Will we be able to navigate large capital ships by ourselves in X4?

[Nikola515]

For a game that is this old it sure is kicking XR ass This also shows that player bace is much larger than i though (thanks for proving my point). I would love to see data of sales per years and not just by total.

[Alandauron]

Just want to start with the fact that I may have in fact mistaken you for someone else, apologies. I'm not too proud(usually) to admit my faults . I won't be responding to everything as it seems several things we are actually of a like mind even if we don't completely agree, there's no point in one of us trying to convince the other that they're wrong as we are two people with two different opinions.

Nonsense! Okay, lucky guess. Still, that's not happening here. You're the one attempting to redefine a negative statement--lacking--as a neutral one--different. I'm just calling you out on it.

I can't agree with you, on my side I would say that X3 is "lacking" because there's no(from what I have read) ship or station interiors to explore, as I found that aspect enjoyable. Though I can admit that the execution led to it becoming extremely repetitive, I hope this doesn't get abandoned and instead they continue with it and push it further.

I don't find Rebirth "lacking" as you do because I hold value in "different" aspects of the game than you do. That doesn't mean I'm right and you're left , just that from the perspective of other people that enjoy Rebirth the fans of the franchise are in fact attacking it because it's "different" and NOT "lacking."

As an aside, I could make an extensive list of the things I thought were stupid about Rebirth when it was first launched. Most of them are either gone, sidelined, or heavily modified at this point.

I do love how Egosoft continues to support their games extensively after launch, to the point where they change things significantly if there is a widespread desire for it.

Now, it's a pretty safe assumption that not everyone who wrote a review gave the game much of a chance.

Understatement of the month at least lol.

Yet I've also notice you attacking me for being 'hostile' to the game, when I've never expressed such an opinion. Well, maybe when someone annoys me.

More of that mistaking you for someone else...whoops

More likely it was a resource limitation, combined with a soft reset. Single ships only need single cockpits(the others were added later). It's not unfair. You also didn't address my point.

Also, X3:Reunion had a similarly restricted story(specific protagonist, etc.), but you could fly any ship you wanted. You were forced into specific ships at certain points, though.

That doesn't mean it wasn't a choice by Egosoft due to the direction they wanted to take with their story. Also it could have been them testing to see if they could get away with it or not *shrug* only Egosoft can answer this one.

You can play in sandbox mode, but you're still Stinky Ren Otani, captain of the Albion Skunk.

Got a problem with Argons?

... rather like you're defending it because it's different. Yes, you're coming across as knee-jerk. It doesn't matter that it's different, or the same, or an inflated replica of a sixteenth century forgery of a pre- Cartesian cuneiform thermoplastic molding--it matters if its a good game.

Nope, legitimately thought it was a proper explanation for why they couldn't reach other races. Now whether or not they should have been in Albion space I really don't know the answer to because I have not caught up on all the lore, so my response is more ignorant than knee-jerk.

Better things to do with my time, and all that.

Agreed, only reason I did was because I bought the game and liked it so was confused.

This isn't about Egosoft posting minor iterations of X3:TC for all eternity. It's about what changes are good, and what aren't.

Others see things differently than you, some things that you don't like others might so you can't really say that it's about what's good and bad rather than what you think is good and bad.

Highways are new--I dislike them, but not terribly intensely. More like... since small ships are irrelevant, they exist to serve the player.

If I hear one more mention about the highways in game I'm likely to lose my mind lol. "Not even 10 years ago...****!"

I might buy 'X4'. I might not. I'm going to look at what that game actually is. If that's an unreasonable position, I suggest that you buy me a copy. That way, I can try it, see if I like it, and Egosoft gets supported either way.

That might actually happen, if they turn away from Rebirth altogether the purchase I make for X4 will be more of a purchase to support the dev team rather than to play. As a modder it's actually very rare for me to get into a new game, I picked this up on a sale(though I would have paid full price if not for all the negative reviews and I could have played a demo) and didn't touch it for over a year. Only played it because I was not in the best of spirits and the game I'm currently modding is in a broken state lol. Been following the X Universe for years just never made the leap, kinda glad I did it with Rebirth, might not have enjoyed X3 as much because of my preferences.

The problem is that it depends upon what you mean by 'commanding'. If I press my 'a' key, or '4', and my ship turn left, why can't I assume I just issued orders and a con officer responded? I want to say 'turn left'. 'Roll five degrees.' You want to say, 'go to x,y,z'.

I'm pretty sure all the sci-fi captains mentioned in this threat did both.

What myself and others are referring to is what was very slightly touched on by Egosoft and then expanded by modders. Now I don't speak for them exactly(of course) so for me I would like to see a well thought out radial menu for commands to have more direct control over your fleet, maybe a UI that allows you to set the fleet actions when you're boarding(so they don't fly in despite you telling them to withdraw and end up killing all your Marines while they are onboard the enemy vessel) or doing other activities in combat. Also I fell in love with the bridge mod someone made and would love to be able to watch and command the battle through a window/bridge like that.

Well, you're at least partly right. It all depends on how its done. Since 'X4' will presumably continue the tradition of a simulated economy, good pathing is essential.

Wouldn't that make me entirely correct

As a side note, please don't talk down to me. I've been competing with Egosoft's AI since around 2007, and I've a fair idea what their AI is capable of--with frequent intervention by mods.

Tone of voice is impossible to portray in text form and I often forget about emojis, but even those I've found can be misinterpreted as well. I assure you that it was not my intent to talk down to you at any point.


And now for the zingers!

Are you sure you don't write reviews often?

BAZINGA!

and you whining about reviews...

Right in the feels!

Now, I know you probably don't like the fact that I keep saying that AI economic behavior is more important than the feature you want, so I'll address that separately. While trading is an important feature to many, it is important to many of them for different reasons. Some people just enjoy being able to trade goods for a fair profit. Some people hate that when they give commands the traders take literal hours to carry them out. Some people like that they can cheese other traders because they can control theirs better than the AI.

Right back at ya!

how foolish of Egosoft. They need to move forward! Yes, that's a low blow on my part, but you know what they say; if at first you don't succeed, bring a bigger hammer

Careful I have some big a** hammers

There were points that I was rolling while reading your post, apologies once again for mistaking you for someone else.

[Alandauron]

For a game that is this old it sure is kicking XR ass This also shows that player bace is much larger than i though (thanks for proving my point). I would love to see data of sales per years and not just by total.

To be fair it's a different game, the fact that X: Rebirth has as many players as the others is impressive to me due to the amount of negative reviews. Many people glance at the game review "totals" and if it's not at least positive they just move one. I wish everyone that rated it negative simply due to it being unlike the previous titles would just take down the review so people could see it based off it's own merits, but that won't happen so oh well.

[Nikola515]

Actually even other titles had pretty bad starts (nothing new there). As i said before majority of players in XR are only baced with Steam while X3 games not. So i would say that chart is only fraction of players. All though X3 don't have player bace what it had before (do to age or people geting tired of it) it is still holding compared to XR.

I understand XR is different game and it is ok game on its own (i have around 2000h on it). Here are some of reasons why it had bad reviews (not talking about buggy release).

1) It should have never been part of X series. Like you said it is different game.....

2) Prce tag is another problem. It was sold as AAA game and it wasn't even alpha.... There was nothing revolutionary about it. People wore expecting too much do to its price i gues.

3) Slow progress with patches and fixing things. I hear that they are finally fixing some of ships AI after 3 years

As for rating i don't think they should get rid of it (a lots of bad devs would take advantage of it). What they need to do is ad rating per years. This way we can see if there is progress with game or is it still crap...

[Alandauron]

I can only really disagree with 1, it IS part of the X Universe and it didn't have a numeric inclusion which, to me, says that it is styled differently. Aside from the initial game the "X" series has been appropriately labeled with a number prior to the title. X[number] [title], so without the inclusion of that number it seems that they were trying something different.

Of course I wasn't around for the marketing and they may have been misleading about so idk. Either way it is a good game on it's own merits(well now that it's not a buggy mess at least), and I hope to see more variations that break away from the standard formula.

Great community also so far, most people are very reasonable.

[Nikola515]

We both know that but im talking about what public though in general about XR. That's why i want X4 to be more like X3 and XR2 to be more like XR. Mixing those two games together would just divide community in my opinion.

They are two separate games and they should stay that way..... All though i would love to see ship/staion interiors in X4

[BigBANGtheory]

Ehm, ehm https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4x1K97JZG0

Anyway, for me it is simple. No way to fly capital ships, no buy for me. If they can not learn from the Rebirth debacle, their problem.

Oh come on out of the 1000's of hours of Star Trek media, tv & films how often does this happen compared to orders being given. ST is also not a great example as for the most part it centres around indivually large ships like Elite where as X is more B5 & BSG with a range of ships under your ownership.

I do agree though the XR way of doing this was flat out wrong as it relied far too much on the AI and NPC to perform the control and navigation which essentially robs the player of gameplay and leads to frustration when your ships aren't doing what you want them to.

[plynak]

But it is not just this one. In many Star Trek episodes captains took helm. The only difference was that instead of joystick they were touching a pad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKZQnkY2fXk

https://youtu.be/1qnhzrZ80FQ?list=PLVH5 ... Ci89&t=158

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

Flying into a Xenon sector in a destroyer and taking out everything including stations was always for me a goal when starting an X3 game.

You could go through several sectors one after another doing this.
Strafe on a capital ship whoop de doo.

Using the rear turret in an elephant to take out a Khaark M2. A long and laborious process but doable. You just had to stay ahead and out of weapons range.

In the original X3-Reunion you could stay in an M3 for most of the game, but with later versions you were literally forced to move up to larger ships.

Personally I'd like to be able to pilot a frigate like the old M6s with some turrets.

I like having a proper interior to capital ships. As some here have repeatedly stated it is just missing the tactical / strategic / planning / AI capabilities that would make this a pleasure to use.

Being stuck in one ship was not a problem, but once you have upgraded it where do you go from there. No sense of progression to the game in that respect. Which for me was a big part of the previous games.

[plynak]

Flying into a Xenon sector in a destroyer and taking out everything including stations was always for me a goal when starting an X3 game.

You could go through several sectors one after another doing this.
Strafe on a capital ship whoop de doo.

Using the rear turret in an elephant to take out a Khaark M2. A long and laborious process but doable. You just had to stay ahead and out of weapons range.

In the original X3-Reunion you could stay in an M3 for most of the game, but with later versions you were literally forced to move up to larger ships.

Personally I'd like to be able to pilot a frigate like the old M6s with some turrets.

I like having a proper interior to capital ships. As some here have repeatedly stated it is just missing the tactical / strategic / planning / AI capabilities that would make this a pleasure to use.

Being stuck in one ship was not a problem, but once you have upgraded it where do you go from there. No sense of progression to the game in that respect. Which for me was a big part of the previous games.

Exactly this. Once I get an M2, I barely switch to a different ship. Only to a fast fighter to catch some missions. Other than that, I have a TS for buying stuff (ecells for jumdrive mostly) and TL to store my loot at, satelites around the space and a nice feeling that I really have to screw up to get killed.

Moreover I always use MARS and I allow it for NPCs as well. It makes quite a differnce. Yes, I am still in an advantage due to strafing, but enemies now switch weapons as well and it is really felt.

And if someone finds this gameplay boring, fine. I do not like fighting in an M3-M5 either. But why not allow everyone to choose what they like?

[BigBANGtheory]

I guess there are a few situations where it could work if you had to say:
1. pilot through a hazardous region accurately
2. wanted to use your hard point placement to maximum advantage vs. an enemy by facing a certain direction
3. were trying to lay a trap or deception

You'd need a reason to do it though some kind of situation where it makes sense and delivers good gameplay as opposed to 'I want to fly my capship manually half way across the map cos I want to fly all ships'. To be clear I'm not suggesting you shouldn't be allowed to do it how you play is your business. Somehow you need to convince ES cos putting it bluntly unless Bernd & co. have changed their minds they basically don't think you should fly a capital ship and have said as much.

So I'll meet you half way on this, if there is a reason to do it that delivers good gameplay then yes it makes sense and could be a lot of fun in those situations.

[Nanook]

....
So I'll meet you half way on this, if there is a reason to do it that delivers good gameplay then yes it makes sense and could be a lot of fun in those situations.

You really don't seem to get it, do you? A lot of players actually like to fly big ships. They don't need special circumstances to do so, they just like to do it. We get it that you, personally, don't like to pilot your own capital ship and that's fine. Just understand that that's your own personal playing preference.

And please, no more of the 'devs time constraints' excuses. That's irrelevant to our discussion, since Egosoft will decide what to include and what to leave out. We have no control over that so arguing about it is just a waste of our time.

[CBJ]

And please, no more of the 'devs time constraints' excuses. That's irrelevant to our discussion, since Egosoft will decide what to include and what to leave out. We have no control over that so arguing about it is just a waste of our time.

How can it be irrelevant? This entire discussion, like many other similar ones, is about what people would prefer the developers to spend their time on, not about who controls that time. Every time such a discussion takes place without taking into account developers' time constraints, the answer is always "do both" or "make it an option" which, for reasons I've explained too many times already, solves nothing.

People have the right to argue against a potential feature just as they have to argue in favour of it. Both sides of such a discussion need to a) accept that the other side's opinion is valid, b) understand that developer time is a factor in this and c) stop trying to claim that they represent the majority of players when definitive data on this simply isn't available.

[Nanook]

And please, no more of the 'devs time constraints' excuses. That's irrelevant to our discussion, since Egosoft will decide what to include and what to leave out. We have no control over that so arguing about it is just a waste of our time.

How can it be irrelevant? ...

It's irrelevant because we players have no clue about what you guys have the ability to do or not do. We don't know what your time constraints are nor what resources you can actually bring to each element of the game. Nor do we have any idea as to what is already planned and in the works. For all we know you've already been working on those items under discussion.

So for someone outside of Egosoft to make a time constraint argument is irrelevant, IMO, because we have no data to support such a supposition. As to what players prefer, it is possible to make an informed guess based on all of the past discussions that have occurred, including those prior to the initial release of Rebirth. Again in my opinion, these discussions are most useful in presenting what the playerbase wants to see in the game and ideas shouldn't be dismissed simply because someone else sees it as a waste of developer's time.

[Alandauron]

It's irrelevant because we players have no clue about what you guys have the ability to do or not do. We don't know what your time constraints are nor what resources you can actually bring to each element of the game. Nor do we have any idea as to what is already planned and in the works. For all we know you've already been working on those items under discussion.

So for someone outside of Egosoft to make a time constraint argument is irrelevant, IMO, because we have no data to support such a supposition. As to what players prefer, it is possible to make an informed guess based on all of the past discussions that have occurred, including those prior to the initial release of Rebirth. Again in my opinion, these discussions are most useful in presenting what the playerbase wants to see in the game and ideas shouldn't be dismissed simply because someone else sees it as a waste of developer's time.

That doesn't make it irrelevant in the slightest, that's exactly what the argument is about, what each person prefers given time and budget constraints for the company. One side isn't gonna change the mind of the other side, and we can't have our cake and eat it too, unfortunately.

I do think the points for each side has been made and I may be partial but considering that the main argument for is simply, "Because I enjoy it" without any real supporting reason then I hope the devs have seen as much. Now if the devs have no intention of improving the AI pathing then yes we NEED to be able to pilot our big ships because it is terrible(even with the gorgeous bridge mod) watching your Capship run into every single obstacle in the way, namely asteroids, and bouncing back for what feels like forever lol.

So devs, if you're going to fix pathing I can accept no Capship piloting, but if you continue to have issues just give us Capship piloting so we can work around those issues ourselves.

[BigBANGtheory]

You really don't seem to get it, do you? A lot of players actually like to fly big ships. They don't need special circumstances to do so, they just like to do it. We get it that you, personally, don't like to pilot your own capital ship and that's fine. Just understand that that's your own personal playing preference.

And please, no more of the 'devs time constraints' excuses. That's irrelevant to our discussion, since Egosoft will decide what to include and what to leave out. We have no control over that so arguing about it is just a waste of our time.

I say it as I see it Nanook we agree on somethings and not others, I question how many players like to fly big ships I don't think that is unreasonable. I've acknowledged there are exceptions trying to be balanced and all that.... Everything is dev time constraint and needs to be justified by ES of course.

[Meme Turtle]

@CBJ,
here is my earlier post to elaborate on time constraints problem:

People should realize that for devs to add any feature into the game they have to:
1) Determine if the new feature seamlessly connects with existing features in the game.
2) Determine how much time it is going to take. Time that can be directed to fixing bugs or improving existing features.

X: Rebirth is all about increased detalization and immersion. So devs can not simply attach external camera to where bridge is supposed to be and let player fly cap ship with WASD keys like in X3, as this contradicts the basic concept of the game. And even if there was a screen or console which allowed the player to fly capship, then how would he communicate with DO and engineer(and any other possible personnel) to set targets for turrets, control drones and repair ship? And what if player wants to operate turrets himself? Having flyable capships is not as easy as it may seem and time spent on implementing this feature could be used to improve existing methods of capship control.

@Nanook,
Time constraint argument is not entirely irrelevant, because: Egosoft is a small team->resources are limited->necessity to chose features to implement. So, when players request new features they really need to be ready to answer the follow-up question: which features/improvements are you ready to sacrifice for your feature to make it into the game?


Would it be possible to attach a poll to this topic? Without solid numbers there is too much speculation on what players really want.

[CBJ]

It would be possible to add a poll, but as Nanook would no doubt point out if I didn't, that would only tell us the opinions of people who currently actively read and participate in this forum. Aside from the sample size being way too small to be meaningful, we also have no way of knowing whether that particular group of people is representative of our player base (or potential player base) or completely unrepresentative.

[vkerinav]

[...] there's no point in one of us trying to convince the other that they're wrong as we are two people with two different opinions.

Even if one of us is self-evidently wrong?

I don't find Rebirth "lacking" as you do because I hold value in "different" aspects of the game than you do. That doesn't mean I'm right and you're left ;), just that from the perspective of other people that enjoy Rebirth the fans of the franchise are in fact attacking it because it's "different" and NOT "lacking."

reviews talking about how it's lacking when compared to previous games(even though it's really not it's just different)

I could swear that you're attempting to prove my point. You basically stated that you were right and the reviewers in question were left, when some of them were just expressing the honest opinion that the differences were bad. That's what I originally took issue with. Rebirth is different, but it's not just different. Nothing ever is.

That doesn't mean it wasn't a choice by Egosoft due to the direction they wanted to take with their story. Also it could have been them testing to see if they could get away with it or not *shrug* only Egosoft can answer this one.

I merely suggest it was a more holistic decision. What with building a new engine and all, they had limited resources to use for building the game on top of it. That's where the soft reset bit comes in. The story is made to fit the game, and the game is made to fit the story.

Got a problem with Argons?

Yes. Without more context, they're mostly a mirror for our assumptions, and I see much of what I don't like about America in them. Same with the Terrans, they're just more Right than Center Right.

Excuse me, could you point me in the direction of the topic?

Nope, legitimately thought it was a proper explanation for why they couldn't reach other races. Now whether or not they should have been in Albion space I really don't know the answer to because I have not caught up on all the lore, so my response is more ignorant than knee-jerk.

Yes and no. It works as an in-game explanation, though it was a deliberate choice to have all the gates open to human sectors. Considering that OL and Albion used the same ships on release, I'd again point to limited resources as a factor. Even with the gate shutdown, though, they really should have featured a minor presence, similar to the Teladi and Split.

If I hear one more mention about the highways in game I'm likely to lose my mind lol. "Not even 10 years ago...****!"

If there's one thing that should never appear in a sandbox, its a repetitive, time-wasting mini-game. Then they went and added trade agents and skill training items, which just made it more necessary. All hail the modders who gave us ways around it.

What myself and others are referring to is what was very slightly touched on by Egosoft and then expanded by modders. Now I don't speak for them exactly(of course) so for me I would like to see a well thought out radial menu for commands to have more direct control over your fleet, maybe a UI that allows you to set the fleet actions when you're boarding(so they don't fly in despite you telling them to withdraw and end up killing all your Marines while they are onboard the enemy vessel) or doing other activities in combat. Also I fell in love with the bridge mod someone made and would love to be able to watch and command the battle through a window/bridge like that.

'More control' is a pretty common refrain when it comes to Rebirth. Definitely an area I'd consider lacking when compared to X3. Of course, much of that came from the modding community...

That's a great tradition that I hope they keep up--making the best mods official.

Well, you're at least partly right. It all depends on how its done. Since 'X4' will presumably continue the tradition of a simulated economy, good pathing is essential.

Wouldn't that make me entirely correct ;)

Nice try, but no. I was referring to the bit about poor pathing taking up more resources. In X3, ships traveled in a straight line. If an obstacle entered their detection cone, they turned in a random direction, moved for a bit, and then turned straight back towards their goal. Very simple. Not terribly effective. Rebirth's pathing is more resource intensive.

Tone of voice is impossible to portray in text form and I often forget about emojis, but even those I've found can be misinterpreted as well. I assure you that it was not my intent to talk down to you at any point.

Fair enough. And I have an intense dislike for emojis.

There were points that I was rolling while reading your post, apologies once again for mistaking you for someone else.

And to think, there are people in this world that believe I don't have a sense of humor.

[vkerinav]

It would be possible to add a poll, but as Nanook would no doubt point out if I didn't, that would only tell us the opinions of people who currently actively read and participate in this forum. Aside from the sample size being way too small to be meaningful, we also have no way of knowing whether that particular group of people is representative of our player base (or potential player base) or completely unrepresentative.

Clearly what you need to do is produce every possible variety of X game, and see which ones sell best. Then you'll know what you should put in 'X4'.