TFTD on Youtube, Let's Plays & other stuff

[kylan]

Hi folks,

 

 

 

I've been trying to record a TFTD Let's Play (Ironman, Superhuman) to upload on Youtube and I'm at the point where I'm wondering whether I should upload what I've got or give a game another whirl. I'm not so sure about the watchability of an entire campaign, particularly as things get easier towards the end, so I was thinking maybe individual missions instead. (In particular, I want to upload a ship terror which I butchered and which goes very close.)

 

 

 

Anyway, over 3 or 4 campaigns (some which I abandoned for no particular reason) I've recorded quite a bit of footage, and I've made a compilation of some odd & bizarre moments here. Clicky.

 

 

 

 

 

Apologies for my noobishness, as always.

[Sunflash]

Are you asking for opnions on the best way to do a recording of an play-through; feedback on what you posted (haven't clicked yet, net is having heart-attack trying to load FA's new AAR), or something else? XD

[chiasaur11]

I vote for "Hey, post the whole thing."

 

I mean, failures are fun to watch, and successes?

 

Well, I know I'd like to see how TFTD goes when it isn't slaughtering the player.

[kylan]

Are you asking for opnions on the best way to do a recording of an play-through; feedback on what you posted (haven't clicked yet, net is having heart-attack trying to load FA's new AAR), or something else? XD

To be honest, all of the above. :-) I've just finished recording a full length LP, but it turned out to be suspiciously easy. I had plenty of missions (and therefore money) in the first two months which meant that my tech tree was well-developed by the time of the first ship terror (the first difficult mission, imo)*. And it also turned out that the MC resistance of my main squadron of troops was unusually good when the MC stats came in at the end of April. I was thinking that perhaps, from the spectators' point of view, watching a few close missions might be more interesting, or at least suspenseful. Anyway, I might begin by posting the whole thing and then add some miscellaneous missions where things don't go quite as planned.

 

 

 

The thing is, there's quite a bit of editing, as I recorded everything through Dosbox and I have to chop everything up into 10 minute segments and perhaps convert the format (my video editor makes a smudgy mess out of Dosbox's zmbv format).

 

 

 

 

 

* My rules for a TFTD LP stipulate playing some of the more difficult missions. I WILL reload on April 1 to ensure I have a mixed ship terror, and on May 1 for a lobsterman/biodrone ship terror, and on June 1 for an artefact site. Of course, occasionally, I get pwned, which is all part of the fun, but on the LP above, I already had the Sonic tank and thermic lance by Apr 1, which meant I was never really in trouble. I think it would be more interesting, or sadistic, to watch how I fare without these tech.

[balam]

* My rules for a TFTD LP stipulate playing some of the more difficult missions. I WILL reload on April 1 to ensure I have a mixed ship terror, and on May 1 for a lobsterman/biodrone ship terror, and on June 1 for an artefact site. Of course, occasionally, I get pwned, which is all part of the fun, but on the LP above, I already had the Sonic tank and thermic lance by Apr 1, which meant I was never really in trouble. I think it would be more interesting, or sadistic, to watch how I fare without these tech.

 

I assume you load at the start to get a good location as well? And how about the first terror site to get gillman? Unless you do, there is a lot of luck involved in getting enough technology to defeat lobstermen in may and the artefact site in june. You need a good start location, you need a good stream of money (loot), and a live deep one. It may happen but it's quite a rare. If it do happen, then it will be smooth sailing, but just like you mentioned it might not be very fun to watch.

[kylan]

I assume you load at the start to get a good location as well? And how about the first terror site to get gillman? Unless you do, there is a lot of luck involved in getting enough technology to defeat lobstermen in may and the artefact site in june. You need a good start location, you need a good stream of money (loot), and a live deep one. It may happen but it's quite a rare. If it do happen, then it will be smooth sailing, but just like you mentioned it might not be very fun to watch.

It seems that at the start of any campaign, the alien activity usually focuses in a specific funding territory each month. Ideally, you would want to be right in amongst it, or in a neighbouring territory, precisely to snap up as much loot as possible. I don't usually restart because of a lack of activity, because I think there's a number of missions which are set, or 'pre-programmed', to occur near your base, wherever it is. The problem is that the radar you start with, the small sonar, is a piece of junk, and often misses these missions.

 

So I tend to go off the graphs which update alien activity in real time. Some missions, I think, can occur anywhere, others occur near your base.* It so happens that in the Let's Play I've started uploading (see the playlist at https://www.youtube.com/ODTxcom), that the alien's zone of choice in January is the Caribbean, and my base is in the Mediterranean, meaning that I can just about reach the activity there. I don't think I actually manage to shoot anything down, though, and I would've struggled but for the fact that there's quite a bit of activity in the Med towards the end of the month. Most importantly, however, I had a base defence in January; and as per base defences, the aliens brought some pretty big technology with them.

 

Occasionally, you don't get a Gillman/Deep One terror in January, and that can really screw things up.

 

My own personal view is that the Let's Play I've started to upload is pretty uneventful, but it might be useful for someone unfamiliar with the game who is routinely slaughtered. I'm figuring out a series of 'challenge' missions which might be more interesting…

 

 

 

I'm thinking that I should have a best of three match (2 ship terrors & an artefact site) with my ten best troops at the start of June. These ten troops will be unarmoured, and are barred from using MC, though they will already have decent MC defences. Perhaps I might bar them from thermic lance tech., too—undecided. And then, simply, play to the death.

 

 

 

 

 

* e.g. there's definitely always a very small ufo near your base on day 1, & possibly another towards the end of day 3. I'm pretty certain that within the first three weeks you're guaranteed to have both types of small sub (escort and cruiser) land in the vicinity of your base.

[Catwalk]

I burned out a bit trying to make interesting videos of a TFTD campaign, it jinxed my game quite a bit that I had to keep up the pace at all times or edit out a lot of boring decision making time. In the end, I just didn't have much fun with it. If I were to do another run, I might go forum style instead with screenshots and written commentary. Entertaining video commentary and fast paced gameplay is quite an art, one that most aren't blessed with

[Jman4117]

I've been thinking about doing this. Either a UFO Let's Play video series or a TFTD AAR with possible battle videos. Not dealing with all the research bugs and the like with TFTD live, that would be too annoying. Assuming I play on superhuman and only save when the game is changing between exes or when I leave the game, what settings are generally preferred? Such as:

 

1. Game version number. I have the DOS versions of both games and prefer it over CE since it runs much better on my setup. Which version of TFTD would be least annoying research wise?

2. xcomutil settings, I at the very least want the difficulty bug fixed and my troops reequipped each mission. What other settings should be used? I usually play as normal with just the modified craft to make things harder by sending 6 or 10 men on missions with the Skyranger only really used for patrolling and sending guys to the other side of the planet if need be.

3. General game play restrictions. What would be most entertaining?

[silencer_pl]

This reequip function in xcomutil is not that good as it sounds. It remembers soldier equipment layout after the battle not at the beginnig, so you might end up re-equiping crew more than without it.

[Jman4117]

Most I ever have to do is find who has the smoke grenades and the occasional high explosive at the start of the next mission. Much better than rearming Mr. Autocannon and his 4 mags every mission.

[Thorondor]

Time for some thread necromancy I guess...

 

Just stumbled across this cable channel dedicated to games I had no idea was part of the package and they just happened to show a fairly well informed review of Terror From The Deep, of all things, so I searched online and found it on their YT channel.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE_Q0F-nA2M

 

::

 

The video review is something like a year and a half old by now too, but surprisingly not too shabby, so worth a sharing post.

[sp1ke]

Thanks, I for one will take a look. I would rather watch a good LP these days than play through my own campaign. I'm getting lazy I suppose. :-)

[sp1ke]

Wow. A really positive review (they didn't even mention the bugs!). That will get some gamers trying TFTD. I wonder if they will find their way here?