X4: Foundations - Mount and Blade with space-ships. Now with significant Beta update

[Turjan]

My experience:

-start game
-fire up tutorial
-tutorial bugs out on extra long range scanner part and I can't complete it.

That's "good" old Egosoft tutorial tradition. If, for example, in X3:TC, you chose the "Trader" start, you spawned in a cargo ship without weapons. The tutorial necessarily failed at the shooting practice stage, which you wouldn't know as a new player. This was never patched or changed.

 

[Zarniwoop]

I watched that video and i am shocked about what he said.


Also there is mod that removes completely highways.

Does it put back MUH JUMPDRIVES? Because that's bascially what the highways are, a piss-poor replacement for the jump drive.

 

[Grotesque]

 

[cw8]

The best X tutorial was in X2. At least it was functional and helped you understand, if a bit, how to play the game. The tutorials in X3 and onwards are pretty rubbish, if not for my hundreds of hours in X2, I wouldn't know how to play X3.

 

[Perkel]

Does it put back MUH JUMPDRIVES? Because that's bascially what the highways are, a piss-poor replacement for the jump drive.

There is i think mod for that on egoboards.

Either way jumpdrives are shit and highway doesn't make really sense in X4 considering how you can just hop in and explore whole universe in less than 2 minutes and gives wrong impression according to egodevs themselves.

This is also why i removed them via mod also on egoboards.

 

[Zarniwoop]

Does it put back MUH JUMPDRIVES? Because that's bascially what the highways are, a piss-poor replacement for the jump drive.

There is i think mod for that on egoboards.

Either way jumpdrives are shit and highway doesn't make really sense in X4 considering how you can just hop in and explore whole universe in less than 2 minutes and gives wrong impression according to egodevs themselves.

This is also why i removed them via mod also on egoboards.

Jumpdrives are not "shit", they are an integral part of the X game mechanics and the lore from day one, the whole X universe was discovered by a malfunctioning jumpdrive.

The only game that didn't have them is Shitbirth which no-one in the entire universe even considers a legitimate part of the series, apart from you for some strange reason.

 

[Perkel]

Stillbirth had jumpdrives.
Secondly whatever it is part of lore or not jumpdrives are one trick pony that removes completely strategy from games that give you more than 1 unit to control. X4 has its growing faults but removing jumpdrives was biggest incline in X series to date.

Also lol reading X games "lore".
No one fucking plays X games for lore.

 

[Turjan]

The best X tutorial was in X2. At least it was functional and helped you understand, if a bit, how to play the game. The tutorials in X3 and onwards are pretty rubbish, if not for my hundreds of hours in X2, I wouldn't know how to play X3.

Yeah, although I started with X3, which means I personally figured it out well enough (probably from a website). However, I don't mean to excuse the failure of those tutorials. Quite the opposite. In those times when I was very active on the Egosoft forums, the topic of "why do X games not sell better" came up time and again. It always baffled me when my suggestion to fix the tutorials was dismissed as "unimportant" pretty much every time I mentioned it. Urthor's reaction up there was also quite common in those times. The tutorial is what most new players will see first of your game. You better make sure it at least works, even if it's uninspired.

 

[Zarniwoop]

Stillbirth had jumpdrives.
Secondly whatever it is part of lore or not jumpdrives are one trick pony that removes completely strategy from games that give you more than 1 unit to control. X4 has its growing faults but removing jumpdrives was biggest incline in X series to date.

Also lol reading X games "lore".
No one fucking plays X games for lore.

Reading is teh hard and for fags. It happens in the game itself. You start off near Earth testing a jumpdrive, it malfunctions and you end up in Teladi space - Seizewell.

You would know that if you played less Shitbirth and more X.

It doesn't "remove" shit. It's always been a part of the game. You must be one of those geniuses that purposefully injure yourself before going on a hike to "make it more challenging", or remove one of your car's wheels before going to the shops.

 

[Perkel]

Sorry mate but if you talk about kindom economy and warfare then jumpdrives can't work.
Because in order for it to work AI can't use it like you do.

IF AI in X3 had same capability like you did then Argon or whatever would just jump in all of their fleets into your homebase sector and wipe you out. And this is the problem when you want to have sandbox galaxy warfare.

And no i don't care about previous X games allowing that. Bad design is bad design and should be removed.
Especially when you want your kingdom part of game to actually be playable.

Without jumpdrives you need to strategize, spread out your forces, keep defenses and patrols etc.
With jump drives at any point in time your whole armada is just split second away from you.

Essence of X games is to be part of that world and build yourself reastically so you know the rules of game and you use them to 1up, not to cheat like in X-rebirth where player ship is stronger than even capital ships

 

[Average Manatee]

Yep. Jumpdrives completely destroy both any logistical/organizational challenge and the universe consistency. If Jumpdrives actually existed in X then no ship would ever be destroyed or ever go around on normal engines since they could always jump away to their destination. The entire concept of having a sector structure and borders between races would be done with since jump completely invalidates it. Of course this would make the game shit, so jumpdrives are merely a cheat for the player that break the game in the player's favor. Which is still bad.

That said you could probably add some restrictions to make jumpdrives still work without breaking the game. Some combination of:

- Can only jump to friendly systems
- Can only jump through friendly systems.
- Requires some kind of anchor point. Expensive station that requires resources to run. Have each race run one in their home sector.
- Requires one to actually enter a normal warp gate. Jump over intervening sectors to your destination.

 

[Zarniwoop]

They NEED ENERGY CELLS JESUS FUCK. Have any of you actually played the games?

 

[Perkel]

You mean those energy cells that you can get everywhere and lasts you through shitload of jumps especially on capital ships which can store enough of them to last for half of game ?
only m3s had issues with fuel but you wouldn't fly them alone either way but as a group.

So point still stands mate.

As fore rebalance even wish such setup you are completely trivializing defense. It would be even worse for attacker because enemy fleet would have to go through whole systems while you could jump in jump out at any point you please.
You also wouldn't have to do what i said above, no defense no patrols no strategizing where to put your m2 to work as living wall in case of invasion.

 

[Zarniwoop]

You mean those energy cells that you can get everywhere and lasts you through shitload of jumps especially on capital ships which can store enough of them to last for half of game ?
only m3s had issues with fuel but you wouldn't fly them alone either way but as a group.

So point still stands mate.

As fore rebalance even wish such setup you are completely trivializing defense. It would be even worse for attacker because enemy fleet would have to go through whole systems while you could jump in jump out at any point you please.
You also wouldn't have to do what i said above, no defense no patrols no strategizing where to put your m2 to work as living wall in case of invasion.

So you want the game to conveniently make choke points for you.

Wow. Much balance.

Anyway, found the secret to making tons of cash (as of v1.32). It's MINING.

Buy a medium miner, let it automine nVIDIUM. Like an hour later, you will have enough money for a FUCKHUEG miner. Buy one, let it mine more nVIDIUM. like 20 minutes later, you can get another. Rinse and repeat until you have a universe crawling with Von Neumann miners replicating at an exponential rate. Until, of course, you exhaust the entire tiny universe.

 

[Thane Solus]

You mean those energy cells that you can get everywhere and lasts you through shitload of jumps especially on capital ships which can store enough of them to last for half of game ?
only m3s had issues with fuel but you wouldn't fly them alone either way but as a group.

So point still stands mate.

As fore rebalance even wish such setup you are completely trivializing defense. It would be even worse for attacker because enemy fleet would have to go through whole systems while you could jump in jump out at any point you please.
You also wouldn't have to do what i said above, no defense no patrols no strategizing where to put your m2 to work as living wall in case of invasion.

So you want the game to conveniently make choke points for you.

Wow. Much balance.

Anyway, found the secret to making tons of cash (as of v1.32). It's MINING.

Buy a medium miner, let it automine nVIDIUM. Like an hour later, you will have enough money for a FUCKHUEG miner. Buy one, let it mine more nVIDIUM. like 20 minutes later, you can get another. Rinse and repeat until you have a universe crawling with Von Neumann miners replicating at an exponential rate. Until, of course, you exhaust the entire tiny universe.

that only works for a while, and yes its stupid, but since the economy is still broken, and probably will be for quite a while, its a way to start geting funds. You can also try missions + crystal hunting and so on.

 

[Zarniwoop]

that only works for a while, and yes its stupid, but since the economy is still broken, and probably will be for quite a while, its a way to start geting funds. You can also try missions + crystal hunting and so on.

Missions only net you 150k or so and take 15-30 minutes. In the same time, an L mining ship makes over a million or more on nVdium.

Also, seems like you can't mine asteroids the old fashioned way? By sticking a mine on them and having resources forever?

The only way seems to be to shoot the rocks with your laz0r and collect the pieces. Not sure how they will handle this mineral depletion in the finished game then...

 

[Perkel]

Wow speculations were true.
Ego is brining some sort of multi into x4.

Fucking berndt. He will never fucking learn.

1.5:

With this, the final update for this year, we introduce "Ventures" - an exciting new feature in which you send your ships out into other players' universes to explore and bring back rewards. Please note that this feature is currently in BETA and will be expanded upon in the new year. Happy holidays!

• NEW FEATURE (BETA): Send your ships on ventures into other players' universes!
• Added (BETA) Japanese localisation.
• Added option for "Betty" to speak target names.
• Added option to undock and abort ship upgrades that are waiting for resources.
• Added turret behaviour settings to the Ship Interactions menu (including L/XL ship turret groups).
• Added notification in case player-owned ship is unable to dock as ordered.
• Added inventory net worth in empire overview.
• Added cooldown for station repair when stations are under attack.
• Added entry for the manual to Help menu.
• Improved performance with AMD GPUs.
• Improved ability of lasertowers to track targets.
• Improved faction rebuilding logic to not overload shipyards as much.
• Improved traders supplying shipyards and wharfs.
• Improved "Where can I find...?" dialogue option.
• Changed inventory drop button to drop all selected wares if multiple are selected (for single wares amount can still be chosen).
• Changed maximum damage done to ships due to sabotage by bailing pilots.
• Fixed getting left behind when leaving your ship in the space suit while in relative movement with a bigger ship.
• Fixed squadron subordinates sometimes flying extremely far from their commanders while flying in formation.
• Fixed station-based mining ships delivering very few resources to their station if the station has little to no funds.
• Fixed shipyards not stockpiling enough resources for ships with large amounts of deployables, and miscalculating resource allocation for other wares.
• Fixed further case that could lead to police punishing player for retaliating against pirates.
• Fixed capital ships sometimes bouncing off of each other when attempting to dock to exchange wares.
• Fixed pirate ships congregating around their own stations.
• Fixed and prevented pirate ships attempting to plunder in highways.
• Fixed receiving requests from other pilots for help while not in a cockpit.
• Fixed player-owned docked ships requring additional instruction to proceed with orders after being given new orders.
• Fixed Xenon and Kha'ak ships always having very bad pilots.
• Fixed incorrect reputation requirements for friend/ally ceremonies of Ministry of Finance.
• Fixed repair mass traffic of pirate ships causing reputation loss when destroyed.
• Fixed turrets and self-maintenance not working on ships whose pilots bailed out.
• Fixed job ships not filling out their squadrons to make up for combat losses.
• Fixed player ship not being included in boarding menu ship selection if player ship is selected along with other player-owned ships.
• Fixed target of successful boarding operation sometimes getting some owner other than the player faction.
• Fixed newly-boarded ships retaining their old orders.
• Fixed lasertowers deployed by AI pilot waiting for player to tell it to proceed before deploying while player is standing on ship.
• Fixed defence drones attempting to go to dock for repairs and to get more supplies.
• Fixed mining ships not correctly reporting when they have completed their order.
• Fixed player station managers not being assigned correctly in certain situations.
• Fixed being able to teleport to stations that are not player-owned or allied.
• Fixed missile blueprints not being available (now available from faction representatives).
• Fixed HQ Escort mission selecting an inactive gate for the ship to fly through.
• Fixed Satellite Coverage mission.
• Fixed Rescue Ship mission not rewarding any credits.
• Fixed ships to be rescued from a minefield responding to attacks.
• Fixed other lasertowers in a group not responding if one of them is attacked.
• Fixed several issues with Find Lockbox mission, including it not finishing in certain cases.
• Fixed Repair mission not completing if object got repaired in the meanwhile.
• Fixed Acquire Captain mission being available for spacesuit.
• Fixed Assassination missions selecting player-owned NPC's as mission-target.
• Fixed abort condition for several missions.
• Fixed several tutorial progression issues.
• Fixes savegames with stalled guild missions.
• Fixed player not being correctly refunded when aborting some ship builds.
• Fixed shipyards and wharfs never building again if they were hacked.
• Fixed Xenon shipyards and wharfs sometimes storing wares they don't need.
• Fixed menu crash when upgrading capital ships.
• Fixed trade context menu being black.
• Fixed doors sometimes getting stuck after loading a savegame.
• Fixed NPC ships being removed on loading savegame in some situations.
• Fixed failure to open Logical Station Overview for large stations and for low UI scale values.
• Fixed plot management menu breaking with too many stations.
• Fixed freeze in map when viewing information on very large stations.
• Fixed mission briefing in ultra-wide resolutions.
• Fixed start menu not opening in certain cases.
• Fixed missing German character voices.
• Fixed various localisation issues.
• Fixed reversed front/back speakers.
• Fixed causes of several freezes and performance issues in specific circumstances.
• Fixed several other causes of rare crashes.

 

[Thane Solus]

good effort. Not sure if they fixed turrets and boosting, but there are mods for that, same for exploring and proper traders

 

[Zarniwoop]

When will they fix the "entire universe is the size of my backyard" bug?

Or the "story mission ends after 20 minutes" bug?

Or the "economy completely stalls after a few hours" bug?

 

[Turjan]

When will they fix the "entire universe is the size of my backyard" bug?

Or the "story mission ends after 20 minutes" bug?

Or the "economy completely stalls after a few hours" bug?

They probably learned from Fallout 76 that it's all about emergent gameplay today. Why need a story if you have real people rampage through your game?

 

[Burning Bridges]

Well, Perkele how is it? Are you still playing it?

 

[Zarniwoop]

Men:

Turns out you can CLAIM SECTORS. You know, like they added in the last patches of X3?

https://www.naguide.com/x4-foundations-how-to-claim-a-sector/

Epic faction wars with constantly changing map painting incoming? I mean, in like 2 years when the game is out of pre-alpha.

 

[Perkel]

Well, Perkele how is it? Are you still playing it?

Nope, spend most of my month back playing with my friend Original Sin 2 because he bought gaming pc after years of being console retard and we try to play something coop to get him going. I got him to play Pathfinder now.

I will back to playing it when someone will release decent overhaul mod like for X3 litecube/x-tended.
Game simply needs more content and some serious modding work to be contender to X3 litecube/x-tended.

Good news is that from looks of it final mod will be much better than litecube/x-tended because modders simply have way more things to play with and there are far less things that are hardcoded. There is already one overhaul mod and you could actually cobble up some decent overhaul if you combine it with few other mods.

 

[anvi]

I have the most amazing space game in my head and it will never be made.

 

[Zarniwoop]

I have the most amazing space game in my head and it will never be made.

Star Citizen?