Can we land on planets or moons?

[mrg81]

I loved this series because it used to be a game which was focused on being a space pilot and and trade/military empire. That combination is like ice cream with strawberries. It goes well together. But if you throw in a steak+eggs in (which are good too but on it's own) .... and you mix all together it will be yuck.
Too many genres together will not work. Let's take a CIV game. Would you want to walk in there? Having an option to walk on streets in each one of your cities? WHY??
What next? virtual marriages and virtual babies like in SIMs (ok that was too far)
Imagine yourself as a captain of space ship and an owner of trade empire in a far future. Most of the stuff you will probably do remotely, from your office without any walking at all. You will do walking only for a non work related stuff

Landing on planetes ... ehh. Also for what Do you want to explore planets? Look at animals? Look for some treasures ? Come on ... space pirates are trying to destroy your solar plant millions miles away and you are watching butterflies on some small planet (ok again went to far .. sorry)

I agree that there should be SOME interaction with planets. Because planets are part of space too after all. But in my opinion it should be limited for example to docking to a space elevator which would give us a way to trade with planets.

Anything more than that is just unnecessary for a SPACE sim and would add a huge amount of work. Devs should spene all their time on getting the best out of SPACE and trade sim.

If we have decent walking ... someone will say "we want guns" and enemies to shoot ... and then we will have FPP shooter like doom and a poor space sim

Please ... no human walking sim. Just space/trade/space battles sim + a great plot!!

[Slashman]

A great plot???

Since when and where did X games have great plots? I really don't think X4 is going to be plot heavy based on what they have described.

[spankahontis]

People who keep asking for walking or "non spaceship" stuff seem to want a different game to what I want out of an X game

What I want is a space game, where I fly, in space, shoot stuff, having a fleet of other ships, maybe some stations. I'm not remotely one bit interested in walking on stations, walking on planets, even a mining outpost. That stuff can be achieved from space just fine so I don't understand the desire for getting out the ship and wandering about.

I have just one question, do those of you who want this feature really enjoy No Man's Sky more than you enjoy X games? I mean there's like, on-planet mining in that game as well as on-planet base building. It seems to me you'd be better off playing that game since it contains what you want more than the X series does.

X games are fundamentally different to this though, and by moving into categories like first person shooters things will start to get derailed very quickly and once that core gameplay loop is lost, the game will start to lose its fan base. I really don't think that off-ship or non-space (planetary) elements will add to X's core gameplay loop in any way, and I think it would be a colossal mistake if Egosoft went more down that route than they already have done with the existing walking on stations.

We want the game to innovate, traditionalists seem terrified of change, even if they claim they want new features, it either seems based on their own personal bias of what that change is?
Or they throw a bluey at any idea they either didn't think of or is too much for them to handle, fearing some apocalyptic scenario that all the features that make an X Game will be scrubbed (Which no person who likes walking on Stations wants to see go by the way).

There are allot of features I like, but many I don't, doesn't mean they shouldn't exist?
So when you say "People who keep asking for walking or "non spaceship" stuff seem to want a different game to what I want out of an X game "
I don't know where you got that conclusion from?
Walking isn't for you? Fine, you should have a choice not to walk about a Station.
But don't deny it for those like myself who want to see ES improve on this feature.

The Spirit of all X Games is personal choice, I want to see more choice, not less.
Rebirth failed in it gave us more new features, it's attempts to innovate an X Game to the next level while removing tried and tested features that fans liked (Some brought back by demand).

[Toramo]

@BlackDemon
I completely agree with you.

@spankahontis
I completely disagree with you


Joke apart, I really think that features in a game must deserve the game itself.
Basically, why is Tetris do not have more than 7 pieces ? Because it wouldn't deserve the game... Even more, it could turn it into a bad Tetris.

A nearest example, is X:R would have been better without the ability to walk into space station ?
Probably not but it wouldn't have been worse since it is a 'useless' feature (please note the quotes).
So, should we keep it or should we save this development time to improve the bery best of features in our game (background simulation, overall management, ships feeling etc...).

A more personal point of view :

For me, the X series is a management game. Yes the game is built around your character but we experience quickly that the true game is about the empire management. Dog fight are quickly boring, as well as doing some trade manually.

Knowing that, there is absolutely no interest about landing on planets IMO. As well as walking on Station.

This is what make X so different than an Elite Dangerous for example. And this is also why ED is so Boring, there are tons of features but no 'goal' behind this. Even landing on planets is useless... Do it one time, 2 times and you're done.

I prefer Egosoft to save their time for the core gameplay than trying to innvate into useless one.

My 2 cents

[Killjaeden]

For me, the X series is a management game. Yes the game is built around your character but we experience quickly that the true game is about the empire management. Dog fight are quickly boring, as well as doing some trade manually.

Knowing that, there is absolutely no interest about landing on planets IMO. As well as walking on Station.

+1.
X3 wasnt particularly great in fighting mechanic and gameplay, and manual trading was also boring. The whole management aspect combined with exploration (finding good deals, or good opportunities to use your fighters/ fight yourself in the dynamic environment) was what made it interesting.
Without anything actually valuable and mechanically engaging thing to do on stations (or planets), other than to look around, makes this superfluous to the game itself. Yes "immersion" can be mentioned, but for the majority of people that quickly wears off fast. And if that "immersion" thing requires a lot of labor to make it work, it will not add much long term value to the game at large. Sure there will always be someone who enjoys sitting hours at a station and just looking outside... not sure if i would want my success of a game to rely on that though.
Good example is the "gate wormhole travel" sequence in X3. Thats for immersion. How many people continued to use that however? I bet 95% switched that off as soon as they have seen it a few times and learned they could disable it.

[Toramo]

I completely agree about that
Especially about the immersion point.

Wanted to improve immersion before the game mechanics is a mistake in my opinion.
Your examples about X:R is precisely true. The walking simulation is pointless. We could also add the highway mechanic, which is bad and do not deserve the core gameplay (management per sector).
We could talk about Elite dangerous landing model also. This is good for immersion but it do not help the game to be more ineresting / entertaining.

Original X players were disappointed about this in XR.
ES transformed the X series into a basic shooting game with basic management rules instead of improving the core management gameplay.
Basically, we got less instead of more...

It's a different 'vision' of the game, they make their choices. So if they want to continue this way, no one can stop them.

At least they didn't add the planetary landing into the game, so, this is a good news