Quoting: denyasisThat's a great idea.

Since they are complete are there any must have mods (balance, immersion, quality of life, that sorry of thing)?

Digging into the list of installed MODs:
X3AP/TCP bonus packs.
XRM (complete rebuild).
MARS fire control.
Race response fleet.
Advanced jump drive.
NPC bailing addon.
Salvage claim software.
Asteroid Relocator.

- Gilboa

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Quoting: foobrewI often see the previous X games on sale on Steam (X2 and X3) for really cheap. Are those worth picking up or better to just splurge for X4?

X3:TC and X3:AP are *very* good and very mature games (stability wise), especially if you use mods to improve them (and there are *huge* mods, such as XRM).
That said, as pointed above, X games are part RTS part space simulation. If you enjoy building *huge* empires, having them clash against other empires in epic clashes, X is for you.
If you are looking for a I-Am-Legend style solo games, X is less for you.

That said, get X3:AP / X3:TC, play and see if you enjoy it.

- Gilboa

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Quoting: Phlebiac

Quoting: slaapliedjeNow to wait 10 years for bpytop to be packaged for enterprise Linux so I can use it. :)

Looks like it's already in the EPEL8 repo? And plenty of others, depending on how you define "packaged for enterprise".

I can confirm its already EPEL8 and being updated regularly. I've been using it for a while on CentOS 8 / oVirt.

- Gilboa

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Its indeed a sad day.
Long time ago, LinuxGames and HappyPenguin (Linux Game Tome) ruled my (Linux) RSS feed.
Its sad to see them go.

On the up side, GOL is a worthy replacement and hopefully it'll continue to grow and thrive.

- Gilboa

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Quoting: edqe

Quoting: gilboaBTW, how's X:R compared to X3*? The initial reviews were very underwhelming, especially ones that were made by avid X2/X3 followers. Do you play the stock version or did you mod the game?

- Gilboa

I cannot say which one is better X Rebirth or X3 games because they are quite different. I have been playing X Rebirth much more recently and I'm happy about some design choices they have made; getting rid of SETA for example. Of course there is still problems but I think it is already very good game and excellent base for upcoming X titles.

For some reason instead of keep playing X3 many "X3 fans" are using their time bashing X Rebirth instead. It was well known that "next X title" was not going to be X4 as the name "X Rebirth" indicates it as well.

X Rebirth had very rocky start because of numerous of technical issues; stability problems, broken campaign, etc. So the question arise why Egosoft published the game in that condition. Although earlier X games has not been in stellar condition on release date either :). Luckily Egosoft has great and long lasting support for their games.

I play X Rebirth without mods and X3 series with mods.

OK. Guess I'll have to find out by myself.
Thanks.

- Gilboa

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Quoting: edqeYeah, totally agree. I think that sandbox is actually "the real X game" but the story helps you understand why things are as they are - if you are interested. I wouldn't mind if they start to push lore even further and in to game. Campaign are more or less just a tutorial to learn game mechanism. I have played about 250h X Rebirth so far and I have not even started the campaign yet. I'm planning to start it now while Alpha/Beta testing Linux version.

I fully agree.
BTW, how's X:R compared to X3*? The initial reviews were very underwhelming, especially ones that were made by avid X2/X3 followers. Do you play the stock version or did you mod the game?

- Gilboa

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Quoting: edqeThey have story modes and the X universe has a lore so in that sense it would makes sense to play them in chronological order. There are some novels/books published as well and if I remember right a new one is coming.
In the other hand lots of players play them in a sandbox mode so it story/lore really doesn't matter. If you are interested in sandbox mode I would buy X3 Albion Prelude and X Rebirth. X3 and X Rebirth are somewhat different so it is really hard to say which one you should buy if you are going to get only one of them.

In my view, the story line of each of the game X3, X3:R/TC/AP is less interesting than the game itself. While I do take the time to finish the built in mission (and some, like X:R are actually quite good), the real game starts once you start playing the game in sandbox, read: customizing the game (E.g. Xtended on X3:R, XRM on X3:TC/AP), building a fleet, building stations (or later on, huge complexes), and once your strong enough, taking over the galaxy :)

- Gilboa

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Having previously X2 (LGP), X3:R (LGP), X3TC (Steam/Egosoft) and X3AP (Steam/Egosoft) and spent God knows how many hours playing and customizing this sandbox game (I started my last X3AP games ~year ago, and I'm at ~20 days game time), buying X:R the day it was released for Linux was a no-brainier. (Even though the reviews seem to suggest X:R is not as good as X3:*)
Hopefully the Linux port quality will be as good as X3:TC and X3:AP, which worked out the box, joystick controller and all, on my nVidia based workstation(s).

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Quoting: maodzedunThe game is notoriously bad. They're porting it to Linux just to squeeze a few bucks from unsuspecting players (i.e. people who do not dual boot).

Being a very frequent X-series player, I lurk in the X:R forums.
It seems that the initial X:R release was nothing short of horrible.
It was buggy, slow and a lot of the things that made the X series such a huge success (people still maintain X2 addons/mods), was missing (E.g. capital ships cannot be flown by player, many limitations over the huge-open-sandbox-gaming, etc)
In Egosoft's defence, since the release there was a frequent stream of patches that improved every aspect of the game.
Thus far, it seems that the consensus is that X:R isn't up to the very high standards set by X3:TC and X3:AP.

... Hopefully in time, the community will add the missing pieces. (Anyone that ever played X3:TC or X3:AP with XRM will understand what I mean).

- Gilboa

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Having spent (and spending) countless billions of hours on X2 (LGP), X3:R (LGP), X3:TC (steam under wine) and now X3:AP (native steam), I can only add a huge /+1 for Egosoft's decision.
Though I would imagine my wife will not be too happy about it... :)

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