X Rebirth

[CaptainHaplo]

Ok, I admit it - I am sold.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNs1rdSkUi8&list=TL_bK6SdXhGPQ

I love the X series, and while the one ship thing is a bit of a disappointment, the interactive economy, improved pathfinding due to lack of gates and the sheer scope have me drooling.

Yes - available for preorder now....

[Skybird]

Holy cow!

Is a garage sufficient to store the needed hardware?

[CaptainHaplo]

They are not as bad as one would think. However, this is the first game that I have seen (had an interest in) that is requiring a 64bit OS...

Note the "specs are still being determined" caveat.
The great thing is this is sure to take advantage of multiple cpu's and hyperthreading.



System Requirements

Minimum:

OS: Windows 7 SP1 (64-bit), Vista SP2 (64-bit), XP SP3 (64-bit)
Processor: Intel i-Series at 2GHz or AMD equivalent
Memory: 4 GB RAM
Graphics: NVidia GT400 series with 512MB RAM or better, ATI 4870HD with 512MB RAM or better
DirectX: Version 9.0c
Hard Drive: 6 GB available space
Sound Card: DirectX 9.0c Compatible Sound Card
Additional Notes: These specs are still being determined

Recommended:

OS: Windows 7 SP1 (64-bit)
Processor: Intel i5 (Quad) or i7 at 2.5GHz or AMD equivalent
Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics: NVidia GT500 series with 1GB RAM or better, ATI 5870HD with 1GB RAM or better
DirectX: Version 9.0c
Hard Drive: 10 GB available space
Sound Card: DirectX 9.0c Compatible Sound Card
Additional Notes: These specs are still being determined.

http://worthplaying.com/article/2013/8/8/news/90085/

[Dowly]

The one ship thing is what will probably keep me from buying this. :hmmm:

[Skybird]

Nice recommended specs, I'm indeed meeting them. i5 2500K@3.3GHz, 8 GB, GTX 460SE, W7-64bit. Maybe the gfx board shows to be weak, but on the other hand I never cared for reducing AA and AF to 2x if needed for better frames. If I find frames with SBP 3.0 being too low (once they finally release it...), I may now have a second argument to update the gfx card to a GTX560.

My only concern is that maybe the game must be downloaded completely, or is completely redownload when they release patches - and then dealing with multiple-GB downloads. With maximum 3 Mbit/sec cable limit, that is a tour lasting half the day. I hate download-sales.

And Steam also is an argument against it. I will keep a close eye on this one, and maybe make another exception from my rules if gameplay indeed is said to be as great as the looks.

[Dowly]

or is completely redownload when they release patches

Nah, most games just have you download the files that have been changed,
or in some cases updates are released as sort of like addons.

[CaptainHaplo]

Skybird - good news for you.

If you don't want a Steam version - there WILL be a Box version - German only! No North American Box version currently planned - but you should be good!

As much as I use to rail against steam, I admit - I am converted. Patches are not huge redownloads, usually pretty small. A whole lot better than stuff like WOW or MWO patches!

[Arclight]

Steam is a requirement I'm afraid, regardless of what package you buy.

[Skybird]

Dowly,
Total war I had tried to install and run for an old man on his system. Beside other problems that made that a fail, that thing very often, when he wanted to play it, instead started to download the latest patch - full game download, for the following 4 ot 5 hours. Super.

Haplo,
what Arclight said I have also read. And in Germany we often have steam games in boxes with the box only containing a code number. The game must nevertheless be downloaded.
So, the boxed. version still must be specified by them regarding its real content. Train. Sim 2013 is such a case, for example, at least I read that. Skyrim however saw me smiling...

[CaptainHaplo]

Steam is required for activation - but not to download the whole blasted game. The Box edition will have the game on disk, so you would be able to install without the download - then just patch it.

[Skybird]

Steam is required for activation - but not to download the whole blasted game. The Box edition will have the game on disk, so you would be able to install without the download - then just patch it.

German website of egosoft has no word on the DvD, s content. It could be the steam installer only. Its like that more often than you maybe think.

I will need to wait until release and then wait for people's feedback. Would sit out the first wave of patches anyway.

[Skybird]

Steam is required for activation - but not to download the whole blasted game. The Box edition will have the game on disk, so you would be able to install without the download - then just patch it.

German website of egosoft has no word on the DVD's content. It could be the steam installer only. Its like that more often than you maybe think. Time and again I read such complaints on the German Amazon site.

I will need to wait until release and then wait for people's feedback. Would sit out the first wave of patches anyway.

[CaptainHaplo]

Well I will be able to tell you my thoughts. Just pre-ordered from steam.

Its on sale at 10% off, for those willing to jump now...

[Arclight]

Would be happy to hear your thoughts, but as much as I appreciate the X series the change in direction means I'll not be pre-ordering, at least. :hmmm:

[CaptainHaplo]

Would be happy to hear your thoughts, but as much as I appreciate the X series the change in direction means I'll not be pre-ordering, at least. :hmmm:

Actually the only "change in direction" is the one ship part - and that is more of a "return to the original" as the X: Beyond the Frontier was a 1 ship and only one ship deal. I am not sure that there is much more "different" other than major additions - unless you could jump gates going away.

Still - your money and your choice and I totally respect it. I don't expect it to be perfect on release, but I know that there is NO doubt I would end up with this game in my library - so I might as well go ahead and have it ordered.

I look forward to sharing my thoughts about the game!

[NeonSamurai]

I have to say, despite being a big fan of the series, I am on the fence about this one too. One of the big pulls for me was that you could fly any single ship in the game.

[CaptainHaplo]

One of the big pulls for me was that you could fly any single ship in the game.

Since the build tools will be released shortly after the game is, you can expect that the ship lock will be undone before too long.

[NeonSamurai]

Maybe... I use to mod the X3 series of games, and making all of the ships pilot-able may present a rather daunting task. Not saying it is impossible, but not easy to say the least, and it may be beyond the capability of the provided tools too. Particularly as I would bet money it will require extensive coding.

[danlisa]

It's a given that you can take the Recommended Specs to mean Minimum Reqs, same for any X title.

That said, I hope their engine has been tweaked to be a little more forgiving. I can see myself wanting this but even though I exceed the specs for Rebirth, I can't say I could run it to my liking, esp given how Albion Prelude chugs in places.

Let's hope it's not so CPU bias than previous X releases. Will be waiting on post-release feedback.

Edit - I have hope. Seems Rebirth is built with Multicore CPU use in mind. Just perhaps, maybe, my GPU will actually stretch its legs on this one.

[McBeck]

Its now on my whishlist :)

[CaptainHaplo]

Edit - I have hope. Seems Rebirth is built with Multicore CPU use in mind. Just perhaps, maybe, my GPU will actually stretch its legs on this one.

This is the best news! Thanks for sharing it! I could not find anything to tell me it was going to be able to use multiple CPU's / hyperthreading. I have 24 cores breathlessly waiting on it now!

[danlisa]

Box Edition
This edition is only available in German (box and manual) and will contain the game and the soundtrack on Audio CD.
Price: 49.99 EUR

For the Steam shy, there's also an official No-Steam exe available as soon as you have registered your game. Still have to purchase/download through Steam though.

On the subject of registering Steam versions of TC & AP, I'm supposed to pick up the X3 submenu in my Library and choose register game. This should give me a code to register on Egosoft. Problem is, that submenu option is not there. Any ideas?

[CaptainHaplo]

On the subject of registering Steam versions of TC & AP, I'm supposed to pick up the X3 submenu in my Library and choose register game. This should give me a code to register on Egosoft. Problem is, that submenu option is not there. Any ideas?

I don't have that option for AP either. However, TC does have that option. Check to see if its on one but not the other. The serial/code associates both games to you, I think.

Check and see if TC has that option, if so you should be good.

[Lionclaw]

Been watching some videos, and it looks quite nice. But I think I'll wait and see what people think of it before getting it though. :)

[Arclight]

Been watching a bit more as well and losing interest as a result. 2 things I noticed is that when you disembark, the pilot just seems to get up out of the seat, walk to the cockpit door and essentially teleport. Which would suggest that you don't have a fully modeled ship, just a fancy cockpit. I thought the idea was that we traded piloting many ships for 1 fully modeled ship, so that would be a disappointment. The other thing is that you don't seem to be able to do trading yourself. You just find a seller and a buyer, with the actual transport of goods handled by other ships. I rather enjoyed a bit of space trucking now and then, so that's rather disappointing.

[Arclight]

Some more to watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfJOYeJfD9c

[Skybird]

To bump this one up.

Beside Assetto Corsa, this title is the other (of two) I waited for in this christmas season. In Germany, in four days it will be the day of days: release day is Friday 15th.

Youtube videos with interviews and conference footage had the news that due to the overboarding modding for older titles, that had mods stockpiling and making the bold games clumsy, they indeed have developed a totally new engine and gave the game handling a new design.

I hope the DVD indeed contains the basic gamecode, not just a Steam access code with the software needed to be downloaded in full. With older titles of the series it has been like that, I read.

[Skybird]

With a little luck the mail delivers my second christmas gift today.

And I just read that the company knowingly burnt an incomplete version onto the CD and that the files needing to complete it are up at Steam later today, and that people who bought the DVD to avoid long downloads now need to download 1.5 GB in speech and video data.

Bastards. This was not called a Beta, this is not an early access release. They seem to think they even demand praise for working until today - as they claim- to complete the game. I read this differently. They burnt and published a DVD weeks before they knew the code was ready to do so. Fairness and honest business principles would have demanded them to wait another two weeks, complete the code, and the do the DVDs.

Sop when I install, first it is 1-2 hours of downloading. Every time when I reinstall the game. Later patches not counted.

Great! :hmph: :down: The DVD version is slightly more expensive. People buy that to avoid having a GB-heavy download to do. I must say I feel betrayed.

The game also comes as a pure download version via Steam as well. Needless to say that such customers need to download it in full. The price is a little bit lower.

[Skybird]

So, three hours of first impressions.

It seems I belonged to the more lucky ones. After an installation that lasted 1 and a half hour, thanks to the incomplete DVD content), I thankfully was NOT playued by the many startup problems the forums are singing symphonies of currently. Many people seem to have immense troubles, not being able to start the game, haunted by low frame rates, and so much more. Cannot say whether there is a difference between those buying the DVD and those downloading it all from Steam. I had NONE of these issues so far. Frames are fluid, and absolutely playable, can't give a number, but I have no complaint there with graphics setting in the medium and upper range.

The visuals are - stunning. It gives me very plenty of Blade Runner feeling, it is the intense colours and neon-sort of looks all around, also, the police gliders remind of the flying cars in BR. The space station I checked out so far, was really big and complex in structure. Plenty of traffic all around, and some individual fights. However, the AI clearly finds its limits here and there, and the flights physics of individual fighters sometimes seem to "warp" a bit . I assume the game is not really fully optimized and that is why the AI lags at times. The handling of the ship is okay with mouse and keyboard, joystick and joypad I have not tried. The space around is very colourful and filled with sensations, from gas c louds over asteroid fields to things that i still have not figured out what to be. It does not necessariyl look like space in some sectors, but like the painted cover of a fantasy book, however, it is great fun watching it. The system of stellar "Autobahnen" works very well. I can imagine to have some nice fighting once I have upgraded my ship a bit, becoming faster and more agile. Gameplay is essentially a beefed up cloine of the old Elite, paired with Frontier and some more games like that. The sations can be docked with and wlaked around, however, here I see the chance that the walking inside can become repetitive quite soon, since there is not too much diversity in interiors and changes. People of many different functiosn and professions stand or walk around and can be hired, asked, or offer you jobs and contracts. What Elite did with simple text menus, is done via this boarding-the-station and meeting people. Sound and music adequate - nothing special and sensational, but okay. The world seems to be very big, every sector being done in a different visual style, probably.

The game offers very huge potential, if it is modding-friendly (what I do not know). But it is a porked release for many people, obviously, or see my DVD complaint above. The publisher rushed this out too early. But I see reason to stay optimistic that this turns into something really good and big. first the obvious bugs and problems need to be worked out. Then let the modding community embark on it. The world they are given to work with, looks stunning and is huge and probably filled with wonders.

There is nothing wrong with waiting some more time and watch things unfolding before buying. But to not leave it behind already completely - keep it on your radar. If the developer does his homework now and the modding scene springs to live, this has the potential to become something extraordinary.

Status: it got rushed out and shows that with its unneeded starting problems - but it also shows its tremendous potential. Outlook: positive and quite promising. If modding is supported, the galaxy is the limit.

[Skybird]

Having spent another 2-3 hours with the game now and going a bit deeper into the game mechanisms, I must say that my initial impression was a bit enthusiastic. The game is buggy like nothing I have experienced since Carrier Command. Missing speech files, and badly recorded speech files, even one character being spoken by two voices (German version). Missing computer data screens and holographic datasheets. And two critical errors now, freezing the system. My initial good mood has gone with the wind.

Also, the interface decisions they made, on more than just a few occasions are - well, they got bad advise on their ergonomics, let's put it this way. I assume you gte used to the handling, but their system is needlessly complicated, imo, I would have done it much more simple and more efficient.

Currently the game downloads the second patch - within 12 hours. Or is it already the third - I'm not sure.

Not only not finished, but very buggy, too. It's a rushed, badly tested release and customers now paying for it get abused as involuntary Beta-testers.

Considering how well the Beta of Assetto Corsa is runnign since one week, even labelling X Rebirth a Beta currently is more excuse than it deserves.

I advise to not let yourself getting blinded from the initial bells and whistles, the laser light show and great looks, but to not buy it right now, and wait some weeks, if not months, before checking back. Right now, the publisher's release policy is a mean and foul impertinence. The shine and promise is there. But they should have waited another 1-3 months before releasing this, completing it and repairing the many bugs during that time.

Let's hope this does not end like Carrier Command, which was also such a big disappointment. Egosoft certainly already have pissed the better part of their potential customer basis - within just the first 12 hours. If you want to ruin your reputation - well done, then!

Stupid.

[CaptainHaplo]

I am going to agree and disagree with you on some things Skybird. I have "played" about 15 hours so far.

I bought the game early on Steam and had preloaded. The game launched all of 3 minutes late. 3 minutes after launch Steam went from preloaded to downloading a ~450mb release pack. This, along with the preload, got the game ready to play. Basically, I was running within 10 minutes of the scheduled launch time.

It is worth noting that in the three minute delay of launch, a thread complaining about the "late launch" grew to nearly 7 pages....

Game launch and in I go. My first impression was not so good. Controls were horrible. I currently use a Logitech Extreme 3d pro. Most controls did not work out of the box, and what did was extremely sluggish. I probably spent an hour working on control configuration. Joystick control works well for me now, though CH and CFS users are having issues. It just took time to get it to work - something that should have been better documented. The sluggishness was actually part of the storyline and was resolved through the playthrough.

Next, I agree with Skybird on the visuals. You truly get a sense of scale in this game. You are no giant and the universe looks amazing.

Performance - well I have what most would consider a monster of a system. The game runs smooth under most circumstances, but there are times I get some hangs. Usually this centers around high traffic areas, which can be optimized with time. I don't believe it is using all cores however....

Speaking of - the game "requires" a x64 OS - but the EXE is a 32 bit app. NOT COOL! They need to build/release a 64 bit version of the exe. This alone would go far to fix performance issues. Egosoft gets a "Fail" on this.

Gameplay - For me, it plays just fine. The biggest thing is its just ... different. Being an old school X player, many things have changed. The "highway/superhighway" system is a bit hard to grasp in navigational terms. The different docking locations on city-stations is great, but the "walkabout" part does feel ... aged for lack of a better term. There is little to no challenge, the "talking" minigame just hurts (I have seen better in Leisure Suit Larry), and the process is overly repetitive. It is just too "dumbed down" to be immersive.

Next to last gripe - the UI. Sadly, this is probably the other big "Fail" in my mind for Egosoft. What used to be simple, is now convoluted. Its just too many keystrokes to get to anything. The lack of "previous", "next", and "closest" target shortcuts is just inexcusable. The inability to "lock" your target is also frustrating. Your cockpit has multiple "modes", which in theory is great - but it lacks a "combat" mode which makes combat in crowded areas really difficult. Information on other owned assets, like transport ships, is also hard to find and hard to manage.

Final gripe - the AI and mission scripting. Missions still have some bugs, and getting stuck in a storyline sucks. If you spot an enemy in a line of civvies and you attack, you would think that all the normal civilians would scatter - or at least react somehow. Nope, they chug along in their orderly flight lanes. Attack one of the civilians - and the rest ignore you as well. Then add in the occasional "cop" (complete with flashing lights and siren!) who is never to be found except right outside the bar dock - yet appears to have had one too many him/herself because all they do is move back and forth, siren blaring and lights blazing.

With all that said, it must be a pretty horrible game, huh?

Nope. Actually, its quite good. Like all of the X series, it has a learning curve that is more than just "follow da path to git bigger gunz". It has a depth. You are not Mr. Space Hero, ready to save the day. Your Mr. Joe Shmoe - and with the right breaks, the right skill and the right choices, you MIGHT just be Mr. Space Hero one day. The game does - at times - truly make you feel "small" in its universe.

Yes, its different. It is also good. It is not great. YET.

Egosoft released 2 hotfix/patches on day 1. More are coming. Egosoft/Deepsilver have always shown to have "Best in Class" product support over the long haul. There are problems, but they are already being addressed. Egosoft has acknowledged and verified that they intend to fix the UI, performance and other issues. X3 and its follow ups had the same teething issues. The came is called Rebirth - and with any birth there is some pain. But the reward is well worth it.

Its playable, deep, enjoyable, but sometimes frustrating. Its a simulation - meant to simulate real life in an alternate, future universe. Well, real life is frustrating at times. The good thing is, you can patch a simulation - and I see another Diamond in the Rough between the long term developer and mod community support.

Can I recommend the game? Yes. But only if you are willing to undergo the teething problems. Otherwise, wait 2 or 3 months, then get it. It will be much more polished by then.

Ultimately, the best endorsement I could ever give a game is that, after playing it, I don't regret the purchase. I can say that about X:Rebirth.

[CaptainHaplo]

For all of those who might go to the Steam forum for X:Rebirth and see all the complaints, keep in mind a couple of points.

About half of the posters (as of early this am when I decided to go check) that were complaining about bugs - did not own the game. Steam is the only legit way to own it - it has to be registered and played through that service. So either some people were complaining (and talking up star citizen) merely to do so - or many were voicing real concerns over pirated software.

Cracked software comes with lots of problems. So many of the complaints are suspect to start with.

Next, its about 100 - 200 people complaining that the game is "unplayable" because of everything from legit issues to "the women in the game are too ugly". There are usually between 12k and 13k users playing X at any one time. So less than 1% are really having issues, and many of them are having issues due to piracy and / or their own stupidity since X isn't "strip clubs in space".

Just trying to keep things in perspective.

[Skybird]

I take it that you downloaded the game in full from Steam, then? The installation and the volume of missing files varies for all-download and DVD-versions. For DVD owners in Germany, the download of the needed content is 1.5+ GB, after installing from DVD, the progress bar showed just 65%, with the remaining 35 then coming from Steam, which took 1 and a half hour for me and my 3000-cable. They said that one day before release in an intervierw that it is indeed vital content not included on the DVD - that was just some hours after I got a mail saying that my parcel was in the mail now, else I weould have cancelled the preorder. They gave me no chance to do so.

Some of the sound problems with missing soundfiles seem to be non-present in the English version, but present for all foreign language versions, including German.

In the forum they said today that major tweaks of the menu system are considered due to massive complaints, but that this will take several weeks if not months to implement.

As I said, Haplo, I have high hopes that they fix the broken things and many bugs, and that then it can shine in all its beauty. I fully agree that there is huge potential. I tried to play again, but could not force myself to mess around with that terrible interface of theirs for longer than one hour - its killing my nerves. And as I assumed in my "first impression yesterday, the boarding of the station becomes repetitive very fast, too.

The publisher seems to have a better reputation than those who did Carrier Command last year, so for the next weeks I keep my hope alive. But their release policy is a slap in the face of customers, especially those who ordered the DVD. They messed it up INTENTIONALLY and KNOWINGLY when starting the DVD production although knowing that one third of needed content was missing. Such business policy is is unforgivable. The game was release in a premature, unfinished state.

Almost all of this can be repaired, if only they want to do it. There is hope that X Rebirth lives up to its full potential one day.

[Seeadler]

You can be glad that Egosoft have not burned again a fingerprint on the retail DVDs like they did with the first release of X3 :D

[Skybird]

You can be glad that Egosoft have not burned again a fingerprint on the retail DVDs like they did with the first release of X3 :D
Well, that was an accident, I assume. That they burnt the new DVD with one third of the code missing, was intentional. At least the German versions. They announced one day before release that they will work until release day to finish the missing code. They knew. That's what is the difference between an accident, and a policy.

Anyhow: some holiday for the eyes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEbL1p5vZpw&feature=c4-overview-vl&list=PLRNrultsQ-Ti7bEZvxJU58YrYiDy4n4JM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thnJTvXtkFs&feature=c4-overview-vl&list=PLRNrultsQ-Ti7bEZvxJU58YrYiDy4n4JM

That's a reminder of what it could be, one day. And then it's all glory, hopefully.

[Skybird]

It has been an uphill battle the last two days, but I fight myself back into liking XR more. :D

I quit on the official campaign, and this immediately gave some relief. Maybe this is the most important message to get put to potential customer: ignore the campaign. The campaign seems to be more seriously bugged, than the sandbox (=free) play, and its the free play you like more in these type of open world games anymore. Well, I certainly do.

With the related bugs gone, I had more willingness and time to focus on other aspects of the gameplay. These however are unfortunately badly documented, and so I had a lot of switching between gaming and forum search.

I discovered the versatility of drones in the game, which actually almost completely compensate for the fact that you fly only one ship - dogfighting with drones is fun, for example. Or spying, scouting, and more. I need to learn more about their options, however, and their automatic modes.

I am also approaching the point where I can buy my first additional ship. They have split trading into two classes now: small-item related trading which you do personally in the style you know from Elite-kind of games, and industrial mass transports, which you just organize, but do not fly yourself with your ship, you need your own fleet of trading ships for that. That actually is a clever feature. You do the desktop job only, but while the transaction goes on,. you can spend your own ship'S time doing something different, or watch your freighter getting loaded and unloaded from the cockpit of your own ship, if you are close by.

I also want to find out if I can buy me a second combat ship, having it escorting me. Or a whole squadron. Drones can be comm anded via communicated commands, orders can be given to your freighters. Why not ordering your other ships to follow you into a battle? Would be cool, with drones it seems to be possible.

I read that there is the option to not buy stations, but actually build them, piece by piece. You need to organize the needed money and resources in time. You seem to be able to watch it at scene.

The menu structure I still do not like, and I often have fired missiles by mistake when just wanting to do a scan, and some more mishaps of this kind. The way you interact with individuals on stations is time-consuming and repetitive, counteracting in a way the new trading scheme with industrial mass goods as outlined above.

Far fewer bugs in free play. That is the important message to get.

The game has had a very rough start, and they made some bad mistakes on the release procedure. The title already has so bad ratings that I currently cannot see it fully recovering from that first blow, it gets massacred everywhere. Well, their bad, they could have avoided that. However, they claim it is the top number one seller at Steam currently. They will need to fight hard to gain back terrain they mindlessly lost in just the first few hours o the release. The game needs time to get into it, yes, but it seems to be worth it. One needs to tame it, so to speak, but I find it increasingly rewarding. They promised patches and changes, and support going beyond just one or two hotfixes.

Don't let this title down too easily, guys. Plenty of detail and complexity under the hood and behind the superficial shine. The future looks bright!

P.S. Some bugs are confirmed to be linked to French and German releases only, especially sound-related bugs. It is also confirmed they are on these, and the others as well.

[Skybird]

Just read a German forum posting that listed many examples of "bugs" in free play - that are no bugs at all - just features that are extremely badly documented, or not documented at all, and on which the game does not give the kind of feedback that would be vitally needed. That is the impression that I have recently gotten myself, too. Too little documentation, too little communication feedback from the game on certain intricate details.

Nothing that could not be changed. Maybe even changed by modders, who knows - in case the developer fails here.

[seaniam81]

Nothing that could not be changed. Maybe even changed by modders, who knows - in case the developer fails here.

Come on really? It's Egosoft. They'll fix it.
They're one of 3 development houses I have 100% confidence in. The other 2 are Paradox and Introversion.

[Skybird]

I'm new to the Xverse. Egosoft has no meaning for me, I admit.

I can report that over the course of this day I really started to enjoy the game, for the reasons mentioned earlier. I stay away from actions that currently are in doubt of being buggy, maybe - the forum discusses some things controversially (taking over other ships, for example, nobody seem to know with certainty whether the problems come from incorrect handling, or bugs: but everybody is convinced of his opinion, of course :D ).

I focus on improving the Skunk's equipment instead, and mapping the sectors. Big business can wait.

[Lionclaw]

It seems it was good to wait and see how the game would be received. It seems it's pretty bug-ridden. :doh:

It looked nice in the trailers. But with the experience of beeing fooled by TW:Rome 2's videos before release, I decided not to be fooled again. :shifty:


The game seems interesting though, but it's overpriced in it's current state, at least on Steam. Retail version is cheaper it seems. :hmm2:

[Skybird]

There are technical problems. First fact is: not all that is reported as "bug" is "bug" indeed. Fact also is, they are working on them, several patches already have been out. Fact finally is the bugs are more present in the campaign. I do play the freestyle game only. And face much less bugs there. Others confirm this. The campaign, on the other hand, almost made me quit. Almost...:) Thank god I mad up my mind, and I did not regret it.

Another fact is that after frequently reading the forums at Steam and Egosoft, I find that many people a.) just parrot the hating that swapped over the boards at the start, and b.) many people report as bugs what they have not understood in functionality, and do not know how to run correctly. The bug thus is lacking knowledge and experience (I initially fell a bit to that very early, too, the game makes it easy to walk into this trap since it does not give enough documentation on its features, and not always the kind of feedback that in the action would be appreciated). Both things now spread, living a life by themselves, it seems. That is not to say there are no technical bugs. There are, but much less than one get get an impression when reading the forum, I'd say.

Egosoft made some questionable design decisions, however, that complicate the handling, and that adds to people finding it difficult to learn how to do something - and then calling the lacking result a "bug". Let's face it: the documentation is lousy. I had so many questions that I needed to search for in the forums that I had to interrupt gameplay quite often. But mostly, I found answers. Some issues however indeed are bugs, it seems.

But I must admit: the game is much better than it's ruined reputation, and it is much less bug-ridden than many aggressive voices indicate. The early experience of one's own expectations not being met, currently has the momentum.

By what it offers in potential, it is brilliant.

That's why I keep on saying: do not scratch this one off your lists too early. Give it a recheck in some time, really. I play it all day and night long since release now. If it were really that much broken like the opinions in forums seem to indicate, not only wouldn't I have been motivated to do so, but I also should have been unable to do so. But here I am, playing. Can't be that bad at all, then.

Egosoft acted stupidly, yes, and rushed it. Some design decisions are questionable. Interface ergonomics leave to be desired. But the game is much, really very much better than what the forums make you believe, or the Amazon feedback (Germany, England, US, they all give it 1-1.5 stars). That is undeserved, and more a media phenomenon with kind of an unstoppable self-dynamic now. And many kiddies howl to the moon while not knowing what they are talking about. Then there are those fools who complain about pushing everything to maximum settings, in an object-saturated environment like this DX9-game offers, and then complaining about getting low frames. That made me laughing already two weeks ago, when Assetto Corsa was released.

I hope Egosoft lives through this time, and stick with it afterward. Criticism is one thing - but the kind of attacks I have seen in recent days, is very different.

I have explored in a fast trip all systems, sectors and zones now. The universe is huge, and beautiful.:)

[Skybird]

Grrrr... I thought I could escape fate, but after 16 hours ingame time that "serious error" described in the forums has struck me as well. Savegames do not load, only older ones. Then 1.15 was released, and suddenly the saves in question loaded again. But only to produce the same problem with some minutes delay, now in midgame, or when saving again.

Before that, in those 16 hours I had one system freeze and one CTD. No lags, low frames, or any of the technical issues others have reported.

[CaptainHaplo]

5 patches in 5 business days.

That is what Egosoft has always been. Releases are known to be historically buggy - but they definitely always support their games. X3TC was patched for at least 3 years.

Egosoft will get this game right - but it will take time. It will take longer than usual because of some bad design decisions, but rest assured the game WILL be fixed.

Skybird is right when he said ignore the webhate. Be patient, then buy when the game is in a finished state.

It should be noted that - to egosoft's credit - that the engine is hugely mod-able. There are already a good number of mods and there are many more coming!

Go Modders!

[Arclight]

Ignore the web-hate... Seems that's applicable to every release nowadays. Makes me wonder what's deteriorating; quality of release or intelligence.

[Skybird]

The only doubt I have is the economic basis, Haplo. German magazines reported that the company (they are German) fell silent completely some months ago, and did not give any testing copies, instead the project manager visited them and showed prepared movies only, never any live ingame action. From a journalists' POV, they say, that always is a very suspicious signal that something is wrong and that a project is in trouble. Having investigated this a bit, I found that the German magazines really really tried to like the game, but nevertheless, with great regret, have shreddered it. And this from print magazines which usually are very friendly to the software sellers.

There must be a reason why Egosoft released it the way they did, and one must take it for certain that the developer knew perfectly well that his baby was ill. There are two reasons only that makes sense to explain why they released it the way they did.

First: they wanted to scramble early for the christmas season. Which was a bit too early, obviously.

The second possible reason: money - and that they are running low on it, desperately needing to make some cash now. And if the studio is economically ill, then you cannot rely on past experiences with their support anymore, for if they cannot live anymore, then they cannot live anymore, that simple.

This is the great unknown variable here. I hope it is just a ghost from the shadows of my mind.

For the time being I can report that continuing gameplay from an older savegame was successful. It was only the mentioned savegames being porked.

Difficult time this project currently has to live through.

[Skybird]

An interesting posting by a business insider.

http://steamcommunity.com/app/2870/discussions/0/648812304912217764/

And this seems to confirm that the game is a console port (xbox360)

http://roguey.co.uk/xrebirth/news/single.php?id=443

Finally, their reply to the console port allegations, and some more official comments by them:

http://www.ez-guild.com/news.php?readmore=867

[CaptainHaplo]

OK let me deal first with the concerns about Egosoft....

The "financial" thread looked at one statement that is over 2 years old, and is not exactly "complete". Simply put - if all the "OMG they were broke" statements you were to read in that thread were true, the company would not have survived to release Rebirth.

We know that there was a MINIMUM of 15k purchases of Rebirth, at ~$50 a pop. That alone is $750,000.00 in sales. Granted you have some overhead, but even Egosoft has already stated the game is - sales wise - a "success". This means they have already hit their "break even" number - and long term sales are now profit. Which, btw - is what insures the historical continued support.

Remember - I said MINIMUM of 15k. We have no real data as yet on what their total sales are. We simply know that nearly 15k players were playing on launch day at one time. It is extremely likely that the number is much higher.

So the "financial solvency" issue is really a red herring - just one more way for some people to try and run down a good company.

Now, on to the console port issue....
Yes, Rebirth was initially started as a "dual platform" game. What Egosoft learned was that the idea was too ambitious for the console platform. Everyone wants to scream about this being in development for 7 years. It was - but when was it ANNOUNCED? Not 7 years ago! Try 2. They were well into the development cycle when reality set in - if they made it a real X game, it wouldn't work on a console. So they took what they had and ran with it. Control setups are one of the first things worked on, because they are how the player interacts with the software. By the time the decision was made that this would be PC only, the control set was already established. All the devs had the controllers and that is what they used to play and test. So other control schemes were neglected. Not wise, but not suprising.

With a lot of base code already written that would have served a dual platform purpose, they chose to use what they had instead of trash it all and start from scratch. Does that make them evil and underhanded? Not at all. Its a smart business decision - or at least it would have been, had the "finished" product met reasonable standards to its purchasers.

Is it an "aborted" console game? No. But it does share a development history that would have MADE it a dual platform game had that been possible. The fact that the engine is what it is today demonstrates that Egosoft recognized the futility of a dual platform product and went forward with a PC platform only. Did they get it right? Not yet.

But as we say here in the US, you don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. They missed seeing the gap they were creating by using console controls and a partial console mindset during the development. They are working to fix that. Mark my words - Rebirth will be a gem in due time.

[CaptainHaplo]

OMG I had an epiphany.

The light just came on for this game. I was flying around, saying a few bad words at the (lack of) design, when I suddenly figured I would "try" something. So I did. Menus suddenly make sense. Well - sort of. I went to the map and figured out how to navigate.

These two things make the game playable and worthwhile.

Now don't get me wrong - the interface is really a horrid thing - but it DOES work and that has made the game much more enjoyable.

[Skybird]

There will be changes to the interface, and a 3D-radar, they confirmed. Plus functionality of the menu will be added and changed. the current one works, but is not nice to handle.

Like you, I now have come to fully enjoy it, no matter the state it is in. I now chas eth cash to upgrade shields to MK4 level. After that I start to save to embark on freighter operations. This is one of the fields that I so far have not touched in the game. The other major operations I avoided so far was taking over ships with boarding commandos. Some problems there, in parts already adressed in hotfixes, in other parts remaining to be problematic.

I have the impression that the lion'S share of the reported hate is because of the broken campaign. I cannot understand everybody's fixation with the campaign. Hell, ignore it.

[CaptainHaplo]

I have the impression that the lion'S share of the reported hate is because of the broken campaign. I cannot understand everybody's fixation with the campaign. Hell, ignore it.

A lot of "new" players were brought into the X universe with this game. As such, they saw pretty graphics and heard it was going to be easy to understand - so they load the game, have no clue what to do so they play the campaign. Which is - initially at least - a tutorial of sorts as well.

For a new player, when the tutorial won't even work right - the dev/pub group deserve to get screamed at. For those of us familiar with the history of the groups - well we were not surprised by the bugs.

Once you get to understanding exactly what is going on, then it works rather well - though yes boarding is still an issue. But when a person - new or not - can't figure out how to do things, there will be lots of screaming. I know - I was one of the voices yelling!

[Skybird]

I was one of those new x-players. And when realising how porked the campaign was, I skipped it and went to freeplay mode.

I ran into questions, yes. It did not take a tutorial to answer them, but using the search button in their forum. I plan to do like this again regarding freighters, boarding, ship building.

I find tutorials unpractical most of the time.

[Lionclaw]

X3 Reunion was the game that pulled me in to the series. Had a pretty big "transport company" going.

Some spaceweed station... Hey, easy money. :O:

Made quite a lot of money with universal traders and some stations.


A couple of years before that, I tried X2 The Threat which I got with a graphics card. But it felt too complicated at the time.

Bought Albion Prelude after reading the first impressions of Rebirth.

[CaptainHaplo]

X3:AP is good, though honestly I like Terran Conflict better. I can't really articulate why though. All three of the X3 variants are good. I have X BTF and X2 as well, though I feel X3TC is (for now) the best of them. Maybe I will go give AP another try (with mods, of course) while I wait for a few more Rebirth patches.

FYI - patch 1.16 came out today. 1 week - 6 patches. That is NOT taking your money and running. Egosoft is showing why they have such a loyal following - real care about getting it right - and in a niche market that is phenomenal.

[Lionclaw]

I've been thinking of trading in a couple of console games and getting Rebirth, depends on how much GameStop is charging for it though. :hmmm:

[Skybird]

Give it some more time, Lionclaw. The patches so far are mostly urgent hotfixes of game crashing stuff that sends people back to desktop. Game mechanisms, which also are bugged in parts, so far have not been touched, but will be. Also interface changes are promised. A first big update is announced by the CEO, but he said it will take several weeks. After that, there will be more.

Possible that in 3 months or so you also get it cheaper. Saw it advertized for up to 50 Euros, I feel that is a bit too much, considering the aged looks. 35-40, I say. I payed 45.

I see no disaster, as some spell it, if having bought it already now and payed the money. However, I also see no need to rush the buy right now if you haven't already. If having the choice again with my knowledge now - I would definitely buy the game, but not now, but a bit later.

The good news of all that bitter opinion fighting is that the feedback made me aware of this thing called Star Citizen. It dropped off my radar screen some time ago, when the kickstarter was announced. Seems to have the potential to blow all other space games out of the universe once it arrived in full in a year or so. The kickstarter earned them 23 Million so far, I read, instead of just the targetted 2 Million. Wowh! There definitely is a market for this kind of games.

[CaptainHaplo]

I will agree with Skybird - if you don't own it right now, wait a month or two. While I don't regret the purchase, most people will find the game frustrating as is - and I would rather other consumers have a good experience and keep the series (as well as egosoft) moving forward.

[Skybird]

Egosoft sits in Germany, and over here it is weekend, Saturday night. They nevertheless released a 50 MB patch just hours ago - and currently I download another small one of 7 MB or so. It is 22:25 on the clock.

Far from a weekend break!

Media Control, a German platform logging the sales numbers for DVDs, albums, games and so forth and publishing the charts, have X Rebirth after this week on number one, and the collectors edition of it on three, behind Battlefield 4.

[Skybird]

A 23 minutes review done in a very moderate tone and with quite some attempt to be fair and balanced. I agree with most, but not all what he says, but I give him cudos for trying to be fair and especially for telling people what bad a mess their behavior is that shout and yell and call each other names in a way they would not dare to do in real life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zE4jofI_rKY

My own biggest complaint so far is that bad balancing and the lack of challenge in fights and dogfights. The Albion is an über-equipped ship-killing monster already at the beginning, outclassing everything of its size and smaller, and even bigger ships. Some people say the combat AI actually were pretty well scripted, but doe snot have the opportunity to shine because the ships it controls die too fast. I use to blow my dogfighting enemies out of battle within one second of encounter. And that is what makes it tiresome and pointless.

I agree with most what the guy says in the video, maybe not with all, but he gets it right, all in all. But currently I have the game in sleep-mode a bit, until fighting has been beefed up, the trading works, and the problems being encountered in boarding procedures and ship building are sorted out. It is buggy, yes, but like the guy in the video it has not stopped me from playing and enjoying it until here.

[Aramike]

As a HUGE fan of X3:TC and X3:AP, I bought this one on day one. I haven't played it since due to the well-known issues. That being said, I'm confident that within a few months much of the problems will be addressed and the game will be at least somewhat playable.

My MAIN problem with is was the way the lead developer (Bernd?) has approached some of the criticism. Yes, he has been EXTREMELY responsive for a developer, but I think he's lost sight of some of the soul of the series. I have no problem whatsoever with a reimagining, as it were. But I don't like how he found certain ways of playing a SINGLE PLAYER, HIGHLY MODDABLE experience to be the "wrong" way. An example of this was how he stated that he believed that autopilot was not how the game should be played.

I used autopilot nearly CONSTANTLY in X3, because my game was focused around running a trading empire. I can fly ships with crappy physics in any number of games. The point was that it was MY choice how to play the game and what my style would be.

X:Rebirth seems to have lost the series' soul. However, I do believe they can get it back.

[McBeck]

Ill be keeping it on my whishlist....and wait

[Skybird]

Me too is in pause and observation mode currently. But they definitely are working on it, and have released 8 patches so far, two them major. Two more are planned before christmas. For many people performance has gone upwards, and major issues that were bugged, have been solved. It still is far from perfect, but progress is being made. really, they seem to be heavily engaged in getting things fixed, changed, changed for the better.

Patience, guys! No need to hurry with buying it. But do not scratch it off your wishlists prematurely. Already now it is in a better state than in release week. Major bugs squashed, performance for most people going upwards - wins in frames of up to 60% have been reported by some.

Modders also have come over it, in hordes.

[GT182]

After reaading all 5 pages I'm very glad I haven't purchased this one yet.... if at all.

I got really deep into X3TC and the patches and it's mods. Loved the sim... then my conputer crashed ahd lost it all. Haven't reinstalled TC yet as I've decided to wait until I figure out what OS I want... Win7 or 8.

[Skybird]

Patch status is now 1.21, with 1.22 in Beta, so one cannot accuse them of sitting on their hands. The bugs will be sorted out, I am confident on that. Whether the quesitonable deails in game design and mechanisms will get sorted by them, or by modders, and when, remains to be seen.

I still recommend not to give it up already, but to wait with buying nevertheless. The balancing issues need serious tackling first.

Myself, I'm currently not playing it, since it is recommended with every new patch so far to start a new game, because saved games cannot take advantage of repaired game mechanisms too often.
But then, I'm currently all Assetto Corsa and the new reserve in The Hunter, so I hardly have any spare time left anyway. :D

[Skybird]

Thought I give this a bump-up.

I took a break from the game since December, and are about to restart with it again. There have been several patches, at least two being quite big one, while the war between haters and hopers and lovers went along all the time. :D Latest chnages, fixes and improvements arrived just today, in the form of patch 1.25. I give the readme and a link to an official announcment of their plans and projects for the forseeable months. It is good to see that although recently changes went slow, they obviously are constantly working on it, and even seem to have listened to some of those complaints demanding some deep-rooting changes in gameplay and menu-structure, with changes there being announced for the future in around 1-2 months.

This game has a terribole start, but it is not dead. And as they say in German "Totgesagte leben länger" (those said to be dead live longer).

Interesting to read that they work on changing the 32bit-exe into a true 64bit-exe. :yeah: More usable memory could solve a whole lot of issues.

Video: features 1.25 explained
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4fPnSnBbrI

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=4350464#4350464

Egosoft is pleased to announce the availability of patch 1.25 for X Rebirth, along with a preview of several projects to be released in the near term. This update is comprised of two sections. Section one is a quick overview of the progress of the last couple of patches, and an explanation of their main features. Section two gives a quick outlook on what is currently being worked on, and what can be expected over the next few months.

1. Patch 1.24 and 1.25

As always you can find the detailed changelog here (http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=4214779#4214779). I have also prepared a short video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4fPnSnBbrI) explaining some of the changes to gameplay. Namely the new target locking and the trade agent, including the change to how smalltalk achievements work.

http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/E4fPnSnBbrI/mqdefault.jpg (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4fPnSnBbrI)
X Rebirth - Patch 1.25 New features explained (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thnJTvXtkFs)

- Smalltalk used to unlock a random reward if you managed to convince an NPC on a platform that you had something interesting to say about a topic. With 1.25, the smalltalk mini-game still works the same way, but rather than getting a random reward, the NPC will now offer the player a choice. For example, if the NPC is a dealer of some kind, you can ask him to give you a discount, or you can ask him if he knows a qualified NPC for a certain job, and he will tell you where to find the best one in your vicinity. For example, the next time the player needs a good pilot, locating the best pilot on a station will be much easier.

- Another new feature is the ability to hire agents on stations which will make sure that you are always kept up to date on all trade offers from that station. This feature can be combined with the trade computer extension to minimize the need to collect trade offers on stations manually. There is also a new feature that allows the player to see all trade offers per station from the station's info menu.

- The target locking update introduces a secondary method of setting a target object which is very similar to the targeting functionality seen in the X3 games. You can now press Shift F to get a lock on the object closest to your crosshair, or Shift E to get a lock on the nearest enemy by distance. Once this targeting mode is activated, the player can press page up and page down to cycle through more objects of the same category in clockwise/counter-clockwise order (or in case of enemies: closer/farther-away target). The other methods of dealing with target locks still work in parallel, but before the event monitor can show environment objects again, the player must first release the last explicit target object - by clicking in empty space, for example.

2. The Near Future

Now let me list a few projects we are currently working on, and which will be released in some form over the coming months. Note that this is FAR from a complete list. The following are a few examples of the different areas being worked on, and they are vaguely sorted in the order they may be released:

- Support for Steam Workshop integration: We will soon start releasing a number of tools (http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=363625) on Steam to help modders work on X Rebirth. We are also working on full support for the Steam Workshop in order to make it possible for everybody to easily install mods by merely subscribing to them, and by making it easy for mod developers to distribute their work through Steam.

- Map on event monitor: This was already mentioned before. The first step will be to enable the map rendering on the event monitor whenever it currently shows no signal. We will then introduce some configuration options so the player can decide whether to view the map zone map on the monitor or the current text information.

- Improved support for joysticks and other input devices: We are working on improving the input mapping menu and the general support for input devices. There have been numerous individual requests in this area, and we are trying to keep this as flexible as possible so X Rebirth can be configured to make best use of all kinds of input devices.

- Improvements to menus: Improving our menu system is a big task, but some features that we've heard requested often could materialize within the next one or two months. A good example of this is a more powerful text based filtering system for menus akin to the trade menu. After we have added text input menus for renaming your ship, the next step will be to enable this functionality in live menus allowing the player to filter quickly with their keyboard.

- 64bit EXE: Right now X Rebirth only runs on 64bit Windows because of the amount of memory required, but it is still a 32bit executable. We are experimenting with a new 64bit executable that could potentially improve several issues. Rolling out the 64bit EXE will probably happen as a beta in parallel to the 32bit EXE. Depending on the feedback, we will then gradually move away from a 32bit EXE.

- Providing interaction functionality with NPCs from space to minimize forced landing: I know many people do not like being forced to land on stations for frequently repeated tasks. The first step to address this will be to have a list of all NPCs on a station available from the station info menu, and to then make some activities possible remotely. You will still probably need to be in the vicinity of the station - so that drones can take over the transport of acquired goods for example - but you only have to land to play missions and to pick up or deliver people.

- Highway redesign: We've heard a lot of criticism on the way the highways behaves, so we are experimenting with radically different gameplay inside the highways. It's still too early to provide details, but as soon as we have a prototype, we will probably make this available as a beta. How soon this will then be rolled out for public release will then depend on feedback we receive.

Again: There are many other things we are working on. We will continue to add features and of course fix bugs. Please stay tuned!

- Bernd Lehahn, Managing Director, Egosoft



http://steamcommunity.com/games/2870/announcements/detail/1388537426173575483



X Rebirth 1.25 and News Update

26. Februar - Egosoft (http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198064663152)
This week we have several new things for you. Our 1.25 update introduces a couple of important new features. We also have a video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4fPnSnBbrI) explaining some of the things we've added recently to X Rebirth and a news update (http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=4350464#4350464) telling you more about our plans for the next few months.

Patch 1.25 Release Notes

• New Feature: Player-owned ships and stations can now be renamed.
• New Feature: Smalltalk reward allowing you to receive trade offer updates for a station remotely.
• Added logbook entries for refuelling, trade and building.
• Added call from manager when a station is low on credits.
• Added ship name when player gets a call requiring a response from a player owned ship.
• Fixed a cause of occasional crashes when loading savegame.
• Fixed a cause of occasional crashes during large battles.
• Fixed several other causes of occasional crashes.
• Fixed another cause of the game hanging after Alt-Tab.
• Added prices for small ships so that these can now be sold.
• Cargo value is now taken into account when selling a ship; you get roughly half it's value.
• Fixed price calculations for intermediate wares.
• Fixed two causes of disappearing ships and one of ships ending up in strange places.
• Fixed certain station elements being rotated incorrectly after loading a savegame.
• Fixed problem with random station elements being built and preventing further building.
• Fixed problem with small ships preventing building.
• Fixed problem with drones not being able to dock at certain mining ships.
• Fixed incorrect container amount being dropped from cargo drones.
• Fixed another issue with cargo collection.
• Fixed buy offers for more wares than can be stored.
• Fixed player being able to start multiple boarding operations on the same ship.
• Fixed abort button for boarding operations.
• Fixed info and comm options for externally docked ships.
• Fixed issue with operational range settings resulting in ships looking for trades in the wrong places.
• Improved station-owned mining ship AI to prevent station from filling with more resources than it wants.
• Improved shooting logic for NPC ships (more improvements to come).
• Fixed a problem resulting in inactive patrol ships.
• Fixed a problem with NPC beam weapons not firing correctly.
• Fixed tag darts occasionally tagging something other than their intended target.
• Added inter-system traders to DeVries.
• Fixed station scan mode remaining active when it shouldn't.
• Fixed rare case resulting in missing info points and dock icons.
• Fixed subordinate count in orders menu.
• Fixed incorrect trade status in ship menu.
• Fixed "+" button not working in map menu under certain circumstances.
• Fixed sold ships and collected drones being displayed as destroyed in the logbook.
• Added missing descriptions for systems to encyclopedia.
• Improved rewards after successful smalltalk on platforms, including trade subscriptions.
• Improved dialog structure to find people on platforms.
• Fixed missing architect on plot builder ship.
• Fixed player being sent to a hostile NPC when asking for directions.
• Fixed ships not in player squad requesting player input when out of fuel.
• Fixed visual flicker when returning to the cockpit from a platform.
• Fixed location of visor/glasses on certain NPCs.
• Fixed missing physics data when loading a savegame.
• Added graphics settings for SSAO, Glow and Distortion.
• Fixed incorrect display of certain options in graphics menu.
• Fixed incorrect resolutions when changing displays in borderless mode.
• Improved stability of job system and patch code with modified games.
• Added support for catalog files in mods.
• Added Korean localisation (text only).
• Added Spanish localisation (text only, incomplete but included to enable feedback to translators).
• Further optimisations resulting in small performance improvements, particularly on lower-end graphics hardware.

[McBeck]

Got it for my birthday and started playing.
Its easier to get into than the olders ones, but still some things that are not explained, like that when you buy something, you have to wait for your cargo ship to pick it up.
This could have been solved easily by a voice stating that orders have been given to the cargoship to pick up the goods.

Its get laggy, so the engine does not seem to be that well optimized.

[zachanscom]

X rebirth is what happens when devs sell their soul for the almighty casual/mainstream dollar

[Skybird]

Got it for my birthday and started playing.
Its easier to get into than the olders ones, but still some things that are not explained, like that when you buy something, you have to wait for your cargo ship to pick it up.
This could have been solved easily by a voice stating that orders have been given to the cargoship to pick up the goods.

Its get laggy, so the engine does not seem to be that well optimized.
For the medium term, substantial changes to menu structure and trading have been announced, I think.

[CaptainHaplo]

As much as I hate to say it - X Rebirth really lost me.

I will wait until they get the true 64bit exe out there and make a few more changes before I start playing it again.

[Skybird]

I played it intensely when it came out, and so my hunger for it currently is fed. I will wait even longer before returning to it once again, maybe next autumn when the days become shorter again. Should have given them the time needed to fix it even further than they already did.

Currently, I'm all in Assetto Corsa mode anyway.

[McBeck]

Well...I need a space sim...until Star Citizen comes out :D

[CaptainHaplo]

X has always been a:
Trade, Fight, Build, Think game

Sadly - as one Egosoft poster put it - X Rebirth gives a whole new meaning to this:

Trade - insults with other community members, or tips how to improve performance
Fight - with steam for refund, or the overwhelming feeling of hopelessness
Build - your patience and knowledge of xml save editing.
Think - before you preorder next time

[NeonSamurai]

Well...I need a space sim...until Star Citizen comes out :D

I would go with one of the previous games from the series (or the mega X pack).

I'm glad though I listened to my instincts and stayed away from this game once Egosoft described what they were doing because they were taking the game in a direction that I think almost no one in the community wanted at all, which is almost always an idiotic move for a developer to do this, as they rarely end up with the revolutionary game they envision, and will alienate their fan base.

[Skybird]

Udate 1.30 currently gets downloaded, 86 MB.

• New Feature: Steam Workshop support (steam://openurl/http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/browse/?appid=2870).
• Improved support for joysticks and multiple input devices.
• Improved mining behaviour for all sizes of ships.
• Improved trade ship behaviour to favour profitable, non-empty runs.
• Improved station scan mode which no longer highlights objects that are not relevant.
• Improved attack and evasive maneuvers and AI.
• Improved flight pathing during normal flight, when following other ships, and when docking.
• Improved collector drone flight behaviour near large objects.
• Improved map handling of ship command hierarchies.
• Improved trade menu, including text search, sorting and colours.
• Improved appearance of small ships flying in lanes around stations.
• Enabled comm/info interactions with player property that is more than 10 km away.
• Added missions relating to the upkeep of ships and stations.
• Added new ship types to DeVries.
• Added list of platform NPCs to station menu (only available if you're in the same zone).
• Added more information and command hierarchy to player property menu.
• Added information to encyclopedia about stations/ships that can be built.
• Added option to stop displaying steering mode message.
• Fixed missing manager comm option.
• Fixed wrong mouse-steering mode being entered in some cases incorrectly when leaving a menu.
• Fixed several other incorrect or inconvenient menu behaviours.
• Fixed calculations for gathering certain resources out-of-sector.
• Fixed player being sent to NPCs on ships or on hostile stations when asking for directions.
• Fixed some objects left in construction state after building finished (still at least one rare case remaining).
• Fixed trade missions not completing if the station storage was full, notably the food trade plot mission.
• Fixed trade ships not stopping their current order after clearing their shopping list.
• Fixed trade orders for selling items using ships in player squad.
• Fixed ships blocking docking bays after having docking interrupted.
• Fixed incorrect docking icons under certain circumstances.
• Fixed not being able to unlock skills of defence officers on platforms.
• Fixed displayed total counts of stored units.
• Fixed drones that should have a commander appearing in property owned menu.
• Fixed destroyed drones not being properly removed from drone storage.
• Fixed incorrect ship position after leaving a highway with a menu open.
• Fixed stations creating trade offers with higher value than it can afford.
• Fixed building and production remaining paused after modules having been hacked.
• Fixed ships assigned to stations being incorrectly assigned mining jobs.
• Fixed outdated trade offer information appearing on event monitor.
• Fixed trade ships assigned to player stations sometimes not updating their range.
• Fixed object menu not restoring after closing station trade offers.
• Fixed production menu information not updating correctly.
• Fixed production showing very long production times in certain cases.
• Fixed production stalling due to stations filling up with intermediate wares.
• Fixed several pathfinding problems, which should prevent ships from flying through stations.
• Fixed ships equiping drones or ammo getting stuck in the shipyard.
• Fixed problem that could cause following ships to get stuck when the target changes zones.
• Fixed most cases of dropped containers being stuck inside each other (can still happen occasionally).
• Fixed architect destroying drones in storage without adding them to the station.
• Fixed issue with parking ships when manager (stations) or pilot (construction vessel) are not present.
• Fixed trade ships waiting too long for a free parking location when intended trade is no longer possible.
• Fixed calculation of required funds when trading with other player property.
• Fixed pilot not being placed on ship's platform.
• Fixed ships trying to go to the same coordinates by default.
• Fixed mining for medium size ships.
• Fixed incorrect mining order for ships which can't transport the mining wares.
• Fixed blocked trades involving discounts if there is only enough money for the discounted amount not the full amount.
• Fixed built ships not leaving the shipyard after shipyard construction module has been destroyed and subsequently repaired.
• Fixed several other cases of ships getting stuck, not moving when they should.
• Fixed owner of fuel station in Gemstone Manufacture.
• Fixed incorrect lasers being used by medium ice collector ships.
• Fixed problem with accuracy of time data in savegames with long play time.
• Fixed rotation of construction ships after flying to build location.
• Fixed visual glitch on map when targeting/entering/leaving highways.
• Fixed animation problem with highways in games with long play time.
• Fixed stalls when entering highways in savegames that have been saved/loaded many times.
• Fixed another cause of the game stalling for a short time.
• Fixed crash when loading certain savegames.
• Fixed several causes of apparently random crashes.
• Various optimisations resulting in performance improvements.
• Significant performance improvements on some AMD graphics cards, particularly R9.

Localisations for text relating to the new Joystick Deadzone option are not yet included. These will be added as soon as possible.

[CaptainHaplo]

I am using the 2.0 (rc9) beta - and I can tell you the game is VASTLY different and MUCH improved.

As much as X:R disappointed me, the work Ego has done on 2.0 has gone a long way to assuage that. It still isn't what I "expected" - but it is becoming a game worth having.

Either sign up for the beta or wait till 2.0 is released, and you will be a happy X player again.

I will add this. Rebirth will actually be worth the purchase when 2.0 comes out. It won't be simply X TC/AP with better graphics, but it will an X game again. When you see it is out - then buy it!

[CaptainHaplo]

2.0 has been released to the public - and its WELL worth revisiting if you already own the game. It still has flaws, but you can see we are now at least heading in the right direction.

[Skybird]

Noticed the steam download yesterday. Will give it another try in a couple of weeks or in autumn, when the inevitable bug squashing for 2.0 has advanced a little bit. By the readme, this and several earlier updates indeed illustrated plenty of work being done on the game.

Just as hoped for the long time perspective!

[Lionclaw]

2.0 is released it seems, Steam is having a 50% sale at the moment.

Still not sure whether to get it or wait. Thinking of waiting to the summer sale at least, might drop to 75%. :hmmm:

[Mud]

2.0 is released it seems, Steam is having a 50% sale at the moment.

Still not sure whether to get it or wait. Thinking of waiting to the summer sale at least, might drop to 75%. :hmmm:

Same here, tempted but not convinced :06:

[kylania]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LevvM-HlVI

Here's a video that covers the changes in 2.0. Looks good to me!

[Skybird]

That video really has brought me into the right mood for X again. How is the internal economics functioning now, is it more reliably interacting as it should?

[Lionclaw]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LevvM-HlVI

Here's a video that covers the changes in 2.0. Looks good to me!

Cool stuff, thanks. :cool:

Will check it out this summer.

[Skybird]

2.10 is out, 110 MB.

Right now in bright summer I'm not in the mood for it, but I will go back to X in darker autumn when it becomes cold again and the evenings longer.

[Skybird]

And I read a news that a release candidate exe is in beta testing - and it is a 64 bit exe.

[Skybird]

The update to 2.20 of today, 19 MB, has turned the exe into a full and true 64 Bit application.

I have not tested it, and with my hands full of AC and TheHunter, I will not try the game again before autumn, probably, but I will do, when the short days have begun again.

[Skybird]

I did a quick testflight with an old save game, although after these many updates it is not recommended to use old save games, I just wanted a quick glance.

The first thing I realised was the new 3D tracker in the cockpit, looking more modern and adding so much SA and precision. The second thing I noted were the two fighters that started to shoot the crap out of me, and a long and intense dogfighting began where battles before were boring, super-easy and in the end: meaningless. This one now was a completely new ballgame, and I took heavy damage before I got rid of one and the other running.

Yes, all the long feature lists in their updates seem to have a meaning. :D Yes, it seems to be a very different game now indeed.

For the moment it is Hunter and Assetto Corsa, but this quick test now set an exclamation mark that will remind me to come back to this one.

[johnpera]

A fan of the previous X games? Then this is probably not for you, it's a completely different game with different gameplay that feels like a bad port

[Skybird]

Almost precisely it is one year ago, that I played X Rebirthz last year, and after some days and weeks abandoned it, waiting for patches and updates and mods to add their impact.

And now, as I predicted :), in this foggy and dark time of the year I got appetite again to try what the passing of one year may have done in change and imporvement, or not. Since some days I am playing it again, with a fresh gamestart, and version 2.51, while version 3.0 is looming at the horizon.

I did so since the videos I saw on youtube about Elite Dangerous, did not really hook me. Also, their business model seems - seems to need getting used to. Its not cheap. However, the space seqeunces, the exterior design of stations and spacecraft gave me more memory of the computer era twenty years ago, than I feel comfortable with in 2014. I just do not get hooked.

In X Rebirthz now, a lot has changed. The whole game is 64 bit now, runs smooth and stable for me. The menus, still not optimal, have been improved a lot. Trading interctions I tested via the m enus instead of running around on the stations, worked reliable so far. The economic functions of the whole world system, before somewhat broken, seem to work now. The AI has been given much more competence and aggressiveness in fighting, before, every shot-out was a piece of cake. Now, it became drama battles quite frequently. There are many more details that have been chnmaged or added, and they all did their share to improve the general quality. It actually makes sense now to start to build a fleet of traders, defence forces, and finally: stations.

The status now shows what the game should have been like on release day 1. There is still room for improvement, and indeed they are working on it., but it would be malicious to claim that the game has no future and sees no chnage for the better: it does, and quite substantially already.

I got hooked again, and will play this now for quite some time to come. I only hope that the upcoming version 3.0 is downward compatible. Rumours say it is.

I also added some mods tweaking some details, scanners, trading, comms, AI, and faction policies. There actually now is war raging between factions, and I found that it depended on my actions whether I was seen as a neutral observer, or a participating fighter that was seen as a valid target. There is much more life, traffic and battle in the universe.

To me, the game concept offers more than the game concept of Elite Dangerous, I admit. And the exterior views of space stations in XB I prefer any time over those to be seen in Elite videos. I wonder whether Elite will offer an as-complex economy simulation as XB does.

So: the trend-indicator for XB points upwards, definitely. Those of you who had, like me, shelved it to wait and see, consider to try it again now or when 3.0 is out at the latest. The disastrous start last year - is a thing of the past now. All objects of criticism indeed have been worked on and still are being further tuned and improved.

:up:

[Dowly]

Also, their business model seems - seems to need getting used to. Its not cheap.

Eh? Give them x amount of money, they give you the game. Just like X Rebirth.
As for price, the pre-order is 40e and you get the mercenary edition. X Rebirth on Steam is still priced at 49,99e.

[Skybird]

Access to the beta they list for 60 Euros over here. Plus the remark that any further content is not included but costs separately. And if you want other ships included, you pay again, 2,50-4 Euro per ship model. And skin packs cost 12,50 Euros.

That is steep, imo.

[Dowly]

Yes, the beta is 60e. It includes Mercenary Edition + access to the beta.
Standard pre-order is ME minus beta access, 40e.

There are no additional ships you can purchase, those are all custom skins.

[NeonSamurai]

That is one of the things I love about Egosoft. They really do support their titles. Plus they often add all kinds of bonuses and other things, that other companies would try to sell as DLC.

I also love how Elite Dangerous is charging more money for beta access. It is normally the other way around. But it could be worse, it could be Star Citizen...

[Skybird]

With version 3.0 in Decembre, there comes a first addon as DLC that will be free for players who had bought X-R before November 1st. The Teladi Outpost will add two completely new sectors and a new storyline (for which I will care as much as for the main quest: not at all, that is :D ), and must be logged for early order already now however, from the game's Steamshop site, since the subscription must be made before a certain date that already has been moved back (originally the offer ended on Nov. 1st). After that it seems to cost money even for those who bought the game before November.

So if you already own the game, make sure you check that you have the Teladi Outpost early-ordered in your Steam account.

I'm still enjoying my second visit in the X-B universe. It is far more active, there far more events and movements, far more action, raids, battles. The new menu system works still not ideal, but much better than originally, one can work with it. No more repetitive running through the station tunnels.

Oh, and the zombie-looks of the faces are gone as well.

The whole universe interacts far more dynamically than before. And boy, is it running super-smooth now!

Memory may fool me or not, but there is more environment sounds, I think. Unrealistic in space, IknowIknow, but so is thecolourful Blade-Runner-looks of the giant space stations as well. It all adds tremendously to the atmosphere.

New cockpit variations available as well, from fighter pits with extra vision and as little cockpit obstacles as possible, to transporter bridges. Every refit costs coins, however. :smug:

[Arclight]

I also love how Elite Dangerous is charging more money for beta access. It is normally the other way around. But it could be worse, it could be Star Citizen...

I'm... confused. SC is actually cheaper, starting at $30,- for the game up to $45,- for alpha & beta access.

At any rate, I'd guess that the extra cost is due to the need to set up the server infrastructure early. Without it those costs would have to be covered by funds that would normally go towards development. Considering they don't have publisher backing, it seems reasonable, though indeed rather counterintuitive.

[Skybird]

Today I got a taste of how much has changed indeed. I flew into a new sector - and stumbled right into a huge space battle between 8 or 9 capital ships by Plutarch and Alliance of Free Worlds. These capital monsters - and their attached fighter wings. If you never have experienced something like that in X-R, then it is hard to describe and even harder to believe. Remember the huge, the really huge battles in later seasons of Babylon-5? It looked like that. Tracers and missiles from here to the horizon, at all vectors. Bombing drones humming by and getting shot down before they could impact. Huge beam weapons by the capitals. The huge ships maneuvering to get alongside their enemies, exchanging kind of broadsides, or trying to get their monster beamers aiming alongside their axis on their enemies. Fighters criss-crossing back and forth everywhere, hushing over the hulls of the big ships, avoiding Flak-laser and trying to get rid of swarms of Hydra missiles in their necks, while firing at other fighters. It was colourful, it was chaotic, it was different from any battle I have seen before. Since the scene was away from a station, the capitals could freely maneuver without getting deadlocked when slamming into station structures.

Later, when Plutarch gained the upper hand, new enemies fell out of the cosmic highway slipstream: a huge number of ultra tough and ultra-fast Reaver fighters engaged Plutarch and unfortunately also me. Then another Plutarch carrier arrived, launching more swarms of missiles, Flak, and fighters. I escaped with burning ship and into the arms of Plutarch fighters who engaged the Reavers while I landed on the flightdeck of a Plutarch carrier seconds before my hull would have collapsed, from there I went to the gate and watched the battle outside. It was breathtaking. Before I escaped the battle, fighters hang in my neck like vampires, I have a relatively good equipped ship and a Nivell-4 drive, but these beasts I have never met before, they had hilarious speed, acceleration, agility and sturdiness. I did nit fight, I fled and desperately tried to stay alive. :) Nice to see that it was possible to hide between the burning dead hulls of big ships, or break the enemy's lockon by racing into the huge smoke clouds left by big ships that had exploded earlier. No physics, please. Discussing physics is forbidden in this thread.

You may need luck to see such things happening, and they may not happen on that scale too often. But when it happens, don'T play: lean back, watch and enjoy the show. Its breathtaking and shows what the game is capable of and what shine hides under its dusty surface.

The huge final battles in the ending episodes of Babylon-5 - take me by my word.

If needing to estimate how many ships, big and small, were participating, I would dare to say that it were probably around fifty, I would say. I use several mods, to what degree they are responsible for this or not, I cannot say. But all objects, particles, salvos beams, laser shots were on screen as well, plus debris, ejected cargo, rocks...

Frames were not always super-smooth, but always remained absolutely playable. Stuttering means in this context: frames that I felt to be around 30, maybe.

Its nice to see that the various factions now actively wage war against each other, in regions that are close to both of them. Or that they launch surprising raids into the heart of the enemy.

The Xenons I can deal with. But those Reaver fighters - I need better - I do not know what I need. A sixth sense to avoid them, maybe.

After it all was over, space around was a graveyard, and a scene of chaos and destruction. I launched, and went into a good observing posiiton, then monitored how the remaining three Plutarch giants gathered their surviving fighters, maneuvered and charged their jumpdrives. Then they warped away, and I suddenly was alone.

After that furious action the 5 minutes before, that felt strange, I tell you.

:yeah:

[Skybird]

Ah, and just for the record, since it should be clear by now anyway:

I hereby fully recommend the game (in status 2.51).

The criticism of last5 year's release is no longer valid, it has been revamped to a degree I hoped for, and but did not seriously expect. The game is GRRREAT. If they would have released it in this state, they would have triumphed.

Version 3.0 coming in December. Things can only become better, I think.

[Skybird]

The Readme for 3.0 Beta2 is here.

3.0 beta 2
• New Feature: Subsystem target cycling.
• New Feature: Dangerous regions that can damage your ship.
• New Feature: Crafting of special items (menu present but feature not yet fully enabled).
• Added new kind of floating crate that must be opened by destroying locks.
• Added new trade and targeting software upgrades for the player ship.
• Added option to enable automatic refuel when ships call player if they are out of fuel.
• Added Patrol Zone order to continuously secure a zone.
• Added encyclopedia page showing station build costs.
• Added automatic zoom between map levels.
• Added new in-game statistics.
• Improved smalltalk gameplay.
• Improved AI turret avoidance.
• Improved AI fuel station selection to reduce queues at the pumps.
• Improved AI attack behaviour on fleets of capital ships.
• Improved positioning of highway advertising signs to avoid traffic.
• Improved price calculation and discount system to make trading viable for a wider range of wares (new base prices to come).
• Improved balancing of police licence prices, bounty rewards and mission rewards.
• Fixed occasional highway-related sound cut-out.
• Fixed builder ship positioning.
• Fixed further cases of production getting stuck when storage for some products is full.
• Fixed attack/defend configuration of Defence Officer not working in some cases.
• Fixed Refuel command being displayed twice in the pilot info.
• Fixed wares being listed as available for resource gathering on ships not capable of mining them.
• Fixed ships with trade orders stuck in following player ship (stuck trades will be completed after current task).
• Fixed capital ships not shooting at some stations.
• Fixed remote controlled missiles not moving if player stops controlling them.
• Fixed ships not finishing planned trade trips in certain situations.
• Fixed ships behaving as though moving while actually standing still.
• Fixed at least one cause of unexpected warping of player ship to a new location.
• Fixed cockpit camera movement not working when loading a savegame.
• Fixed missing voice feedback for some orders.
• Fixed incorrect NPC voice feedback when there are no explicit orders.
• Fixed object positions on map when viewing a different sector.
• Fixed random initial mouse position when mouse cursor activated on platform.
• Fixed target cycling sometimes skipping a target or selecting the wrong one.
• Fixed rare case of current target being lost when cycling targets.
• Fixed repaired surface elements not being targetable.
• Fixed capital ships not showing target elements directly after having been constructed, refueled, or repaired.
• Fixed several other rare problems with target elements.
• Fixed various problems with "re-pinging" of mission targets.
• Fixed various problems with crosshair information display.
• Fixed ability menu not updating if new drone is installed while menu is open.
• Fixed several other minor menu behaviour issues.
• Fixed various causes of the most common causes of crashes, and improved crash reporting.
• Optimisations resulting in performance improvements, especially in busy areas.

---

And since they were not posted but illustrate how many things have been worked on, some of the earlier readmes for the major patch releases:

Version 2.50 (187052) - 2014-10-09


New Feature: New side-bar based main menu.
New Feature: External camera view.
New Feature: Free look in cockpit.
New Feature: New shipyards for small and medium sized ships.
Added Drone Hunt generic mission.
Added Protection Detail generic mission.
Added Diplomatic Aid mission chain.
Added respawning of specialists with increasing hire fees.
Added incoming remotely ordered wares to item trader menu.
Added auto-refuel setting.
Added small ship traders.
Added primary shields to large ships which did not already have them.
Added "civil war" behaviour between Plutarch and Heart of Albion in Albion.
Added ability to replace destroyed CVs so that station construction can can continue.
Added ability to assign ships to other ships of same size or to any large ship.
Added option to choose between stopping and maintaining speed while in menus.
Added event monitor display to drone control mode.
Added target elements for player-owned small ships.
Added statistic for storage modules hacked.
Added crash report option with privacy settings.
Improved event monitor with "picture-in-picture" mode.
Improved hacking gameplay.
Improved engine animation and effects.
Improved ship AI behaviour in numerous situations.
Improved generation of mission enemies.
Improved "Assign new superior" command.
Improved ability menu to show when a drone is unavailable.
Improved mission target indicator to point always to the closest mission target.
Improved trade offers menu (shopping list is included in ship cargo).
Improved docking behaviour of drones.
Improved build tree menu user experience.
Improved several mission briefings.
Improved Open Comm Link menu in legacy main menu.
Improved scan time for police scanning illegal activities.
Improved lifetime of containers dropped from cargo bays.
Improved remote controlled player drones flying back to the player ship.
Improved rendering of distant objects to reduce flickering slightly.
Improved Mission Bar so it no longer obstructs menus.
Improved crash report content to help us find and fix causes of crashes.
Fixed several plot and other mission issues.
Fixed player ship cover faction not being reset from Xenon after plot.
Fixed player ships returned during the plot being inactive.
Fixed incorrect Player relations with Plutarch.
Fixed Reiver reputation not being mutual in new games.
Fixed drones not being able to return to their home base.
Fixed an issue with station expansions not completing out-of-sector.
Fixed multiple ship dealers per platform.
Fixed escort ships disappearing after loading a savegame.
Fixed a pathing issue for ships flying to stations.
Fixed an issue with gas collectors not collecting.
Fixed production module animations being stuck after having been out-of-sector.
Fixed incorrect AI ship behaviour after having been forced out of a highway.
Fixed several problems with drone docking.
Fixed problems with transport drones not picking up containers.
Fixed drones failing to get a new commander if theirs is destroyed.
Fixed several mining bugs (resource gathering, movement, searching...).
Fixed cases of player drones getting lost when you enter a highway.
Fixed police not detecting illegal cargo in player inventory in many cases.
Fixed station building not proceeding correctly when not in the player zone.
Fixed refuel budget menu assuming that the trader has no money.
Fixed case where build resources are requested for the playership.
Fixed problem involving disappearing wares.
Fixed managers pestering the player for money.
Fixed stuck trade offers and refunded money to all participants.
Fixed shields not protecting surface elements on several ships in Omicron Lyrae.
Fixed jumpgates sometimes sending the player to invalid positions.
Fixed mining drones not picking up asteroids in some cases.
Fixed ships getting stuck waiting for drones.
Fixed some ships not shooting at large objects.
Fixed some trade ships ignoring trade opportunities for extended periods of time.
Fixed storage calculations for intermediate products that caused storage requirements to be vastly overestimated.
Fixed exploit allowing repeated instantly-profitable trades on shipyards.
Fixed temporary loss of faction discounts when temporarily losing reputation.
Fixed remote transport drones ending up in the player squad.
Fixed station-to-station trades sometimes ending prematurely.
Fixed dropped inventory items being picked up again immediately.
Fixed picked-up objects disappearing due to timeout.
Fixed several problems associated with hacking gameplay.
Fixed mining drones being unable to return to some capital ships.
Fixed Split "Gangrene Chaser" turrets disappearing and allow re-building.
Fixed upgrade resources being counted twice for building.
Fixed upgrade level rounding issues resulting in incorrect upgrade counts.
Fixed ship category in encyclopedia for Hermod, Light Sul and Heavy Sul.
Fixed inconsistent upgrade counts between encyclopedia and ship dealer.
Fixed player ship selectable in Assign to Commander conversation.
Fixed unidentified station modules having a name in the map.
Fixed being able to remote comm NPCs in the same room.
Fixed offset mouse position in borderless window mode.
Fixed mouse confinement when starting the game in borderless window mode.
Fixed minor button selection bugs in menus.
Fixed issues with scrolling down in some menu tables.
Fixed automatically changing selection in map menu.
Fixed initial button selection in menus not being highlighted.
Fixed rare cases of hotkey buttons not working.
Fixed occasional freeze when opening the options menu.
Fixed cases where the dialog menu was not displayed.
Fixed mode options being available in the player ship's back room.
Fixed left mouse clicks not closing ability/interact menus in some cases.
Fixed double clicks on current target not always opening interact menu.
Fixed stuck scroll-bar when returning to a previous menu.
Fixed platform trader menu getting stuck with discounts.
Fixed various other issues with UI and targeting behaviour.
Fixed dialog or legacy main menu sometimes not showing buttons as selected.
Fixed pressing ESC/DEL on loading screen returning to startmenu after loading is done.
Fixed target cycling not working in highways.
Fixed targets being lost in some cases.
Fixed mission targets showing group target elements for ships instead of single ship target elements.
Fixed certain invisible ship/station components being selectable as target.
Fixed keyboard navigation selecting options from time to time.
Fixed input actions and states mapped to axis on joystick 3-8 not working.
Fixed ability to comm from a remote control drone using the "C" shortcut.
Fixed stuck shift keys when alt-tabbing or changing window focus.
Fixed station hints not being shown in non-plot games.
Fixed mission offer locations being displayed when in a drone.
Fixed weird camera behaviour when flying relative to moving capital ships.
Fixed main menu font issue in Chinese and Korean.
Fixed the boost effect not stopping in some situations.
Fixed missing Ad Sign text in event monitor.
Fixed wrongly-scaled buy ship menus on detail monitor.
Fixed wrong message text when standard drones arrive via remote delivery.
Fixed subtitles changing too fast for long lines.
Fixed incorrect English voice lines for a Teladi speaker.
Fixed excessively bright lights on certain objects.
Fixed disappearing ice asteroids.
Fixed missing advertising signs.
Fixed several of the most common causes of crashes.
Various optimisations resulting in performance improvements.


64-bit

The system requirements for the game have always stated that it requires a 64-bit version of Windows, and the 64-bit version of the game is now successfully in general use. This is likely to be the last major version for which a 32-bit executable is available.

---

Version 2.20 (184360) - 2014-06-27



NEW: The 64-bit EXE is now the default. See below for more information.
Fixed Secret Service missions constantly reminding player to talk to mission actor.
Fixed campaign progressing unexpectedly when docking at station.
Fixed player occasionally being in wrong position on platform when loading savegame.
Fixed trade offers on player ships/stations occasionally not appearing in trade menu.
Fixed claimed ships not showing up in property menu.
Fixed ships continuing to move when ordered to wait.
Fixed trade orders not being executed when ship has been ordered to wait.
Fixed various cases of drones being unable to dock/return.
Fixed missing docking bay on Wheat Plantation.
Fixed missing container storage on Pharma-Spice Farm.
Fixed missing MK2 weapons after completing plot (you may need to change zones before this kicks in).
Fixed map not showing player stations.
Fixed incorrect positions of some elements on map.
Fixed menu slider controls breaking under certain circumstances.
Fixed controls no longer working when opening ability menu on a platform.
Fixed controller A-button not working after having left the cockpit while an interactive notification was displayed.
Fixed station under construction becoming invisible after Alt-Tab.
Fixed a leak causing savegames to grow slowly in size over time.
Fixed several causes of occasional crashes.

---


Version 2.00 (183618) - 2014-05-20



New Feature: Three new gamestarts, each with a new cockpit configuration.
New Feature: Rebalanced combat with three difficulty settings.
New Feature: Additional commands for your ships.
New Feature: Autopilot can fly your ship while you are busy.
New Feature: All new highway flight model.
New Feature: Most tasks can now be performed without landing on stations.
New Feature: Full screen HUD detail monitor option.
New Feature: Clicks on event monitor now open relevant menus.
New Feature: Map/radar on event monitor.
New Feature: New ships in Omicron Lyrae.
New Feature: Huge new Xenon ship.
New Feature: Four new missile types.
New Feature: Improved graphics for an even more beautiful universe.
New Feature: New graphics options and presets.
New Feature: New start menu scene.
New Feature: New Steam achievements.
Added support for up to 8 input devices (now even your pet octopus can get the most from the game).
Added option to buy replacement player ship cockpit layout from certain traders.
Added shield damage for collisions.
Improved responsiveness of main menu and dialogs.
Improved event monitor with more space for important information.
Improved positioning of interface elements in first person mode.
Improved production logic now skips products where the station has too much stock.
Fixed gamepad mode switching on when axis has non-zero value while at rest.
Fixed problem with wrecked state of ship/station surface elements not always being loaded from savegames correctly.
Fixed collectable objects not showing a target element.
Fixed gates not showing a target element.
Fixed info points not being displayed at drone launch pads.
Fixed cases where clicking on larger targets didn't work.
Fixed rare instance of mission objective bar being stuck on screen.
Fixed text field not being reset when closing and reopening trade menu.
Fixed problems with overlapping/truncated text on first person event monitor.
Fixed cases resulting in jumping target elements.
Fixed incorrect text in certain conversations.
Fixed icon size in licence encyclopedia entry.
Fixed distance sorting in trade menu.
Fixed capital ships becoming invisible when boosting while player is close.
Fixed cases where build icons were displayed without a builder ship in the player squad.
Fixed missing trade offers for architects with no money.
Fixed rare case of missing target elements (usually build locations or player owned cap ships).
Fixed cases where targeting objects using gamepad/joystick controls did not work correctly.
Fixed trade restrictions menu getting stuck.
Fixed several causes of occasional crashes.
Various optimisations resulting in small performance improvements.

---


Patch 1.30 - 2014-04-15

Localisations for text relating to the new Joystick Deadzone option are not yet included. These will be added as soon as possible.



New Feature: Steam Workshop support.
Improved support for joysticks and multiple input devices.
Improved mining behaviour for all sizes of ships.
Improved trade ship behaviour to favour profitable, non-empty runs.
Improved station scan mode which no longer highlights objects that are not relevant.
Improved attack and evasive maneuvers and AI.
Improved flight pathing during normal flight, when following other ships, and when docking.
Improved collector drone flight behaviour near large objects.
Improved map handling of ship command hierarchies.
Improved trade menu, including text search, sorting and colours.
Improved appearance of small ships flying in lanes around stations.
Enabled comm/info interactions with player property that is more than 10 km away.
Added missions relating to the upkeep of ships and stations.
Added new ship types to DeVries.
Added list of platform NPCs to station menu (only available if you're in the same zone).
Added more information and command hierarchy to player property menu.
Added information to encyclopedia about stations/ships that can be built.
Added option to stop displaying steering mode message.
Fixed missing manager comm option.
Fixed wrong mouse-steering mode being entered in some cases incorrectly when leaving a menu.
Fixed several other incorrect or inconvenient menu behaviours.
Fixed calculations for gathering certain resources out-of-sector.
Fixed player being sent to NPCs on ships or on hostile stations when asking for directions.
Fixed some objects left in construction state after building finished (still at least one rare case remaining).
Fixed trade missions not completing if the station storage was full, notably the food trade plot mission.
Fixed trade ships not stopping their current order after clearing their shopping list.
Fixed trade orders for selling items using ships in player squad.
Fixed ships blocking docking bays after having docking interrupted.
Fixed incorrect docking icons under certain circumstances.
Fixed not being able to unlock skills of defence officers on platforms.
Fixed displayed total counts of stored units.
Fixed drones that should have a commander appearing in property owned menu.
Fixed destroyed drones not being properly removed from drone storage.
Fixed incorrect ship position after leaving a highway with a menu open.
Fixed stations creating trade offers with higher value than it can afford.
Fixed building and production remaining paused after modules having been hacked.
Fixed ships assigned to stations being incorrectly assigned mining jobs.
Fixed outdated trade offer information appearing on event monitor.
Fixed trade ships assigned to player stations sometimes not updating their range.
Fixed object menu not restoring after closing station trade offers.
Fixed production menu information not updating correctly.
Fixed production showing very long production times in certain cases.
Fixed production stalling due to stations filling up with intermediate wares.
Fixed several pathfinding problems, which should prevent ships from flying through stations.
Fixed ships equiping drones or ammo getting stuck in the shipyard.
Fixed problem that could cause following ships to get stuck when the target changes zones.
Fixed most cases of dropped containers being stuck inside each other (can still happen occasionally).
Fixed architect destroying drones in storage without adding them to the station.
Fixed issue with parking ships when manager (stations) or pilot (construction vessel) are not present.
Fixed trade ships waiting too long for a free parking location when intended trade is no longer possible.
Fixed calculation of required funds when trading with other player property.
Fixed pilot not being placed on ship's platform.
Fixed ships trying to go to the same coordinates by default.
Fixed mining for medium size ships.
Fixed incorrect mining order for ships which can't transport the mining wares.
Fixed blocked trades involving discounts if there is only enough money for the discounted amount not the full amount.
Fixed built ships not leaving the shipyard after shipyard construction module has been destroyed and subsequently repaired.
Fixed several other cases of ships getting stuck, not moving when they should.
Fixed owner of fuel station in Gemstone Manufacture.
Fixed incorrect lasers being used by medium ice collector ships.
Fixed problem with accuracy of time data in savegames with long play time.
Fixed rotation of construction ships after flying to build location.
Fixed visual glitch on map when targeting/entering/leaving highways.
Fixed animation problem with highways in games with long play time.
Fixed stalls when entering highways in savegames that have been saved/loaded many times.
Fixed another cause of the game stalling for a short time.
Fixed crash when loading certain savegames.
Fixed several causes of apparently random crashes.
Various optimisations resulting in performance improvements.
Significant performance improvements on some AMD graphics cards, particularly R9.




---

Patch 1.25 - 2014-02-26

Russian and French localisations of texts that are new to patch 1.25 are not yet included. These will be added as soon as possible.



New Feature: Player-owned ships and stations can now be renamed.
New Feature: Smalltalk reward allowing you to receive trade offer updates for a station remotely.
Added logbook entries for refuelling, trade and building.
Added call from manager when a station is low on credits.
Added ship name when player gets a call requiring a response from a player owned ship.
Fixed a cause of occasional crashes when loading savegame.
Fixed a cause of occasional crashes during large battles.
Fixed several other causes of occasional crashes.
Fixed another cause of the game hanging after Alt-Tab.
Added prices for small ships so that these can now be sold.
Cargo value is now taken into account when selling a ship; you get roughly half it's value.
Fixed price calculations for intermediate wares.
Fixed two causes of disappearing ships and one of ships ending up in strange places.
Fixed certain station elements being rotated incorrectly after loading a savegame.
Fixed problem with random station elements being built and preventing further building.
Fixed problem with small ships preventing building.
Fixed problem with drones not being able to dock at certain mining ships.
Fixed incorrect container amount being dropped from cargo drones.
Fixed another issue with cargo collection.
Fixed buy offers for more wares than can be stored.
Fixed player being able to start multiple boarding operations on the same ship.
Fixed abort button for boarding operations.
Fixed info and comm options for externally docked ships.
Fixed issue with operational range settings resulting in ships looking for trades in the wrong places.
Improved station-owned mining ship AI to prevent station from filling with more resources than it wants.
Improved shooting logic for NPC ships (more improvements to come).
Fixed a problem resulting in inactive patrol ships.
Fixed a problem with NPC beam weapons not firing correctly.
Fixed tag darts occasionally tagging something other than their intended target.
Added inter-system traders to DeVries.
Fixed station scan mode remaining active when it shouldn't.
Fixed rare case resulting in missing info points and dock icons.
Fixed subordinate count in orders menu.
Fixed incorrect trade status in ship menu.
Fixed "+" button not working in map menu under certain circumstances.
Fixed sold ships and collected drones being displayed as destroyed in the logbook.
Added missing descriptions for systems to encyclopedia.
Improved rewards after successful smalltalk on platforms, including trade subscriptions.
Improved dialog structure to find people on platforms.
Fixed missing architect on plot builder ship.
Fixed player being sent to a hostile NPC when asking for directions.
Fixed ships not in player squad requesting player input when out of fuel.
Fixed visual flicker when returning to the cockpit from a platform.
Fixed location of visor/glasses on certain NPCs.
Fixed missing physics data when loading a savegame.
Added graphics settings for SSAO, Glow and Distortion.
Fixed incorrect display of certain options in graphics menu.
Fixed incorrect resolutions when changing displays in borderless mode.
Improved stability of job system and patch code with modified games.
Added support for catalog files in mods.
Added Korean localisation (text only).
Added Spanish localisation (text only, incomplete but included to enable feedback to translators).
Further optimisations resulting in small performance improvements, particularly on lower-end graphics hardware.

---


Patch 1.24 - 2014-02-04

Includes changes from Patch 1.23 that was not released outside the Beta process.



New feature: Manual target control with keys for target nearest crosshair, closest enemy and next/previous target. Further improvements planned.
New feature: Logbook system covering non-plot missions, player ships, discounts/commissions and game tips. Logging of a wider range of events planned.
Added shipyard to Gemstone Manufacture.
Added escort fighters to some capital ships.
Increased Pirate, Reiver and Xenon activity for more action.
Increased yields for mining regions in DeVries and Maelstrom.
Fixed error causing map to suddenly close under certain circumstances.
Fixed more causes of being teleported into the middle of nowhere on loading a savegame.
Fixed cases where destroying a ship could result in the target element not getting removed.
Improved update frequency of target elements.
Fixed cargo collection mode.
Fixed mining ships collecting ware containers.
Fixed builder ships not being able to trade with stations reliably.
Fixed one problem with building restarting when player not present (another build issue remains).
Added filtering by station/ship in trade offer menu.
Added Hire option with negative response for certain NPCs.
Prevented certain plot ships from being sold.
Fixed problem with timing of money transfer to/from manager.
Added means for NPCs to return to player ship from assignments.
Fixed marines not showing up in player ship units.
Fixed builder ship menu not updating player account.
Fixed negative total yield amounts for asteroid fields.
Fixed more inconsistencies in weapon counts.
Fixed drone count calculation for ship trader.
Fixed several issues with active mission/guidance info being disabled.
Fixed missing/incorrect highway names in mission objectives.
Fixed assigning a ship to a station without a manager.
Removed "taglauncher" from encyclopedia.
Removed civilian factions from encyclopedia.
Fixed several encyclopedia layout issues.
Fixed several issues with build/repair drones.
Fixed incorrect cargo prediction based on shopping list data under certain circumstances.
Fixed trade menus not keeping track of selected ship in some cases.
Added default "protect" behaviour for ships in your squad.
Improved capital ship fight behaviour.
Fixed problem with ships not attacking.
Fixed enemies not attacking correct target in certain circumstances.
Fixed another cause of jumping ships ending up in invalid positions.
Fixed player ship sometimes being in the wrong place after undocking.
Fixed problem with engineer sometimes being paid twice for player ship repairs.
Fixed incorrect player engine price calculation.
Fixed incorrect weapon counts in ship menu.
Ships working for a station no longer sell wares to their homebase (goods just transferred, no money involved).
Shipyards and fuel stations should no longer run out of resources (may take a while to take effect).
Fixed cargo drones bumping into hull of mining ships and blocking trade.
Reduced likelihood of mining ships transferring more minerals to a station than it wants.
Added hotkey for docking (Shift-D by default).
Fixed welder drones appearing in property menu.
Fixed "keycode NNN" appearing in Options menu.
Fixed problem remapping keys used in Detail Monitor (C, I and G)
Changed resource cost for ship-building in Omicron Lyrae
Changed ships available for construction in DeVries
Fixed URV Wharf module in Integrative URV Forge not producing drones
Fixed scan sound being replayed for something that has already been scanned.
Fixed scan highlighting not being properly removed when leaving cockpit.
Fixed trade missions not completing.
Fixed problem resulting in player getting stuck in Canteran air ducts.
Fixed floating crate on Albion platform interior.
Fixed floating ad signs and incorrect traffic at DeVries wheat station.
Fixed DeVries shipyard interior orientation.
Fixed lights in prison being too dark.
Fixed bench obstructing hangar entrance of DeVries repair platform.
Fixed NPC stuck in locker on DeVries repair dock.
Fixed not being able to take cases out of cardboard boxes.
Improved Russian localisation.
Improved support for Chinese text.
Fixed another problem with borderless window mode on certain hardware.
Fixed freeze and memory-related crash caused by ships shooting excessively under certain circumstances.
Fixed several more causes of crashes.
More small performance improvements.

---


Some smaller ones there were before, but I skip them, they came very early after release.



One cannot say that they have been lazy over this year.

[NeonSamurai]

I'm... confused. SC is actually cheaper, starting at $30,- for the game up to $45,- for alpha & beta access.

That is for the cheapest (crapiest) ship though (and just one ship). Throw in nicer ships, insurance, etc and you are talking a whole lot of money.

[Dowly]

You can still buy the other ships in-game. SC's model isn't like that of Rise of Flight or DCS.

[Arclight]

It's a fair point currently though, I guess. If you want the fancier ones in your hangar or in Arena Commander then yes, you'll have to pay for them. I'd say it's just marketing though; as noted all of these ships will be in-game, no real money nescesary beyond purchasing the game. Insurance costs and such will be negligable, making the LTI and free hangar costs that came as a bonus for early backers a rather minor perk.


-
Wasn't expecting a turn around in opinion on Rebirth yet to be honest. Guess it's back on the watch list. :hmmm:

[Skybird]

Wasn't expecting a turn around in opinion on Rebirth yet to be honest. Guess it's back on the watch list. :hmmm:

Don'T get me wrong, I do not say it already is flawless and perfect, obviously there are still some bugs, else they would not need to release another patch, but the bugs are such that now they do not seriously hamper the fun to play, are no showstoppers (at least I haven't experienced them), and nothing that springs into your eye at first glance, like it was one year ago. I would compare it the armA series, for example. It never has been perfect, it always lived with bugs, namely in the terrible AI. But that did ot stop those interested in the game's focus to enjoy it.

X-R now compares to a game that sees a more or less solid first release. Which shows that they released it ONE YEAR TOO EARLY.

For fans of space shooters and traders: enjoy it. All others: Check and examine. I personally have a very good time with it. Now worth the money I paid. Running a mining ship now, seeing it manouvering by itself, lasering asteroids, drones collecting it, and then shuttling it back to the station. Or that battleship two days ago: after the battle, with smoke and fires blasting from several wounds into space, swarms of astronauts and drones got launched and started to work on the hull.

I think X-R competes even better with other such titles if you sooner or later realise that the others also boil their tea with water only.

[Arclight]

Well I'm not running off to get it right now, but it seems to be getting to the point where it's worth considering again.

With regards to being released too early: the damn thing was already in development for 7 years when it was released. They probably reached a point where they either had to release it or drop it. It's holding with their tradition at least; all their games I've played got rather a lot better over time. Rebirth seems to have had a particularly rough start, but with them rebuilding the thing from the ground up it was somewhat to be expected.

[NeonSamurai]

You can still buy the other ships in-game. SC's model isn't like that of Rise of Flight or DCS.

It's a fair point currently though, I guess. If you want the fancier ones in your hangar or in Arena Commander then yes, you'll have to pay for them. I'd say it's just marketing though; as noted all of these ships will be in-game, no real money nescesary beyond purchasing the game. Insurance costs and such will be negligable, making the LTI and free hangar costs that came as a bonus for early backers a rather minor perk.

We will see though, as if the prices stick for ships after release, how bad would the grind be to acquire a 100USD ship, let alone half the ships in the game (which if purchased would cost over a thousand dollars easily).


As for XR, I will probably pick it up once I am working again, as I have always been a big fan of the X series and Egosoft. I just hope they learn from all of this and never go with a single ship concept again. One of the biggest draws in the X Series was the ability to physically pilot any ship you wanted.

[Skybird]

I so far never felt the one-player-ship-concept stopping me from having fun with this one. What I would prefer is to have the fleet management system (the way you buy or order the building of ships and must provide resources) simplified, not in idea, but regarding the ergonomy of the interface. It is not a very accessible process, and anything but self-explanatory. Same is true for building your own space stations. Intuitive is something different, there still is room for substantial improvement in the interface.

The new side bar menu for the most works quite well on other aspects, on the other hand. Just the buttons could be increased, its all a bit small and tiny. Trading runs smooth now, and it is a relief that as long as you do not sell on the black market or want your ship systems being altered you do not need to board stations anymore. What they must learn however is that their mechanics should not sit in bars or any random place of the station, but should be expected to hang around in the hangar. Why do they have those repair facilities, if not for that purpose? - All in all the new menus are a big improvement already. There is space for more.

The look of the highways has been changed, although in practical gameplay it makes not much a difference.

In general with the going for an X64 exe, the game runs smoother and looks better. It still has that Blade Runner look, and is very colourful (sometimes even tooo much so). Those space stations still are impressive, they leave their dull Elite counterparts in the dust, imo. Ship designs also are showing plenty of imagination and often visual beauty.

Explosion and weapon effects however sometimes remind a bit too much of old school FX from several years ago, they are not up to date. No wonder when considering that they are working on this game since 8 years now.

[Skybird]

Version 3.0 has been released two days ago, along with free addon (for old customers) of "The Teladi Outpost".

Quite some changes:



Readme 3.0

Egosoft is delighted to announce the release of the
X Rebirth 3.0 update along with a new DLC,
The Teladi Outpost (http://store.steampowered.com/app/325580). The DLC is available free to players who download it before 15th December.

Highlights of the 3.0 release include:

• Interactive holomap.
• Ability to build stations in Empty Space.
• Dangerous regions that can damage your ship.
• Crafting of special items.
• New non-plot mission chains.
• Employee training to improve skills.
• Ware exchange between player ships and stations.
• Subsystem target cycling.

The Teladi Outpost DLC introduces a whole Teladi-controlled system containing two new sectors and over a dozen zones of interest, along with new Teladi and pirate factions, and various new Teladi ships, stations and weapon types.

Be sure to also check out our new
http://youtu.be/K75uEQV1YMwl video overview (steam://openurl/http://youtu.be/K75uEQV1YMw), and also our
X Rebirth 3.0 features explained (http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=347274078) guide.



Readme Teladi Outpost

Faster Playing
Abort cutscenes
All cutscenes can now be aborted by pressing escape (e.g getting out of the Albion Skunk).

Running
To run on platforms double tap the “walk” button (w by default).

Exploration and Rare Items
Rare items: Complete redesign of all items found in the universe. Many new rare items were added including some that can be used for special missions.

Lockboxes: Objects are now found in different types of “lockboxes”. To open these containers, the player has to first shoot locks without damaging the container.


Crafting: Some items can be used in crafting. Once you find one craftable item, the inventory menu will show the other missing items and the product that you can build out of it. Read the objects’ encyclopedia entries for hints of what unique missions and activities can be unlocked with these objects.

Gifts and Bribing (Unlocking Rewards on Platforms)










Gifts: After a successful smalltalk conversation on a platform, not only do people (NPCs) offer valuable rewards, such as the option to update your trade computer with live trade offer updates from this station permanently (2.0: Trade agents), but you can now also give them a gift to play an extended conversation and unlock special rewards. Several gifts can be crafted from rare items. Among the rewards are:


Virtual seminars (—> Skill improvements)
Long term discounts



Station Sabotage (New Hack Panels)
Hacking on platforms:
A range of new control panels and security terminals on stations allow
you to skilfully sabotage all areas of station operation on your opponents space station:

Sabotage station defence: Successfully sabotaging station defence systems can give you a limited period of time in which a station is weaker or even defenceless. This requires a security decryption system, which can be crafted in your inventory once you found all of its components.

Sabotaging Station Repair: Successfully sabotaging a station's repair facility will greatly increase the time the crew needs to rebuild the station after an attack. You need a temporary local security ID to access this terminal, which can be crafted from items sometimes found on platforms.

Hack trade offers: Hacking into a trade terminal can be used to gain illegal long-term discounts or commissions. You need a temporary local security ID to access this terminal, which can be crafted from items sometimes found on platforms.

Sabotaging Production: Successfully sabotaging a station's production will cripple it for a long period of time. You need a temporary local security ID to access this terminal, which can be crafted from items sometimes found on platforms.

Blocking station security: Successfully sabotaging station security will increase the time for stealing containers after hacking. This requires a security decryption system, which can be crafted in your inventory once you found all of its components.


Stealing Goods from Stations (Improved Trojan ROV)


First preparation:
Before you start your career as a thief, you should have several security decryption systems.






Step 1: Identify target station: Decide which station to rob. A successful robbery needs a target that has valuable goods.
Step 2: Identify target storage module: Where does the station store its most valuable goods? Scan the station and look inside all storage modules to choose the one with the most valuable goods, or those you need yourself.
Optional preparation: Consider disabling the station security before starting to hack the storage. This is not necessary but reduces your risk. (—> Station sabotage / Blocking station security).
Optional preparation: Make sure one of your trade ships, capable of transporting the wares you want to steal, is very close nearby (consider a move to my position command) and has a large amount of Cargo URVs to pick up the stolen goods as fast as possible!
Step 4: Approach the selected storage module and launch the Trojan ROV. Once you are remotely controlling the ROV, avoid security ships at all cost. Fly to the info point of your selected storage module, click on it and select the “hack” action.
Step 5: Fly to the target points shown now as mission targets and hack them by selecting the hack action. You will have to succeed in the very fast minigame by pressing the button when the scan line is near the peak of the curve.
Step 6: Once the progress bar reaches 100% you will receive the message “hack successful”. You will then see that the station has triggered its alarms and raised its security level.
Step 7: If you choose the right target, you now will find lots of free floating ware container in the area around the station.
Optional preparation: Land on a platform and find the station defence control panel to disable all station turrets for a short period of time. You will need a security decryption system for this step.
Step 8: You can switch to cargo collect mode and tag containers so your freighter can pick them up. The moment you claim the first container, you reveal your identity and intention to the station and station security will retaliate for your actions. If you disabled station defence systems, you have to be quick or you risk that your freighter being attacked. However, the reward can be more than worth the risk.



Skill Improvements
Virtual seminars: You can now improve the skill set of your workers (NPCs) in relevant categories (those in bold) by giving them virtual seminars. These seminars can be acquired from experienced NPCs by giving them crafted gifts. You can give a virtual seminar to an NPC either by
visiting them personally or, in the case of active pilots in your ships, remotely when
talking to them (COMM from NPC details menu)

Improving your NPCs: Levelling up your workers' skills can now improve important features of
the game. Examples:


Managers: Will work more efficiently and increase station productivity
Engineers: Will repair stations or ships faster.
Boarding Commander: Will lead teams more effectively in fights and thereby increase boarding chances.
Pilots: Will learn more advanced flight techniques and improve at mining.
Defence officer: Improved tactics for better results in fighting with your capital ships.
Specialists: Will increase their effect on station productivity even further.



Boarding
Promoting marines: Marines are now promoted through successful boarding operations. Look to board weaker targets first to train your marines. With a full compliment of marines (50) and with some of them promoted to Veteran or even Elite status, you will be able to take on increasingly stronger ships. With these changes, only Recruit marines are available to acquire at Recruiting Officers.


Educate the Marine Officer: Further improve your chances in boarding by educating your Marine Officer with virtual seminars (—> Skill improvements). The Marine Officer will also gain experience after a successful boarding operation.

Marine losses: Marines can now be lost on boarding operations, even those which are ultimately successful. Increase your chances of zero casualties by training your marines.

Boarding resistance: Capital ships now display a 'Boarding resistance' value in their info menu. The resistance will affect how effective your marines are and how many casualties you may suffer. The more expensive and upgraded the ship, the higher the resistance. Lower it by destroying surface elements and damaging the hull. Of course, the more damaged the ship is, the less it will be worth.

Boarding missions: Throughout a boarding operation your Marine Officer may suggest targets to be hacked or destroyed to help aid their progress. Fail these tasks and you risk more Marine casualties.

Missions
Chain missions: Occasionally you will see this new mission offer type. These are groups of missions offered by various factions. They do not just give you the usual mission reward, but often promise a special reward at the end of the chain. Some unique discounts and unlocks are only available through these new missions.

Many new missions: The set of missions offered on stations has been improved. If you enjoy playing missions, you can accept many missions at the same time and try to play them simultaneously. This is especially useful when multiple missions send you in the same direction. Be careful however when missions introduce time restrictions. Losing the mission may cost you some reputation.

Map Improvements
Mouse interface: The map system has been greatly improved to allow more interactive control.


SELECT objects directly in the map with a left mouse click.
PAN the map by holding down the left mouse button and dragging the map around.
ZOOM by using the mouse wheel, including changing the logical level of the map (e.g system to sector to zone).
ROTATE map by holding down the right mouse button and moving the mouse at the same
time.



Trade Improvements


Trading with non squad ships: All your ships that are not currently assigned to a superior (e.g: They are working for a manager to supply a station or are part of a squad protecting another ship), will now be selectable in the TRADE MENU. This means you have now two options to manage your trade ships:



Ships that are part of your squad will execute trade orders and try to fly to your current location as soon as they are done.
Ships that are not in your squad will execute trade orders and remain in their last zone after they are done.


Set your own prices: The managers of your factories now have the new option to “Manage trade offer prices”. This can overwrite the default automatic price choice, which is based on the stations current storage of resources and products.

Ware exchange: It is now possible to order to transfer wares directly between all of your property. This always starts with a ship in your squad. From the conversation with the pilot or captain, you will find the“Transfer wares” option in the “New order” section. In the following step, you can select any other object to transfer wares TO or FROM. This also includes wares that are not available as trade offers, allowing you to get resources out of a station again, or even move drones from one station to another. The ship will of course have to fly to the other station, or in the case of two ships exchanging wares directly, have to meet somewhere in space. Capital ships will then exchange wares using their cargo vessel drones, while small ships have to pick up the wares as containers floating in space.

Trade computer MK2 and MK3: These extensions now improve your trade computer's memory. This means that all your trade ships will have a longer command queue. With the trade computer MK2, for example, you can assign 5 orders to each of your trade ships. The trade computer extension is not cheap and therefore reserved for expert traders.

Commanding Squadrons

Broadcast commands to entire squad: The property owned menu now has a new“Broadcast” button when you select your own Albion Skunk. This will allow you to select orders that can be sent to all ships currently in your squad at the same time! (All that appear if you click on the “plus” symbol of the Albion Skunk.


Attack command: An “Attack” action was added to the interact menu of many targetable objects, such as ships and info points of stations. This action replaces the “Hail” action in many places, which is still available through the C hotkey and in the info menu by selecting the NPC you want to talk to. Giving this “attack” order behaves exactly like giving a BROADCAST command from the property owned menu, selecting “Attack object” under new commands and selecting this same object from the map. Note that in both cases, your order is sent to all the ships in your squad that can fight, not matter where they currently are. If you want to exclude ships, you can remove them from your squad and still use them for trading or alternatively you can —> form squads. (next point)

Creating sub squads: To make controlling large amounts of ships easier, you should consider organising them into groups. Instead of commanding each ship individually, you will only deal with the “boss” and all ships assigned to him will follow his command.

Withdraw command: One of the new commands available from the “ORDERS” group in conversations with your pilots or captains is the simple order to withdraw from battles. This could be especially important when trying to sabotage stations and steal their goods without ending up in all-out open war.

New Weapon Types and Ship Upgrades
Pulsed Maser Mk3 
: This is the Teladi take on the popular Pulsed Maser. It fires from alternating barrels and at a lower fire rate than the regular masers, but the projectiles stick to the target and continue giving off energy for some time.

Heavy Laser Mk1: 
The Heavy Laser Mk1 is a powerful beam weapon that delivers enough energy to damage ships. However, it is still an improved version of the Mk2 Mining Laser and as such also makes for an effective mining tool.

Particle Repeater Mk3
: The Particle Repeater Mk3 has a longer reach and does more damage, but comes at the cost of a slightly reduced fire rate.

Constrictor Missile: 
This unguided missile is used by security forces and pirates, disabling the boost capabilities of all known engines and stranding ships for easier looting and boarding.

Engine Mk5 Upgrades
: All engine variants can be upgraded to Mk5 versions - if you manage to find the components that are needed for this, and complete the "Treasure Hunt" crafting mission centred around the "Rare Engine".


Building Stations
Build spots in empty space have been added. This now allows you to start construction anywhere in empty space, no matter if you just leave a local highway in the middle of nowhere or simply boost far out of a normal zone. This works like with any normal build spot. Once you have a construction vessel with architect in your squad, the HUD will show build spots. Select the one you want to use and select the “Build here” action, then follow the instructions in the conversation with your architect.

Switching between automatic and manual management of building and trading. Both architects and managers can be freely switched from a mode where you manually execute every necessary transport and trade operation to a fully automatic mode, where you just give the NPC the money and they order all required resources for you. To do this, just switch the “Only trade with OWN faction” option in the NPC's info menu and add or remove funds to the NPC's budget. An architect with a budget and permission to trade with all factions will build the station you ordered completely or until he runs out of money. Money left after building will always remain on their account and you can move it back to your own account any time. You can now also exclude individual factions from potential trading partners for architects and managers.

[Skybird]

When science meets fiction: :88)


Pulsed Maser Mk3 
: This is the Teladi take on the popular Pulsed Maser. It fires from alternating barrels and at a lower fire rate than the regular masers, but the projectiles stick to the target and continue giving off energy for some time.

Beam weapon. Firing projectiles. :dead:

[Mud]

I'm so stuck :down:

The food ration mission.
Got 300 rations and deliver them to the station and after awhile the rations are gone but no joy in completing the mission.
Tried jumping in and out the system and everything you can think of but it won't complete.
3 nights in a row trying, fun is a bit gone lol.