Ship/Station scaling and universe map

[Ethernet]

Hi everybody,

I just want to ask if it will be possible with the new engine, maybe finally for X5, to have proper scaling. I really like the Xgames, but honestly the scaling of stations and L/XL ships is crazy.

Please Egosoft, bring warships and stations to their glory they deserve. Right now it feels very dumb that the window of my fighter is 5 times bigger than the window of a station or L class bridge.

The next thing is, would it be possible for the future to have something like a universe oversight to see where the systems actually are in space. Something like the galaxy view of mass effect. The systems right now are merged together, with no real feel where you are in space and why this sector/system is important. The real galaxy mod makes a good job of doing this, but it would be better to have a egosoft solution.

I understand that both things are only immersion stuff, and not so important to some players but thats my thoughts

This would be amazing

[CBJ]

I just want to ask if it will be possible with the new engine, maybe finally for X5, to have proper scaling. I really like the Xgames, but honestly the scaling of stations and L/XL ships is crazy.

Please Egosoft, bring warships and stations to their glory they deserve. Right now it feels very dumb that the window of my fighter is 5 times bigger than the window of a station or L class bridge.

Have you actually tried looking at the relative sizes in external view? It's possible that you are not just realising how big some things are, because the view you see is limited by the capabilities of a monitor. This is not something that can easily be solved. The FOV can be adjusted to make things appear bigger, but that introduces other problems such as leaving you with too narrow a view of space for combat.

The next thing is, would it be possible for the future to have something like a universe oversight to see where the systems actually are in space. Something like the galaxy view of mass effect. The systems right now are merged together, with no real feel where you are in space and why this sector/system is important. The real galaxy mod makes a good job of doing this, but it would be better to have a egosoft solution.

Part of the lore of the game is that the actual locations of the systems are widely scattered, and that the gate connections don't necessarily correspond to systems that are physically close. Any "galaxy view" that attempted to arrange sectors by the actual locations, rather than their logical locations in the gate network, would end up being a tangled mess!

[linolafett]

Station windows are supposed to be between 2-3m high, this is mostly the case for the modules as well as for capital ships.
I assume that most fighter cockpit windows are not 10-15m high this would be 5x the size.
In older games like X3 and XR the scaling was a utter mess, where windows varied in scale massively, this should not be the case for most of the new X4 assets and i am making sure that sense of scale is one key priority when creating new, large assets.

[chew-ie]

The next thing is, would it be possible for the future to have something like a universe oversight to see where the systems actually are in space. Something like the galaxy view of mass effect. The systems right now are merged together, with no real feel where you are in space and why this sector/system is important. The real galaxy mod makes a good job of doing this, but it would be better to have a egosoft solution.

Part of the lore of the game is that the actual locations of the systems are widely scattered, and that the gate connections don't necessarily correspond to systems that are physically close. Any "galaxy view" that attempted to arrange sectors by the actual locations, rather than their logical locations in the gate network, would end up being a tangled mess!

For SCIENCE! reasons I'm starting to develop an interest on how said tangled mess would look like. Current ordering is a grid system if I'm not mistaken (indicated by tiny 2D coords on the map).

I guess the result would involve a lot of "whitespace" and navigating the "playable" areas would be quite annoying ...

[CBJ]

The current ordering is the logical arrangement, i.e. arranged according to where the gates lead. It is potentially unrelated to the physical locations in the galaxy, which could end up with lines crossed all over the place. Bear in mind that this is a matter of lore; we don't actually record the physical locations technically at all, as they're not relevant.

[Ethernet]

Now that I've tried it out a bit, I understand what you mean. However, the scaling still feels weird. Always a bit out of proportion.

Ok then the point is ticked off. As for the other one, yes I totally understand that too, that would be a huge tangle of gate connections, buuuuuut now it's pretty confusing too. Just everything to the right of Getsu Fune... As said, the real galaxy mod would be great if egosoft ever decided to pick up this idea I had in mind. Since this will happen, I play with this mod.

As I said, I think the game is very well made and I like playing it, that's the main thing, thanks for the quick replies.

BR

[Raptor34]

Bear in mind that this is a matter of lore; we don't actually record the physical locations technically at all, as they're not relevant.

I was curious about this. But I did figure you probably didn't actually plan out where's where beyond the solar system.
Otherwise I'll expect more stuff hinting at where systems would be like how there is that one Xenon system that is extragalactic.
Can't deny that'll be really cool though.

[dtpsprt]

.............

I was curious about this. But I did figure you probably didn't actually plan out where's where beyond the solar system.
Otherwise I'll expect more stuff hinting at where systems would be like how there is that one Xenon system that is extragalactic.
Can't deny that'll be really cool though.

It's not even that, according to lore.

The Terran systems which are the planets and moons of the Solar system actually were not connected with jump gates but Transorbital Accelerators in X3TC and X3AP. The Terrans managed to create their own Jump Gate to connect with some lost colonies.

The Jump Gate Network expands in many Galaxies and was created by the Ancients, who shut it down in the end of X3AP. Supposedly only they have the exact locations of the systems (and a small possibillity the Boron but they will not tell).

[Raptor34]

.............

I was curious about this. But I did figure you probably didn't actually plan out where's where beyond the solar system.
Otherwise I'll expect more stuff hinting at where systems would be like how there is that one Xenon system that is extragalactic.
Can't deny that'll be really cool though.

It's not even that, according to lore.

The Terran systems which are the planets and moons of the Solar system actually were not connected with jump gates but Transorbital Accelerators in X3TC and X3AP. The Terrans managed to create their own Jump Gate to connect with some lost colonies.

The Jump Gate Network expands in many Galaxies and was created by the Ancients, who shut it down in the end of X3AP. Supposedly only they have the exact locations of the systems (and a small possibillity the Boron but they will not tell).

We're talking about physical locations though.

[Ethernet]

I believe that also the terrans either by science, espionage or force know where the systems are on an universal scale. This shouldn't be this hard for them.

My idea was more of a galaxy map like mass effect, which will result in many many overlapping complicated jumgate routes.

Even if some systems are in other galaxies, out would be even more complicatedvto display this correctly.

Anyway what I really would be thankful for is when egost would not mergeva this sectors in this crowd we have right now. Getsu Fune-Savage Spur-Matrix xy...

De-crowd it, give some systems maybe one two sectors more and everything will be fine. If they should merge something together than this should be whole systems. For example wretched skies, three stand alone big systems, Grand exchange has three merged systems. It's just for the looks

[dtpsprt]

............................

We're talking about physical locations though.

This is what I was talking about. Only the Ancients know where the systems physically are, eventually not even Egosoft(!!!)*. Everybody just enters the Gate and goes...

* Obviously Egosoft, when creating XBTF (the first in the series), thought about physical locations and decided to leave them vague. This helps both for variation between systems and for copy/paste work if the systems are not "adjacent". In other words only a handful of backgrounds have to be created and "randomly" be repeated in the various systems.
I am all for this (copy/paste) because there are so many other things to consider (and fix) in the game, I personally hate the idea of puting more work on a small and, generally, good and pleassant workforce...

[Ketraar]

If you read about the Alliance of the Word you will notice they mention contacting other location physically, which would make some statement to where things are in relation to each other. There are other mentions in older games about shared space that can be inferred where they are. For example Sol and Company Pride, since in the book Farnahm's Legend its said that Company Pride is Alpha Centaury we would know where it is in relation to Sol physically.

MFG

Ketraar

[dtpsprt]

If you read about the Alliance of the Word you will notice they mention contacting other location physically, which would make some statement to where things are in relation to each other. There are other mentions in older games about shared space that can be inferred where they are. For example Sol and Company Pride, since in the book Farnahm's Legend its said that Company Pride is Alpha Centaury we would know where it is in relation to Sol physically.

MFG

Ketraar

Indeed, but Fahrnam's Legend is way newer than XBTF... Even if this stands, whithout jumpgates and with a ship able to reach .99c taking out all safeties, and puting the fastest (purple) mods on it (the pphysically faster ship of X4 Pegasus Vanguard) it will need 5 years of flying to reach Sol from Company Pride (10 light years apart and measuring game time as double RL time)!!!

And that's supposing that the System Barier can be somehow breached... therefore what's the point? Unless someone is so young and at the same time has the patience required...

[Uwe Poppel]

in the book Farnahm's Legend

Indeed, but Fahrnam's Legend is way newer than XBTF...

Meant is the book Farnham's Legend (published in 2000), not the X-game Farnham's Legacy (X3FL) ....

[dtpsprt]

.................................
Meant is the book Farnham's Legend (published in 2000), not the X-game Farnham's Legacy (X3FL) ....

This is what I am talking about, both the book and the game (which I enjoy) that came out in 2022, they are both way way newer than XBTF (the first game in the series), which came out in 1989... (in floppy disk, updates/patches were distributed also in floppies, which was making both the programmers and the companies way more careful as you can imagine!!!).

[CBJ]

they are both way way newer than XBTF (the first game in the series), which came out in 1989... (in floppy disk, updates/patches were distributed also in floppies, which was making both the programmers and the companies way more careful as you can imagine!!!).

You're 10 years out here. XBTF came out in 1999, not 1989. And Farmham's Legend, the book, was written at pretty much the same time, coming out in German in 2000.

[mr.WHO]

Personally, for a matter of clarity, I'd love if Egosoft introduce one more, larger size hex in map view:


(current) smallest hex - space sector - e.g. location in planet orbit, e.g. The Moon.
(current) normal hex - planetary sector - e.g. Earth-Moon sector consicting of two small hex.
(new) Big Hex - star system (or in case of Sol half of the system, could be functionally broken into two, aka Inner and Outer Sol).

Technically we already have this, except that normal hex are not placed in orderly fashion (aka forming a big hex) and there is no outline and label for big hex.

[dtpsprt]

they are both way way newer than XBTF (the first game in the series), which came out in 1989... (in floppy disk, updates/patches were distributed also in floppies, which was making both the programmers and the companies way more careful as you can imagine!!!).

You're 10 years out here. XBTF came out in 1999, not 1989. And Farmham's Legend, the book, was written at pretty much the same time, coming out in German in 2000.

I stand corrected... the 10 years mistake is prbably due to my age to which 10 years is not that much(!!!) As for the Book I only saw it with X4...