X rebirth, video serie (german) part 1, 2, 3 and 4

[Earth Ultimatum IV.]

I've just realize one thing, there is no gravidar now

I hope will be option on this big InfoPanel in cockpit.

P.

Nope, there will be no gravidar...
I also hope that they will give me an option to remove those "ship icons" at sides of the screen, they are annoying. Just show me the icons of ships in my FOV.

[rhohltjr]

I also hope that they will give me an option to remove those "ship icons" at sides of the screen, they are annoying. Just show me the icons of ships in my FOV.

They might prove useful if you have someone on your tail, not in your FOV, shooting at you.

[Alci]

They might prove useful if you have someone on your tail, not in your FOV, shooting at you.

then you will see from where it is going or you always can target nearest enemy and navigate with crosshair arrow to it. Those icons of ALL things around never helped me in orientation. But I simply ignore them.

[jasonbarron]

After 50+ minutes of video, mostly of the interviewer apparently aimlessly flying around running into things and shooting at non-responsive civilian ships and stations, I can't say it really did much to change my opinion of the game one way or the other.

A couple of thoughts:

Speaking of non-responsive civilians & stations--for the love of God, please let the lackluster response of the ships and defensive turrets be an aspect of the game running in some kind of debug mode for the purposes of the interview. If not, then I predict MASSIVE negative feedback day one of the release. No one is going to appreciate playing the game if the universe is blase to even the most offensive player action(s).

Where were the police, and what is with the "whoo whoo whoo" of their sirens when they go whipping past hassling everybody but you? Weird.

It was interesting to see that space battle in the last vid, quite epic IMO. Too bad we didn't get to see the set up. How did the interviewer finally manage to piss off everybody enough to finally get a shooting war going on? Whatever the case, it looked really cool and I liked seeing the Skunk get pummeled to the point of "Game Over" screen.

The lighting is really good to my eyes. I like the fact that when you put an object, such as a ship, between you and the light source you are in shadow and have a flashlight that comes on. Offers up some interesting possibilities for "spooky" battlefield graveyard areas.

Love the boost effect. Ditto for the cockpit.

It would be nice to have seen some empire management/ship & station building/trading etc, but I understand why they didn't bother getting into it with these vids.

As to the cap ship "clipping" into the station geometry in the first vid...obviously there are going to be plenty of bugs to iron out. I would rather see a bit of clipping then endlessly circling.

All in all, very pretty, very interesting for the most part.

Thanks to the kind souls who translated all the videos into English!

[A5PECT]

How did the interviewer finally manage to piss off everybody enough to finally get a shooting war going on? Whatever the case, it looked really cool and I liked seeing the Skunk get pummeled to the point of "Game Over" screen.

I'm pretty sure it was a part of the plot, since there was an objective indicator telling him to help those friendly capital ships destroy the enemy ones.

I share JClosed's assessment: this was an interview first and foremost. The gameplay shown was more or less incidental; its role was was to occupy the background and bring up the occasional point of conversation. If you're looking at the visuals without paying any attention to the dialogue you're missing the purpose of the presentation.

It's also worth it to note that X games have traditionally made very bad Let's Play subjects. I've enjoyed playing X3 far more than any other game in the the past, but just sitting there and watching someone else play it is one of the least interesting activities I can think of.

[SuckMyNova]

Speaking of non-responsive civilians & stations--for the love of God, please let the lackluster response of the ships and defensive turrets be an aspect of the game running in some kind of debug mode for the purposes of the interview. If not, then I predict MASSIVE negative feedback day one of the release. No one is going to appreciate playing the game if the universe is blase to even the most offensive player action(s).

I agree, but Bernd said in the interview, that there are no reactions to him attacking the other ships because of the player's high reputation in that situation. Furthermore he said, that if there is any reaction at all is also dependant on the station's owner/fraction, regarding how much they actually care about the ships flying about. In part 3, you can see at 5:40 how a defense type station reacts immediatly when he attacks its turrets.

[Sryan]

Hope I'm not stepping on Sryan's toes here but I'm sure people want this as soon as possible.



5:15
[Interviewer] I'm trying to force a bit of a fight but somehow...
[Bernd] You have a very high reputation but just shoot at the station turrets a bit. It depends on the relationship between the faction and the ship. Factions don't really care too much if you shoot at other people. So whether they protect strangers or not that depends a lot on whether they have their own police force (not sure if he meant "belonging to the faction of the other ship" here.) In this area for example, the Argon region, they have some police and they won't tolerate this. [Interviewer starts shooting "Big Bertha"] Oh, oh! Ok try shooting the little guys below. Now everything is turning red. Now you have to make sure you get away. This "Big Bertha" - as we call it sometimes, it's not the official name - [Interviewer] He can't really catch me right? [Bernd] Yeah, but those little guys [Interviews] They're not exactly thrilled with us either.. [Bernd] Maybe it would be smart to get away while you can still boost because that shield energy is also your boost energy and if it's gone you won't be able to get away so easily..

No need to worry yourself You didn't step on my toes, thanks for translating However I want to shed some light on the pacifist behaviour by the station when you shoot civilians, by making some small corrections in your translation.

5:15
[Interviewer] I'm trying to force a bit of a fight but somehow...
[Bernd] You have a very high reputation but just shoot at the station turrets a bit, because it depends on the faction of the ship and the faction of the station. The stations themselves cannot care to much about people who shoot strangers. The act of defending strangers or not depends on if the station has law enforcement authority or not. For this area that would be the argonian goverment, they act as the police. and they won't tolerate this behaviour. [Interviewer starts shooting "Big Bertha"] Oh, oh! Ok try shooting the little guys below. Now everything is turning red. Now you have to make sure you get away. This "Big Bertha" - as we call it sometimes, it's not the official name - [Interviewer] He can't really catch me right? [Bernd] Yeah, but those little guys [Interviews] They're not exactly thrilled with us either.. [Bernd] Maybe it would be smart to get away while you can still boost because that shield energy is also your boost energy and if it's gone you won't be able to get away so easily..

So the reasons they didn't respond was because they didn't had authority to do so. and there probably weren't any police ships around. Once he angered station defense though, the turrets started shooting, and the capital ship became angered with him as well ( although it didn't do much yet )

Also I can't remember wich video or wich part. But I remember Bernd saying that at first the station defense was to aggresive at first, and that they had to tone it down, but that they perhaps toned it down a little bit to much.

[ThommoHawk]

ok. I've watched the 4 parts a couple of times now and here is my impression:

Interview; Bernd was like a peripheral on the couch being asked lukewarm questions by a rather distracted guy, who was pretending to show an interest in what Bernd had to say. The guy couldn't really get into the game while at the same time trying to pay attention to Bernd etc. (may have but could not do both justice at the same time)

Gameplay display; god mode gee-wiz eye candy and look how laid back this game is on the couch with a gamepad cool aint it? And look at this, look at that... not really doing much because (again) the guy is distracted from the game by trying to come up with meaningful questions and intelligent comments, while thinking what he should do next in the game itself.

Barely a pass on both counts imo.

lesson? if any, it is if you are interviewing the CEO of Egosoft then make up your mind beforehand to actually do so. If the game must be played in the background / featured then get a third person to do it, so you can focus on your job, interviewing.

final thoughts? while I do appreciate any new info, my impression of the presentation was bordering at; "... very interesting but stupid ..." (quote from Cheech and Chong iirc).

but thaks for the new material anyhow.

Having ordered, and with 34 days to go until game release, I am tempted to ignore all future vids/screenshots until then. (tempted but probably will not be able to resist)

I will also use this opportunity to say thanks to those who did the quick English translations.

[DaMuncha]

The videos arnt to answer all ur spoiler questions, its merely to show off parts of the game we havent seen yet.

[Earth Ultimatum IV.]

I also hope that they will give me an option to remove those "ship icons" at sides of the screen, they are annoying. Just show me the icons of ships in my FOV.

They might prove useful if you have someone on your tail, not in your FOV, shooting at you.

We had no "ship icons at the edges of screen" back in X2:TT & X:BtF and we were absolutely good.

Even better, not seeing anything except for things in your FoV somehow made the game much more fun, because you got ambushed from behind a lot. And that is great IMO.

Well, I hope that modders will make a mod which removes those "ship icons at the edge of screen". Or there might be a menu option to turn them off.




For those stations, I totally believe that they are so tolerant, simply because of this:
Egosoft wants to implement stations into combat.
BUT
While you are fighting, it happens a lot that you miss.
It´s just plain impossible to implement stations to the combat, when you keep hitting them and you lose reputation.

Now that is why the police is so tolerant about station attacking.

[rhohltjr]

We had no "ship icons at the edges of screen" back in X2:TT & X:BtF and we were absolutely good.

But in The Threat, you did have rear turrets in a lot of ships which you could view with a little monitor screen in upper left center or right. And they defended you as well. You weren't blind even if no ship icons to the edges of screen. Didn't do XBTF.

[jasonbarron]

How did the interviewer finally manage to piss off everybody enough to finally get a shooting war going on? Whatever the case, it looked really cool and I liked seeing the Skunk get pummeled to the point of "Game Over" screen.

I'm pretty sure it was a part of the plot, since there was an objective indicator telling him to help those friendly capital ships destroy the enemy ones.

I share JClosed's assessment: this was an interview first and foremost. The gameplay shown was more or less incidental; its role was was to occupy the background and bring up the occasional point of conversation. If you're looking at the visuals without paying any attention to the dialogue you're missing the purpose of the presentation.

It's also worth it to note that X games have traditionally made very bad Let's Play subjects. I've enjoyed playing X3 far more than any other game in the the past, but just sitting there and watching someone else play it is one of the least interesting activities I can think of.

I agree with your points for the most part, A5PECT. Watching a distracted interviewer (speaking a language I don't understand) explore random game elements is hardly compelling stuff, and certainly a poor basis for making assessments. Still, I am seriously hoping that the game isn't too forgiving to player actions.

As an aside, I spent many many hours watching youtube vids of people playing X3TC (which was my entry point into the series) as a means to understanding the game's mechanics--in particular I advise new players to check out CdrDave's channel http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiD9qZFGlFhu7P9pmwGJn7w
if they're interested in some really useful tutorials.

[DaddyMonster]

Hope I'm not stepping on Sryan's toes here but I'm sure people want this as soon as possible.



5:15
[Interviewer] I'm trying to force a bit of a fight but somehow...
[Bernd] You have a very high reputation but just shoot at the station turrets a bit. It depends on the relationship between the faction and the ship. Factions don't really care too much if you shoot at other people. So whether they protect strangers or not that depends a lot on whether they have their own police force (not sure if he meant "belonging to the faction of the other ship" here.) In this area for example, the Argon region, they have some police and they won't tolerate this. [Interviewer starts shooting "Big Bertha"] Oh, oh! Ok try shooting the little guys below. Now everything is turning red. Now you have to make sure you get away. This "Big Bertha" - as we call it sometimes, it's not the official name - [Interviewer] He can't really catch me right? [Bernd] Yeah, but those little guys [Interviews] They're not exactly thrilled with us either.. [Bernd] Maybe it would be smart to get away while you can still boost because that shield energy is also your boost energy and if it's gone you won't be able to get away so easily..

No need to worry yourself You didn't step on my toes, thanks for translating However I want to shed some light on the pacifist behaviour by the station when you shoot civilians, by making some small corrections in your translation.

5:15
[Interviewer] I'm trying to force a bit of a fight but somehow...
[Bernd] You have a very high reputation but just shoot at the station turrets a bit, because it depends on the faction of the ship and the faction of the station. The stations themselves cannot care to much about people who shoot strangers. The act of defending strangers or not depends on if the station has law enforcement authority or not. For this area that would be the argonian goverment, they act as the police. and they won't tolerate this behaviour. [Interviewer starts shooting "Big Bertha"] Oh, oh! Ok try shooting the little guys below. Now everything is turning red. Now you have to make sure you get away. This "Big Bertha" - as we call it sometimes, it's not the official name - [Interviewer] He can't really catch me right? [Bernd] Yeah, but those little guys [Interviews] They're not exactly thrilled with us either.. [Bernd] Maybe it would be smart to get away while you can still boost because that shield energy is also your boost energy and if it's gone you won't be able to get away so easily..

So the reasons they didn't respond was because they didn't had authority to do so. and there probably weren't any police ships around. Once he angered station defense though, the turrets started shooting, and the capital ship became angered with him as well ( although it didn't do much yet )

Also I can't remember wich video or wich part. But I remember Bernd saying that at first the station defense was to aggresive at first, and that they had to tone it down, but that they perhaps toned it down a little bit to much.

Yeah, I don't think anyone who saw vid 3 didn't come away thinking there was a balancing issue there. Anyone beg to differ???

Bernd has talked quite a lot about a GTA style rep system but it isn't that hard in GTA to gain a few stars. I've no doubt everything he said was straight up but I get the feeling that Bernd recognised the problem too. The guy was doing everything possible to provoke aggression, even with Bernd directing him how to and then he tells him to fly away before we see the resulting AI reaction (when game over is turned off). Hmm.. I think Bernd, understandably enough, didn't want to draw attention to an issue and it can't be by chance that vid 4 was all battle - he wanted to plug the concern.

I have a feeling that we'll see that one fixed before launch.

[Ketraar]

and then he [Bernd] tells him to fly away before we see the resulting AI reaction (when game over is turned off). Hmm.. I think Bernd, understandably enough, didn't want to draw attention to an issue and it can't be by chance that vid 4 was all battle - he wanted to plug the concern.

You are mistaken, Bernd pointed out that not all ships are from same faction, most might not even have a close relation to the station, hence why he told the guy to try and blow up some station turrets or other hardpoints. Clearly the chap is a noob and went straight for the big gun which was unbreakable with the puny guns of the skunk. It was to me more like Bernd was not about to call him out as noob and rather let him "drive" off.

MFG

Ketraar

[DaddyMonster]

and then he [Bernd] tells him to fly away before we see the resulting AI reaction (when game over is turned off). Hmm.. I think Bernd, understandably enough, didn't want to draw attention to an issue and it can't be by chance that vid 4 was all battle - he wanted to plug the concern.

You are mistaken, Bernd pointed out that not all ships are from same faction, most might not even have a close relation to the station, hence why he told the guy to try and blow up some station turrets or other hardpoints. Clearly the chap is a noob and went straight for the big gun which was unbreakable with the puny guns of the skunk. It was to me more like Bernd was not about to call him out as noob and rather let him "drive" off.

MFG

Ketraar

Ok, fair enough. Can't argue when I'm not able to understand without translation.

[Earth Ultimatum IV.]

Bernd said somewhere that one of his goals for X Rebirth is to implement stations into combat (that means dogfights while avoiding platform connections, taking cover behind station parts, chases etc.), and it would be pretty dumb if the stations turned hostile after two shots (as in previous games), because you will miss a lot of shots while fighting, those might hit the station and make them angry. Thus they made the stations more tollerant, to avoid misunderstandings.

[ICO_hr]

They can solve all station stuff just by adding some sort of state when enemies are around like fight state and non fight state.So when you shoot the enemy ships and you hit the station they will know its not on purpose.

[jasonbarron]

The concept of station 'tolerance' seems to make sense, to some extent, but when the player is burning down civilian ships with psychopathic abandon they should be scattering like quail and the local police should be on you like glue

[DaddyMonster]

Bernd said somewhere that one of his goals for X Rebirth is to implement stations into combat (that means dogfights while avoiding platform connections, taking cover behind station parts, chases etc.), and it would be pretty dumb if the stations turned hostile after two shots (as in previous games), because you will miss a lot of shots while fighting, those might hit the station and make them angry. Thus they made the stations more tollerant, to avoid misunderstandings.

That's an excellent point, bit of an opinion changing one actually. Coding to decrease tolerance when there are no hostiles present might help.

EDIT: Apologies ICO_hr, somehow missed your post saying the exact same thing.

[Chris0132]

The concept of station 'tolerance' seems to make sense, to some extent, but when the player is burning down civilian ships with psychopathic abandon they should be scattering like quail and the local police should be on you like glue

If you make them too touchy it could be very annoying to play though, if you're fighting near a station and catch some civilians you shouldn't immediately turn the station hostile, losing potentially days of reputation buildup.

Killing civs seems to annoy the station because they keep warning you about it, and attacking the station directly annoys them too, but a few junk ships, well, that shouldn't warrant the entire sector turning red on you in the same way that killing someone in the street doesn't make the army call in an airstrike on you.

Lose rep, yes, maybe make the police chase you off/ticket you, yes, but don't dump all your rep because you hit a civilian ship. The interviewer didn't have to do very much to piss the station off so I think it seems about right where it is.