Reduce the Chatter for the Love of God!

[Doctor Idgaf]

So I really like Xcom 2. I really like War of the Chosen.

But I am absolutely fed up with the talking heads.

If I have to hear Bradford lecture me about the Dark Avatar thingy one more time I am going to climb onto my roof and scream until the men with butterfly nets come and take me away. I am sick of the Chosen, who somehow have our comm frequency, showing up to babble at me. I'm tired of Tygan and Shen. I'm even sick of Optimus Prime. The resistance leaders need a mute button.

Seriously, I would pay $5 US for an option to turn off all the unnecessary comm chatter, at the very least as a kind of new game plus option; I've been through the game, I know the story, it really kills immersion to have a firefight interrupted by Central "introducing" an alien that I am already very well aquainted with. It murders immersion.

And the "Reduce Beginner VO" does NOTHING.

Please, for the love of all that might or might not be holy, give us an option to turn off the talking heads.

[6000 Chipmunks]

You have MANY friends on this matter. Unfortunately; they have your money...and they just walked away with it. :( Most YT play-throughs skip all the chatter, so you really have no way of knowing just how nausiating this chatter is until they have your money. It is a real sad revelation of just how much the publishers(not nessesarilly the Devs), really care about a "fan-base". Money talks, and greed is king!

And, NO, there has been no mod put out (by the Devs or anybody with the true ability), to fully remove this from the game. There have been serious attempts made, but you will have to jump through some hoops(learn to modifiy game files), and/or lose even more game funtionality, just to get SOME relief...So much for "made-to-mod" from the ground up. (Eye-roll)

[red255]

quiet bradford was one of the first mods released for this game.

just get a mod and shut them up.

[Traveler]

Originally posted by red255:

quiet bradford was one of the first mods released for this game.

just get a mod and shut them up.

I use it, but it's not a very big improvment. Whis the actual voice files could be replaced with empty sound files.

[SeriousCCIE]

I replaced mine with Torgue from Borderlands 2.

So, that means bradford's mouth moves , and then out comes EXPLOOOSSSIONSSS bowchickawwow!

[Traveler]

Originally posted by SeriousCCIE:

I replaced mine with Torgue from Borderlands 2.

So, that means bradford's mouth moves , and then out comes EXPLOOOSSSIONSSS bowchickawwow!

Lol! Could you upload that to Workbench?

[Doctor Idgaf]

Originally posted by SeriousCCIE:

I replaced mine with Torgue from Borderlands 2.

So, that means bradford's mouth moves , and then out comes EXPLOOOSSSIONSSS bowchickawwow!

That is awesome.


I just wish the devs would learn that anything that stops the action by taking control of the game from the player is a bad idea.

[6000 Chipmunks]

Originally posted by Traveler:

I use it, but it's not a very big improvment. Wish the actual voice files could be replaced with empty sound files.

Yea, funny that.
Looking at the workshop it looks as though you can replace every voice in the game(aparently), BUT, I guess somebody decided the chatter, constant nagging, interupting, and taunting was something that just HAD to stay in this "Made-too-mod" game. I get MORE of a head-ache just trying to figure out what that meeting sounded like.

"Do you think we should tone down this talking a bit? Perhaps an option to turn it off? I mean, every tester we've used has suggested we either do that, or put the National Suicide Prevention Hotline Number at the top of every screen."

"Um, no."

"Um, OK"

*Me - Bangs head on table to relive the pain.

[Doctor Idgaf]

Originally posted by Out-There Dave:

Originally posted by Traveler:

I use it, but it's not a very big improvment. Wish the actual voice files could be replaced with empty sound files.

Yea, funny that.
Looking at the workshop it looks as though you can replace every voice in the game(aparently), BUT, I guess somebody decided the chatter, constant nagging, interupting, and taunting was something that just HAD to stay in this "Made-too-mod" game. I get MORE of a head-ache just trying to figure out what that meeting sounded like.

"Do you think we should tone down this talking a bit? Perhaps an option to turn it off? I mean, every tester we've used has suggested we either do that, or put the National Suicide Prevention Hotline Number at the top of every screen."

"Um, no."

"Um, OK"

*Me - Bangs head on table to relive the pain.

Pretty much. I honestly don't understand why a developer would think it's a good idea to lock the screen and then have Bradford launch into a bloody soliloquy once every in-game day, usually about something I'm already dealing with.

That really kills the pace, and that's just the geomap; that crap gets REALLY old during a mission.

[Doctor Idgaf]

Here is an example for people who are unfamiliar with this phenomenon (not my video):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeFRbVS_694

[6000 Chipmunks]

Yea, its that bad at times, and WOTC gets exponentially worse.

[Doctor Idgaf]

Originally posted by Out-There Dave:

Yea, its that bad at times, and WOTC gets exponentially worse.

Oh god yes. Those Chosen fools make Bradford's interruptions look coherent.

[6000 Chipmunks]

Originally posted by Wabbajack:

Originally posted by Out-There Dave:

Yea, its that bad at times, and WOTC gets exponentially worse.

Oh god yes. Those Chosen fools make Bradford's interruptions look coherent.

True, AND it does more than just slow the pace of the game...it makes it near impossible to concentrate on the task that they are blathering on about. I cannot begin to tell you how many times I was setting up for a great turn, only to be interupted by some "Chosen", Bradford, or some other numb*ut, and completely lose track of what I was attempting to do.
Pure Genius!

*And I thought the launch of Sim City 5 was bad.

Its amazing how fast those responsible for this fiasco have scurried away from it.

Saddly, given the time, this DEMO looks as though it could really have been a game to set the bar for this genre.

*Unfinished animations - The ones that made the demo are great...just don't watch when they open a door...and pretend that tank exploded AFTER the shot, and that window smashed AFTER something went through it.

Great cut scenes - if you ignore the fact that nothing makes any sense("They don't need an infiltration unit anymore...", "Um,OK, what excatly are the Faceless then?")...and don't mind wasting half your life waiting for them to load.

I've spent the better part of 3 months playing the half-a**ed LW2 mod, and modding out as much insanity as I could, so I don't actually see alot of the stuff that made me wonder how this game got out of the production office anymore.
(I put WOTC back on the shelf until such time as I can actually hear myself think whilst playing.)

Still, it makes me sick, seeing that this game had so much potential, and given the time I'm SURE would have been worth some of the extra time it takes to load, and or hardware upgrades needed for smoother playing.

If you want to get a simpler explanation, I suggest watching Zero Puctuation's review of XCOM2. You will want to laugh, and cry at the same time. LOL/Sniff

[Doctor Idgaf]

I've seen the ZP on it, it is a classic.

I gave up on Long War in the first game. It's hard to put into words but I just didn't like it. It felt like they took anything cool about the game and reduced it's impact while also making you pay some arbitrary cost for it. Nerfing stuff that was working fine for the sake of a "challenge" and then adding a bunch of superficial choices. I like my mods to be smaller; I like some of the stuff the Long War people put out, like SMGs and Laser weapons for X2, but I don't like giant mods that completely change the game to someone else's "vision".

As for this game, I have it modded to heck and back (over 100 seperate mods), and it is mmore or less where I want it, but there isn't a reliable way to cut off the narrative. I gave up on the story when they announced what it was; the sequel shoud have been taking the fight to the aliens after a narrow victory in the first game. As it is this is basically a terrorist simulator, and that doesn't sit too well with me. The whole "yeah man, we're like, the resistance and stuff!" attitude in the game is kind of off-putting and just doesn't fit XCOM.

The combat is really where the game shines, but I still had to mod the heck out of it to make it enjoyable.

[6000 Chipmunks]

Originally posted by Wabbajack:

I've seen the ZP on it, it is a classic.

I gave up on Long War in the first game. It's hard to put into words but I just didn't like it. It felt like they took anything cool about the game and reduced it's impact while also making you pay some arbitrary cost for it. Nerfing stuff that was working fine for the sake of a "challenge" and then adding a bunch of superficial choices. I like my mods to be smaller; I like some of the stuff the Long War people put out, like SMGs and Laser weapons for X2, but I don't like giant mods that completely change the game to someone else's "vision".

As for this game, I have it modded to heck and back (over 100 seperate mods), and it is mmore or less where I want it, but there isn't a reliable way to cut off the narrative. I gave up on the story when they announced what it was; the sequel shoud have been taking the fight to the aliens after a narrow victory in the first game. As it is this is basically a terrorist simulator, and that doesn't sit too well with me. The whole "yeah man, we're like, the resistance and stuff!" attitude in the game is kind of off-putting and just doesn't fit XCOM.

The combat is really where the game shines, but I still had to mod the heck out of it to make it enjoyable.

Yes, I agree with all of that.

I think my dissatisfaction results from the age-group this new version was aimed at...(At least I hope that is the reason for a lot of it).

If I didn't have the programing background and the months to spend modding and testing(It took almost 3 months), I would have shelved all the latest versions of this game.

The MAIN reason I use LW or LW2 is that they do open up a lot of stuff so that it is moddable for me, without having to use the SDK, or hack the exe. Also, both EW and XCOM2 are so linear, that if you followed the bread-crumbs, or (lets face it), BILLBOARDS you could finish this game in an day. I do like the way the LW devs(Pavonis Interactive), stretch out the game a bit, and add more time to the originals. *To be fair, it looks as though there wasn't much to stretch in this lattest version.

I really want to go back to a more vanilla game, but I would have to rely on less-than-optimal mods/modder coding, and would loose the abililty to "Tweak" some features of the game.

My LW mods look nothing like the originals. :D

If I ever figure out how to relyably remove all the chat in WOTC, I would love to play that version, as there are some great features, and even better mods, but I just don't dig the new "witchcraft" aproach, and all the interuptions. Unfortunately, I would probably have to test it for months, and I don't think I have enough Xanax on hand, to allow me to pursue it that long. LOL.

I watch a lot of Marbozir's play-throughs, and it really makes me want to try. Still...I value my sanity, and feel really uncomfortable with the new "witches, and warlocks" addition. :(

PS:And yes, at times, I do feel like this is a terrorist training simulator. I played "Terror-from-the-deep" and I was terrified at times, of the little green dudes with plasma-pistols. Now they have these grotesque monters, and quite frankly, they don't add any "scarriness" at all for me. IMHO

[Doctor Idgaf]

I think that the best thing they did with XCOM 2 was open it up for mod support. Considering how many active mods I have the thing shouldn't even load, but it runs pretty well. It's just sad that it takes that in order for me to enjoy the game.