Not-X-COM

With age it has become increasingly difficult to play games like Dwarf Fortress and X-COM. Part of it is a dwindling interest in games, but these games are also difficult to break into sessions. I can't remember what I was doing last time and lose any investment.

When thinking about how to mitigate this in my old X-COM project I got the idea of logs, perhaps visual histories of past actions, and auto-diaries for the personnel. One would  still have to read those though, which adds friction...

So I spent some time thinking about it today when I found and added stuff to this old doodle sheet. Actually I picked up an idea I had for the boardgame I posted about earlier. If it's possible to leave a (campaign) game in a less complex state (such as just the world map and current resources), then resuming from that might be easier. 

In X-COM it might be doable to simplify the game state by using instantaneous construction and research. Is waiting fun and can I plan timings well and with satisfaction against future events? Not really, I'd say, though it's a source of suspense perhaps.

To compensate for the lost wait mechanic, a system of e.g. weekly workshop/lab points could be used. The amount depending on facilities, staff, automatization and other upgrades. A richer looting and materials system might be appropriate. This way, it's more like shopping in a catalog, picking out the things needed for (adapting to) the current challenge/problem. If I reload an old game I can get into it right away and not have to worry about old forgotten plans. I kind of enjoy material gathering (hoarding) in games too.

Edit: I'm rather bad at games with overlapping actions. In RTS games I often forget lumps of units and factories because I'm hyperfocused on something else, so a system like this where I can take my time to decide, then complete the action in one click might be a solution to this issue as well.

As for the game's setting... X-COM is kinda like Stargate SG-1 where humans level up like crazy. This could be taken to a further extreme to differentiate from other material. In The High Crusade (Poul Anderson, 1960) a UFO lands on Earth in medieval times but the aliens are killed by knights, who then go on a space crusade. It's an interesting tableau...

So, a UFO crashes on medieval Earth and a group of people finds it along with an AI core, factory, indoctrination modules perhaps. They somehow manage to adopt some of the alien tech, but are then branded as heretics and witches by the church. The influential church (and various leaders around the world) were actually brought under control by the scheming aliens who realized this situation might escalate. Now the group is on their own, up against an alien invasion only they can stop. This explains why the personnel roster is sort of small (and recruiting is hard) even though the whole Earth is involved. The art direction can get interesting/different too (more-so than what I drew here). No gas stations to blow up though.

EDIT: Minor additions to sheet, and a map from 2014.

Since governments operated differently back in the middle ages with large parts of the world not communicating, the funding game would have to be different. In the original game you're supposed to protect regions or lose funding (eventually being shut down). But this might not work here. Possible replacement mechanics:

• Recruiting becomes harder in indoctrinated/invaded regions.
• Indoctrinated populations will rat out player bases, causing direct attacks.
• If global indoctrination reaches a certain threshold it's game over for some reason.

Successfully defending a town results in lowered indoctrination and higher recruitment (maybe pops up a list of grateful survivors from the combat map?) . Winning any combat scenario yields valuable resources, so doing nothing is not useful, especially if time is not a resource in construction/research beyond say a weekly action refresh. 

For material names, I was thinking that maybe the human personnel does not really understand the tech all that well because some alien system is handling the complicated stuff... a bit like the STC situation in 40K. Thus it might be appropriate to use mystery names for the materials, like Starflight did. Pulsing Tube, Crystal Helix, etc. Alien devices and ships generally aren't human friendly but can be salvaged into useful mystery components which are invested into the base facilities, weapons, bio enhancers/meds, or maybe a Not-STC level upgrade.

I've added a WIP map image above. It's a height inverted Earth. If you look carefully you can see a sunken Africa. Lots of brushstrokes remain to complete this map :G