Readers answer XCOM 2’s hardest question: To save-scum or not to save-scum?
Scummers Anonymous
Earlier this week, William Hughes delivered his take on XCOM 2, a significantly meaner sequel to the already kind of mean alien-busting strategy game XCOM: Enemy Unknown. This installment’s difficulty and unpredictability has made the practice of “save-scumming”—where players save their game frequently and retry a scenario at the first sign of shit hitting the fan—even more appealing. Down in the comments, CrabNaga asked readers to reflect on their personal scumming habits:
This review talks about something I feel we’ve all experienced during these games: the decision to save-scum and how scummy you’re willing to be. For those who don’t want to scum, there’s Ironman, but I feel like there should be some middle ground, some way to encourage (or force) players to not rely on saving/loading so much.
How scummy is everyone here? I tend to let things happen as they happen, until a soldier dies. There are some other reload-worthy scenarios: missing a crucial high-percentage shot that means the difference between whether or not a Sectopod will rain hell on your squad’s nethers; moving my Ranger one tile and uncovering a fresh new pod of aliens when I’ve already got five to deal with; running next to an unseen civilian, abruptly ending my concealment when I’ve got two pods about to be ambushed; etc.
There should be an in-game way of weaseling your way out of scenarios like this (at least pre-Ironman), without relying on simply reloading the game. I’m not entirely sure the form that this would take beyond a simple “do-over” button that lets you undo an action or restart the current turn entirely. A “Chrono Trooper” class might be a cool addition for this sort of ability and could have all sorts of other time-manipulating powers.
Duwease described a scummy past and a more accepting present:
I used to be a horrendous save-scummer. The greatest gaming invention of my childhood was the holy duo of quicksave and quickload. When playing the original Doom, I’d save after every firefight and reload anytime I took any damage whatsoever. Yes, it took eons, and yes there were health items scattered liberally across the game, and yes it does turn a fun and frantic first-person shooter into a repetitive grind. I believe that borders on some sort of psychological disorder, but as far as I know, it doesn’t extend into any perfectionism in my actual life. Nowadays, I try and let the chips fall as they may, as there’s beauty in the chaos. The feeling of pulling through by the skin of your teeth in a situation that was completely ass-end-up is one of those feelings that justifies gaming.
That said, I’m not going to redo four-plus hours of anything due to bad luck. I have limits.
For Monkeylint, it’s a matter of time:
I’m the scummiest scum that ever scummed. I’ve become much less precious about my gaming “integrety” in the five years since becoming a father and watching my game-time dwindle to a vanishing point. I don’t have time for Ironman or losses that result in an unwinnable game. I had to abandon my first playthrough of XCOM as I was learning because I didn’t get satellites up fast enough and ended up losing too many countries, and it killed me to have to start over. I will accept serious injuries in XCOM and long recoups and even failed missions, but I will reload any soldier deaths.