Worried about the future of X

[Alan Phipps]

@ Athraku: Buzzzzz. Click. <Silence>

[elexis]

'scuse my poor memory/ignorance if this is wrong, but I was under the impression that when it came to things not owned by you, there was generally a "human" in the driver seat. I was also making the assumption that since you don't directly control capital ships that they were also manned by a "human". This leaves your ships, your drones controlled by AI. In that sense, what's the difference between Rebirth and X3?



*swap human for your favorite X species.

[facetious1]

would be kind of cool if a couple people could hook up and join ones game... maybe man a turret or repair the ship for the pilot......maybe jump in the VR and fly their drones... just a thought <goes back to the days of JTL- Pre SWG nerf days...>

[ezra-r]

I agree with certain points:

* Huge sectors
* Huge stations

These do not fit in the current engine at all considering how the AI/AUTOPILOT works.

* Terran Space has never been fully playable and a pain but someome may like it so I can choose to never go there so... not much harm done, just wasted cpu cycles.


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I also think they screwed up adding too much new stuff without proper testing and forgetting everything about X3:R well balanced standpoint, yes, ships stats and new designs. Ex: Kestrel, an M5 at 600+speed with a rear turret... And AI incapable of keeping formation.

IMHO bringing the xtended team in to egosoft did more harm than good in those aspects. X3TC ended extendedly messy and buggy (how long did it take to fix the slow over time super-bug?).

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Good things though have been the MD code for missions and the new updates for AP which let you fit ships from the Shipyards too.


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Since Rebirth is a start from scratch I bet they are making sure to keep the right direction now. I believe Egosoft knows very well what they have to do, so anxiously awaiting for the results.

[Athraku]

@ Athraku: Buzzzzz. Click. <Silence>

No its them begging for mercy and them screaming as i ignore their cries or nothing at all!

[Rekalty]

I just wonder what they're up to... If they just one day suddenly report that the game is done, be that tomorrow or in 2 years... It's been pushed too many times for me to be able to keep my attention on the game. I'm sure I will love it, once it's released, though when that's going to be, is anyone's guess.

[Athraku]

I just wonder what they're up to... If they just one day suddenly report that the game is done, be that tomorrow or in 2 years... It's been pushed too many times for me to be able to keep my attention on the game. I'm sure I will love it, once it's released, though when that's going to be, is anyone's guess.

What? Did you read your post before you hit submit

If this is a complaint on the release date there's a thread for that to.

[DiabloTigerSix]

b) The Universe: Why are we making all new sectors huge (is it just because we now have the technology?) as to me they are very boring. I hate Terran space (great to get that boring long haul feeling), I have no interest in going there. Aldrin, another example of we have the technology so lets build a massive sector with a massive planet in the middle to ensure that the auto-pillock takes hours to get from point a to point b. Bring on Albion, lets not put in any gates to force players to get bored sitting on SETA getting from place to place and while we are at it lets fill it full of rocks so that auto-pillock freaks out and goes crazy and any satelites are promptly booted to the edge of the sector.
I get very worried when I hear "no more small sectors" as the traditional sectors (the small ones in Commonwealth space) are going to be nerfed. Does this mean that there will be jump beacons everywhere? If this is the case I guess this will be ok, I just don't want to be forced to long haul all the time. I think Commonwealth space is just about right for travel times between stations WITH the current jump gate system.

WHAAAT? Puny sectors and a general lack of intersting space objects like nebulas, planets, etc... is the only thing I really hate about X3. X3 sectors feels like you're getting a representative sample of it. Also, some games have don't have any sectors, just one huge universe. Doesn't make them boring for God's sake.

Having a sense of large scale is not boring at all, space is meant to be big. You know what's boring? Travelling slowly from gate to gate all the time in tiny sectors with SETA on. I absolutely like where X-Rebirth is going in this area.

[DiveBomberDave]

I know Rebirth will be good, all the rest of the series is, as long as they keep the same philosophy it will be good. And don't dumb it down too much, the AP universe is just too safe, when do you feel the fear of a khaak rose super cluster spawning 500 metres away from you these days?

Drones have always been part of X lore, in X2 you had a mission where you had to pilot a spy drone into an swiss cheese asteroid IIRC, normal fighter drones (M5's) and in TC Mk.2 drones (M4's).

There's one thing more boring than SETAing across a 80km wide sector, thats crossing a 200km. wide sector without SETA, I'll guarantee you that. And for interesting objects, they were taken out with TC, no more hull eating nebula to fly through...
The art is great in Terran sectors though.

Maybe we will always be able to point jump, that is the impression I get from playing more AP, like those Response Fleets, they don't use gates.

[DiveBomberDave]

Ok, I've read the stickies again...
And no I didn't miss anything.

The questions are still the same;

Can I cap an NPC's mothership(Albion Pride ship)?
Surelly unless we are the only people in a universe of drones controlled from planets.

I hope I will be able to instruct my pilot to strafe left and up and roll and steer to keep the enemy cap ship in target and use skill to win the battle.
And not be reduced to mathematical equation.

[Geek]

You missed all the references to boarding then.

[Earth Ultimatum IV.]

Capital ships can´t leave sectors no more. Also, they can´t enter highways.
They can now travel between sectors just with jumpdrive. Somehow I like this, it prevents hitting friendly ships near gates/highway entry.


Another thing which I like is that you can still control capital ships.
But you are not the driver and shooter in one person, you are now the COMMANDER. You order people from deck while you watch the battleground.

From capitals you can switch to Albion Pride at any time, because it´s
docked in the capital ship.

[bluenog143]

I'd say that I'm on the fence. Since there is not too much info about X:R, and even if there were then I'd still need to watch some gameplay/ play the game myself, to know for sure what I think about X:R. So I'll have to reserve my judgement until X:R comes out.

[unknown1]

My god if egosoft devs decide to make a strategic interface where all i have to do to command my ships to attack is just right click an enemy on a top down 3d displaye i would just... nerdgasm until i die, think about how easy it would make commanding your capships....

Why not? In Homeworld it worked like a charm...

[Dr2i]

My god if egosoft devs decide to make a strategic interface where all i have to do to command my ships to attack is just right click an enemy on a top down 3d displaye i would just... nerdgasm until i die, think about how easy it would make commanding your capships....

Why not? In Homeworld it worked like a charm...

He was saying that it would be a good idea.

[amtie]

Haha. Nice. That suggestion/wish has been suggested/wished multiple times before, including myself.

[Dupin]

I think the general concept is really impressive. Highly detailed stations, interactive environment, updated interface, "evolving" the player's ship, "live" NPC - all of this is what greatly missed. The only thing that upset ... Judging by the screenshots, the graphics had become outdated. On this side of the game, all my worries.
Such innovative game must be innovative in everything!

[jaml78]

A) For me, the idea of "one ship" at this moment is terrifying. I think for me and probably for most players, a big advantage was the possibility to choose which gave X. If I want fast & simple action - I just jump in my Mamba, If i want to make (or situation requires) "big move" I take my M2 and rest of the fleet and...; If i just want to have old Mercury I can have it and not using JD travel to the farthest corners of universe. I have a choice!!! What i mean for one person is nonsense, boring etc, and for other it is freedom. Do not take this choice from us.

B) Traveling the universe using Gates (which we know so far from x series) is a good one. I hope this highways will not ruin this. Personally, I dont want to play "arcade game", and focus to jump off the hightway in specific point otherwise game force me to trawel for a long time back to my destination.

C) I do not know how You, but I do not want to be forced to wandering around the ship in the style of Mass Effect, and talking to 3 or 4 NPCs there - for whatever reason. I want to command from bridge. Personaly i dont need to see my main char talking to NPC about instaling new gun or additional shield, engine tuning... The first time it may be a fun thing, but for forty rather a waste of time.

There are many more things that make me worry... So i really hope that X:Rebirth will be FULLY modable, maby more than X:TC/AP...

[BigBANGtheory]

A) For me, the idea of "one ship" at this moment is terrifying. I think for me and probably for most players, a big advantage was the possibility to choose which gave X. If I want fast & simple action - I just jump in my Mamba, If i want to make (or situation requires) "big move" I take my M2 and rest of the fleet and...; If i just want to have old Mercury I can have it and not using JD travel to the farthest corners of universe. I have a choice!!! What i mean for one person is nonsense, boring etc, and for other it is freedom. Do not take this choice from us.

If you park the Albion Skunk somewhere, and simply allow your in game character to board/teleport to ships with a different graphical overlay to the VR flight mode you'd pretty much be back in the X3 style of things. It doesn't seem like a huge modding challenge to allow this kind of thing, Egosoft just need to ensure its atleast possible to do this type of thing with the scripting language or config then to my mind this whole problem goes away...

[CutterJohn1]

If having interactive crew, working cockpit, functional interiors and "free roam" mean I'll only get one ship, then so be it.

I'd rather have one truly working ship than 100 hulls only with different stats and collision boxes.

Also, most people only fly one or two ships 90% of the time anyways and those are usually M6 or M7.

They should have used the Independence War 2 solution to this issue, and made all ships controlled by a detachable command section. They then simply state that the player ship is one of those command sections, and presto.. You get new ships, but you don't have to make a new internal area for every single one.

Command section

Command Section attached to tug

Command Section attached to Advanced Patcom

Command Section attached to Heavy Corvette


A system like this would have made for an excellent compromise between those that want ship internals and detailed cockpits, and those that want a wide variety of ship choices. It also would have been functional as a built in escape pod.

My god if egosoft devs decide to make a strategic interface where all i have to do to command my ships to attack is just right click an enemy on a top down 3d displaye i would just... nerdgasm until i die, think about how easy it would make commanding your capships....

Oh yes.. I realize people don't want X to change into an RTS, but functionally the game pretty much is at this point, it just lacks the refined controls for controlling many units that genre has developed. Proper utilization of the mouse with loop selects and context sensitive mouse actions for the most common actions would be a massive improvement over current control methods.