So X Rebirth is getting patch 4.21in beta today. Nothing super game-changing that I can see, but it adds a couple of new things, changes others, and some bug fixes. Changelog can be found here.
I cannot believe they never released a patch to fix the Terran sectors of X3AP. The nearest solar plant to the warzone is in Saturn and like 200km, literally off the map. Even at 10x SETA it takes forever to get anywhere, partially because the AI decides to set you to 100m/s while you waddle through the map for no reason. And that's provided the AI hasn't started deleting large swaths of the stations because even the AI traders don't want to put up with this crap.
I'm guessing the team that worked on X3 and X3:AP didn't have as much overlap as they would have liked.
... Then I realize the people who made these design decisions went on to make X-Rebirth, and it all makes sense ...
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Sir CarcassI have been shown the end of my worldRound Rock, TXRegistered Userregular
RESEARCH Research new technologies like TELEPORTATION from an ancient Terran installation.
Since Teleporters were available to every race in X3AP... I'm calling it now. X4 takes place centuries later. It's the easiest way to make a clean break.
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AxenMy avatar is Excalibur.Yes, the sword.Registered Userregular
edited September 2017
I gathered the bullet points for easy digestion.
Freedom to personally fly all ships:
X4 will allow you to fly all ships personally. From small scouts over a wide range of ship classes up to the biggest carrier, everything can be piloted from the cockpit or an external view. Additionally some drones and utility vehicles in X4 can be remotely controlled by the player.
A big focus in the development of X4 has been to achieve a seamless and immersive experience when moving between ships. You can leave a ship, climb down a ladder, walk over the dock of a large space station into another ship you may have parked there and replace the pilot that was working for you just by clicking on his chair.
Modular stations and ship upgrades:
Building space stations and factories has always been a foundation of the X games. After gaining enough money through fighting or trading, most players want to establish their own economy and start influencing the universe on a larger scale. In X4, it is now possible to be completely free and creative. Stations can be constructed from a variety of modules, be it production modules, living sections, docks or many other types of parts. The powerful new map system allows you to drag and connect modules using a connection system to design your own unique creations.
Ships also offer a variety of upgrades. Engines, weapons and other equipment can be added in a graphical editor and actually seen on the ship.
Most dynamic X universe ever:
X4 will be the first X game to allow our races and factions to freely build and expand their empires; the same flexibility the player enjoys in creatively designing space stations from modular building blocks is also available to them. Races expand their empire based on supply and demand, which leads to an extremely dynamic universe where every action the player makes can influence the course of the entire universe.
Managing your empire with a powerful map:
Once you have more ships and many NPCs working for you as pilots, crew or station managers, the map will be your preferred method of managing it all. Ships can be ordered with simple clicks and through drag-and-drop operations to set their future path and commands.
Graphically plan your trade routes, coordinate attacks with your entire fleet, manage the hierarchy or send ships on remote exploration missions.
Most detailed X economy ever:
One of the key selling points of X games has always been the realistic, simulated economy. Wares produced by hundreds of stations and transported by thousands of ships are actually traded by NPCs and prices develop based on this simulated economy. This is the foundation of our living and breathing universe. Now with X4, we have taken another, massive step. For the first time in any X game, all parts of the NPC economy are manufactured from resources. Ships, weapons, upgrades, ammo and even stations. You name it. Everything comes out of the simulated economy.
Research and Teleportation:
The seamless change from ship to ship and from NPCs controlling your empire for you continues on a higher level. Once you own a larger fleet, you will be very interested in researching a technology from your HQ: Teleportation. Once you've unlocked teleportation, you can jump from ship to ship a lot quicker and experience all the critical situations your NPCs encounter first hand.
Every order you have given to a ship before turns into a mission objective when you pilot the ship yourself. The moment you leave again, your pilot takes the helm and continues with their previous orders.
Get into the game:
In X4, you can start your journey from a number of different gamestarts and as a number of different characters, each with their own role, set of relationships and different ships and technologies to start with. No matter how you start, you are always free to develop in any other direction. Focus on exploration, make money with illegal trading and theft, command large battle fleets or become the greatest entrepreneur ever. It's all up to you to decide.
Color me optimistic I suppose. I mean Rebirth was garbage, but they had three other games that weren't so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt for X4. (Besides Rebirth was an aborted Xbox game).
Axen on
A Capellan's favorite sheath for any blade is your back.
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Sir CarcassI have been shown the end of my worldRound Rock, TXRegistered Userregular
Yeah, it's not a day one purchase for me, but it's definitely a "hope it's good and then buy it if it is".
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DrakeEdgelord TrashBelow the ecliptic plane.Registered Userregular
I wonder how well X4 will sell after all the good will they burned. I'm sure they'll always have an audience due to the niche aspect of their games but people were pissed about the quality of Rebirth at launch.
"I see everything twice!"
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DrakeEdgelord TrashBelow the ecliptic plane.Registered Userregular
People have been pissed about the quality of every X game released, except for the standalone expansions that come out for every mainline game, going all the way back to X: Beyond the Frontier.
X3 just happened to come out at the right time, and then they released two standalone expansions that further improved on the base game. But if you go back and look at the opinions generated when X3 launched, you'll see that people were super unhappy about practically every aspect of the game.
This is just how Egosoft does things. There hasn't ever been a lot of goodwill for the series to start with, they were just about the only game in town during X3's lifespan. I think maybe some fans thought they'd moved past this with Terran Assault and Albion Prelude, but those games were solid because there were iterating on the same concepts in the same engine.
I guarantee you X4 will be a flaming wreck on launch and we'll get a new chorus of Never Again. And after a few years of post launch support the game will be flawed but fun. Just like every other game in the series.
Yeah, it's not a day one purchase for me, but it's definitely a "hope it's good and then buy it if it is".
Day 1 for me, if only so I get the first DLC for free as an apology. :P
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OrcaAlso known as EspressosaurusWrexRegistered Userregular
edited September 2017
It will be interesting. They came in when we were in a prolonged space sim drought. We are now seeing a revival. Can their culture change sufficiently that they can still succeed now that there is competition? Or will they stay stuck?
And is what they do (econ simulation and ability to fly tiny to huge craft) compelling enough to make up for their other faults?
It will be interesting. They came in when we were in a prolonged space sim drought. We are now seeing a revival. Can their culture change sufficiently that they can still succeed now that there is competition? Or will they stay stuck?
And is what they do (econ simulation and ability to fly tiny to huge craft) compelling enough to make up for their other faults?
Presuming they can give people what they ultimately wanted -- X3 with XR's graphics? Maybe?
And is what they do (econ simulation and ability to fly tiny to huge craft) compelling enough to make up for their other faults?
It's still definitely interesting to me; everything else in the market is still focused on the single-ship experience, and I really enjoy the Stellar Trading and Manufacturing Empire that the X series has going for it.
Better graphics and a flight model that isn't total butts are really what I want added to the series (and the ability to start automating things a little quicker) which is why I had such high hopes for Rebirth.
DrakeEdgelord TrashBelow the ecliptic plane.Registered Userregular
Honestly Helium Rain is probably going to replace the X series completely for me. It does mostly the same thing but it takes out all of the SETA tedium and grinding. The interface is pretty nifty too. It's also nice to have a few freighters out running trade routes making cash for you before the tutorial is even finished.
Space simmers that are looking for the economic warfare experience that X has provided may find Helium Rain to be a more immediately engaging experience. It'll be interesting to see if they can maintain the depth with their streamlined and compressed approach.
I heard Helium Rain is still a bit... less than deep. Might be time to give it a whirl though, because jesus christ, fuck the Terran sectors.
Also, as a followup to my theory above that X4 takes place a looooong time after X3AP/XR:
Regards NPCs, There will be important characters like for example Nopileus, or Bala GI around?
I doubt they will appear in person, not least as many of them must be long dead by the time X4 is set!
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DrakeEdgelord TrashBelow the ecliptic plane.Registered Userregular
edited September 2017
Helium Rain isn't going to have the crazy scale and granularity of the X series. A lot of people consider that sort of thing depth I guess. The depth I'm concerned with in a game like this is the operational strategic layer. It'll be interesting to see if they can make that compelling with the compressed scale and streamlining. I think they have all of the ingredients to do it, and I hope they pull it off because honestly I've never had the patience to get that far with any X game. I only know about the endgame stuff from reading about it here and other places. I am thoroughly intimate with the X series tedium and lackluster flight model though, which Helium Rain has already successfully eliminated in my opinion.
So it may lack in depth of scale and granularity but I think it's going to punch well above it's weight in putting out a more compelling and cohesive game. It's not going to put the fun stuff of running an anarcho-capitalist military industrial space superiority corporation behind a grindwall that you have to bypass with shenanigans. That part of the X design philosophy has always confounded me.
Finished Operation Loose Ends. 3 More plots and X3AP is done, although I'll have to do some misc achievement crap at the end -- max out my ranks to X-TREME, fix my Argon rep, capture 10 M1/M2s and a Q, capture some... flies... yadda yadda.
Almost done with Shady Business. Trying to set up the home sector first though -- is any race's stations better than the others? I know the Terran ones' size is an issue, but is any other one's size significantly better? Or the food loops -- any specific one better than the others?
Allegiance is now free on Steam. Allegiance is one of the best space sims ever made, not because it has particularly cool ships or anything but because it is one of the most amazing strategy games ever designed. Basically everything is done by players, like dropping probes to scout for enemies or healing bombers while they're on attack runs vs. space stations, which means teamwork is of the utmost importance. It has a big learning curve but it's super rewarding to get into.
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DrakeEdgelord TrashBelow the ecliptic plane.Registered Userregular
I've heard some say that it predicted a lot of MOBA mechanics. Not saying it's a MOBA but some of thei similarities are surprising.
House of the Dying Sun is 50% off and I highly recommend it. It's a real top-shelf space sim.
Ok, this is great. I love the story/theme, however immaterial it may be.
The fleet control interface in VR leaves a bit to be desired, but you get used to it, and the game is paused so *shrug*.
Helium Rain is somewhere between (real) X and Endless Sky. Without combat, there's precious little flight simulating to be done; and it's just the X3 econ game.
And so far, it seems like if you just keep doing contracts, no one ever tries to fight you. I see the big boys trading facilities back and forth, but I've seen no indication that the material worth and lack of defenses on my stuff will ever translate into someone trying to knock me over.
Still second to last in corporate rankings; will that happen eventually, or can I just carebear my way to the top?
Presumably I will need to become the aggressor to overcome monopolies of the companys 10x my size, but will they ever 'aggro' on me based solely on my prosperity?
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Fleebhas all of the fleeb juiceRegistered Userregular
edited July 2018
ARISE THREAD, FROM THE DEPTHS OF THE VOID
So, I dusted off my old copy of Freelancer and have been playing around with that for a bit, and it got me curious about modern successors to the style and lo and behold I stumbled across Underspace, think i read that it's expected to be released pretty soon, Q3 of 2018. Just thought yall might find it interesting as well.
Sir CarcassI have been shown the end of my worldRound Rock, TXRegistered Userregular
I still need to play more of Starpoint Gemini 2 and Rebel Galaxy. They both gave me a Freelancer vibe. Also what I played of Galaxy on Fire 2 was pretty decent.
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Fleebhas all of the fleeb juiceRegistered Userregular
edited July 2018
Man Rebel Galaxy has a really great soundtrack and some really weird enemy scaling mechanics, like Oblivion in space.
"Oh you got a better ship? Well so did EVERYONE ELSE MUHAHAHA"
I am looking for a space game that lets me do as much space merchanting that a space merchant might want to space merchant. Dealing with encounters and stuff is fine, too, I guess. What do you recommend?
I am a Linux gamer, but that's my problem, so if you recommend me a Windows only game that's totes fine.
NEO|PhyteThey follow the stars, bound together.Strands in a braid till the end.Registered Userregular
I am not a super expert on space sims, but I am reasonably sure that the X series lets you space merchant pretty hard.
It was that somehow, from within the derelict-horror, they had learned a way to see inside an ugly, broken thing... And take away its pain.
Warframe/Steam: NFyt
Spoon has grown his team slightly, and for an unpaid fan campaign there's really nothing else like it for now.
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Fleebhas all of the fleeb juiceRegistered Userregular
edited July 2018
Yeah X series is pretty much the big one. Most space games are going to be pew pew pretty explosions games, with trading being an afterthought at best.
Rebel Galaxy has some trading in it. There's always the venerable Freelancer, I've been playing the Discovery mod and running pretty much a pure cargo hauler and having a blast.
Posts
Bloody hell, that was fun.
Not sure if I want to save and move on to the HQ / Hub plot, or switch over to Terran for the Loose Ends achievement.
And yes, I had a fully kitted out Boreas M2 following me around. No regrets.
I was in the OTAS M6 most of the time, though, which was still plenty overpowered.
Edit: Holy balls the Terran sectors are about 50% too big.
I'm guessing the team that worked on X3 and X3:AP didn't have as much overlap as they would have liked.
... Then I realize the people who made these design decisions went on to make X-Rebirth, and it all makes sense ...
X4: We Promise It Won't Be Shit This Time.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Since Teleporters were available to every race in X3AP... I'm calling it now. X4 takes place centuries later. It's the easiest way to make a clean break.
X4 will allow you to fly all ships personally. From small scouts over a wide range of ship classes up to the biggest carrier, everything can be piloted from the cockpit or an external view. Additionally some drones and utility vehicles in X4 can be remotely controlled by the player.
A big focus in the development of X4 has been to achieve a seamless and immersive experience when moving between ships. You can leave a ship, climb down a ladder, walk over the dock of a large space station into another ship you may have parked there and replace the pilot that was working for you just by clicking on his chair.
Modular stations and ship upgrades:
Building space stations and factories has always been a foundation of the X games. After gaining enough money through fighting or trading, most players want to establish their own economy and start influencing the universe on a larger scale. In X4, it is now possible to be completely free and creative. Stations can be constructed from a variety of modules, be it production modules, living sections, docks or many other types of parts. The powerful new map system allows you to drag and connect modules using a connection system to design your own unique creations.
Ships also offer a variety of upgrades. Engines, weapons and other equipment can be added in a graphical editor and actually seen on the ship.
Most dynamic X universe ever:
X4 will be the first X game to allow our races and factions to freely build and expand their empires; the same flexibility the player enjoys in creatively designing space stations from modular building blocks is also available to them. Races expand their empire based on supply and demand, which leads to an extremely dynamic universe where every action the player makes can influence the course of the entire universe.
Managing your empire with a powerful map:
Once you have more ships and many NPCs working for you as pilots, crew or station managers, the map will be your preferred method of managing it all. Ships can be ordered with simple clicks and through drag-and-drop operations to set their future path and commands.
Graphically plan your trade routes, coordinate attacks with your entire fleet, manage the hierarchy or send ships on remote exploration missions.
Most detailed X economy ever:
One of the key selling points of X games has always been the realistic, simulated economy. Wares produced by hundreds of stations and transported by thousands of ships are actually traded by NPCs and prices develop based on this simulated economy. This is the foundation of our living and breathing universe. Now with X4, we have taken another, massive step. For the first time in any X game, all parts of the NPC economy are manufactured from resources. Ships, weapons, upgrades, ammo and even stations. You name it. Everything comes out of the simulated economy.
Research and Teleportation:
The seamless change from ship to ship and from NPCs controlling your empire for you continues on a higher level. Once you own a larger fleet, you will be very interested in researching a technology from your HQ: Teleportation. Once you've unlocked teleportation, you can jump from ship to ship a lot quicker and experience all the critical situations your NPCs encounter first hand.
Every order you have given to a ship before turns into a mission objective when you pilot the ship yourself. The moment you leave again, your pilot takes the helm and continues with their previous orders.
Get into the game:
In X4, you can start your journey from a number of different gamestarts and as a number of different characters, each with their own role, set of relationships and different ships and technologies to start with. No matter how you start, you are always free to develop in any other direction. Focus on exploration, make money with illegal trading and theft, command large battle fleets or become the greatest entrepreneur ever. It's all up to you to decide.
Color me optimistic I suppose. I mean Rebirth was garbage, but they had three other games that weren't so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt for X4. (Besides Rebirth was an aborted Xbox game).
I don't know. Every mainline X game has been varying levels of totally broken shit at launch. I don't expect that to ever change either.
Yeah, even X:R was vastly improved with the patches. Still not great, but not the broken pile of shit it was at launch either.
X3 just happened to come out at the right time, and then they released two standalone expansions that further improved on the base game. But if you go back and look at the opinions generated when X3 launched, you'll see that people were super unhappy about practically every aspect of the game.
This is just how Egosoft does things. There hasn't ever been a lot of goodwill for the series to start with, they were just about the only game in town during X3's lifespan. I think maybe some fans thought they'd moved past this with Terran Assault and Albion Prelude, but those games were solid because there were iterating on the same concepts in the same engine.
I guarantee you X4 will be a flaming wreck on launch and we'll get a new chorus of Never Again. And after a few years of post launch support the game will be flawed but fun. Just like every other game in the series.
Day 1 for me, if only so I get the first DLC for free as an apology. :P
And is what they do (econ simulation and ability to fly tiny to huge craft) compelling enough to make up for their other faults?
Presuming they can give people what they ultimately wanted -- X3 with XR's graphics? Maybe?
It's still definitely interesting to me; everything else in the market is still focused on the single-ship experience, and I really enjoy the Stellar Trading and Manufacturing Empire that the X series has going for it.
Better graphics and a flight model that isn't total butts are really what I want added to the series (and the ability to start automating things a little quicker) which is why I had such high hopes for Rebirth.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Space simmers that are looking for the economic warfare experience that X has provided may find Helium Rain to be a more immediately engaging experience. It'll be interesting to see if they can maintain the depth with their streamlined and compressed approach.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Also, as a followup to my theory above that X4 takes place a looooong time after X3AP/XR:
So it may lack in depth of scale and granularity but I think it's going to punch well above it's weight in putting out a more compelling and cohesive game. It's not going to put the fun stuff of running an anarcho-capitalist military industrial space superiority corporation behind a grindwall that you have to bypass with shenanigans. That part of the X design philosophy has always confounded me.
Almost done with Shady Business. Trying to set up the home sector first though -- is any race's stations better than the others? I know the Terran ones' size is an issue, but is any other one's size significantly better? Or the food loops -- any specific one better than the others?
That. . . is actually pretty true now that I think about it. Huh, go figure.
... I have to kill HOW many Xenon capital ships? Welp. Time for a Kyoto or a Skirnir. Or both.
Also is there a Steam Sale? My wishlist just lit up like a christmas tree.
Halloween sale.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Man I am not thrilled with this trend of VR space sims not supporting HOTAS.
Do I even have a HOTAS? No, I lost it in a move.
Does this mean they would be inaccesible to me without dual analog support? Yes, but shut up me, that's not the point!
It supports HOTAS, just not officially. It took a bit of fiddling but I got my X55 and pedals to work with it fine.
Ok, this is great. I love the story/theme, however immaterial it may be.
The fleet control interface in VR leaves a bit to be desired, but you get used to it, and the game is paused so *shrug*.
Helium Rain is somewhere between (real) X and Endless Sky. Without combat, there's precious little flight simulating to be done; and it's just the X3 econ game.
And so far, it seems like if you just keep doing contracts, no one ever tries to fight you. I see the big boys trading facilities back and forth, but I've seen no indication that the material worth and lack of defenses on my stuff will ever translate into someone trying to knock me over.
Still second to last in corporate rankings; will that happen eventually, or can I just carebear my way to the top?
Presumably I will need to become the aggressor to overcome monopolies of the companys 10x my size, but will they ever 'aggro' on me based solely on my prosperity?
So, I dusted off my old copy of Freelancer and have been playing around with that for a bit, and it got me curious about modern successors to the style and lo and behold I stumbled across Underspace, think i read that it's expected to be released pretty soon, Q3 of 2018. Just thought yall might find it interesting as well.
Definitely not AAA quality but not bad for a 1 guy shop
"Oh you got a better ship? Well so did EVERYONE ELSE MUHAHAHA"
I am looking for a space game that lets me do as much space merchanting that a space merchant might want to space merchant. Dealing with encounters and stuff is fine, too, I guess. What do you recommend?
I am a Linux gamer, but that's my problem, so if you recommend me a Windows only game that's totes fine.
Warframe/Steam: NFyt
Spoon has grown his team slightly, and for an unpaid fan campaign there's really nothing else like it for now.
Rebel Galaxy has some trading in it. There's always the venerable Freelancer, I've been playing the Discovery mod and running pretty much a pure cargo hauler and having a blast.