X2 - The Threat

[smilodon]

I have a humble pie and it is large. See how I eat it. See how I eat the humble pie.

X2 The Threat is a delight. It's everything that Freelancer wasn't. It's absolutely stunning to look at. Huge in size. A dynamic trading economy that alters in real time. (Your trading actually affects prices as you move commodities around the universe).

There is a wonderful honour system that allows you to regain the friendship of races you may have upset in the past buy doing good things for them. I.e. if you save a trading vessel owned by your arch enemy from pirates, you become someone they dislike intensly rather than their sworn enemy. More altruistic acts can ultimately make you their allies. So no career or loyalty path is fixed for ever.

You can buy carriers for up to 100 of your own ships. You can build factories and set up trading routes or command battleships and fleets of fighters while taking over whole sectors of space. And then you can give give it all up to become a smuggler. And all this from the cockpit of what is a sort of FPS/RTS hybrid.

While the storyline (something you can take or leave, as you could with Freelancer) is somewhat weak, the rest of the game is fantastic.  However it does take at least a few days of solid play to get to grips with it, but as soon as you learn the controls it all opens up before you.  

It's also a fairly tough game. No one tells you what to trade or where to trade it. You have to find the cheap places to buy and the best places to sell for a fat profit on your own. There is an ellusive trading upgrade that helps with this, but of course no one is going to tell you where it is. You'll have to find that out for your self too. So if you don't like a challenge stick to something easy.



There are also a few bug issues reported although I haven't had so much as a hint of a bug (apart from having to fiddle with the joystick setting to stop some screen judder).

Unlike the frankly  insipid Freelancer this really is Elite for the 21st Century.  

[Maus]

Most definitely a game made of win. I'd hate to try it on a non-beast computer (my new 3GHz one struggles in places) but sheebus does it suck you in. Gorgeous graphics, the best trading since my old Elite and Frontier days, and (with the next patch) the ability to import models into it, so I'll hopefully be flying a Cobra MkIII around in no time

I'm currently wondering if it was a huge mistake to delay my business empire a little and save for a corvette, but I sure do feel like the daddy cruising around in my Split Dragon.

It does have a couple of annoying wee bugs though, including a fairly serious one where it corrupts saved games, so be sure to not rely on the autosave too much, and rotate between a few save slots so that if anything does go wrong you don't have too much to plough through again.

[albert]

I am just going through the tutorials for X2 and it is very enjoyable, the autosave problem got resolved in the latest update and the scope of the game is huge.

Looking forwad to playing this one for weeks.  

[smilodon]

You may find a bug in the forth tutorial about factory building. You get half way through and the narration stops. You don't miss much and what you do miss is covered in the manual.

Good Trading

[albert]

Originally posted by smilodon@Feb 23 2004, 07:41 PM
You may find a bug in the forth tutorial about factory building. You get half way through and the narration stops. You don't miss much and what you do miss is covered in the manual.

Good Trading

I noticed, but you can look back at your logs and see what the tutor said so it's not too bad.

[0ni0n]

Just ordered this game after reading these posts    should get it today!
Any one have the first one, i thought it was pretty good although i did my usual trick of playing it solidly for a couple of days then never to return    Hope i stick this one abit longer.. Only thing i find is you dont get the buzz of  real people like eve or jumpgate....

hmmm n e 1 know y i cant see my onion avator? <_<

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by 0ni0n@Feb 24 2004, 08:27 AM
hmmm n e 1 know y i cant see my onion avator? <_<

No idea mate but you could always upload it again from the "My Controls" section of the forum (link at top of page).

[DuVeL]

With the new forum style a few avatars get lost, just reload it and it should be fine.

[0ni0n]

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