Egosoft, Plese stick to what you are good at!

[Player.]

Hi everyone,

(Warning a long post ahead)

I've recently become aware of the X4 announcement after leaving the X Universe following the release of X Rebirth, I have to say that I am genuinely concerned with what I saw in the reveal trailer.

Now let me be clear, this is not a post that's meant to bash Egosoft, its employees or anyone else. I am merely posting to voice my concern since Egosoft has a special place in my heart and I would hate to see it release a product like X Rebirth again and not being able to recover from it.

What has me mostly concerned is that the reveal trailer has shown tendencies that proved disastrous when applied for the development of X Rebirth. Egosoft as a small developer is good at making a very specific type of games that cater to a very specific audience... It's totally OK if X4 becomes a more refined edition of X3 and its predecessors.

The X Universe has enough lore, story and concepts to go for without going into areas that Egosoft has no clue or talent in... And perhaps not the credits to put in to bring the required talents.

Please Egosoft I beg you, drop the station interiors or trying to focus on characters and graphics. While X games were never graphically lame games it was the gameplay that made them a success, we don't need fancy graphics or the attempt at making eye candy we just want the X Universe we liked so much in X2 and X3... This isn't Star Citizen or Elite and nor should it be.

I don't know how much flak I might get for posting this but its something I felt I need to be say and hopefully it will change something although I know that at certain stages of development things don't change no matter how much anyone might want to.

So here is a list of my favorite features in the X games which I think Egosoft should focus on, hopefully I am not alone in liking these

- Variety of ships/stations and ship/station design.

In this regard I think X2 was the best, it may not have had a large variety of ships but the amount it did have felt like it was unique and each ship had its own unique and recognizable look.

Also, many of the races had truly unique stations and the best examples are the Boron and Argon. The Boron ships were very cool and felt like they were alive with rotating and otherwise not static ship parts.

Best examples are the Boron Dolphin and Ray which were truly symbolic ships of the Boron and could be spotted from miles away due to their unique build and engine trails.

While I loved X3, its ship design felt like a step back since all ships became very static and too similar and lost their unique traits. The Boron dolphin for example was changed to something like just a "piece of Boron ship" and a "piece of Argon ship" mixed together... No creativity or imagination in that design.

Another example are the changes to the Boron trading stations and how they were represented in X2 vs what they looked like in X3.

- Unique sector atmosphere

Once again I have to point out X2 as the best game to represent this in the whole series. In X2 when you visited certain sectors (like Presiden't End after the Khaak attack) you would get this uneasy feeling, at times the game felt like a horror game especially when you were flying in a slow freighter with minimum defenses and weren't sure if a Pirate or Khaak ship were going to exit from the near gate.

Adding to that are the nebula's that were true nebula's that didn't swallow whole sectors (like in X3) but you could actually enter and exit them... Some even had some effects on your ship like eating away at your shields or hull.

As far as planets go X3 was no doubt a step forward and in certain sectors really made them come alive, this is something that needs to continue even if we can't land on them (and that's fine).

- Keeping things simple (as much as possible)

While many will no doubt praise the many additions made in X3TC and X3AP I felt like Egosoft overextended with adding content. In X3AP there are around 10 types of shields while in X2 there were 4 maybe 5 (1MJ, 5MJ, 25MJ and 125MJ).

Sure, with the addition of new ships I totally get that we need new shields but herein lies another problem... My head went spinning from all the ship types added in X3AP.

Look, variety is nice but not when it goes too far and when its not implemented properly into the game. Some of the ships, weapons, shields and so on didn't even have their own unique descriptions or icons. If you can't add new content properly and make sure that everything is balanced I would prefer for it not to be added in the first place.

With the new additions (with content spam being the ultimate goal it seems) the ship designs, missiles and so on became less original and more into the realm of "lets just give this ship a different name, change and engine part, maybe change the color and here we go... we have a new ship."

One example are the M3+ ships added in X3 Reunion (wtf was that?!)

No, It doesn't work that way and when its done this way its obvious and transparent. Additions on this level are expected from modders but not the developer who gets paid.

X games are complicated enough as they are due to their nature, adding more stuff without properly integrating it into the game serves no purpose but to confuse players, please try avoiding that as much as possible.

- Mid/Late game challenges and additions

X3TC and X3AP have both done good on presenting players with mid/late game challenges and goals. While the X games are sandbox games and players are expected to come up with their own goals and challenges its a very good idea to present players with new content and refresh your games from time to time.

I am not advocating DLC's but X Games could benefit from such a structure and could allow players to choose their own additions if they would like to.


- Its the economy, stupid

I think it is no secret that X Rebirth was a step back in terms of economy and the size of the universe compare to X3. The economic aspects of the game have seen massive improvements since the days of XBTF and then this thing comes in X Rebirth... Let's just pretend it never happened.

- Do not take your community for granted

The community and especially the modding community and devnet are the heart of the games connection to its audience. Many have left due to the fact that while X Rebirth may have X in its name it is not truly and X game and will never be regarded as such no matter how much Egosoft or the publisher would like to push this agenda.

Egosoft, you know how to make good space sim games and you have show consistent improvement with your games from the days of XBTF all the way to X3AP. While I take issue with some of the design choices I could not help but be proud of this company and be glad to be part of the community that has been built around these great games.

I beg of you please, you have very talented people on the development team who have very good skills with what X games are really about. Not fancy graphics or delivering some sort of an illusion that you are making an AAA type of game... You are not and in some respects that is what makes you unique, if you try to do something which isn't your niche you will fail again and I would truly be sad to see that happen again.

Maybe some day after X4 is a smashing hit and the company has the money to truly make a good AAA space game with station interiors, NPC's and so on you could make that game, but that day has yet to come and both you (Egosoft) and your publisher need to understand that.

We the community know it and we do not request or expect you to try and make such a game, we only ask that you do what you are good at... Nothing more [/b]

[Skeeter]

Good post.

[pioupes]

I am totally agree with you, I play the X during 8 years (Terran conflict and AP) and I played X rebirth during few month only. Thank you Egosoft for your great works and I hope play X4 during many many years.

[Bazza]

Just to state I have been playing X games for 18 years. I was even on the previous 2 boards and on this one since 2003 apparently. I got sick of empire building menu based mechanics and I personally welcomed some of the refocus of Rebirth. Not everything worked and the bugs were a nightmare but maybe Egosoft wants to expand its traditional user base as I'm sure its not the greatest revenue generator in the world and more power to them.

Not everyone wants Just X3 version 2. I am confident that extra gameplay elements are welcome by more than just me. Yes, drones, highways, walking with further refinement.

[Morkonan]

Just to state I have been playing X games for 18 years. I was even on the previous 2 boards and on this one since 2003 apparently. I got sick of empire building menu based mechanics and I personally welcomed some of the refocus of Rebirth. Not everything worked and the bugs were a nightmare but maybe Egosoft wants to expand its traditional user base as I'm sure its not the greatest revenue generator in the world and more power to them.

Not everyone wants Just X3 version 2. I am confident that extra gameplay elements are welcome by more than just me. Yes, drones, highways, walking with further refinement.

First, I want to say that I don't, on principal, disagree with you.

I'd also like to say that while I agree with the OP, I don't necessarily agree with it completely.

Here is what worries me about walking-simulations in X4 (Station interiors):

A player plays a game that is largely about flying ships, shooting ships, building stations and putting together ship configurations, delivering cargo to stations and completing missions that involve the same sorts of things.

Those activities occupy, without any other additions, about 100% of the player's game experience. (They might spend a bit of time crashing ships into gates, stations, other ships, big rocks, tiny rocks... etc. )

So, there's an outcry calling for "station interiors" and face-to-face NPC interactions. The players think this will be "cool."

The devs say to themselves "OK, we can do that" and proceed to do it. It's not rocket science, it's just another instance to create and modelers love to model things. So, "boom", there are station interiors.

"Now that we've got them, we need to have a use for them," say the developers. So, they remember that all those canned radio-transmission missions can just be moved to station NPCs - Content problem solved, let's move on to the 'splosion engine and particle effects, because those are really cool.

So, what happens to the player?

Now, due to the fact that certain NPC interactions are critical and the mission system is absolutely critical, the player spends 50% of their gameplay time walking around in stations that are barely "just there" and don't have a lot of gameplay content created specifically for them.

In that case, half the gameplay a player experiences will be "there's not a lot of content and interesting things for me to do with half of my time playing this game."

It's a case of diverted focus, not "lost focus," as none was really lost, only mistakenly diverted. And, that diversion costs money. Those people developing the interiors have to be paid, whether or not those assets become a valued part of the gaming experience.

A "walking simulator" is not a valuable addition to this sort of game.

That being said, though, there is no way why it couldn't be. However, I am concerned that it would take resources away from other development issues for the game and, because of resource constraint, it couldn't be fully developed considering what the main focus of the gaming experience is supposed to be and what must be achieved there.

A proposal - There is absolutely no reason at all why station interiors couldn't be part of an X4 experience. None. However, before they become part of that experience, they must be well developed, well thought out, and the player must feel that they represent a valuable gameplay asset during play. This will take additional resources and money to develop, therefore:

Plan for station interiors, perhaps even put some rudimentary ones in the released game. However, use some of the revenues to focus on truly making these additions worthy of a player's time. Create missions for them, mysteries to solve, optimize them so they don't truly involve a lot of "walking around", but still give the player the feeling of being in a large station. Create tons of new NPCs, some political intrigue, some station-specific-interior missions involving new assets the player can use, like marines/robots/tactical transportation/something in order to justify all this new content.

Then, sell it as a true expansion pack with a few new sectors, station scenes for every station in the galaxy (generated scenes or static selections), some new ship types, a few new station types (Marine barracks/prison) and a goodly number of new storyline missions that make having station interiors in the game worth experiencing.

[Player.]

Just to state I have been playing X games for 18 years. I was even on the previous 2 boards and on this one since 2003 apparently. I got sick of empire building menu based mechanics and I personally welcomed some of the refocus of Rebirth. Not everything worked and the bugs were a nightmare but maybe Egosoft wants to expand its traditional user base as I'm sure its not the greatest revenue generator in the world and more power to them.

Not everyone wants Just X3 version 2. I am confident that extra gameplay elements are welcome by more than just me. Yes, drones, highways, walking with further refinement.

First, I want to say that I don't, on principal, disagree with you.

I'd also like to say that while I agree with the OP, I don't necessarily agree with it completely.

Here is what worries me about walking-simulations in X4 (Station interiors):

A player plays a game that is largely about flying ships, shooting ships, building stations and putting together ship configurations, delivering cargo to stations and completing missions that involve the same sorts of things.

Those activities occupy, without any other additions, about 100% of the player's game experience. (They might spend a bit of time crashing ships into gates, stations, other ships, big rocks, tiny rocks... etc. )

So, there's an outcry calling for "station interiors" and face-to-face NPC interactions. The players think this will be "cool."

The devs say to themselves "OK, we can do that" and proceed to do it. It's not rocket science, it's just another instance to create and modelers love to model things. So, "boom", there are station interiors.

"Now that we've got them, we need to have a use for them," say the developers. So, they remember that all those canned radio-transmission missions can just be moved to station NPCs - Content problem solved, let's move on to the 'splosion engine and particle effects, because those are really cool.

So, what happens to the player?

Now, due to the fact that certain NPC interactions are critical and the mission system is absolutely critical, the player spends 50% of their gameplay time walking around in stations that are barely "just there" and don't have a lot of gameplay content created specifically for them.

In that case, half the gameplay a player experiences will be "there's not a lot of content and interesting things for me to do with half of my time playing this game."

It's a case of diverted focus, not "lost focus," as none was really lost, only mistakenly diverted. And, that diversion costs money. Those people developing the interiors have to be paid, whether or not those assets become a valued part of the gaming experience.

A "walking simulator" is not a valuable addition to this sort of game.

That being said, though, there is no way why it couldn't be. However, I am concerned that it would take resources away from other development issues for the game and, because of resource constraint, it couldn't be fully developed considering what the main focus of the gaming experience is supposed to be and what must be achieved there.

A proposal - There is absolutely no reason at all why station interiors couldn't be part of an X4 experience. None. However, before they become part of that experience, they must be well developed, well thought out, and the player must feel that they represent a valuable gameplay asset during play. This will take additional resources and money to develop, therefore:

Plan for station interiors, perhaps even put some rudimentary ones in the released game. However, use some of the revenues to focus on truly making these additions worthy of a player's time. Create missions for them, mysteries to solve, optimize them so they don't truly involve a lot of "walking around", but still give the player the feeling of being in a large station. Create tons of new NPCs, some political intrigue, some station-specific-interior missions involving new assets the player can use, like marines/robots/tactical transportation/something in order to justify all this new content.

Then, sell it as a true expansion pack with a few new sectors, station scenes for every station in the galaxy (generated scenes or static selections), some new ship types, a few new station types (Marine barracks/prison) and a goodly number of new storyline missions that make having station interiors in the game worth experiencing.

I agree with you, station interiors are not a definitive no-non but they should be implemented properly and given the love they deserve as do all other aspects of the game.

My main point was that Egosoft needs to be aware of its limitations, when cockpits were removed in X3 it was the right decision despite the fact it had received such negative responses when it was announced.

At that time Egosoft made a very calculated move realizing that they could either make very bad cockpits or they can remove them completely and it was the right choice not to include them since just putting something for the sake of having it there is not enough

This is what I am aiming for here again, Egosoft needs to be aware of its limitations, in the announcement trailer I have seen that they are bringing cockpits back and hopefully that will come along with a reduction of ship types since I can't imagine a small company like Egosoft being able to create proper cockpits for all variants that were introduced in X3AP.

After Elite, the simple 2D cockpit we had in X2 will no longer do, they have attempted to create a working and functional cockpit in X Rebirth and no doubt it had some good aspects to it but it was only for one ship...

Focus and clear goals are what's required to make sure that the money and development time go into something that will really make the gameplay great and won't just serve as eye candy, we have enough eye candy elsewhere that is not what I expect Egosoft to deliver.

[Kitty]

I agree 80% of OP.

Fact is that I may have felt a frustration in X2 when I could not land nor visit a station. In fact, there was some parts of the missions when we did, in X2 or X3R, visit interiors, in main plot. The drone piloting inside an asteroid was epic. But XR proved us that having the feature can be worst than the frustration.

I 100% agree on the fact that the development force to design interiors and to model living people is not worth the result. I 100% agree that the Borons are one of the main graphical assets of the game. It's a space sim game. Not showing Boron ships because the budget imposed a choice between Borons and Teladi walking design, it's a shame.

But it is too late.

As we've seen in the trailer, interiors are already integrated in the game, and people modelized as walking puppets. Let's just hope that this is playable. Anyhow, I loved many things that have been answered by Egosoft on this forum and the trailer looks good, interior walking apart.

[Ricemanu]

...
What has me mostly concerned is that the reveal trailer has shown tendencies that proved disastrous when applied for the development of X Rebirth. Egosoft as a small developer is good at making a very specific type of games that cater to a very specific audience... It's totally OK if X4 becomes a more refined edition of X3 and its predecessors.

The X Universe has enough lore, story and concepts to go for without going into areas that Egosoft has no clue or talent in... And perhaps not the credits to put in to bring the required talents.

Please Egosoft I beg you, drop the station interiors or trying to focus on characters and graphics. While X games were never graphically lame games it was the gameplay that made them a success, we don't need fancy graphics or the attempt at making eye candy we just want the X Universe we liked so much in X2 and X3... This isn't Star Citizen or Elite and nor should it be.
...[/b]

While i understand where you're coming from and also probably share a lot of the same views about the game, i have to say, you speak for yourself here. I also want most of the stuff you're talking about, but i think Ego needs to keep moving as well, try new things (and learn from them, they've shown that they obviously can do that) and expand the other parts of the game as well. X is such a fantastic game but it can become a bit dry. I like station interiors because they make the game more living, and X always had a strong tendency to be a game that at some point exists only in menus. And why shouldn't they stay on top graphically? Mind you, there are other people besides hardcore fans, who also help keep this great franchise alive. And besides that, i want eyecandy too, i'm not a robot.

[Player.]

...
What has me mostly concerned is that the reveal trailer has shown tendencies that proved disastrous when applied for the development of X Rebirth. Egosoft as a small developer is good at making a very specific type of games that cater to a very specific audience... It's totally OK if X4 becomes a more refined edition of X3 and its predecessors.

The X Universe has enough lore, story and concepts to go for without going into areas that Egosoft has no clue or talent in... And perhaps not the credits to put in to bring the required talents.

Please Egosoft I beg you, drop the station interiors or trying to focus on characters and graphics. While X games were never graphically lame games it was the gameplay that made them a success, we don't need fancy graphics or the attempt at making eye candy we just want the X Universe we liked so much in X2 and X3... This isn't Star Citizen or Elite and nor should it be.
...[/b]

While i understand where you're coming from and also probably share a lot of the same views about the game, i have to say, you speak for yourself here. I also want most of the stuff you're talking about, but i think Ego needs to keep moving as well, try new things (and learn from them, they've shown that they obviously can do that) and expand the other parts of the game as well. X is such a fantastic game but it can become a bit dry. I like station interiors because they make the game more living, and X always had a strong tendency to be a game that at some point exists only in menus. And why shouldn't they stay on top graphically? Mind you, there are other people besides hardcore fans, who also help keep this great franchise alive. And besides that, i want eyecandy too, i'm not a robot.

The thing is that there is still so much potential to explore outside of stations which can be integrated and applied better than these horrific models and FPS sequences that aren't Egosoft's specialty.

As I have said I'm not anti station interiors but the whole production should not be wasted on them, perhaps limiting them to just one type of station (for example shipyards) is a smarter way to go about this instead of giving us the illusion that we can visit all stations and actually have some good content in them.

The main focus in terms of both eye candy and development should be the space aspects and ships. I will remind you that X games don't have modular ship designs after 6 games... This means we can't destroy engines, sensors and other aspects of ships and opening these up could bring up a whole new array of gameplay mechanics.

That is just one example, among other things I can think of is resolving the bad guy issues... As of X3AP we have too many bad guys and this is once more an example of Egosoft stretching itself too thin and not giving us properly fleshed out bad guys to fight and fear of.

Right now we have the Xenon, Khaakh, Pirates, Terrans and other "evil" corporations who are all supposed to be bad and fearsome yet neither of them is deep enough for players to care about.

Lastly Egosoft really needs to streamline the whole transition between single ship gameplay and fleet gameplay, right now the game itself isn't really built to make any clear distinction between the two making the transition very uncomfortable and cumbersome to manage and they had 6 games to get that in order, while they had complemented improvements in these areas it is still not nearly at the level is should be.

So you see there is still PLENTY for Egosoft to do before they go micro into the stations and ships but trying to do all of these at the same time in the same game is just not a task Egosoft with its current manpower and resources is capable of and their community understands that but its time that they understand it as well and adjust their ambitions and goals accordingly.

I believe the success and the money that came in from X3 and its expansions have given Egosoft (and probably more so the publisher) the feeling that they can do this but the results have proven otherwise, they have recovered from this false notion once but I'm not sure they will be able to do that a second time.

Sometimes I wonder if it would be a better idea for Egosoft to lost its publisher and start a whole new project that will be crowd funded, they have the knowledge and the skills to show off in order to raise the required cash and without a nosy publisher that dictates by the whims of the moment it could be their chance to make the game they want and know they are capable of making.

[Krushwarok]

...
Now, due to the fact that certain NPC interactions are critical and the mission system is absolutely critical, the player spends 50% of their gameplay time walking around in stations that are barely "just there" and don't have a lot of gameplay content created specifically for them.

In that case, half the gameplay a player experiences will be "there's not a lot of content and interesting things for me to do with half of my time playing this game."...

I do not want to be offensive here but what the hell did you do at the other half of the 50% in your ship if your walking game-time was 50%?(rhetorical question ofc) I think you over exaggerated by a lot the station experience like every other people's comments in this forum that I have seen so far. In my experience I did just run to the quest npc and other useful npcs that took me about 2-5 minute and left the station with the menu.


All of your other points I agree with 100%. We need meaningful new features instead of cheap badly implemented ones.

In my opinion as far as I see it, Egosoft is facing one of the the biggest chellenge that hey had encountered. Their last game was not a success(great reputation and maybe money lost) and their team and resources is small especially even now after XR. They still a small developer team despite the time they developing games. They are just floating on the water that is not enough anymore after XR. X4 have to be big and feature rich which comes with a great risk and "responsibility" (or they loose their fanbase). If they are lucky Star Citizen wont be released(probably) in 2018 and I know not the same game but that doesn't mean people can't love both of them and when they have to decided which game... yeah you get it now. As you can see my concern is not entirely about the current fanbase(naturally you have to keep it) is more like the new ones that Egosoft MUST HAVE TO get into their game. They have to grow more then ever and restore their reputation for the current and the new fans. That is my opinion.

[-Dna-]

To satisfy this community, Egosoft need to do at least 10 games all together. Unfortunately, by doing each one of them they will upset at least 50% of the community...


¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[xirsoi]

Egosoft, please don't listen to the OP. Continue to improve and expand upon your games, making them more interesting and feature rich. Walking around stations (especially when you can see outside!) is immersive.

[Alan Phipps]

Please note that there are dedicated threads already active on 'walking' (including a separate poll) and on 'interiors'. Let's not repeat all those threads' discussions here please.

[caleb]

I agree with the OP. I hope the focus goes back to space/economy simulation. So we can have the whole "Trade, Fight, Build, Think" back again. Many of the features added in XR do not really go with that philosophy. Character models, character interactions (whether on your ship or station) do not really fit in that philosophy.

I liked the old X games where the player was simply an non-descriptive entity (we arrived with an old experimental ship, that was it). We were the representation of our empire, and what we decided to be. When I was managing my station, I was a mogul. When I was flying my scout mapping sectors, I was an intrepid explorer. When I was in my fighting M3, I was an ace fighter pilot. When I was flying my capital ship, I was a peerless commander.

XR threw all that out the window. I want to go back to being a GOD in the game. That was fun for me.

[Ynemey]

While I agree with some of what the OP posted, saying that the X Rebirth economy was a step back is obviously wrong. As someone who actually put 700 hours into X Rebirth's economy, I would more accurately say it was a big step forward with a few small steps back. It is far superior to X3's economy, in terms of the depth of production chains, production challenges, and range of options. It is also very tedious to set up stations and that greatly limits its potential for both new players and veterans. The economy is excellent, especially if the features mentioned for X4 are implemented (modular stations, player shipyards, accurate resource sinks, AI construction/destruction of factories). The problem is the player's interaction with it, from start to finish. It shouldn't require reading guides and taking hours to search for all the components just to build one station. Furthermore, veterans who know what to do and have all the resources shouldn't be forced to go through hundreds of menus over and over if they want to build an empire. Trading, too, can obviously be improved, but I won't go into that. Needless to say if X4 did go back to the X3 economy, I would be massively disappointed and probably just stick with X Rebirth.

As a side note, I'm so sick of hearing these people talk crap about X Rebirth's economy when they know nothing about it (and don't care to know either). It's not helpful to the developers or the community.

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

As someone who put 1300 hours into Rebirth.

The economy in Rebirth had more depth and was better done that any previous game.

I liked the way stations were constructed and once the player was manufacturing certain products in quantity it became quite easy to build a large empire.

At first walking on stations was a novelty, I just wish they had done more to utilize the interiors.

From my perspective boarding was way better than X3. Hacking stations and ships was a lucrative pastime. There were lots of other new features that I found enjoyable kept me playing. The fact that it was not a copy of X3 was as far as I am concerned the best bit.
I am glad that they experimented with new stuff. Its going to make the next game that much better.

[Dygaza]

As someone who put 1300 hours into Rebirth.

The economy in Rebirth had more depth and was better done that any previous game.

I liked the way stations were constructed and once the player was manufacturing certain products in quantity it became quite easy to build a large empire.

I agree that economy in Rebirth were way more deep that it was in previous games, but it wasn't nearly aswell balanced. There were simply inbalance between production in certain goods.

Let's take few examples:

Fuel cells. At the beginning there was huge problem with fuel cell in game, there we simply not enough of them being produced compared to the rate ships were burning them. Results for this were that ships actually stacked into the systems where fuel cell fabs were located. This killed the economy competely as there were hardly any large vessels trading at that point.

This was later fixed by simply ramping up the production speed by big scale, which resulted universe to be really stacked with fuel cells. Making money with fuel cells is no longer possible since all facilities are full of them all the time.

2nd Item I would mention is narcotics. Only way to produce Narcs are through a station, which main product is Medical supplies. This causes a huge problem, as the station simply resserves gigantic portition of nacrotics for it's own use. And selling a very tine portition of it to the market, which has actually rather huge demand for it.

There's more of these examples, but I think I made my point.

[Crellion]

Oh boy. I read the announcement and came running here and ... well I was dissapointed I guess.

Why: I read other people saying it "looks" like Rebirth and others say not it "looks" like X2.

However the problem with Rebirth was not "looks" but game play. Rebirth looks great. It plays not so great.

So let's see what I deduce regarding gameplay so far from you tubing the demo:

- Walk from ship to ship and even go through the whole thing when docking / undocking. oooopss

- Map is still the thingy with the highways and station blueprints where you get too "focused" information. X3 maps were 100000 times better. One quick look and you know whats happening in the entire system how many reds what type and where exactly - where your other assets are etc etc even see their direction and glean speed. In comparison the Rebirth map is a pile of ... you guessed it. You have to zoom in to see (useful gameplay) detail and by the time you zoom out again you have no idea where stuff was.

EDIT: At least it seems the map may be seamless... that will be an improvement / partial solution

- Collisions????

If Egosoft want to call the game X4 they must make very sure it answers the core gameplay "problems" of Rebirth for people like me which consider X3 R/TC/AP superior games to Rebirth.

IF (jury still out of course) you make a Rebirth II and call it X4 you are just adding (further) insult to the injury and its really not worth it Bernd. It might work as a cheap marketing trick getting you a few more sales but it will be the final nail in the coffin of a beautiful relationship.

Please think about it.

[BigBANGtheory]

- Walk from ship to ship and even go through the whole thing when docking / undocking. oooopss

They showed that you could walk not that you had to walk.


- Map is still the thingy with the highways and station blueprints where you get too "focused" information. X3 maps were 100000 times better. One quick look and you know whats happening in the entire system how many reds what type and where exactly - where your other assets are etc etc even see their direction and glean speed. In comparison the Rebirth map is a pile of ... you guessed it. You have to zoom in to see (useful gameplay) detail and by the time you zoom out again you have no idea where stuff was.

So they haven't shown some kind of overview interface/screen that gives you a snap shot of what all your assets are doing. Aside from that the map interface is far superior to anything we had in X3 and XR you must be thinking of some very niche case to not see that. Can I remind you that the X3 sector map displayed information but had very little interactive options fine if you were focused on trading but totally inadequate for any tactical purpose leaving you with the property menu to order things around 1 on 1.... yeah that was fun when you had 20+ ships.

X4 looks set to be X3 with significant improvements and an XR look about it, seriously what is not to like about that?

[Vandragorax]

X:R, despite its release with some high severity issues, actually made a lot of improvements on the X formula, and I'm glad to see them return but improved upon for X4.

Highways were predominantly added because of the removal of SETA (which was a good move imo). SETA was a band-aid fix for the fact that it was tedious to fly from one side of a sector to the other in X3. Highways are a vast improvement upon that and the removal of SETA also allows for a lot of other positive changes in the game that were otherwise broken with such a system being available to the player.

Walking around was added in Rebirth yes, and unfortunately didn't add much to the gameplay. It's one of those features that everyone seems to think they want, but in reality it means they are asking for two games in one (a space sim and a first-person shooter). Sadly this means that usually one or the other suffers, especially with Egosoft because they are a small team. I'd be much happier if they removed the walking around elements, or drastically cut them down at least, and concentrated on the space sim which is what their game is all about. However as long as the walking around has a purpose and doesn't just feel like an annoying time waster then great. We'll have to wait and see for more details on how this will pan out I reckon

As for the map, if you watch the release video you will see there are already a HUGE ton of improvements in this aspect. It's looking like a really nice modern RTS UI, with lots of rich features to help us manage our tasks in remote systems which is exactly how it should be! I don't know why you think the map in X3 was so good because it really wasn't, and I'm certainly glad they are keeping the basis of X:R but making loads of nice improvements to make it more usable and interesting. We should be managing our empire through the map more than through a series of spreadsheet menus, a visual interface not just text is way more modern and relevant in 2017.