EGOSOFT and Deep Silver announce X Rebirth

[Walkop]

@NetHawk, take a look at this quote (mainly the latter part);

The transportation system will be much different. Instead of just flying from one place to another through the lonely void of space, there will be closer interaction and proximity with other ships. While this interaction may seem like 'GTA in space', you wouldn't be dragging anyone out of their ship and beating them up. In previous games, players asked for more and more content, sometimes at the expense of quality. This time around quality is the watchword.

Quality over quantity, there you go

The next quote mentions how no features were left out from previous series because they were hard to develop, but mostly because they were replaced with "cooler" features; good news for most of us, I think (at least, depending on people's opinion of what is cooler). This is also where the speculation on Capships arose (I hope I'm not restarting this... )

Things haven't been left out just because they're hard to develop, rather we've concentrated on bring in gameplay features that are 'cooler'. Previously, for example, it was possible to pilot a capital ship from its bridge. No more. It took many players a long time to get to the point where they would own one and it wasn't a huge amount of fun to fly. If we'd included this, it would have put us back a bit.

Making capital ships able to fly, in the way we understand it (steering, etc.) would actually be easier than to develop a whole new mechanic otherwise. Size does not really matter to engines in general (unless you start to get REALLY big), so if you COULDN'T pilot capships it could likely be changed through a very simple function; or change the "type" of ship that the model is in the engine...lets just say that negative speculation on this is pointless at this stage.

[e1team]

i have a theory about there only being one player flyable ship etc etc

now bare in mind i have not read any X lore/literature beyond the events of x3tc.

I think due to the supernova the races of the commonwealth and terrans have had to start using AGI again to help them re build what was lost.

with that in mind mabye the player ship starts off as a classic ship but is upgradable as you go along. like building an rpg character as you level up but building a ship. for example you can choose to upgrade to a massive lazer or opt to have a missile turret etc.
And at higher levels your ship basicly becomes mabye an M7 size ship once upgraded,

this imo would explain the one cockpit but would enable the player to effectivly build a new ship suited to there play style. I know that i personnally when i have played x games only used one ship after i have a ship i like. i hardly ever swap to bigger / smaller ships unless i have a special trade mission etc so remote controling capitals etc wouldnt bother me that much just aslong as we can give them orders by remote. And hopefully the ai is better so this will be more rewarding.

Like DarkStar One? No thanks. Stupid game.

[RAY-GUNNER]

Having purchased and played all the X Universe games I am looking forward to the new game X Rebirth. One problem however, as I am a Mac user will I have to wait an eternity for it ? or for once will Egosoft and VP recognise that there are a lot of loyal Mac X Universe players out there ?

[grhluna]

there awaiting the new x game i installed tc again using cockpit mod and cheats, skript kollektion and the new xtended of course i didnt try before
i already finished building argon 1-of-everything operating for xtended
about 77 station complex and a big loaded valhalla defending it
now that ive made a new game and a new base its time to explore when ive the time for it and expand the empire
im gonna create tight security at my base and around my trade empire
with lots of traders and miners flying around for me
after that im gonna create an assault force for when the first alien p me off
im gonna wipe out their home
its neoliberalism in space really haha
after i'll start mapping the new system and exploring and questing and all that
i still gotta figure out new names for ships and stations and all that
works great on my big hdtv and new videocard
i'm thinking about....... maybe... NIMC The new intergalactic mining corperation! and when i get really bored i'll wipe out sectors so i can have the asteroids all for myself

[perkint]

Bernd has said he hopes it'll be done for Mac, but at release it is PC only...

Quote here

Tim

[NetHawk]

@Walkop :
Seen it!
actually that's why I said, I really hope they keep that promise
About the features...we could discuss this for days, so no point there. I just hope things will get balanced.

@dougeye:
I SERIOUSLY HOPE NOT. It would be pointless to even have different ship models then. So I want boron design...you want paranid, who get's the call?
Also, modulated ship designs can be tricky to make.

@Everyone About Cap Ships:
Ok, so...acceleration would be c*** but a cap ship would fly 500m/s...I still don't like that. Again, it's personal choice, but I'm pretty sure very soon noone would bother with M1's even. Just 3 M2's and hunt down everything. Why we even need other ships then?
There are way too many weird classes as is. And in TC, even some ships which make some stations redundant. BUT before I fall into the rant pit, let me tell you what I'd LOVE to see, maybe that will help clarify some of my points:
So you're standing on the bridge, tactical screens all around you, camera drones setup for 3rd person view, and you "command" your troops into battle: "All turrets fire on my mark!".
How about it? Do you already feel like an admiral?

can find the exact comment, but they said that we won't be able to fly 'em ourselves, not that we won't be there. I think what call my dream can very well become real, especially since Capital ship crews were a major hit in the downloaded scripts (judging by comments and number of threads/scripts about it).

Now to the speed. Please think about it, and tell me if you'd still use M3's at ALL if your cap ship would be faster/better turning. I know they'd have other drawbacks, but what about the M6? M6+? M7? M8?....either ALL of those ships get upgraded to more speed/rudder which results in just making SETA useless and fighting a very hectic thing, then tell me how you will control your other ships?
Yeah thought so...it's not as simple as making something faster, you have to think about the effects on overall gameplay too. I do think that the ships in X3R could use a bit more speed and a bit more rudder (check Roguey's classic rules....it does that...kinda), but I'm talking ~30m/s more and 8percent instead of 0.8 for turning. That way they still handle like huge ships, but atleast have a chance of turning away from "some (read slower)" fire.

Just saying, personally I won't miss flying Capitals, especially if we get some nice Bridge or something like that to control it from. This would give it a much bigger psychological impact. Also, not flying the ship yourself opens your hands to control your ships on the battlefield, giving the fighting a RTS addon. While I do love to fight myself, I think it would be nice to have tighter control over a battlefield (Homeworld anyone?).

Now about that co-pilot thingy, can we just agree to dissagree and let people do their jobs instead of ranting about every single detail of information we get?
I mean seriously, no wonder ego is scarse with info, if EVERY little thing they say get's ranted.

While I can be a bit harsh sometimes, I don't want to upset anyone.

EDIT:
Forgot to mention, but anyone got ANYTHING on multiple screens?
That would be quite useful feature. One screen as main, and one for instruments (map, sectors, resources, ships, communication...whatever you want)...

[dougeye]

im just puttign 2 and 2 together and getting 5 like everyone else. im trying to link to no cap ship flying, the only one cockpit statment and all the rest 2getha.

[NetHawk]

im just puttign 2 and 2 together and getting 5 like everyone else. im trying to link to no cap ship flying, the only one cockpit statment and all the rest 2getha.

I didn't mean anything personal.
I just think people are overacting over everything again. Let's see what they come up with, and we'll talk then
About your post, well..sorry if it sounded harsh, but it was kinda the first thing springing to my mind.

I just read the forums and...I don't know folks. Saying that something will have a different interface or "you won't need to dock on a station to pick up wares" does NOT by a longshot mean it won't be included.

Through as everyone I'm asking the devs for more info, we crave it. I think through the next news will be more like: "What you think is wrong folks, let me clarify".

EDIT: Can someone link me to the german posts? I speak german well, maybe things are clearer there

[X2-Illuminatus]

This is the german version of the What we know about X-Rebirth-topic, including links to the german interview(s) and videos. Though I think the english topic covers all known facts pretty well, so I doubt that you get any new impressions or pieces of information.

[Retiredman]

From the trailers you can see there some form of jumpgate in use.

I would figure that it might also be about a 1000 years since Terran Conflict.

So what happened to the UFJD research and what was used by the Terrans in the X-shuttle?

You would surmize that advances in those technologies would have made
the gates obsolete. So the Super Nova shouldn't have impacted travel between systems..

Oh well.. see what it is like.

[THE_TrashMan]

Fighters do have great turning, because they are small.

Without some magical dampening field, the longer the ship is, the slower is has to turn, becuse the force on it's opposite ends grows. Capships should be sluggish.

[supahfly]

So what happened to the UFJD research and what was used by the Terrans in the X-shuttle?

You would surmize that advances in those technologies would have made
the gates obsolete. So the Super Nova shouldn't have impacted travel between systems..

Seconded. At the point of TC event almost every ship could sport the jumpdrive. Why the need in the gates after all?

[A5PECT]

Because jump drives in TC still required the gates to create an exit point. Without using the existing gate system as an anchor, Commonwealth/Terran jump drives would spit your ship out at some random point in the universe (unfocused jumps).

If I'm remembering correctly, the only species to develop effective point jumping technology were the Xenon and Kha'ak, and they still may have required access to existing jump gates to function properly.

[calmterror]

if you notice those are not jump gates. they are trans-orbital accelerates.. the Jump drive requires a gate to lock onto. the UFJD is just a scary crazy jump drive that did not actually work well since you never knew where you would land and if the ships systems would stay working.. And the jump drive on the X-shuttle was basically the UFJD since the jump computer never actually worked right and it fried the systems. now the Kha'ak had a Point to point jump drive but they needed info on where they jump to. the Xenon made a point to point jump drive to but needed a jump beacon to lock onto. So about jumping you need to know the universal cords. and theoretical you need the four dimensional or even the five dimensional cords, but those last two only the ancients have knowledge of. so you have to use the three points and hope you stay on the 4th and 5th planes.

[StarTroll]

if you notice those are not jump gates. they are trans-orbital accelerates.. the Jump drive requires a gate to lock onto. the UFJD is just a scary crazy jump drive that did not actually work well since you never knew where you would land and if the ships systems would stay working.. And the jump drive on the X-shuttle was basically the UFJD since the jump computer never actually worked right and it fried the systems. now the Kha'ak had a Point to point jump drive but they needed info on where they jump to. the Xenon made a point to point jump drive to but needed a jump beacon to lock onto. So about jumping you need to know the universal cords. and theoretical you need the four dimensional or even the five dimensional cords, but those last two only the ancients have knowledge of. so you have to use the three points and hope you stay on the 4th and 5th planes.

and it might be possible that all the jump drive systems actually require the gate network to power it,not depending on an actual gate to rach a location, but using the power within the whole of the gate system to reach the desired point.
Any theory is possible though.

And BTW we keep saying Supernova (I did too), but we don't actually know what disabled the gate system and this supernova is one of the possible causes.

[mr.WHO]

Because jump drives in TC still required the gates to create an exit point. Without using the existing gate system as an anchor, Commonwealth/Terran jump drives would spit your ship out at some random point in the universe (unfocused jumps).

If I'm remembering correctly, the only species to develop effective point jumping technology were the Xenon and Kha'ak, and they still may have required access to existing jump gates to function properly.

IMO in the time of TC Terrans already have gateless jump technology.
However, without gates (to commonwealth sectors) or jump beacons (to Aldrin) as long range markers, they are limited to shot-range jump like inside Solar system, or from Sol to anything within X-number of light years radius.

[NetHawk]

How about using slipstream style jumping? e.g. "almost" precise 4X FTL-travel along strings?

[A5PECT]

From what I've seen in the trailers I'm guessing that's what the developers have done.

One point Bernd made was that travel in space is pretty boring. All you do is point your ship at your destination and accelerate, there isn't a whole lot to do.

So what I think Egosoft has done, is given ships a sort of "super turbo booster" that accelerates them to extremely high speeds. Then, they design the universe with various sorts of obstacles between stations and key locations within the game. You'd essentially have to steer through/past asteroid fields, planets, stars, and other stations all while flying at breakneck speeds to get to your destination.

See 0:53 in the announcement trailer to see what I'm talking about.

Sort of like how in GTA you don't just get in a car, point straight at your destination, and hit the gas. You have to navigate streets, go around buildings, maybe even find a shortcut or two through some back alleys and do a sick jump off of some makeshift ramp.

Side note: Bernd seems to like comparing the X series to GTA.

[Walkop]

And BTW we keep saying Supernova (I did too), but we don't actually know what disabled the gate system and this supernova is one of the possible causes.

Actually, we know exactly what caused the gate network to shut down. According to the X-univrse encyclopedia, the Ancients themselves shut down the entire gate network to prevent the Xenon from spreading and destroying all of civilization. Obviously, they underestimated the Commonwealth...

Also, @KloHunt3r, wouldn't that kind of flight be insanely dangerous? I'd hate to be flying at that speed and miscalculate my trajectory .
Like a bug on a windshield...

[A5PECT]

If such a system exists, I'm sure the developers would give you a way to plan your trajectory and react to obstacles accordingly. Sort of like how in TC, if you target a station, its distance to your ship is shown. Any obstacles in your flight path would be pointed out on your HUD. If an asteroid field was in your way a little targeting box would pop up over in the distance and it would say "Asteroid field. Distance: 10 parsecs." Then you would have the choice to either alter your flight path to go around it, or slow down to navigate and explore it.