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Creators of XCOM: Long War Mod Officially Form Studio, Name New Game

The game is called Terra Invicta, the studio is called Long War Studios, and all indications are that they know where their wheelhouse is

A short description:

Terra Invicta is a grand strategy game in which the player leads the defense of Earth during an alien invasion.

An alien force has arrived in the far reaches of Solar System and begun probing Earth's defenses and building an invasion fleet. The player must assemble a council of scientists, politicians, military leaders and operatives who can unite Earth's squabbling nations with the ultimate goal of taking the fight to the aliens in the high ground of outer space.

Status: In pre-Kickstarter development

These guys did some FANTASTIC work with Long War, which I encourage all XCOM owners who are living under rocks to try.

Make the bit where I lose over and over and over canon if old.

EDIT: Right, homepage link! http://www.longwarstudios.com

Thanks, serversurfer :p
 

Salsa

Member
well

im glad for them and I liked the mod

but are they basically... making XCOM without XCOM's involvement now?

that description just sounds like XCOM. did they get em to clear them for this or something? no trouble?
 

ZoddGutts

Member
Eventual Kickstarter eh. Wonder if I'll be 2D or 3D. Xenonauts was 2D on a 154K budget. Since they did the well known Long War Mod they might get more funding than the Xenonauts crew did.
 
I love XCOM and the expansion, I easily have over 200 hours in the game (alot for me) but always thought Long War looked like it added too much micromanagement. Watched plenty of videos and twitch streams, but it always felt like the sheer amount of things to track would be overwhelming.

Now that XCOM 2 is around the corner, I don't see myself trying it, but I'll def keep track of the studio and this new game.

XCOM basically sparked a turn based tactics resurgence, resulting in some amazing games including Invisible Inc., my GOTY for this year.
 

samn

Member
well

im glad for them and I liked the mod

but are they basically... making XCOM without XCOM's involvement now?

that description just sounds like XCOM. did they get em to clear them for this or something? no trouble?

Firaxis don't own the concept of strategy games about alien invasions.
 
I really don't think they did themselves any favors by announcing a game that sounds like an XCOM clone, even if the strategic layer is way different.

Also, I just hope they don't double down on the absurd difficulty, because there's a reason Long War for XCOM:EU/EW only has ~200K players, while the stock game has nearly 3 million.
 

Miker

Member
I guess they're staying in familiar territory. Which is understandable, I suppose, but I'll see what sets their game apart from XCOM 2, which, with better tools, may have an even stronger modding community than the first game's.
 
I really don't think they did themselves any favors by announcing a game that sounds like an XCOM clone, even if the strategic layer is way different.

Also, I just hope they don't double down on the absurd difficulty, because there's a reason Long War for XCOM:EU/EW only has ~200K players, while the stock game has nearly 3 million.

I don't entirely disagree, but the reason why the figures are so lopsided is because most games (as in, ones that are not Skyrim) have tiny tiny tiny mod adoption rates PERIOD, not just for specific mods.

Also, Long War offers more difficulty variety, not less. Turn on Cinematic Mode and Friendly Skies and suddenly the game becomes way way way easier :p
 

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
I really don't think they did themselves any favors by announcing a game that sounds like an XCOM clone, even if the strategic layer is way different.

Also, I just hope they don't double down on the absurd difficulty, because there's a reason Long War for XCOM:EU/EW only has ~200K players, while the stock game has nearly 3 million.

Long War is such a better game than the base though. After the opening months the game is just straight easy. Also a mod that came out years later has less downloads than the commercial game its based on? Truly I am shocked.
 

ZoddGutts

Member
I really don't think they did themselves any favors by announcing a game that sounds like an XCOM clone, even if the strategic layer is way different.

Also, I just hope they don't double down on the absurd difficulty, because there's a reason Long War for XCOM:EU/EW only has ~200K players, while the stock game has nearly 3 million.

That's 200k or so people who will be interested in this game quite a lot especially for a small studio/indie group if their game sells around that number. Xenonauts which is a game that takes cues of the first XCOM game sold a little over 200K. So I can see why their doing XCOM type game with Long War being mentioned as well.
 
Also a mod that came out years later has less downloads than the commercial game its based on?
Long War didn't come out years later. It started development before EW came out (IIRC) and has continued development for the past 2-3 years, only recently being completed (probably so the team could move on to this game).
 
So I guess where XCOM is the modern, streamlined version of this concept, and Xenonauts is the old-school, fiddly version of this concept, these guys are going to do the... extra-strategical, punishing version? I'm not sure how much room there actually is for different sub-niches here but I hope it works out for them.

I really don't think they did themselves any favors by announcing a game that sounds like an XCOM clone, even if the strategic layer is way different.

I mean, pretty much the entire reason these guys are making a game is so they can try creating an alien invasion tactical/strategy game from scratch. I don't think they're gonna get out of bed in the morning pumped to make an FPS.
 

Stoze

Member
Also, I just hope they don't double down on the absurd difficulty, because there's a reason Long War for XCOM:EU/EW only has ~200K players, while the stock game has nearly 3 million.

I could be wrong, but isn't that a really good attachment rate for a mod? (Also did the game really do 3 million on PC?)
 

Sou Da

Member
So I guess where XCOM is the modern, streamlined version of this concept, and Xenonauts is the old-school, fiddly version of this concept, these guys are going to do the... extra-strategical, punishing version? I'm not sure how much room there actually is for different sub-niches here but I hope it works out for them.



I mean, pretty much the entire reason these guys are making a game is so they can try creating an alien invasion tactical/strategy game from scratch. I don't think they're gonna get out of bed in the morning pumped to make an FPS.

What about a TPS? The deep strategical version The Bureau we all wanted
/s
 

Jintor

Member
I'll keep an eye out? I really enjoyed Long War, but... I dunno

They gotta find the right balance.

Personally I would've done a magic demons version with kingdoms and shit
 

Weebos

Banned
I enjoyed the mod, hopefully they make this game a tad bit more accessible, at least in the game length category.
 

Falk

that puzzling face
So I guess where XCOM is the modern, streamlined version of this concept, and Xenonauts is the old-school, fiddly version of this concept, these guys are going to do the... extra-strategical, punishing version? I'm not sure how much room there actually is for different sub-niches here but I hope it works out for them.

I think the fact that Long War has far longer legs (no pun intended) than EU/EW shows that there definitely is a market for what they're trying to do.

XCOM 2 by its very nature is going to be shackled (at least, pre-mods) to be somewhat casual friendly, despite its permadeath/ironman/hardcore allure.

Also, they have a leg up over Xenonauts by simply daring to be different on the tactical layer. A lot of Xenonauts honestly feels archaic and bloaty at this point.
 

Stoze

Member
Look at steamspy numbers

Thanks. Didn't know it did that well, good on Firaxis.

I'm just finishing up XCOM:EU for the first time right now so the thread caught my eye. I've been looking at Long War and may consider when I move onto EW, but the extra stuff kinda looks overwhelming (and extremely impressive), and I feel like I should just do the base game/expansion as a first time player anyway. Plus I doubt I'll have the time, especially with XCOM 2 coming out in a month.

Will be interesting to see what these guys make next.
 
I'll keep an eye out? I really enjoyed Long War, but... I dunno

They gotta find the right balance.

Personally I would've done a magic demons version with kingdoms and shit

Oh, that would be cool. Scrying in place of Mission Control, Demonologists and Wizards in place of R&D, Blacksmiths & Enchanters in place of Engineering.

Stack it onto the XCOM 2 Mod Ideas pile :p
 

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
I'll keep an eye out? I really enjoyed Long War, but... I dunno

They gotta find the right balance.

Personally I would've done a magic demons version with kingdoms and shit

I would have done Terror from the Deep since Firaxis clearly has no interest in it and Terror was the one famous for brutal difficulty.
 

Falk

that puzzling face
I would have done Terror from the Deep since Firaxis clearly has no interest in it and Terror was the one famous for brutal difficulty.

Honestly the only thing I remember it having over UFO were terror missions being far more annoying since it's much harder to sweep a cargo ship of aliens as it is some city blocks.

Oh and a messed up tech tree.
 
Honestly the only thing I remember it having over UFO were terror missions being far more annoying since it's much harder to sweep a cargo ship of aliens as it is some city blocks.

Oh and a messed up tech tree.

When it came out a friend who knew I was a fan of the original was showing me his terror mission save file and was pretty angry trying to get me to explain how it was fair. In the end I just had to admit to him that terror from the deep was badly designed. The game was also pretty heavily advertised in the UK when the original had nothing. They pretty much killed the series dead with that game I think.
 
I'll keep an eye out? I really enjoyed Long War, but... I dunno

They gotta find the right balance.

Personally I would've done a magic demons version with kingdoms and shit
Yeah, going fantasy seems like a better choice, because that way they could avoid direct comparisons with XCOM. Hell, there's plenty of eastern and western fantasy that use guns, so it's not like had to go full D&D.

I think the fact that Long War has far longer legs (no pun intended) than EU/EW shows that there definitely is a market for what they're trying to do.

XCOM 2 by its very nature is going to be shackled (at least, pre-mods) to be somewhat casual friendly, despite its permadeath/ironman/hardcore allure.
I think there's a fine balance between meaningful length and pointless tedium, which LWS had to find if they're going to expand their market beyond the 200K or so people that play Long War. Firaxis is pretty good at finding that sweet spot and making a game that's accessible to a broad audience; LWS's schtick is the opposite, which could bite them in the ass later. Even tons of gaming sites singing the praises of Long War for years hasn't done much to increase the user base, and that's probably because it's easy hear/see about Long War's downsides.
 

Falk

that puzzling face
They pretty much killed the series dead with that game I think.

Well, Apocalypse was pretty good. ;)

I think there's a fine balance between meaningful length and pointless tedium, which LWS had to find if they're going to expand their market beyond the 200K or so people that play Long War.

On the contrary, I think that focusing on the game blueprint they want to make rather than becoming an actual XCOM/XCOM 2 clone is a better bet. There's definitely tedium in Long War, but I'd chalk it down to more of the limits of how far modding XCOM can go (which may or may not have had solutions with XCOM 2's reportedly more robust modding capabilities).

I think there's definitely a market for a longer, more involved campaign along the lines of the original UFO Defense or Apocalypse with some modern design sensibilities thrown in.

Of course, I loved XCOM (EW moreso than vanilla) and Xenonauts, and I'm also going to be playing the shit out of XCOM 2. I'm just glad that there's variety in this little niche.
 
A 3 person team making a grand strategy game from scratch and their only previous experience is making mods.

I don't foresee great things in their future.
 

Kyougar

Member
A 3 person team making a grand strategy game from scratch and their only previous experience is making mods.

I don't foresee great things in their future.

Some of the most acclaimed and biggest successes in Gaming came from modders who made their hobby into a Business.

Thats why PC Gaming with modding is so great. Some of your Audience tinkers with the base files. Mod the games with official tools or just disect the game and sometimes those people will make the big step and make great games themself.
 

SparkTR

Member
A 3 person team making a grand strategy game from scratch and their only previous experience is making mods.

I don't foresee great things in their future.

It's pretty common. The creators of Project Reality recently launched Squad. The creators of Darthmod for Total War launched Ultimate General. The developers of a Sonic fangame launched Freedom Planet. The developers of the HL2 mod Insurgency launched Insurgency. The developers of Zombie Panic Source mod launched Contagion. The developers of Natural Selection mod launched Subnautica and NS2.

There's one thing common between all those games, they're all acclaimed by fans of their genre and people love them.

Seriously, in the 90's that's how development teams formed, they made mods and then started selling their work for a living. How nice is it that it's coming back?
 

pastrami

Member
I'll keep an eye out? I really enjoyed Long War, but... I dunno

They gotta find the right balance.

Personally I would've done a magic demons version with kingdoms and shit

A long time ago there was supposed to be an X-COM like game based on Delta Green (secret government agency vs Cthulu). I wouldn't mind seeing that premise revived. I don't necessarily mind aliens, but if they are starting a brand new IP, it would be nice to see them explore other ideas and settings.

Good luck to them though.
 

Falk

that puzzling face
Massive Chalice was pretty cool.

Less medieval, more fantasy would be an interesting premise, I agree.
 
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