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I loved, loved X-COM. It had an ability to capture imagination in a way that few turn based strategy games do. The randomly generated soldier names still loom l

I loved, loved X-COM. It had an ability to capture imagination in a way that few turn based strategy games do. The randomly generated soldier names still loom large as heroes in my mind. I was affected when they were killed in action. "Bernard Dujardin", wherever you are, I salute you

systemvoltage 6y ago
I find this emotional attachment between a real human and a fictitious entity absolutely fascinating, unsettling, beautiful and creepy at the same time. This is pure fiction, generated by some C++ code written in Visual Studio and yet, we are attached to it like a real human. Same thing with fiction books. It’s just words being consumed by the brain but emotional impact is real. Then I question, isn’t all human to human interaction just data exchange through our “sensors” (sight, sound, touch, smell and taste)?
- eru 6y ago
  Slight nitpick: I am fairly sure the original X-COM was not written in C++ in Visual Studio. No clue about the actual language it was written in, probably C or assembly. C++ is unlikely but possible. But I am rather sure that the game was not written with Visual Studio. Of course, your point still stands. As an addition to go even further back in time, I would add stories that people just tell to each other. It's a great feature of humanity that we can communicate about situations that we weren't personally involved in. Emotional attachment is then just a general feature of how mammalian brains seem to work.
  - nottorp 6y ago
    If I remember well, it should have been Watcom C, like most DOS games that wanted to go beyond 640 kb. The two separate executables (it had one for the geoscape and one for the tactical battles) displayed the DOS4GW banner at startup if i remember well.
    - pjmlp 6y ago
      Watcom also had a C++ compiler in the box, and Abrash books have some examples with it.
usrusr 6y ago
The names dripping so heavily with national cliches, but they all throwing their skills in a single jar (and their limbs) because humanity vs aliens, it was truly impressive. And the multitude of viable tactics and strategies... a friend of mine was systematically playing for earliest Mars victory, he ended up never shooting at scout UFO to lure in bigger targets. "If they don't set up a base by $date I won't be able to beat my record of $otherdate". Pretty sure that approach wasn't consciously designed into the game, but it worked out because the inner logic was sufficiently complete (even if perhaps not actually sound, he ended up doing some pretty radical strategical hacks)
Delk 6y ago
It did get slightly comical when one of them died (or you started another game from the beginning) and you had the second or third guy with the exact same name down the road, though. But it's true, you did grow attached. Since in some sense the nature of the game is also that your soldiers will die -- and sometimes a lot of them -- because of a small mistake or just due bad luck, that creates a weird dichotomy where you're tempted to care on one hand and to see them as expendable and replaceable on the other hand at the same time. Also, the atmosphere of night missions in particular where shots might come out of the dark at any point, and you might not really even see where they came from, made for a surprisingly engaging and even scary experience. The weird, ominous music was probably a part of that. I've heard others not find it that way, though, so maybe it's a matter of imagination and how prone to getting immersed you are.
- appleiigs 6y ago
  I remember it was a big enough of a dilemma to me that I had to decide at the beginning of the game whether I was going to frequently save or not for that entire run. Now I figure it's most fun not to re-do and deal with the drama, but I do bring some red-shirts with me now.
- JohnBooty 6y ago
  The reboots are a bit of a different beast, but they really lean into the soldier attachment thing. You can deeply customize your soldiers, and in XCOM2 they even gain visible scars (!) and emotional wounds (!!) and form bonds with other soldiers based on their experiences. It's all bait, of course. Because they are gonna die. A lot. A rather deliciously sadistic design choice, encouraging you to form attachments like that. =) My general rule of thumb in XCOM is that rookies are lower than dog crap. Not even human. You do not rename rookies because rookies don't even deserve a name in the first place, much less a new name. If there was an in-game mess hall I wouldn't even let them eat with the other soldiers. If they somehow survive a few drops... well, then we can talk lol.
publicola1990 6y ago
With the recent Firaxis XCom, a common recommendation going around was to rename your soldiers with your closest friends names, for an additional layer of attachment with them.

systemvoltage 6y ago

I find this emotional attachment between a real human and a fictitious entity absolutely fascinating, unsettling, beautiful and creepy at the same time. This is pure fiction, generated by some C++ code written in Visual Studio and yet, we are attached to it like a real human. Same thing with fiction books. It’s just words being consumed by the brain but emotional impact is real. Then I question, isn’t all human to human interaction just data exchange through our “sensors” (sight, sound, touch, smell and taste)?

eru 6y ago
Slight nitpick: I am fairly sure the original X-COM was not written in C++ in Visual Studio. No clue about the actual language it was written in, probably C or assembly. C++ is unlikely but possible. But I am rather sure that the game was not written with Visual Studio. Of course, your point still stands. As an addition to go even further back in time, I would add stories that people just tell to each other. It's a great feature of humanity that we can communicate about situations that we weren't personally involved in. Emotional attachment is then just a general feature of how mammalian brains seem to work.
- nottorp 6y ago
  If I remember well, it should have been Watcom C, like most DOS games that wanted to go beyond 640 kb. The two separate executables (it had one for the geoscape and one for the tactical battles) displayed the DOS4GW banner at startup if i remember well.
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    Watcom also had a C++ compiler in the box, and Abrash books have some examples with it.

usrusr 6y ago

The names dripping so heavily with national cliches, but they all throwing their skills in a single jar (and their limbs) because humanity vs aliens, it was truly impressive. And the multitude of viable tactics and strategies... a friend of mine was systematically playing for earliest Mars victory, he ended up never shooting at scout UFO to lure in bigger targets. "If they don't set up a base by $date I won't be able to beat my record of $otherdate". Pretty sure that approach wasn't consciously designed into the game, but it worked out because the inner logic was sufficiently complete (even if perhaps not actually sound, he ended up doing some pretty radical strategical hacks)

Delk 6y ago

It did get slightly comical when one of them died (or you started another game from the beginning) and you had the second or third guy with the exact same name down the road, though. But it's true, you did grow attached. Since in some sense the nature of the game is also that your soldiers will die -- and sometimes a lot of them -- because of a small mistake or just due bad luck, that creates a weird dichotomy where you're tempted to care on one hand and to see them as expendable and replaceable on the other hand at the same time. Also, the atmosphere of night missions in particular where shots might come out of the dark at any point, and you might not really even see where they came from, made for a surprisingly engaging and even scary experience. The weird, ominous music was probably a part of that. I've heard others not find it that way, though, so maybe it's a matter of imagination and how prone to getting immersed you are.

appleiigs 6y ago
I remember it was a big enough of a dilemma to me that I had to decide at the beginning of the game whether I was going to frequently save or not for that entire run. Now I figure it's most fun not to re-do and deal with the drama, but I do bring some red-shirts with me now.
JohnBooty 6y ago
The reboots are a bit of a different beast, but they really lean into the soldier attachment thing. You can deeply customize your soldiers, and in XCOM2 they even gain visible scars (!) and emotional wounds (!!) and form bonds with other soldiers based on their experiences. It's all bait, of course. Because they are gonna die. A lot. A rather deliciously sadistic design choice, encouraging you to form attachments like that. =) My general rule of thumb in XCOM is that rookies are lower than dog crap. Not even human. You do not rename rookies because rookies don't even deserve a name in the first place, much less a new name. If there was an in-game mess hall I wouldn't even let them eat with the other soldiers. If they somehow survive a few drops... well, then we can talk lol.

publicola1990 6y ago

With the recent Firaxis XCom, a common recommendation going around was to rename your soldiers with your closest friends names, for an additional layer of attachment with them.