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[TempAcc]

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeea, I was kinda typing an answer but just... What? I dont get what neo is even talking about. Both plotlines make it pretty clear that the aliens had a plan and were in control of everything from the start, with the only difference being that instead of hilariously allowing humanity to take a stab at their core structure, like in XCOM EU/EW, they decided they had seen enough and stomped on humanity to continue their overarching goal.

Its not like the ORIGINAL xcom had a plot, like GD said. It was just basically LOL ALIUMS ARE EVIL WE MUS FIGHT THEIR STRANGELY SEGMENTED AND SCALING WAR EFFORTS BECAUSE REASONS.

[Aklyon]

I think neo is just being negative again.

[EnigmaticHat]

Oldcom didn't have a plot, oldcom had a style.

[GiglameshDespair]

Here, I'll copy paste the three 'plot' research you have to do.

Spoiler: Alien origins (click to show/hide)

It is clear that we are fighting a losing battle on Earth. The Alien hordes are overwhelming in number. The best we can do is slow down their progress. The only hope for humanity is to tackle the aliens at their source. Our research seems to indicate a nearby base of operations within our solar system. Aliens indicate this place to be the centre of an ancient civilisation that pre-dates Human history. We must locate this place as soon as possible. However we need to capture and interrogate an Alien Leader to gain more detailed information. The larger UFOs probably contain at least one Alien Leader.

Spoiler: The Martian Solution (click to show/hide)

Our research now points to Mars as the base of Alien operations. The base is well hidden, and contains all the manufacturing and cloning facilities to fuel the infiltration of earth. It also seems to contain a controlling computer of some kind that controls the whole operation. It seems that the hive-like Alien society has some kind of 'Queen Bee'. This is their fundamental weakness - if we can eliminate the 'Brain' then the body will die. We must step up our research efforts before it is too late. In order to progress we must capture the highest ranking Aliens - the Commanders - which only reside in Alien Bases.

Spoiler: Cydonia or bust (click to show/hide)

It is now clear that the Alien hordes are being controlled from an underground base in Cydonia - which is an unusual area of Mars featuring five-sided pyramids and a large formation resembling a human face. Cydonian civilisation once flourished on Mars many millions of years ago, but we do not know why it died out, or what the connection is with the latest Alien activity there. Whatever the explanation, we must send an expedition to Cydonia. This is the only way that we can defeat the aliens. We must destroy the controlling master 'Brain'. We will need an Avenger craft equipped with the most awesome destructive power at our disposal. There is nothing more we can learn here - we must await the outcome of the Cydonian assault.

Look at all that plot.

[Neonivek]

Its not like the ORIGINAL xcom had a plot, like GD said. It was just basically LOL ALIUMS ARE EVIL WE MUS FIGHT THEIR STRANGELY SEGMENTED AND SCALING WAR EFFORTS BECAUSE REASONS.

It is because you were basically fighting an Alien armada on their last leg. They are using a outpost to recover and are basically doing a multi-stage attack, some of which had a pretty good chance of succeeding if it wasn't for the Xcom. Before basically going balls to the wall and going all out.

Versus new Xcom where the aliens are doing a multi-stage attack, all of which has a pretty good chance of failing miserably... good thing Xcom was there.

Which is actually kind of funny... In the original the earth was doomed but thank goodness for the Xcom.

In the new one... The alien's plans were DOOMED but thank goodness for the Xcom.

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeea, I was kinda typing an answer but just... What?

It is a simple plausible possibility. when shooting down the plane, the ONE creature who absolutely needed to survive... could have just died in the crash immediately ruining the alien's plans.

It was probably one of the biggest issues I found with the story was that in the end the gambit relied on such not only serendipitous luck EVEN WITH them manipulating things from the background... But required such excessive overwhelming success on the human's side to even succeed remotely... and in the end their plan, when successful, basically dooms them in a very predictable way.

It would have actually been a better story had they never given a story and never even hinted at there being a larger plot. Which is the issue, the plot they gave us was worse then not giving any at all.

[TempAcc]

Oldcom didn't have a plot, oldcom had a style.

This is true. I remember that the first thing that attracted me to XCOM was the weird saturday morning cartoon aesthetic it had, and also the guile haircut. After that the gameplay took over in hooking me. Also mutons being schwarznegger in a purple/green jumpsuit.

[Neonivek]

I actually think Xcom 2 does basically life saving surgery to the plot.

This actually makes a bit more sense all in all... and the aliens aren't working against themselves.

I mean everything makes sense. Even the alien units are basically built to be more pleasing to humans (In a sort of "I don't QUITE think you understand humans" sort of way which makes sense for aliens).

As long as it isn't revealed that they are taking control of the entire earth to test its population, I think this story is much better.

Then being more advanced now then before... is a minor gripe but all in all it is more cohesive.

[GiglameshDespair]

It is because you were basically fighting an Alien armada on their last leg. They are using a outpost to recover and are basically doing a multi-stage attack, some of which had a pretty good chance of succeeding if it wasn't for the Xcom. Before basically going balls to the wall and going all out.

Baseless. Nowhere in the game is anything like that mentioned.

Versus new Xcom where the aliens are doing a multi-stage attack, all of which has a pretty good chance of failing miserably... good thing Xcom was there.

Which is actually kind of funny... In the original the earth was doomed but thank goodness for the Xcom.

In the new one... The alien's plans were DOOMED but thank goodness for the Xcom.

It is explicitly stated that the aliens in nucom weren't doing an all-out attack... they're not trying to destroy or straight-out conquer humanity. If XCom wasn't present, then they simply would have moved on to a different plan, i.e something like XCOM 2.

The information about the alien's motives and origins in X-Com: the aliens have a base on Mars in Cydonia (cunningly hidden beneath the huge face and pyramids, where no one would possibly look). The aliens are part of an interstellar empire (from the loss screen). If you lose, humanity is exterminated, Earth is rekt'd, and the survivors are mutated slaves. The end.

It is a simple plausible possibility. when shooting down the plane, the ONE creature who absolutely needed to survive... could have just died in the crash immediately ruining the alien's plans.

Still not really making sense here.

If you're talking about shooting down the overseer ships to grab an Ethereal, there's ways they can help protect the Ethereal... or you know, try until it sticks. The Ethereals are pretty tough, with their psionics, and it's not like the crew don't have a solid chance of surving a crash. If sectoids can do it, Ethereals can.

It's not like one setback completely unravels the aliens plans now and forever.

[Rolan7]

I dunno, the alien plot in NewCOM 1 seems fine to me.  But then, I don't assume that the aliens had limitless resources, or needed XCOM to win.  I think they had limited but advanced resources, and just needed human DNA.  But XCOM kicked their ass...  Or, as it turns out, didn't.

Basically the Uber Ethereal was trying a desperate gambit.  But not straight up lying - they did want us.  They just didn't mean to wake us up (psionically) except in their labs.

* Abduct primitive hu-mans with expendable vat-grown scouts who still overcome all police and government forces.
* Oh what, this special forces team is confounding a portion of our efforts.  Good thing all our weapons explode.
* Huh, lost some scout ships.
* ...They're doing *what* with the alloys?  And they're figuring out elerium??
* Gloves come off, send in the cryssalids.  The funding governments will collapse in anarchy.  Loss of guinea pigs... unfortunate, but acceptable.
* Uh oh, that didn't work.  Start mobilizing the honor guard (mutons) for ground assaults, rejects (floaters) first
* Uh oh, they found our base and *somehow reverse-engineered the key*.  Commander down.
* Uh oh, the honor guard isn't stopping them, particularly since they've somehow reverse engineered our weapons.  IN A CAVE!  FROM SPARE PARTS!
* We'll just go down ourselves - Oh FUCK they're AWAKE
* And they built a bizarre McGuffin which beat our cloaking technology by hacking our psyberspace or some shit
* ... Maybe they'll negotiate?
* X_X

Is there a reason so many people seem sure that the EU aliens were "losing" on purpose?
I know Shen says it at one point... In like month two!  He has no idea!  All he knows is that their tech is strong, he has no idea what their resources are.  And he's pretty much instantly proved wrong since the aliens begin total war through terror missions.

Of course the aliens could just orbitally bombard and "win", but:
1: The game is about ground tactics, air and space support are bizarrely lacking on both sides
2: Maybe they don't want to wreck the planet with all their precious samples on it.

[Neonivek]

It is explicitly stated that the aliens in nucom weren't doing an all-out attack... they're not trying to destroy or straight-out conquer humanity.

Yes I know NuCom's story. I know they were trying to challenge humanity in order to force them to evolve and unlock their potential.

Yet their plans had so many ways it could have just failed and only succeeded because the Xcom had the bad assest commander ever born.

The information about the alien's motives and origins in X-Com: the aliens have a base on Mars in Cydonia (cunningly hidden beneath the huge face and pyramids, where no one would possibly look). The aliens are part of an interstellar empire (from the loss screen). If you lose, humanity is exterminated, Earth is rekt'd, and the survivors are mutated slaves. The end.

There is a bit more then that. Mars as you find out has a large source of basically fuel. They didn't have a fuel for an all out attack, hence their staged attack.

It's not like one setback completely unravels the aliens plans now and forever.

It is a pretty big setback... and one of many.

Just play the game and think to yourself how many things have to go right on missions for you to win... How many ways you can just outright lose.

Basically the Uber Ethereal was trying a desperate gambit.  But not straight up lying - they did want us.  They just didn't mean to wake us up (psionically) except in their labs.

Well not exactly. They did want us to "wake up" psionically. But they thought we would be at least on par with the Sectoid commanders. Yet when we finally unlocked our full potential we proved to have abilities far surpassing even their own.

[Rolan7]

They unlocked psi-powers in those three abductees, though, in their labs.  Before XCOM gets psi powers.  So they didn't need XCOM to develop psi - in fact, XCOM's psi is far weaker than what the abductees were able to do.

In XCOM2, humanity never even awoke psionically.  The aliens clearly didn't need us to.  I still think the goal of the terror attacks, like the XCOM base assault, was to destroy XCOM...  And that's what XCOM 2 is the result of.

[Execute/Dumbo.exe]

Well, the 'Chosen One' needed a specialised Psi Suit just to be capable of a full offensive Psionic power which I'm...
*Googles*
Pretty sure Etherals could use from the start, and Psi Lance as a basic attack, and then they depended on Psi Powers to survive, I mean, if they couldn't use Psionics they probably wouldn't be able to move.

[Culise]

I dunno, the alien plot in NewCOM 1 seems fine to me.  But then, I don't assume that the aliens had limitless resources, or needed XCOM to win.  I think they had limited but advanced resources, and just needed human DNA.  But XCOM kicked their ass...  Or, as it turns out, didn't.

Basically the Uber Ethereal was trying a desperate gambit.  But not straight up lying - they did want us.  They just didn't mean to wake us up (psionically) except in their labs.

* Abduct primitive hu-mans with expendable vat-grown scouts who still overcome all police and government forces.
* Oh what, this special forces team is confounding a portion of our efforts.  Good thing all our weapons explode.
* Huh, lost some scout ships.
* ...They're doing *what* with the alloys?  And they're figuring out elerium??
* Gloves come off, send in the cryssalids.  The funding governments will collapse in anarchy.  Loss of guinea pigs... unfortunate, but acceptable.
* Uh oh, that didn't work.  Start mobilizing the honor guard (mutons) for ground assaults, rejects (floaters) first
* Uh oh, they found our base and *somehow reverse-engineered the key*.  Commander down.
* Uh oh, the honor guard isn't stopping them, particularly since they've somehow reverse engineered our weapons.  IN A CAVE!  FROM SPARE PARTS!
* We'll just go down ourselves - Oh FUCK they're AWAKE
* And they built a bizarre McGuffin which beat our cloaking technology by hacking our psyberspace or some shit
* ... Maybe they'll negotiate?
* X_X

Is there a reason so many people seem sure that the EU aliens were "losing" on purpose?
I know Shen says it at one point... In like month two!  He has no idea!  All he knows is that their tech is strong, he has no idea what their resources are.  And he's pretty much instantly proved wrong since the aliens begin total war through terror missions.

Of course the aliens could just orbitally bombard and "win", but:
1: The game is about ground tactics, air and space support are bizarrely lacking on both sides
2: Maybe they don't want to wreck the planet with all their precious samples on it.

The reason for the notion on the aliens holding back is probably because of the statements by said aliens - truthful or otherwise - that the entire conflict was a test of humanity's potential.  Basically, they figure on how strong humanity is, and by extension its genetic potential for uplift as a new project and inclusion into their existing projects, based on how many of their own "tiers" the humans can overcome.  As such, humanity basically defeats one menace after another, they simply step up to the next challenge to determine if this is humanity's limit, or if humanity is still capable of more.  Needless to say, as humanity continues to beat one challenge after another, the Ethereals get more excited, but once XCOM constructs the Gollup Chamber and rings their front door bell, they get worried; after all, they're all out of challenges to pose, short of themselves.  This is largely based not only on Shen's speculation, but also on the systematic level design and narration of the Temple Ship assault.  This is all speculation, though, as much as Neon's inferences on OldCom's aliens are.  Indeed, it could be an underestimation of the threat as you outline, or else something entirely (such as a lack of capability: maybe the Temple Ship and its Ethereal crew is all they have when they first arrive in-system, so they start cloning Sectoids from their gene banks and building light craft first since these are the fastest way to get a strike force on the surface, then move up to cloning more complex creatures and building more advanced craft and robots as they get successive production facilities online and as the human threat becomes more apparent, apropos of Xenonauts and your own statements on limited resources).

The thing is that terror missions still aren't really total war, not to the degree that total war is fought between humans.  If they were fighting a total war and they had their resources from the get-go, they would have simply dropped battleships over each major city, reduced them, and moved on to the next without ever setting down, as in Independence Day (only without a Mac-powered virus to save the day).  Alternately, they could have picked a few convenient Earth-grazer asteroids, redirected them to ensure impact on the appropriate time frame, stuck a cloaking device similar to the one on their Temple Ship on each one, and watched the fireworks as invisible dinosaur-killers started rocketing in a few months or years later, then come in to present themselves as saviors to the survivors, who they would then use as their genetic stock.  As such, either they weren't fighting at full strength or their full strength was much, much less than could be determined, and they had to have a reason to challenge the humans directly rather than taking the indirect approach (even if it's just to preserve Earth's biosphere, given their emphasis on genetic uplift and manipulation), instead of taking a total war approach or even simply stealing a statistically-significant sample of humans here or there and then vanishing.  Which is pretty much what you say. 

[Neonivek]

Well not just a test on its own but a test that "levels up humanity". That potential could only be unleashed when tested in such a manner.

At least that is what I got from the ending speech.

As for amplification. To my knowledge the other psychic aliens are amplified in their own way.

[Rolan7]

Thanks Culise, I didn't really interpret the Temple Ship mission as a metaphor for the war...  But in retrospect it really looks like one.  I still suspect that the Ethereal was attempting last-minute diplomacy, but I better understand why people wouldn't.

I thought the Ethereal was basically just saying "We were trying to build a perfect being, and you have that potential.  If you don't kill us, we'll unlock that potential.

@Neonivek I guess that would explain why they drop so much meld, and the slow buildup of forces.  Still, they seem more than happy to win, particularly considering XCOM2.