X4 Foundations - Split Vendetta (Freelancer Like Game)

[Blake00]

If it wasn't for Freelancer I would never have probably heard about the X series as being a little German studio they seem to go under the radar a bit. One of my mates who got me on to Freelancer in 2003 said "hey I found a game series just like it" and that was it, I was an addict lol. God knows how many hours I've put into the X series over the last 15 years.. and I'm still way behind in them due to my OCD urge to do and see everything haha! These days every man and his dog is making Freelancer like games but back in the 2000s and early 2010s there wasn't that much out there so the X series (particularly X2 and X3) was my way of dealing with Freelancer withdrawal symptoms lol. Sure they didn't have the great story and awesome planet landings Freelancer had but the ships and planets were gorgeous and the game universes huge. Being able to become a business mogul and build my own empire of stations and fleets of capital ships to whoops ass with was particularly fun and addictive for me. I've even been reading the X novels over the years to immerse myself in their universe further (although I'm gonna get stuck soon as they're not all translated to English haha).

Well anyway those who are familiar with X games will also know that pretty much every game they release is practically a friggin disaster at launch lol with endless bugs and broken or missing features. Then rather amazingly unlike most studios they then spend years releasing patches and addons to the games until after around 2 or so years the game is friggin awesome lmao! Sure enough X4 has followed that path and they recently released the first addon for X4 Split Vandetta which appears to be quite an improvement over the messy vanilla release. No doubt they'll be more coming too over the next few years. Presumably Egosoft must make their money back through addons as I don't know how those guys survive the bad first releases and somehow keep going. I think the first X game came out in 1999 so its over 20 years now haha.

Has anywhere here played X4 yet? I don't have it yet as I've been holding out of a physical collectors release (yeah I'm one of those old weirdos lol) which is probably not going to happen as they've said they can't afford it these days sadly but nevertheless I've been drooling over their videos lately to build some anticipation for the inevitable digital only purchase lol. I like how you can walk around the bridge of your capital ships while station construction looks way more advanced than previous games with you putting together all the modules yourself into whatever custom setup you want. Then of course you can walk around them and hire staff and mercs etc.

Trailer for the new Split addon looks cool...



And now they're doing a video series talking about each aspect of the game..

Trading


Fighting


others not released yet..

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Blake's Sanctum:
- Total Conversion mods: Star Trek Doom 2, Quest for Glory IV-3D Hexen, & Star Wars Civilization 2
- Game Shrines: Age of Wonders, Babylon 5 Games, Command & Conquer, Elder Scrolls, Dune Games, Final Fantasy, Freelancer , Heroes of Might & Magic, Master of Magic, Quest for Glory Series, Starflight, & Star Trek Games

[Blake00]

Opps my bad they have done another one! oooh station building!! Gonna watch this right now lol

Building

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Blake's Sanctum:
- Total Conversion mods: Star Trek Doom 2, Quest for Glory IV-3D Hexen, & Star Wars Civilization 2
- Game Shrines: Age of Wonders, Babylon 5 Games, Command & Conquer, Elder Scrolls, Dune Games, Final Fantasy, Freelancer , Heroes of Might & Magic, Master of Magic, Quest for Glory Series, Starflight, & Star Trek Games

[Enkidu]

I read this as "XA foundations" - the Xeno origin simulator.

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[jammi]

I must admit, I haven't even looked at X4 after the disaster that X: Rebirth was. If they're going back to their roots, I might give it a try.

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[Strichev]

I read this as "XA foundations" - the Xeno origin simulator.

So did I.

I found Disco when looking for info on X3. I never got around to actually playing it, though.

[HoakinBlackforge]

I tried to play the x3 games, but i have this weird bug on keyboard that the menu gets stuck and i cannot press anything.

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[LuckyOne]

Haven't played the new ones but I used to waste hours and hours in X3. I remember the mods back then were huge, with all kinds of features (mobile mining, hidden wrecks, custom HQ bases, hiring NPC traders / NPC fleet ops ...)

The only thing I missed was the multiplayer... You had this huge galaxy that felt alive but you were always alone in it. Freelancer/Disco on the other hand has the people but you never get the feeling of huge, living galaxy... more like a tiny pocket universe (the tiny planets only add to that feeling )

[Blake00]

Yeah taking the advancements and good things from X Rebirth but going back to a more open sandbox X3 style game was definitely the right move and showed that they listen to their fans. Now you can walk around ships and stations AND command any ship in the game instead of having one and not the other haha.

Yeah the no multiplayer thing has always been a problem for them but being a small studio they've often said they couldn't manage the combination of multiplayer with their extremely complicated and dynamic sandbox universes. It's interesting that they've 'sort of' added some multiplayer interactivity to X4 in the latest version but its not actual multiplayer. Eg you build special stations to open portals to other player's 'realities' and you visit them and possible steal/trade some special stuff not in your universe. Egosoft have said in their latest videos that they plan to expand on this in future patches and dlc etc. So in another year or 2 maybe we'll find out what the final incarnation will be haha.

Anyway over the last few days they've uploaded the final episodes in their series. I really enjoyed watching these.. but my god does the latest version look more complicated than ever! There's just SO MUCH you can do, customize and tinker with.

Think (Missions) - The mission management system in X3 Terran Conflict was a huge upgrade from X3 Reunion & previous games. Every time I'd play those older game sifting through endless cr*ppy news about spawnling donations and people laying eggs etc trying to find decent missions I'd find myself screaming "WHY DON'T THEY DO THINGS LIKE FREELANCER" lol and thankfully Egosoft eventually listened. The X4 version looks similar to the excellent X3TC one but just better organised and with more variety which is fine by me lol!


Explore - the exploring spooky derelicts part looked cool and reminds me of the stuff Star Citizen are toying with, except this game is actually finished haha (well sort of lol).


Strategy - this was one of my favourite things about X3 Reunion onwards (X1-2 it was much harder due to more simplistic system views).. sometimes I would park my ship for days and not go anywhere and just spend my entire playing time in the system views directing my fleets, managing resources, and building stations just like a game of Sins of a Solar Empire.

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Blake's Sanctum:
- Total Conversion mods: Star Trek Doom 2, Quest for Glory IV-3D Hexen, & Star Wars Civilization 2
- Game Shrines: Age of Wonders, Babylon 5 Games, Command & Conquer, Elder Scrolls, Dune Games, Final Fantasy, Freelancer , Heroes of Might & Magic, Master of Magic, Quest for Glory Series, Starflight, & Star Trek Games

[Lucifer]

This game is worth trying. Pretty good tbh, and highly customizable with loads of scripts and modding.

[Blake00]

Forgot to post about this here.. we've got a new addon on the way! The Terran's are back!

I'm kind of surprised that Egosoft didn't do a Boron expansion (using fan suggestions on how to achieve their look and mobility in non-liquid environments) and then put in a bit of a cliffhanger story ending with a Terran tease, so you could then save the Terrans for a big stand alone game with a new story like they did back in the day with Terran Conflict (same engine but separate to X3 with a sexy cliffhanger to bridge the games). Reckon they would have made more money in the long run IMO even if some fans would have hated having to buy a new game again though of course haha.



Also I was drooling over this video below the other day. The 'Pilot' youtube guy did very sexy video on the Split Raptor supercarrier haha.. my god when the sun reflects off it like that... drools. And those dark red C&C NOD like interiors.. oh baby lol. Can almost see why all those crazy people bought gorgeous super expensive ships in Star Citizen lol!.. almost.

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Blake's Sanctum:
- Total Conversion mods: Star Trek Doom 2, Quest for Glory IV-3D Hexen, & Star Wars Civilization 2
- Game Shrines: Age of Wonders, Babylon 5 Games, Command & Conquer, Elder Scrolls, Dune Games, Final Fantasy, Freelancer , Heroes of Might & Magic, Master of Magic, Quest for Glory Series, Starflight, & Star Trek Games