ethereals that are leading the invasion in XCOM2 aren't actually dying - they're evolving to a bodiless, non-corporeal state that some members of their species have already achieved, but for some reason are desperately trying to retain their physical forms for whatever reason.

Yeah, especially since the Ethereals have made it pretty clear they don't NEED dual sexes on their forces, only using it when it offers drastically varying abilities (Male Mutons being smaller while females being fuckhueg), as evidenced by how they continue to produce vipers despite having eliminated their males.

Odds are there's only gender variance in ADVENT troops to keep up the ruse they're normal people to the public.

>they're evolving to a bodiless, non-corporeal state that some members of their species have already achieved, but for some reason are desperately trying to retain their physical forms for whatever reason.
Nah, they specifically state that they failed to ascend unlike the other ethereals. That's why the are desperate.

>Nah, they specifically state that they failed to ascend unlike the other ethereals. That's why the are desperate.

That explains a whole lot. Where was this explained?

They confirm that they have space AIDs at one point in the final mission, I'm pretty sure, and that they need the fresh hosts of the Avatars to survive.

Also, doesn't it get confirmed in The Bureau around the time of the Asaru reveal that when he bonded with Carter it was to save both their lives? Asaru needed a host and bonding with Carter saved him from death.

Suggests to me that Ethereals need a host or to be contained/manifested in some way to survive long-term. (The one who was powering Mosaic or whatever it was called was contained/manifested in machinery designed to contain it)

Xcom 1 was the original war that started the events of 2 in 2 we know the humans lost in the war against the aliens / xcom failed , it's also implied why would the aliens give a fuck about the commander if X1 was just a simulation since all the commander would be to them is another human and not the person who almost kicked their ass , further more why even keep the commander since his tactics clearly failed in the first one.

You telling me that the entire story of xcom is basically one alien race fighting eachother by using other races like chess pieces?

The uber ethereal on the temple ship

Probably not. Whatever the Ethereals are afraid of, it's fucking HUGE. The new cutscene in WOTC shows the psionic energy it emanates or (IS) is large enough to course through the earth's fucking crust, practically dying the entire thing purple.

Here, found the direct quote:
>Behold the greatest failure… of the Ethereal Ones… We who failed to ascend as they thought we would.
We who were cast out. We who were doomed to feed on the Gift of lesser beings… as we sought to uplift them… to prepare them… for what lies ahead.

Basically, yes, you've got the Ethereals, who are themselves divided, and something that terrifies the shit out of the Ethereals, and humanity has gotten caught in the middle.

Ethereal M.O. is to take over and control other races to diversify their forces against the things that threaten them, whilst searching for a race with the potential to serve as new physical hosts for them.

I thought that was them accidently poisoning earth's ocean thus setting up enemy from the deep.

They do though. Go load up the XCOM dev tools. Avatars have about the same gender differences ADVENT soldiers do. They look most similar to landers.

I thought this was the case. Can you post the different models?

*Who are themselves divided between the ascended and those who failed to

ChristopherOdd's video has a cutscene in War of the Chosen where an Ethereal gives the Chosen their orders, that clip is shown again in the same breath as the Ethereal talks about their great enemy.

I really hope they go in this direction, Earth just being a strategic position caught in the middle of a war way bigger / older / weirder than we can get is dope and barely gets used (I mean, where else do we have it, I can only think of the Kree-Skrull War from the top of my head)

Guys, what if the reason that the Warlock goes insane and starts thinking of himself as a god higher than the Elders and the only one who knows the true power of psionics despite boasting how loyal he is in his trailer is because he's being corrupted by whatever psionic force the Ethereals are afraid of.

Oh, weird! I've been given false info, then. Despite this, I think it's pretty sound to think that the Ethereals don't follow exact human gender dynamics, given they're a race that makes a habit of body-hopping and going by their concept art from EU don't even have any ORIFICES, let alone genitals.

Joey mod when?

Shit guys, the price of WOTC is rather steeping.

If you don't want to go grey-market, get it from GreenManGaming, there is a code in the previous thread which nets you even more money off.

Takes the sting out of the price a bit.

I mostly agree, but they do make a point of having male and female voices for the ethereals for some reason. Surely they had gender at one point of time, perhaps before they started stuff like cloning themselves to cheat death, combined with their over-dependence on psionic energy, eventually leading to bodies that were mere husks. I don't know if they actually cloned themselves, that's just a guess.

Alright, since I figure you don't want to download 45gb of content.

Gender differences in ADVENT are so subtle I didn't even realize they had different genders until 100 hours in.

That avatar is thicc

Thanks user
Could you do me one more favor and post the stuff that proves they don't have faces?

The way I see it, the alien army's makeup when it comes to gender and sex is basically:

Sectoids - Clone species, either genderless or only one gender.

Mutons, and by extension Floaters/Archons - Male and female, females are more aggressive and large, possibly augmented by Ethereal race-engineering.

Chryssalids - Presumably have a model close to real life eusocial animals, with female drones and a queen. Due to how they parasitize other species with eggs, it's doubtful they have male specimens, though perhaps in their original, low-tier insect forms they had male drones like real ants.

Vipers/Thin Men - All female, used to have males, but explosive breeding and male viper dominance made it unappealign for the Elders, who neutralized the male Viper.

Cyberdiscs - As silicon-based life, it's hard to tell.

Gatekeepers - Presumably genderless, as they are just big ol genetically engineered fuck balls.

Outsiders - Presumably genderless constructs.

Codices - Female for whatever reason. Maybe it has to do with the Ethereal leader in XCOM2 presenting as female?

Faceless - Genderless blob things, probably.

Ethereals - May have had gender in the past, but their decayed bodies clearly have non nowadays.

I wish they used the female archon model more as well

Codex Brain appears to be based off of a human one, so that might have something to do with their 'physical' appearance.

Also Advent - Have both genders, likely so as to not cause the human populace to wonder why a "volunteer" defence force that "recruits" both genders is mono-gendered.

Wait, what?

>Sectoids
They didn't have gender in x-com (ufo defense), so that confirms it for me.