The Incredible Destruction Physics of X-Com: Apocalypse
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- Опубликовано: 8 июн 2024
- Why are all my favourite X-Com memories from Apocalypse? Is it the blend of real-time combat with the notoriously punishing tactical difficulty the series is known for? Or is it just goofing off to play stupid games and ruin people's buildings while they stand by, unable to do anything because the weapons have been edited right out of their hands?
Predictably, it's BOTH.
I explain why my favourite variety of X-Com is real-time, provide a little historical context that turn-based strategy wasn't quite so universally loved as you might think, and naturally dive in to how physics which let you collapse entire buildings work without also collapsing your 486.
Undermined foundations:
0:00 We've been here before
0:45 "Weird" doesn't narrow this down much
1:09 No Internet, just Teletext
1:30 An interesting pronunciation of "start".
2:25 That TV probably didn't support Teletext, did it now.
3:09 Real time and its consequences
4:55 Scaled down geography and scaled up furniture prices
6:38 Keeping up the difficulty
7:20 Time to get the editors out
8:32 Yes, you can see what else I've got installed!
8:49 Elerium Catch League 2084
9:26 Base layout editing
10:00 Unexpected equipment miniaturisation programme
10:44 Overkill
11:32 I finally get to the point
12:24 Fred Action: Space Asshole
13:10 Teardown lives up to its name
13:50 X-Com: Demolition Team
14:45 But how does it work?
17:04 Back to "why I likes it"
17:40 Such a thing as too much destruction
18:20 Shuddering to a conclusion
Games Featured:
X-Com: Apocalypse
X-Com: Terror From The Deep
Red Faction: Guerrilla
Teardown
Digitiser is a trademark of Paul Rose, content used with permission. Teletext images kindly provided from Chris Bell via Super Page 58, ultimately copyright DMG Media Ltd. Moc moc!
Comments are pre-reviewed to avoid spam. I aim to publish all comments, including dissent, but overly pedantic or negative ones may be moderated. Hearing about different experiences and what things were like in other countries adds a lot to the video! Please try to do so in a positive way while remembering that if I had to explain every minor international difference the video would be 2 hours long and boring, rather than 19 minutes long and boring. Failing that, at least make me laugh.
Bonus fact: X-Com Apocalypse was originally intended to have a vastly richer and more complex series of alien dimensions with procedurally generated cityscapes, as opposed to the single fixed dimension which ended up in the game. Once the Organic Factory building is destroyed the aliens will lose all capability to access Mega-Primus, meaning the game can be played indefinitely with no opposition other than any hostile organisations X-Com refuses to repair relations with, or any that became infiltrated earlier in the game. 
Игры
Agent equipped with 2 autocannons with HE, walking down a corridor with full auto.
You can't do that in turn based. Real time was the dream back then.
Shortly followed by the "we are unhappy with the actions of your organisation" screen as they tally up the destruction... :D
To be fair, basically all mainline X-Com games had fully or almost fully destructible environments, at least in battlescape. Interceptor didn't, of course - not much terrain in space.
Apocalypse is my favourite due to its sheer ambition. It does so much!
I think Xcom 1 (and TFTD) had destructible buildings, but no real gravity physics. You could destroy floor-1 completely and floor-2 would not drop down on you.
Apoc was pretty revolutionary.
I played the hell out of Xcom 3 when it released as an older teen/young 20-something. The real-time play, destroyable environment, and overall weirdness were just amazing.
Many years later, my son played the hell out of it, too, despite all sorts of modern games at his fingertips. That's the sign of a truly special game.
I'm happy to hear it stands up for subsequent generations! There is some genuinely great gameplay there too, beyond it being technically impressive at the time it was released.
@@TimberwolfK there's something unique about being rewarded for going into an enemy facility (Cult of Sirius), throwing incendiary bombs everywhere, and causing as much damage as possible to hurt them economically. And slaughter their troops, too. Not many other games have a similar mechanic, and it's fun.
Apoc is unfortunatelly woefuly underappreciated game.
I also remember tunneling through cult "churches" for fun with disrupter firing squads. Every square was basically steel scaffolding supports, so it was ridiculously labor-intensive but I had a real vendetta and OCD to fuel the endeavor lol!
Ah, the Cult, the one organisation where it doesn't matter in the slightest how much you upset them. I used to mod the HE auto cannon ammo to ridiculous strength, then attempt to reduce the entire building to just the grey base tiles before the "all enemy units have died or fled" message popped...
I remember gleefully collapsing that same slum and also realizing what an atrocity that would be IRL
Definitely agree with a lot of this, the switch to a more local setting was a lovely twist compared to the second game which was basically "Okay but what if water?". I think I only ever managed to have one successful game of Apoc, where I actually made some progress, most of my other games failed fairly early on and now you've explained the rubberbanding I can see bloody why!
The early game has a bunch of "guide damn it" moments, particularly that you need to capture several varieties of UFO which the aliens will very quickly stop sending after the first couple of weeks (one of which is also quite hard to take down with the typical fleet of vehicles you'll have early game)
As you say TFTD seemed lame to me. I loved Xcom1 but Xcom2 was not what I dreamed of. It was just a reskin mod of the first game.
What I dreamed of as a teen playing on my Amiga was a more realistic game. Turn based was fun, but not realistic. I wanted all the persons to move together, like in real time. So Apoc was basically the answer to my dreams.
Destroying the map, and entire buildings in particular, was my favorite part of XCOM Apoc. Stressful week? Time to visit corp HQ for some explosive redecoration.
Cult of Sirius are put there to be a stress toy, right?
This is why it is my favorite X-Com. I can't wait for OpenApoc !
It looks like they're making good progress.
Syndicate Wars' destructible environment was no slouch either. And the game was fantastic.
I'm not actually sure I even played any from Terror to 2012. I certainly don't remember pass the parcel, extreme edition.
That's pretty normal, Apoc sold moderately well but it was already a bit niche, and then once they started going properly into the weird era it dropped off a cliff for everyone but people who really loved the series trying to give it a second/third/fourth chance.
I wonder how much influence the streamlined approach of Command & Conquer and Warcraft II had on sales of the more old-fashioned "clicky" games like X-COM, in 1994 when UFO came out "kneel down, get grenade out of inventory, set fuse, choose where to throw it" was more or less just How Games Worked, but after the RTS explosion it must have seemed very slow compared to "click once to attack and let the game figure it out"
I've heard so many good things about the X-Com games over the years but never actually played one. I think all this destruction has finally convinced me 😅
Weirdly this means you might be in a better place to enjoy Apocalypse than most, having no preconceptions about what one should be. (I think that might be another, as-yet unmentioned reason why I enjoyed it; it may have been the first one I played, I definitely remember getting through UFO and TFTD with some heavy cheating and editing, but that might well have been after playing Apoc)
I remember having no clue what to do and kind of hated the graphics. I am going to find a manual and give this game another shot, all the features you mentioned sound truly incredible. I feel bad for setting this game aside for so long thinking it what a bastard version of Xcom.
This is like hearing Adam Curtis describe my favorite game ever.
Ah~ I accidentally got that game. I bought used cd-rom drive and later discovered that last owner forgot one game disc inside it. It was X-COM 3.
Yes, it's fantastic game. Many many hours lost in it.
OMG This brings me back!! I still play Apoc, to this day... BUT back in the day I actually ported the AUTOCANNON from APOC to Rainbow Six... Thru editors.. OMG it was epic!
Maybe I need to give Apocalypse another chance then.
Always when I played it I found the interface and the cityscreen too confusing compared to X-com 1.
Btw. the key to beat turnbased games is to save before starting the next turn.
Save in the middle of a mission? Such dishonour!
(He says, below a video of himself hacking a game to bits so he can "win")
@@TimberwolfK I guess I'll always take dishonorable victory before honorable defeat. 😁
God, some of those old game manuals were beefy. I've still got mine from Baldur's Gate II. Thing was bound with rings.
This is on the tail end of the classic MicroProse Manual, too. The ones they were putting out in the prime of the MPS Labs era (c. '91-'93) were incredible. I still remember the Civilization one which had a ton of world history, a full strategy guide for playing the game and all sorts of other stuff. One of the few PC big box games which needed to be that big for everything to fit in!
[Unrelated to the great video]
If there still is development on the Timberwolf-waypoints for openttd, maybe just porting the visuals of the 16 station-end tiles onto their own waypoints to assign certain trains to certain platforms , while having the realistic beauty of the Newgrf set held in tact
Maybe one day, I'd like to do a bit of a set refresh and bring them all up to date with newer stuff. If there's IDs left I think I'd do something more like draw some stuff that you commonly see just beyond the end of the platform, like when Network Rail leave line maintenance equipment out ready for overnight works.
What a relaxing voice. Great video my friend. I too yearn for more interesting destruction physics in modern games.
It would be great. I think to a certain extent Apocalypse gets away with it because it's of an age where it doing destruction physics at all is impressive, let alone well - although the size of maps in Teardown suggest something similar could be done with a modern version if it didn't have to look full-on AAA.
Everyone was talking about the original. Always. I knew there were sequels, but didn't know what they are
@13:50 ah... Reminds me of my nodded Marsec Mininuclear Launcher... The last alien in somewhere in the building. Screw door to door/floor to floor search. >:D
Not sure how I haven’t played any X-Com games it looks just the kind of thing I was in to at the time.
Whereas bizarrely it wasn't the kind of thing I was in to at all at the time, I just happened to play this round a friend's and absolutely loved the setting and the gameplay.
Was it really that complicated without the manual?
My whole guide when I first finished the campaign was the ufopedia and my experience from the previous 2 and I didn't have too much trouble, just enough to be challenging
Interesting video TW thx!
XCOM 1 was great. Terror from the Deep too hard. Interceptor was interesting! Never played Apocalypse, or at least I tried to last year but didn't have a clue what was happening without the manual
Well at least I've still got the manual and technical supplement! Even playing from long-ingrained muscle memory I had a bit of a struggle with some things, manual control of vehicles in the cityscape is a particularly well-hidden feature.
X-Com: Apocalypse is my favourite X-Com/XCOM game (I spell XCOM as "KSOM", since it is clearly one word, while X-Com is not). Although I never played first one, and very little about second one. XCOM...well, I played it through once, and was trying with expansion to play again, but felt that it is so inferior for X-Com: Apocalypse, that I stopped playing it. I do not like idea, that every agent can have only one grenade, or healing item, or so... I loved to think what I want for that agent to carry on mission, etc. Some of them armed on their teeth, while others having less equipment (so that they can actually move too, and have actions).
Also, I like more sci-fi element of Apoc, and that there is multiple levels in map, and it is important part of missions go to vertical buildings, and clean them out. And of course the demolition part (although I never had intentions destroy parts! (says some one who gave autocannons with explosive ammos for those who's accuracy was poor, and normal ammo for those who had good accuracy (but it works mate! It works!!))).
But I never played with real-time mode...for simple reason: I panic more than my agents when they see first-time aliens, if I play with real time. I like my apocalypse nice and calm; easy to control! I also won the game in one of first tries. Didn't see problems with technology, or end game invasions (opposite, mid game were helluva laser show on top of the city, destroying lot of things, but in end game, I think enemy were destroyed quite fast?). But I saw my friend play the game before I did, and got some tips and ideas which were great help. I also believe that I was quite lucky: no other corpos were hostile than Cult of Sirius, and I "eliminated" Sirius in early game, so they were not really other enemies than the aliens.
I would like to play the Apoc again, but mouse issue and voice issue were last time quite game breaking things (well, I think voice issue was fixed last time I tried, but mouse issue still existed). I hope OpenApoc could fix that. But more than that, I kind of wish there would be "remake" by some indie company... which take all good elements from the game, and alternate those mediocre parts of the game (like the end game, which I didn't like at all... I mean the alien world... Equally bad with Half-Life's end...).
PS. Do you know that feeling, when you first time buy the biggest, most expensive missile and use it first time against aliens, you launch the missile and look it in map view how it comes closer and closer to enemy ship...and in last moment, enemy ship make 90'decree manoeuvrer, and avoid hit, and the biggest skyscraper in the who city got the missile...and will collapse from it. And after battle, you see the bill from the skyscraper, look how much you have money (not enough), take load game, and never again use that missile type..? I know that feeling.
Thanks!
Thanks so much! Much appreciated.
I could never get into Apocalypse because the screens were so busy and vertical.
I liked that! It's definitely classic 1990s PC fiddly. You're supposed to be fighting an interdimensional war but half the time is hiring individual scientists by name and building them bedrooms to sleep in.
@@TimberwolfK I don't mind complexity, I just couldn't figure out what was going on!
so true, the game was incredible when it came out. too bad it's DOS only.
It was a bit of a development hell for the Gollops, mostly down to the ambition of the game design. I think they did release a Windows version, possibly as part of the X-COM Collector's Edition, but it's *rare*, I've never seen it in the wild and can't find much information about it. Mine is of course the standard DOS version.
I remember playing the original version, and got an itch to try it out again on a modern PC... didn't work out so well. However, it's available on Steam now if you're still looking for it. Definitely playable now.
"It's time to spend a worryingly self-indulgent 20 minutes." You had me at hello
And it only ends up as 18:57, minus however late in the video I say that. I'm like a teacher who lets you out of the lesson before the bell rings.
I've played and finished UFO Defense, Terror From The Deep, Apocalypse, Interceptor, Enforcer, Bureau and the 2 reboot games - and I'd just like to say that real-time Apocalypse is my favorite, too. Real fans can respect that. Screw the purists.