Now, I know that action camera offers a thrilling view of the battlefield, and really, some of the best images and screenshots come from the 3rd person view.
It’s just that, as it stands, the constant moving back and forth between the action can get tiresome. I shoot an alien. Two of the aliens shoot back at me. Then the turret shoots at one of the aliens. Just because, three of the aliens also return fire. Afterwards, it’s aliens turn, the turret shoots automatically at it, and its pals shoots against the turret. By now, I would just prefer an XCOM style “toogle action camera off”
Yes i would like to see the option to turn it off as well.
I never use it because it is constantly moving back and forth and it is annoying. Which also reminds me the nature of camera behavior in XCOM EU\EW, it was constantly being tilted because of narration and other stuff. It was VERY annoying.
The option to turn it off should be a standard quality of life thing, instead of tilting it back and forth, just zoom out to get both the shooter and its target in the picture and play the move out.
I raise all my hands for that. Eventually if you want changed perspective to action then it can be triggered with some keyboard shortcut. Let say - hold “Ctrl” while giving shot order.
Actually that is even better then a simple “on\off”, you can still do cool screen shots or play out cool moments when fighting something huge and laying down the last shot.
So instead of running to the options menu to turn it off or on, you can bind it to a key+order execution combo for it to trigger.
I see two options. One would be to offer the option to toggle on/off, the other is for snapshot devs to think about the cinematic and how to enhance it. You don’t have to do it on every turn for example, and in addition, you can isolate the camera for the entire round and not each turn.
Example of the latter that would improve the ambiance would be to lock the camera on an actor (either the initial shooter, or the target and then the return fires would be from the same locked camera). In addition, they can work on the camera angle timing to get the right speed/flow so the cinematic seem more natural.
I think the action cam option to turn it off gives the control to the player which is priority since everyone has their own preferences, but then with that aside I think it’s an opportunity to improve on what Firaxis did and to create additional immersion by tweaking with and refining the camera controls for cinematic creativity. It will take some experimentation to get that “just right” feel, but if they achieve it will just add to the experience.
And if resources allow it, they could even make the “toggle” a slider, because action cam can be enjoyable, if it’s done in moderation (which is personal preference, thus the slider).
Speaking personally, I’m not usually playing a strategy game in the first place for its graphics, and having the camera swing about all over the place like with the action cam acts a distraction from the tactics that I’m trying to play through.
Just for the record, I like the action camera. You know, there’s nothing quite like facing the queen from bottom to top. But I would like even more to have the option, even as quickly as the next backer build
I really hope there’s the option to switch off and I imagine there will be.
Being greedy though, I’d prefer a ‘Always, Frequent, Occasional, Never’ slider and I loved the idea mentioned above about holding Ctrl when clicking to fire; a shortcut for the special moments
I’ve clocked well over 1000 hours on XCOM 1 and 2 and it never bothered me to the point of turning it off. That said I can imagine some wouldn’t stand it for that long.
I clocked over 3000 hours in XCOM LW EW, and i never had it on, because it is an annoying tilting action of the camera, back and forth which essentially adds nothing unless you are making some kind of a review or trailer video. If it was occasional, fine, but it is either on or off.
I’d rather see the map and think about what i can do next, while actions are being played out.
Another thing that should be in game options, is the ability to speed up animations.
When LW came with the “ALT+F7\F8\9” “Slomo” tweak, it was a breath of fresh air. It sped up the game, and made you realize you were playing in a slow motion mode all this time.
At the moment PP animations are very responsive sharp and quick, yet they aren’t very polished. For example if you noticed that the soldiers have their weapons vanish when they execute a movement action?
They don’t holster the guns, they just run. These type of things add only a mere few seconds, but overtime it accumulates and the repetitiveness might get tiring.
That is why LW found the “slomo” tweak that allowed you to speed up the game, and that is why XCOM 2 had official “ZIP Mode” (I think it was called) in it’s option menus to cut out the action execution times.
There are also Mods out there that increase “speed” even further without actually touching the animation speed, i would still use these mods with the “slomo” in XCOM2 to speed up the run speed, climb speed, make them holster the guns faster when they climb, and pull them back out faster when they are done climbing.
It lets me spend more time playing, than watching animations play out.
So unless PP animations get extra “juggling” action i’m alright with the speed, otherwise i would appreciate a slider to make the game faster.
About the animations, Unstable Voltage just posted some shots in the Discord today of the team working on sprucing those up, so at least some of the things you described will look better in the final game
You completely missed the point, i meant if they polish the animations and add small movement details like holstering weapon etc etc… can build up significant down times between issuing commands just like it did in XCOM EU\EW and XCOM 2 - which introduced “Zip Line Mode” to speed the game up because it was tiring watching those animations. On top of that you could speed it up with the “Slomo” tweak…
