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XCOMUFO & Xenocide

300,000+ Words Fanfiction.


Sabin

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If a person got used to it, he or she would probably find that it is quite useful, due to a number of advantages computer-based reading matierial has. In my case, I can eat, drink, read, and listen to music with sufficient capability. You can also bookmark the chapters if need be, for later reading.
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yeah, i read it like half a year ago, or somthing. It was really really sad when the pilot dies on the moon, and th commander choce to be left on mars....sob sob...
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  • 3 months later...
Well I'm going through it now. I'll let you know when I'm done. And yes you do have to allow for spelling and grammar errors. I downloaded it to my machine, stuck it in Word and arranged it in 3collumn format to make it easier to read. The only annoying part is scrolling up for the next collumn but that aint to bad.
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I still have it. However, I can't think if I want to kill off my main character or not. Also, I'm going to expand its perspective so it includes what the civies and aliens are thinking. Also, there are police/national guard in my terrorsites! :)
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Hopefully before, most likely once version 2 hits the shelves. :)

 

I'll do up a lil teaser for you guys sometime soon. :)

hits the shelves? :D We going commercial at one point then! :wink:

 

Anyway I'll be sure to read that story when I got some free time!

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Hey, do you guys think I should include chryssalids in the teaser? Or rather save them for the full story? :)

eh, probably save them for the full, the name itself brings trouble, so i think you should wait until the full story before bringing one in/killing half the team :P

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  • 3 weeks later...

Okay I read it. I won't fault the guy because English is appearantly not his first language; good effort considering.

 

If he wrote this story based on a particular game he played I'd say it was one played on the lowest difficulty and before he became proficient at the game. Sectoids show up right away, Floaters a couple months later, snakemen in the summer, Mutons the followiing winter-or-so and Etherials 1/2 to 1 year after that. In all this time he only loses 6 countries (1 doesn't count). Although, the decision to sell stuff comes after months making me think the story described an "early" game, not to mension he finally defeats the aliens in March of 2002. His description of the Japanese base shows poor design for repelling invasions yet in the story they brush aside a muton invasion when mutons are "new". He arms his Firestorms with one plasma and one fusion ball; do YOU do that?

 

His explanation to account for selling aliens stuff in a world where alines are supposed to be kept secret is pretty good; specifically the swiss bank thing; I liked that. In fact the whole selling stuff/financing thing was good, he even followed some of its implications which I liked. I liked his whole description of Elerium, it followed many of the ideas I had when we discussed this in the workshops for Xenocide. The use of the gravshield was done well also.

 

For plotting purposes I saw no reason to have the 3rd secret society that the pilot runs into at the end; why are they in the story? I assume they are different than the one discovered in Nevada and the one with the 12 members. Also the mysterious savior at the Antarctic base, who was that? Was that an Aquanaut from the future; what? I felt the story didn't follow the game close enough. Xcom wasn't really all that secret. Everyone knew where their bases were. The aliens had mixed crews. The aircraft weapon were misnamed (where were the avalanche and stingrays?). Many transports showed up at sites (15 Avangers go to Mars?, what?). Other nations continued to battle the aliens in spite of their Xcom membership, using their airforces not just containing sites on the ground. The implications of Psionic use didn't jive with the game either. Whereas I can understand why he introduced Laser weapons the way he did, as a way to follow the game. The introduction of Psionics did not follow the game.

 

Overall, if you are a fan of Xcom you will like the story though; I did.

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  • 1 month later...

Well this is certinly a well writen story. Its very long and boring in the begining but it picks up and the author does a very nice job of describing the first encounter. I have written my own short x com story (much shorter then this) and found one similarity to be almost scarry. This paragraph...

 

%%

"Johnson took off his night vision goggles and looked. There was an almost undistinguishable rectangle that seemed to form a door. “And how do we opened it now?” he asked.

 

“Well, what if we give it a push?” The Delta squad man pushed the door and it suddenly moved upwards, disappearing into the fuselage of the craft. The motion surprised him and he never had time to reach to the energy discharges that came out from the opening. Johnson only saw his torso disappear under a green light. The trooper’s arms, shoulders, neck and head fell down on the water, still holding the heavy cannon. After a moment his legs, which were still standing up, dropped on the swamp and joined them. Johnson immediately reached for a grenade, pulled the pin and threw it to the inside of craft before the door had completely closed. A muffled explosion was heard minutes later coming from the inside of the UFO."

%%

 

It is almost identical to what I have written in my story. I am not accusing anyone one of copying my work LOL that would be ridicluous. I just found it interesting that 2 completly different people have had almost exactly the same idea. I think were all a little bit alike in this crazy X-Com world.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Not surprising, every person who has played the game has had EXACTLY that experience (several times) when assaulting the medium scout.

 

At any rate I've been making notes for a fiction myself; came up with a really great expalnation for something today.

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As I sated in the other forum, a series that follows the x-com plot/theme should be written.

 

Not a cheap, piece of crap write a quick page for the next story series.

 

An indepth, developed story that gives the reader the feel that they are almost playing the game.

 

I think (although ive never done such a thing before), that this should have two writers... ahem, you and Stewart?

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Nothing personal but nah. I think people would prefer to write fiction on their own, at least I would. BTW I think I'm gonna toss out most of the UFO "lore" in mine. Why rehash it. In the 300 k-word story the guy touches on every theory you can think of so I'm thinking "it's been done, why should I". I think in mine Rosewell /might/ just be a weather balloon afterall.
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Well that long story attempts to explain everything about the game and tried to put it in a realistic mannor that people could believe. It did a decent job but you have to remember one thing, x-com was a game and the very facts of 6 man squads and such vs an alien invasion are too un-realistic to begin with.

 

I think you should give your own imput on the UFOs, much of it will be old news, but im sure you can come up with something new and intersting. True X-COM fans will appreciate it if you follow the UFOpedia info, adding only small bits and pieces that make it unique.

 

besides, how are you gonna write a 300k word story w/out using all that good material?

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  • 3 months later...
Okay I read it.  I won't fault the guy because English is appearantly not his first language (...)

Overall, if you are a fan of Xcom you will like the story though; I did.

Well, I'm glad you did enjoy it. And yes, my first language isn't English. :)

It was funny to discover this thread about my fanfic and read comments. Always good to get some feedback :wink:

 

I had been playing UFO for years when I discovered and read some X-COM fanfic. Since UFO is my favorite game, I wanted to write something big, not only a short story. For that I decided to stick to the official timeline and since it says that the war went from 1999 to 2002, I needed to have enough material to span over three years. That's why Ethereals only appear two years gone by since the start of the war and why research takes so long.

It also seemed that it would be more realistic. I remember reading back then in a post where someone complained that it would impossible to construct an UFO from scratch in 6 months using reverse engineering. Accordingly, I tried to split it up as much as possible.

Many of my decisions concerning certain elements on the plot that differ from the game also come from the difference between reality and the game. Usually no one arms Firestorms with Fusion Launchers because it's a waste (too much Elerium, the interceptor will be blown out from the sky by a Battleship). But the fanfic is written much in the perspective of a new player on the game, who would make mistakes.

Likewise, it's impossible to have several X-COM craft landing on the game, but in real life that's what would make sense. Even if you have a top secret organization you don't send 14 soldiers to deal with 30 aliens, you send 100 soldiers, plus all kind of support.

Sometimes I call the fanfic "what's happening on Earth while you're waiting on Geoscape for the next UFO to appear", since there isn't much happening on the game at those times. It would be too simplistic to reduce things to country X defected to the aliens, so I tried to innovate a bit. Overall, like I said, I tried to mix both aspects of the game (the guy being blown away when entering the Medium Scout) with more realistic military and international aspects (using real missiles instead the game ones, countries trying to fight the aliens by themselves), like NickJones said.

 

Well, to end this post, I'll give you a hint concerning who was that mysterious savior on Antarctica. At the end of Chapter 16, Johnson calls 'something' a 'Rambo robot'. As for the secret 12 member council, to explain it would take another post nearly as long as this one.

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and why'd you throw in those moon-nazi's?

Here we go....long post ahead

 

If you read about Majestic-12, you might have read about the theories considering how Nazi Germany planned to continue the fighting from Antarctica at the end of WW2, or even that they built their own UFOs (which would explain the actual reports of allied pilots of Foo Fighters). It's more or like what happens in the fic, a Nazi scientist knows about Hitler's secret plans but he's captured by the Allies and recruit to work at the crash site on Roswell. When he sees the UFO he first thinks that it's one of the German UFOs but then he realizes that it has a completely different origin.

The scenes right after the end of WW2 are basically glimpses of how the Group (aka Majestic 12) started. A few people knew about the aliens and what they wanted. So they made a deal with the Sectoids, but they were smart enough not to trust the aliens, and each one possessed its particular fiefdom. And the Moon Nazis are one of these groups, led by number Three, which is the son of the scientist above mentioned.

You don't read about this on the fanfic because I originally didn't intend to explain it, since I had decided to write a second novel based on TFTD, where I will (I hope!) reveal a couple of things left open at the end of the fanfic.

It can be argued that this particular plotline is completely outside of X-COM and that it is vague and confusing. To that I say that the original game designers had stuff like MIBs that never made it into the game, and also that this is my way of looking at X-COM, adding a bit of mystery, plus trying to give a different perspective.

 

Hope this clarifies some aspects (Most likely it didn't :blink: )

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  • 4 weeks later...

Did you write the fic by starting on page one and writing to the end or did you do it some other way. I've heard it said the some writers begin with the climax and write "outwards" from there.

 

BTW when I was kid (in the 70s) I was into UFOs, Von Danken, etc. In all the literature I read there was no mension of Roswell. Indeed UFO were first mensioned in 1947 but in this case it was by some guy (I believe the fellow who coined the term "flying Saucer") flying his piper cub near mount rainer in washington state; he claimed to have seen a flight of 7 UFOs. I never heard of rosewell until the early 90's.

 

As for MIBs I recall hearing about those at about the same time. At that time however they were described as Asian in appearance (if you'll pardon the pun "Secret Asian Man" :rolleyes: ). I liked how X-Files turned them into a US Govt agency but that didnt match the original description. BTW the SS or as the germans now call them the ß, were described as "Men in Black" although orignially as Men in Brown but still MIB (in english at any rate). On the other hand so was Johnny Cash and the guy from the Prices Bride. :rolleyes:

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Chapter One was the first I wrote and then I proceeded from there in a somewhat straight fashion. At the same time I got halfway I started writing the Cydonia assault since by then I had already figured out how the plot would unfold. Curiously, the Prologue was the last item to be written.

But on Abyssal I've been using the technique you described. I have written the very end of it right at the beginning, even if I've only done 9 chapters so far of the planned 25. I guess it depends on your inspiration.

 

I also read some UFO literature when I was a kid and I remember that it didn't say a word about Roswell or the MIBs back then. It was only when I started using the Internet years ago that I read about both subjects. I had no idea that the SS were called Men In Black (I actually think that it must be black rather than brown - the SS uniform was black, while the SA's was brown).

From reading UFO literature I got the feeling that the whole Roswell matter was simply kept quiet during the 60's and 70's (or that everyone's mind was thinking on more earthly affairs back then). That wouldn't surprise me too much: I don't know if you ever read about the RAF Bentwaters sighting but the official reports have only been released 20 years afterwards, confirming what eye witnesses saw.

 

Have you ever read 'Above Top Secret' by Timothy Good? Quite a good reading if you're still interested on the UFO matter. Some of the material on it is quite exagerated (he was the one who first wrote about Bob Lazar's claims about Area 51 and E-115 Elerium). Somehow I suspect that the X-COM creators had the book next to them when they were writing the game ^_^

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Quite a bit of the story occurs around the Soviet "Laser Defense" complex. Were you aware of the theories from the late 70s and early 80s that the USSR had such an installation? IIRC in your story the installation is in European Russia; according to the "stories" back then the "gun" was supposed to be in the city of Semipalatinsk in easter Kjazakstan.
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Yup, I had that in mind when I wrote that part of the story. The Soviets did some research on ABM (anti-ballistic missiles) and ASAT (anti-satellite) technology back then. It was thought back then that they actually developed a laser that was suspected to be able to 'blind' satellites. It was discovered later that they weren't even close. The facility was called Sary Sagan or something like that but I decided to place it somewhere in Siberia. A couple of months ago I even had a Russian guy complaining about the name I gave it, saying that it wasn't correct in Russian :)
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  • 2 months later...
Well I just finished reading "The Unknown Menace" today and I must say it was a very good read, I'm impressed. Well done!

 

Oh and by the way, your "fanfiction" links on your site don't work anymore!

 

Indeed...the ff.net site has been changed. I've fixed the links now. Thanks for the notice and the review. :)

 

EDIT: Btw, who was your favorite character?

Edited by Hobbes
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I have the Unknown Menace, haven't had much time to read though, heard its pretty good!

 

Well it is long and most of it is unedited, which added to the fact that english is not my first language means that sometimes the grammar can be lousy.

I need to find more time to work on my fanfics *sigh*

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I've not read this whole thread because I don't want spoilers, I saw xcommand had not the complete story and asking for that matter j'ordos sent me here and I've gladly found it is complete in fanfiction.net. Great!

I like it much, knowing the author isn't a natural english speaker I forget any misplelling. The story catched me, it's very interesting and well developed.

Maybe some times I see some typical fail as you can see in some films: like that of someone (Mr Chevereaux) talking any thing, and then Ms Johannes "What did you say? repeat, oh! that's the solution". Or that other time when there is a section with "scientific theory" and "Einstein no more valid"... I think the main fail in scifi films is when they come to explain theories and technology, I think they would get a lot better if forget explanations and get into the story.

Anyway, besides those two things and a couple of errors which seem those dangers for the amateur writer, I see Mr Galvão avoid the most of those dangers and achieves a story very very well told, like a professional would do.

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Anyway, besides those two things and a couple of errors which seem those dangers for the amateur writer, I see Mr Galvão avoid the most of those dangers and achieves a story very very well told, like a professional would do.

 

Yes, I completely agree with you on how magical solutions for a problem falling off the sky to resolve narrative problems should be avoided. But you need also some explanation for the technological aspects of the story, especially if they affect the narrative in some sort, although you don't have to make it too descriptive.

One of my problems when I wrote the fic was how to explain that Earth managed to replicate the alien technology in such a short notice, like building its own UFOs after 1 year. One thing that helped was the existence of the secret Group, which was conducting its own experiments and for the rest I mostly relied on 'inspirational moments'. It might not be creative at all but it was better than having the technology simply coming out of the labs without any explanation of how 100 scientists managed to research UFO Construction in one month. You could do it that way, but one of the things about XCom that I wanted to keep on my story was the scientific breakthroughs brought discovered by humans. It shows a bit of human ingenuity (something that seems to separate humans from the aliens) and also how freeing your mind can make your dreams happen. The best example of this is Chevereux: he is completely skeptic about UFOs until he's shown a dead alien, then his only goal is for mankind to reach the stars.

 

Well, thanks for the comments and sorry for the long post (I hope I managed to avoid giving away any spoilers. :)

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Yeah, I understand that. In fact I'm not talking about all the scientific things.

I had to be more precise, that's one error I get too many times, I say something forgetting that if I don't say more what I've said is not only incomplete, but also that it can have a slight different meaning.

So this time, I wrote as if the scientific explanations I was talking about as error were every scientific narration. Actually, that's one of the best things I've found in your story: the 99% of the times you put the scientific discussion is done so smoothly and well integrated in the story I read it without thinking "hey this are explanations that are the most common problem in sci-fi films". That thing about explanations is true for every sci-fi movie explanation I've seen: they usually get too much chit-chat.

There is my error: I stated that as general fact in all sci-fi movies I've seen, but I forgot to tell that statement was about films, not your story. That's not your case, because of what you quite right have answered, you get the research part very very well, I'd say hollywood's scriptwriters should read your story to learn how scientific explanations should be used.. I only found two moments: that of the "what did you say repeat?", which is something I'm tired of hearing in films, but I think is not an objective error, but just a subjective one due to my tiring of watching the scene; and one part in a chapter I don't remember now which one was it, that I thought you got too long (I'll see which later).

Greetings.

 

P.S. -

I like it much, knowing the author isn't a natural english speaker I forget any misplelling.

Huh? Why I wrote that? Well, there are some typewritting errors, but I don't see the sense for that phrase. Delete it.

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Like you said there's a difference between books and movies so there really can't be a comparison between them. If I wrote a movie script most likely the producer/director would tell me that 3/4 were useless stuff and that I should ditch it.

But I still think you have a point about the scientific explanations and the possible risks (overextending, presenting everything as a moment of inspiration and so forth). At least your mention has made me rethink the way I have been presenting the technologies on the unfinished novel about TFTD, Abyssal. :)

 

P.S. -
I like it much, knowing the author isn't a natural english speaker I forget any misplelling.

Huh? Why I wrote that? Well, there are some typewritting errors, but I don't see the sense for that phrase. Delete it.

 

I think I got it, though. Replace forget with forgive. Was that what you wanted to say? :)

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Even with forgive would be wrong. There are some typewriting errors, that has nothing to do with being english speaker or not. I've not catched more than two or three of "english use errors", so I can't say that (maybe there are more but I'm neither english speaker, so...) I think someone who said that and I read is a sectoid hybrid. :aliencool: and I have a low Psi strenght :crying:
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  • 2 weeks later...
You mean the two month separation between the two chapters is puzzling? Well, in the plot nothing relevant happens during that period (with the exception of the launch of the mission to Cydonia and the travel to Mars) so I decided to skip the story to right before the attack. If you look careful at other chapters sometimes the temporal jump is even bigger.
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¡Porras! Puzzling was not the right word, then.

I thought so, there was things that pointed that. I ask because although it's a very wise thing, I got a bit surprised by it.

I noticed there were some longer separations, but even if I have seen your work is full of good things, this had a, saying this way, so 'risky' doing, that I wondered whether you (where 'you' means 'generic fan writer', since I don't know you) would dare to do it. And I'm very glad you did. That's really brilliant, and expectable from the rest of your story.

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hobbes, anyway to DL your story? I wanna try to resize it so I can print that baby out...

 

Sorry not at the moment. I've never even printed it all myself because of its size. But fanfiction.net (the site where they are hosted) allows you to change the text size, you might try to see if you get decent results that. Even so, you might have to print 600-900 pages, depending on the lettering.

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