Why Oh Why Egosoft

[MERC Major Gosnell]

I have been playing Since X Beyond the Frontier,yet,now on my fifth attempt ,the latest in V3.0 I still find myself not only bored but baffled by the design choices within the game.Some of the following will be personal preferences,but some i feel are felt by some of the community.Having done a bit of research, X4 is hardly ever reckongnised as one of the best current space games.This worries me as i feel Egosoft is stuck in the past. Egosoft used to have a monopoly on the space sim niche,however with the rise of genre,through obvious games such as Elite,Star Citizen,Space Engineers ect that niche is no longer there.The competition is more popular,in terms of positive press coverage,the X-Series is hardly covered.Where as in the past Egosoft could release bug ridden products with the aim of future patching and relying on the community to keep interested,this however when there is other ports of call that offer a better experience is a strategy that will fail.Alongside which selling a title which resembles an early acess beta at full price,then launching dlc at 50% of that price,is sure to drive away any new player base.Whilst I long for a true successor to X-Albion,I fear that egosoft might cease to be before that happens if they maintain their current approach.Times have moved on Bernd.

Why Oh Why
1.Why reduce the number of races?
2.Why release the game at triple A price point,and not early access?
3.Why change the gate network?
4.Why launch with no story?
5.Why change the entire art style of the ships?
6.Why leave out the classic x music?
7.Why can we not rotate modules with the press of a button when building?
8.Why remove all the great weapons from X3?
9.Why make it so easy to make money?
10.Why are all the battleships so small in comparison to X3?
11.Why is the loot dropped in war zones always the same?
12.Why isn't the player hq quests,better signposted?
13.Why do we have to come to the forums to find out how to complete said quests?
14.Why make us wait in stations for upgrades ,when there is sweet bugger all to do on them?
15.Why if your going to have walk able stations are all the stations nearly identical?
16.Why did you Think it was a good idea to have ships be built pixel by pixel?
17.Why not have them built Module by Module?
18.Why make ship explosions look so bad?
19.Why make the eva suit sound like static?
20.Why make eva controls so damn awkward?
21.Why make searching wrecks such a damn awkward experience?

[rucky]

Now I'm obviouly not a FanBoy as I'm just in some 2 Months - even if I even have the X SuperBox, but HandDown, I couldn't get into any of the former X Games as I could not get bothered to learn the basic stuff which is needed even for the basic tasks.

This being said, I LOVE X4. 3.0 Beta to be more precise. Tutorials. Finally.

Another thing about me, I'm a Elite Dangerous Veteran, playing that since more than 2400 hours, since August 2014, yes, since BETA phase, even before Gamma and going gold.
So don't try to tell things about that game which isn't true ;-) others tried already, and failed.

Now to your Points.

1) Not really sure, though as far as I know, NO first version of any X Game did had ANY races included which was then added by the various DLCs (I would rather call them EXPANSIONS).

2) TRIPLE A PRICE.
Let's have a look (I'm also including Collections):
X4 Standard : 49,99€, Collectors : 79,99€ - over 1 year old
No Man's Sky : 54,99€ -- AddOns all included.
Star Wars Fallen Order : 59,99€, Deluxe Edition : 69,99€ -- new
XCom 2 : 49,99€, Collection : 92,20€ -- nearly 4 years old.
Battletech : 39,99€, Collection : 89,99€ -- nearly 2 years old.
Tomb Raider Definitive Edition : 59,36€ -- over 1 year old
Red Dead Redemption 2 : 59,99€, Special : 74,99€, Ultimate : 89,99€ -- "new" (in Steam)
Planet Zoo : 44,99€, Deluxe : 54,99€, All : 64,99€
Prize is surely not overpriced.

DLC Price. is 30€ for: 2 (!) Expansions + Collectors Edition Content (ebook, soundtrack, artwork)
so it's at max 15€ for the next Vendetta DLC (I would say some 12.50) and that's way less than 50%

3) 5) 6) 8) 9) 10) 11) 12) 13) 14) 18) 19) 20) 21) New game. New designs. Can't say more.
Though gett some Mods, they have X3 music, ships, effects, explosions etc. also economy is changed and so on. It's the same on all X Games. Get Mods for bonus.
But I'm sure, as f.e. 3.0 has way better GFX already they are working on it...

4) Okay. Though as I heard rumors saying some story will come with the 3.0 DLC....

7) YES. YES. YES. Your first true point. +1

13) Really ?!?!?!?! My friend, in ALL of the former X Games even looking at forums, vids, or as there wasn't so much, than PC Games books etc. did NOT helped me getting things started. Though this Quest was the easiest thing even I had understood on my first try -- better said, MAKE THE FU%&ING TUTORIALS someone told me, I took, and the third one GOT me the PHQ Quest. Done.

14) You complain about waiting? Really? X Games I thought were mostly about using Sinza to get time pasted anyway. So do that. Or not??

15) Its their second game with walkable Stations (did X Rebirth had them?), yes, hopefully we get more content here later...
but Come on, you're complaining about the "Triple A" prize which isn't, but then even want more than "Triple A" functions in.

16) 17) Lol. yeah, okay, haha +1
How was it in X Rebirth or the other versions?
Though, really, that's still no worthable complaint.

So, as you already should know as you seem a X Veteran:
GET MODS these will already get your points done.
OR wait until it's implemented into the Game by the Devs.

[MERC Major Gosnell]

The point I was trying to make is that Egosoft shouldnt be happy with people modding to fix their game,we shouldnt have to resort to mods to fix,bad design choices.Yes its a new game,but there was no need to destroy all that came before.
As to stations,im actually advocating that either provide us with something worthwhile to do on them or remove the wait times.Personally ,I would rather see the resources that went into the stations be put into fixing the games combat and economy.
As to the price comparison,alot of those games launched in a fairly playable state and could reasonably charge those prices(no mans skky being the exception.
Its a shame you bounced off the earlier x games,you might understand the frustrations some of us have.

[Tempered]

I've played all the x series games and this is the first one that really drew me in and had me taking sides in a conflict. This is the first x series game that felt like there were consequences for your actions or inaction.
Yes, Egosoft definitely needs to step up their game on bug fixes and even some basic functionality, but I think they've finally nailed the over all feel of the game and added some much needed immersion. The bones of a really good game is there, it just needs to be polished.

[Darllock]

Originally posted by Tempered:

I've played all the x series games and this is the first one that really drew me in and had me taking sides in a conflict. This is the first x series game that felt like there were consequences for your actions or inaction.
Yes, Egosoft definitely needs to step up their game on bug fixes and even some basic functionality, but I think they've finally nailed the over all feel of the game and added some much needed immersion. The bones of a really good game is there, it just needs to be polished.

A lot of polish! I agree with the OP the game is lacking. Thank goodness for the mods.

[MERC Major Gosnell]

Originally posted by Tempered:

I've played all the x series games and this is the first one that really drew me in and had me taking sides in a conflict. This is the first x series game that felt like there were consequences for your actions or inaction.
Yes, Egosoft definitely needs to step up their game on bug fixes and even some basic functionality, but I think they've finally nailed the over all feel of the game and added some much needed immersion. The bones of a really good game is there, it just needs to be polished.

Im the oposite,I feel like all i do is fly point to point,the combat in particular just lacks the wow factor.

[eMYNOCK]

@MERC

as a veteran of the series you should know that the base of the previous games went into a nightmarish mess over the years.

we had no choice but to slim everything down to a minimum and start it from scratch.

i think i already tried to decribe that in an other topic, so i see no reason to do it again.

beside, the Team is working constantly on improvements... economical, combat wise and in general, it takes time and i am certain you will be pleased when it is finished propper... and not rushed and bug ridden.

Originally posted by MERC Major Gosnell:

Its a shame you bounced off the earlier x games,you might understand the frustrations some of us have.

being new to the game is an opportunity some of us (yes us, i have the Dev Tag since May last year) would need....

all veterans, including me, already learned how stuff works in XBtF, X2 & X3... we expect all following Xes to be just like the last X.. just better.

That might be a natural assumption.. but it is not healthy... neither for the Devs nor for the affected Player.

I surely can understand the frustration of everyone... and all i can do about that is to suggest everyone to take a deep breath... clear your Mind... forget that everything prior to X4 ever has existed and have a fresh look at it.


Thats what i've done when i came from AP to XR... i eradicated everything AP told me from my mind... so did i with X4.

[Wraith]

Well the previous X game were all fly point to point as well...
Combat wasn't that great for them either unless it was modded.

X rebirth probably had the best in term of combat but suffer by taking to much away from previous game.
X4 combat isn't that bad but it need some visual and audio changes.
Like new explosion is pretty fantastic and I hope they continue to do some revamping.

[Easy Target]

Nothing was worse than a gate system - seriously hated the crap outta that BS.

[Culling]

My biggest issue with this game and Egosoft is that they wasted so much time trying to port the idea to console with X3 Stillbirth. Now I do understand they had to overall the engine, but I still think they should have just skipped that game.

While I am liking the 3.0 beta, I have to agree that the DLC is insulting at the price. Is it going to give us what we need? I am guessing it is just expanding out the Split to a race and a bunch of sectors and ships with maybe a quest line. This should be free or maybe something like $5. I will not be buying the expansion until it is proven to be as good as the $ or it goes on some sort of super sale.

Just as a side note I have played every X game. The real x3 series games I had massive super empire where I ended up getting bored and just sent massive battle fleets OOS into every races sector and started killing everything they had. Mods were a must to mange the empire and fleets I wish they would have added this into X4.

[MERC Major Gosnell]

Emynock,you say forget the previous games,that's not a great dev attitude to have.The reason you sold so many copies I suspect is due to the fact that alot of albion fans thought they were getting another x game in the "series"You said it will be polished soon,it should have been polished on launch.Surely the lack of acknowledgement from the most gaming websites should be indicative of a larger problem.

[eMYNOCK]

i also said that i am wearing that Dev Tag only since last year... everything i said before that Tag went next to my Name is my personal experience as a Player.

From a Players perspective i totally agree and understand your opening Post, from my insigts i also totally understand why decissions were made that Players can not know about.

It is a double edged sword and a huge risk to take... for all sides.

[MERC Major Gosnell]

Hence the concern,how many flopss can egosoft survive,how many flops before the existing community leave?I loved the series till albion,it seems that egosoft has lost its edge.I dont mean to be offensive,just giving my opinion.

[eMYNOCK]

i have no knowledge of a flop yet.. rough starts for sure but flops?

your concerns and opinion are the evidence that you care for the series... and it is the best you can do...

voice your concerns, voice your opinions... in constructive topics like this one.

better and more direct would be in our Main Forum but here is good as well.

[Teo]

No music from previous games? Are you serious? X4 included a lot of original soundtracks.

[dogshocker]

I always wondered why the Boron never seem to feature much any more. I liked the old X3 Boron royalty concept. I liked their ship types...their whole cultural style.

I always lamented the end of the jump drive/gate system for the introduction of the highways.

I long for the days whereby we had many more ship types and race specific weapon types.

I would also like to see more activity on stations....no closed shops, more folk generally, etc.

I pretty much agree with the OP on these matters. As to the rest, for me, the price is fair enough by modern standards (except that the game needs much more work for the money, certainly before 3.0 beta). The music and artwork don't present a problem for me. I like the look of X4.

Re quests and the need to contact forums...that's the same with most games...it's how we all communicate our problems/solutions. X series are always a bit complex so, for me, thank God for the advice I can receive on the forums !!!

Re rotating build designs....I think you can but I'll agree, it's all a bit fiddly, as is the map menu generally. I'd really like to see a dedicated sales/purchases menu page with ship selection, like we had in XR.

Re capital ship and station size....come on man, you've got to be kidding. One of the few things that's really great from the start of XR and X4 has to be the representative scale...big ships are big, so are the stations.

All in all, you've got some points that I agree with....some I don't. Hopefully, X4 will prove to be a game that we'll all accept to be, at least as good as X3. It always takes a good few patches and more than a few mods to make any of the X series more like you'd want it to be.