cruton321, on 06 March 2016 - 12:12 PM, said:
I agree, and am somewhat surprised we don't see this in games more often. There are quite a few ancient games that could use a simple face-lift and a few minor added effects and be prominent again. They did change a little more than needed, but it mostly worked out for XCOM. I do miss the option to have more then one skyranger, and action points would be nice, but other than that the changes that were made added some nice substance to what were some fairly flavorless mechanics originally. Enough of the complex mechanics were left in and the more basic ones were beefed up to make a very solid game.
I would argue that the new XCOM series is a much more drastic change from the original, more of a reboot than a remake. The smaller squad size is big change... you can't split up and flank. Action points have a very different feel from two moves/one action per soldier. The strategic side of the game was minimized and highly scripted in XCOM EU, compared to the Geoscape of the original. The sequel XCOM2 now has time limits on many missions, which never existed in the original and completely changes the feel of those missions.
If one says "they're both basically the same because they're both turn-based," that skips over some fundamental differences. All you have to do is compare XCOM EU/EW and XCOM 2 with the Xenonauts game, which actually is pretty close to a modern remake with just updated graphics, and not a reboot.
As for the developer motivations with NewMOO, I think all you have to do is compare the interest and sales of XCOM EU and XCOM2 to that of Xenonauts to find the answer. They're clearly going for an XCOM-style reboot here. I'm glad players have that choice, but I'm far more interested in the reboot because I already played the original.
The only way to enjoy a reboot -- assuming it ends up being a fun and polished game in the end -- is to roll with the changes. Wishing it was a remake instead of a reboot just leads to disappointment, no matter how good the new game is (or isn't).