New Images from the 7.00 update just landed!

[jlehtone]

Remodelling the ships in such a way that they completely replaced the old ones without affecting savegames at all would have severely limited the design options, as well as annoying people who really liked the old designs.

To be fair[1], the "severely limited" touches that you had on existing Builder ship types were positively received.


[1] Letterkenny

[CulunTse]

The reason is simple: we can't remove the old ships completely without breaking everyone's savegames.

As someone who has taken three years real-time to collect about 400 hours on my single save (becoming a parent really cuts into gaming time.. ) I cannot overstate how much I appreciate this stance from Egosoft.

Your save game migration is legendary, and deserves all the compliments!

Still, I must admit to some slight curiosity to what a save-breaking "X4 game-of-the-year Edition" would look like. What could you do with such artistic liberty?
All DLCs bundled? Only new ship models? (even more) Redistributed minerals mining? Sunlight variation in old sectors? (I play with Starbright mod for exactly this reason, and liked the XR energy-only freighters).

I would even pay money for such a bundle, and start a new save on it, but I want a compatible 7.0 more

[chew-ie]

Your save game migration is legendary, and deserves all the compliments!

Indeed As much as I prefer the new ships - the savegame compat layer is awesome.

Still, I must admit to some slight curiosity to what a save-breaking "X4 game-of-the-year Edition" would look like. What could you do with such artistic liberty?
All DLCs bundled? Only new ship models? (even more) Redistributed minerals mining? Sunlight variation in old sectors?

Maybe we don't need a repack of the game but "just" access to the compat layer settings (replace ships: yes | no / rebalance solar power in sectors: yes | no / rebalance mining yields: yes | no)

(I play with Starbright mod for exactly this reason, and liked the XR energy-only freighters).

Agreed - those energy freighter variants were awesome.

[CulunTse]

Maybe we don't need a repack of the game but "just" access to the compat layer settings (replace ships: yes | no / rebalance solar power in sectors: yes | no / rebalance mining yields: yes | no)

I know you mean well, but as a professional software developer (industrial), whenever my product owner starts down this path, I sigh loudly (both internally and externally).
That way lies testing madness, QA hell, duplication-of-effort slowdown and developer purgatory.
It is NOT something I would recommend to anyone.

And if the developer-side isn't bad enough, it's also likely to create choice-paralysis on the user side: do they pick the game start "young entrepreneur (classic)" or "young entrepreneur (remastered)", and what's with all these dozens of (undocumented) settings on "custom gamestart"?

I repeat: that way lies madness!

Agreed - those energy freighter variants were awesome.

Hurray! Another XR-appreciator. They seem to be rare on these here boards! I had an entire energy economy based out of DeVries. I intentionally didn't build any of my own energy stations, to give the poor stranded DeVries-ians a purpose in life. Development aid, so to speak. That said, with all the scanning and hacking I did on their main energy plant (the huge one), I paid only 1CR per Cell

[chew-ie]

Maybe we don't need a repack of the game but "just" access to the compat layer settings (replace ships: yes | no / rebalance solar power in sectors: yes | no / rebalance mining yields: yes | no)

I know you mean well, but as a professional software developer (industrial), whenever my product owner starts down this path, I sigh loudly (both internally and externally).
That way lies testing madness, QA hell, duplication-of-effort slowdown and developer purgatory.
It is NOT something I would recommend to anyone.

And if the developer-side isn't bad enough, it's also likely to create choice-paralysis on the user side: do they pick the game start "young entrepreneur (classic)" or "young entrepreneur (remastered)", and what's with all these dozens of (undocumented) settings on "custom gamestart"?

I repeat: that way lies madness!

Heh - I hear you But being a professional software developer myself (construction industry) my thoughts are this: there is a compat layer already. And new DLCs / patches introduce rebalances like adding different solar power to new sectors or altering the mining yields of the existing ones. So my proposal "only" involves exposing those things to the player on a global game setting layer. Like adjusting resolutions they would just flip said switches and those settings affects all saves loaded by the client. The code then evaluates and patches the game accordingly. Heck, most of the X4 XML api is about patching things.

Hurray! Another XR-appreciator. They seem to be rare on these here boards! I had an entire energy economy based out of DeVries. I intentionally didn't build any of my own energy stations, to give the poor stranded DeVries-ians a purpose in life. Development aid, so to speak. That said, with all the scanning and hacking I did on their main energy plant (the huge one), I paid only 1CR per Cell

I like X:Rebirth for being the most immersive X so far in terms of ship and sector designs - as well as for the unique locations and the design of the game world. That part about fleeing to DeVries is the most memorable moment in all X games for me (and I'm playing X since X:Btf).

The only thing I strongly disliked about the game was that I never could pilot all those ships myself. (I'm a capital ship / frigate captain and only use small ships as shuttles or in emergencies).

Always dreamed about a "X:Rebirth" DLC for X4 (actually I still am ^^) - to finally fly the Fulmecron in a Vanilla X4. Or my beloved Sucellus.

[Crimsonraziel]

Always dreamed about a "X:Rebirth" DLC

I'm fully on board with this.

We get a couple of new sectors with the next DLC/patch. So maybe Albion is in the mix.
At least I have hopes for Aldrin.

[Submarine]

The reason is simple: we can't remove the old ships completely without breaking everyone's savegames. While some people might not mind about this, others who have invested thousands of hours into their savegames would be, justifiably, extremely upset.

It's worth noting that in existing games, older ships will gradually be replaced with new ones as they are destroyed or decommissioned. And if you start a new game, the older designs will very rarely appear at all.

Remodelling the ships in such a way that they completely replaced the old ones without affecting savegames at all would have severely limited the design options, as well as annoying people who really liked the old designs. The solution we've adopted means that nobody has to lose out.

That is very considerate, which is a perplexing because while egosoft are considerate about some things, there is apparently no recognition of, or compassion for, the annoyance caused by default boost in attack orders always being on, with no way to change the default to off.

I havent played since Nov 26th 2022 because of this. New models have no meaning if the game is not playable.

[Hairless-Ape]

Breaking Saved games is part of the X-Series. We're not babies. We want PROGRESS, and don't care about saved games.

Nuf said. Mic drops to floor. Old man walks away with crawler.



FYI, your first image looks remarkably like an Eve Online Amarr Titan.

[BaronDeKalb]

Could we get a picture of that ship that has the spinning part in the middle ? I need a new desktop background I know Alan used to keep tons of snapshots about

[chew-ie]

That's not part of 7.0 - that's DLC content. Guess we have to wait for that a little longer.

[jlehtone]

New models have no meaning if the game is not playable.

One could also say that "game is not playable" because ware transactions between two player stations does not transfer credits as compensation. Royal we does not say that, even though we should.

[adeine]

Maybe we don't need a repack of the game but "just" access to the compat layer settings (replace ships: yes | no / rebalance solar power in sectors: yes | no / rebalance mining yields: yes | no)

For simple changes like this an easy solution is to bake them into the save game. Existing saves would remain unchanged but new games could start off with the updated parameters.

[Submarine]

New models have no meaning if the game is not playable.

One could also say that "game is not playable" because ware transactions between two player stations does not transfer credits as compensation. Royal we does not say that, even though we should.

I am sorry I dont quite understand your reference to the royal we. It is common for those not experienced with methods of debate to have problems engaging with the assertive styles of expressing valid subjectivity such as have evolved in the democratic context, in parliament etc. Where I live in the UK the crown belongs to us all but we must debate and vote to influence it. This is my turn to speak.

I began that paragraph with "I", presenting it as a subjective perception, because that is the truth, which is a better foundation for feedback than delusions of grandeur.

I know I am not just speaking for myself though because other people, being not entirely dissimilar to myself, having similar genetic code and playing the same game with the same digital code on similar hardware, do agree about this issue. Which I know having seen feedback to that effect on this very BB on numerous occasions and I have taken every opportunity to agree with them.

Many players gravitate to the problems with boost and its control in subordinates because X4 gameplay inexorably leads one to it.

All bugs deserve fixing but if it comes to contending for highest priority, I don't see credit transfer within the player empire as being as being comparable to all your ships boosting themselves to death. It was not credit transfer which made me stop playing after 937 hours, it was endless boost micro which is orders of magnitude greater than credits management.

My argument is simply the boost mechanic is new in X4 but has not been attended to or polished in the slightest, despite causing chaos and dismay. It stands to reason the playability of boost needs to be given a high priority.

I am sorry to say beautiful artwork is not sufficient to overcome the aversion I feel for X4 gameplay as it stands due to this issue. If the boost default was exposed to player control, I would be happy to try again. Otherwise sayonara.

[Buzz2005]

Im just going to say after 4.5k hours boost has never been a problem for me and I have other priorities that I think needs to be fixed, improved or whatever first

I hope you see my point

[chew-ie]

Yeah, priorities are a very individual thing - as is perception of progress.

I wonder what that other guy I saw over at Steam with 10k hours ( ) in X4 has to say RE "development priorities".

[GCU Grey Area]

All bugs deserve fixing but if it comes to contending for highest priority, I don't see credit transfer within the player empire as being as being comparable to all your ships boosting themselves to death. It was not credit transfer which made me stop playing after 937 hours, it was endless boost micro which is orders of magnitude greater than credits management.

Neither of those are bugs. They're game design choices & the degree to which they're desirable or undesirable is subjective & depends on how exactly each player approaches the game.

Personally I don't have a problem with boost. Indeed very much like seeing my ships boost in combat. I use well trained pilots who can boost between attack runs (therefore attacking more often) & can also use boost to evade. Have certainly never seen ALL of my ships 'boosting themselves to death', or even a significant fraction of them (in almost 10k hours of X4).

Conversely, utterly detest the lack of internal credit transfers between my stations. Don't think I've had a single X4 run where this lack didn't cause a serious problem to my economy at some point (e.g. SPP runs out of money & can't buy food & meds, therefore workers starve & SPP is now 40% less productive, which ripples throughout the entire production chain it was supplying).

[Falcrack]

Conversely, utterly detest the lack of internal credit transfers between my stations. Don't think I've had a single X4 run where this lack didn't cause a serious problem to my economy at some point (e.g. SPP runs out of money & can't buy food & meds, therefore workers starve & SPP is now 40% less productive, which ripples throughout the entire production chain it was supplying).

Internal credit transfers between player owned assets, at least as an option I could enable globally or on a per station basis, is something that is high on my list of wishes to have.

[Thomas2052]

In the words of Mr Twist, please sir, can we have some more?

... and in case picking another teaser image was the difficulty, I would most welcome a sneak peak at the Colossus E, if such a revamp is due

As an aside, the unlockable ships for the sandbox through Timelines: will they be single use like the Yasur, or able to mass produce into fleets?

Regards

[Gregory]

In the words of Mr Twist, please sir, can we have some more?
... and in case picking another teaser image was the difficulty, I would most welcome a sneak peak at the Colossus E, if such a revamp is due

We are closing in on the launch of Public Beta 7.00. So no more teasers until then, but soon more than just teasers

[chew-ie]

... and in case picking another teaser image was the difficulty, I would most welcome a sneak peak at the Colossus E, if such a revamp is due

Lino already provided a Colossus-E sneak-peak here: viewtopic.php?f=146&t=459362&start=140#p5216306