Story

[Michael]

Let me start off by saying that I've only recently played and officially beat X: Beyond the Frontier. Never have I felt so accomplished, especially being 32 now and finally having finished the game after buying it on disk back when it first came out, before the days of Steam. :-) 16 years...better late than never, I suppose.

So! Now that I've finally gotten around to it, I've become obsessed with completing the entire franchise in its proper order. However, everything that I've been reading has conflicting claims about X: Tension. I do realize that it's basically an expansion of BTF, and I've been playing it for quite a bit now. I'm really enjoying the additions to it. But...is there an actual story besides the introduction? Is there an official "ending" to the game like there was in BTF? Most people say no, but some say yes. I suspect that it's because most folks never really got far enough to find out, or missed an objective somewhere.

So...am I just plodding around, making money, and forging my trade empire for nothing? Or is there an official end-goal in XT like there was in BTF?

[Laptop]

Not really a story, no. A lot of people liked the sandbox workings and so on in BTF, but didn't really think the story was great.

So for the expansion (if you like), they basically focused on improving the sandbox world and adding more stuff to do rather than the story.

I guess the general story is "The ship jump home failed, so you got another ship to continue your adventures in the universe until your ship is fixed". Your ship doesn't actually get fixed, so you really just float about in space forever with all the trading, building, fighting and so on to keep you occupied.

[Michael]

I remember reading somewhere that your original ship gets stolen at some point though, and there's some kind of race...? Would that be considered the main objective, or is that simply yet another side mission with no real consequence?

[Laptop]

I haven't played X-Tension 100%, the intro seems to sum the story for that game up though.

From Wikipedia:

Originally posted by Egosoft:

"There is no overarching plot in X-Tension. It is an open-ended, sandbox game, filled with "microquests".[9] The player is free to choose "to be a trader with an unarmed Argon Lifter... or a bounty-hunter ... armed to the teeth with plasma throwers.";[8] free to choose "where [they] want to go, what to trade in and who to pick on".[7] Egosoft's Managing Director, Bernd Lehahn, described X-Tension as "[a] space game that allows you to live freely in a virtual universe and do whatever you want to do. At least that's our goal."[9]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X:_Beyond_the_Frontier#Gameplay_2

[Michael]

Hmm...oh well. If there's no clear ending to the game, I may as well move on to X2 then. Thanks for the quick reply!

[DragDenDFO]

I know I'm late, but better late than never :).
There is a mission that can be considered as an end-game plot. I'm afraid I don't remember all the prerequisites... You need to have a 100-hour playing time (shown in player info), high relations with Borons and, I think, Paranids... Maybe some fighter and trader ratings, but I don't remember.
The mission is that experimental Paranid ship Perseus was stolen by Xenons, and you need to intercept it (capture or destroy). You even get X-Perimental from XBTF, the fastest M3 in game.
Perseus as enemy is very strong - it has 2x125MW shields and anti-missile defense.
Personally, I considered my main objective to capture Perseus, and I managed to do that with help of two Mambas.

[Autismonaut]

Originally posted by Achtungerto:

I know I'm late, but better late than never :).
There is a mission that can be considered as an end-game plot. I'm afraid I don't remember all the prerequisites... You need to have a 100-hour playing time (shown in player info), high relations with Borons and, I think, Paranids... Maybe some fighter and trader ratings, but I don't remember.
The mission is that experimental Paranid ship Perseus was stolen by Xenons, and you need to intercept it (capture or destroy). You even get X-Perimental from XBTF, the fastest M3 in game.
Perseus as enemy is very strong - it has 2x125MW shields and anti-missile defense.
Personally, I considered my main objective to capture Perseus, and I managed to do that with help of two Mambas.

There is also an extra sector that you end up unlocking in that mission, which requires taking out (I think two?) Xenon M2 ships.