X4 Foundations

Got a whole new PC with faster…. everything, and now save times are back down around 30s. ;)

Anyway, version 4.1 is out now. Two new features: customized starts and improvements to how you construct bases.

The change to bases simply lets you twist the pieces around 3 axis instead of just one, which can make for some pretty twisted stations if you're of a mind to do so - or pretty ones.

The custom starts come in two flavors: budgeted and whatever-you-want. The latter just lets you start with whatever you like. If you want to begin play with two billion credits and a massive station, you can do so. You're game will be marked as "modified," but that will only matter once they finally get multiplayer back in again. The budgeted version looks at what you've gotten while playing the game, then gives you the ability to skip some things based on that. If you've already been doing terraforming, for instance, you can spend some of your budget so some of your research is already completed.

And, of course, bug fixes. Lots of bug fixes.

Oh, in other news, there's another DLC coming. There hasn't been an official announcement, but somebody found their application for some funding from the German government. Also, they are running a contest right now looking for stations with pleasing aesthetics, with the next DLC as a prize.
 
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Great news zloth. Here's hoping it is the Boron! Dunno how they would handle the interiors though. Is that 30 seconds save with a developed empire? What kind of PC if you don't mind answering?
 
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Pretty developed - nearly 400 hours. However, lots of people make many more stations and ships than I do in that much time.

Stats…
AMD 5600X
32GB of memory - I've forgotten the speed, but it definitely wasn't the fastest there is
NVMe drive that is pretty damn fast!

The drive shouldn't make much difference with the game load, though. It's likely more about the CPU and memory speed, by what Egosoft has said in the many topics on the subject.
 
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"In coming months" is now "next week"

 
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For those that are interested you can snatch X4 + DLC 1 and a 50% discount off DLC 2 and X Rebirth + DLC 1 and a bunch of their older games (which X fans probably already have) on HumbleBundle at the moment.

Link is: x-universe-collection

I was waiting till they added the Boron but this price was just too good to pass up.
 
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Have fun with it! The AI can be flat-out sad sometimes, but the overall game is great fun.
 
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Have fun with it! The AI can be flat-out sad sometimes, but the overall game is great fun.

Hey Zloth. I am playing through X:Rebirth before starting X4 (since it was also in the bundle) and I saw you wrote the most popular guide on Steam!! Nice work buddy!

One question for you though. I got to the plot mission where you are supposed to build a station (you get given a construction ship) and I can't for the life of me figure out what to do. I tried giving the architect on board it 7 million credits but when I talk to him the only station is still greyed out with no explanation as to why!

I need a complete basic list of steps though. How do I find a location to build a station, what is the command to start it, do i need anything before i start the process etc? The game literally gave me no advice at all!! And google is proving to be useless.
 
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Hey Zloth. I am playing through X:Rebirth before starting X4 (since it was also in the bundle) and I saw you wrote the most popular guide on Steam!! Nice work buddy!
Thanks! My X3:TC guide did well, too, though my X4 guide isn't doing so good. I wasn't able to do my typical "beginner's guide to just about everything" because there's just so much!

It's been some years since I did Rebirth, so I've got to go by memory. And a little refresher from Egosoft. I think you might be having the same issue I did.

So, you've got the architect on the build ship. I presume you've got a save made, too, so you can go back to this point if you don't like the results. Now the big key I missed when I played: you need to get the build ship in your squad. Once you do that, build location icons show up all over the place. You should be able to click on the little icon (or right click?) and select the option to build. After that, it's pretty easy - you pick the station to build and what options it should have. The build ship will then (slowly) fly into position and deploy. Your trade ships will need to put wares on the build ship for the ship's drones to use while building.

Note that the build ships have crazy amounts of cargo space to allow building to work. In order to keep you from using build ships as trade ships, wares put on a build ship can't ever be taken off the ship. If you write down what will be needed for building, though, you could send the build ship around to buy up the needed wares before deployment - or maybe just some of the wares that happen to be along the way.
 
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Now the big key I missed when I played: you need to get the build ship in your squad. Once you do that, build location icons show up all over the place. You should be able to click on the little icon (or right click?) and select the option to build.

Thanks! That was it!

Does X4 have the same systems are Rebirth i.e. station scanning and smalltalk minigame? I find that the worse part of the game.
 
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Does X4 have the same systems are Rebirth i.e. station scanning and smalltalk minigame? I find that the worse part of the game.
Small talk is a good way to get you the lore - at least the first time or two that it plays through. By the 30th time you're going through that fool "Want to know about VR? I can tell you about it," though, it's time to go find some mods. I think my guide mentioned a few that can help with that.

There's NO small talk in X4. You can see everybody's skills just by looking at them. (Yes, even Terrans. The EU doesn't seem to have regarded this as a privacy issue. ;))

You can scan stations to learn more about them in X4 - maybe check to see if the station's processing has any bottlenecks or some such. You won't do it much, though.

Station building in X4 is totally different. Instead of picking a location, you buy a plot of X by Y by Z size, then build your station inside it. As soon as you buy the plot, a tiny little "build storage" module pops up off to the side where trade ships can dock and dump all the goods you need for building. The build ships drones pull materials out of that instead of storing it all on the build ship itself.

You build individual modules, too, more like was done in X3 except without the pipes. You can make stations that just build a few things or make a giant station that lets you dump in rocks and gasses in one end and starships come out the other end. The editor is a little flakey, but it can be used to make some pretty big stations.
 
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Looks like Bofu is back on the menu, boys!
View: https://youtu.be/pWfQ6fHsMQA

(Given the game's tendency to smack ships into asteroids and stations, I'm a bit worried about these floating suits. ;))
 
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Hell yes! This was the one thing I was waiting for before playing X4. I already own the base game and the first 2 DLC so I will just have to pick up the last 2 when this launches.
 
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What is a bofu and why is it important ?
Each race (species, ancestry, whatever) eats different foods. The peace-loving Boron eat tofu... I mean bofu.
 
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Each race (species, ancestry, whatever) eats different foods. The peace-loving Boron eat tofu... I mean bofu.
So until this update all the boron were starving to death because there was no food for them ?
 
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Nah, their empire wasn't around at all.

The universe in X consists of a bunch of regions of space. In X3, I think there were over 200 of them. Those regions were connected to each other via wormhole-like gates to take you from one to another. When the game was rebooted with X:Rebirth, many of the gates were shut off. (In real terms, the new engine with all its new features simply couldn't support that many sectors.) At first, Rebirth just had humans. As time went on, the gates were re-activated and new species could be contacted again. Now we've finally got everyone from X3 back in: humans (Argon and Terran), split, paranid, teladi, khaak, xenon, and boron.

In game terms, all that has happened is that a gate has re-activated so the Boron empire can be contacted again. We don't know what's been happening with them over the past several in-game decades, so they might not be as peace-loving as they once were.

(The re-activation of that gate is kinda suspicious. You can see the gate near the end of the video, and it has a bunch of stuff attached to it. Did the Borons force it open?)
 
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Nah, their empire wasn't around at all.

The universe in X consists of a bunch of regions of space. In X3, I think there were over 200 of them. Those regions were connected to each other via wormhole-like gates to take you from one to another. When the game was rebooted with X:Rebirth, many of the gates were shut off. (In real terms, the new engine with all its new features simply couldn't support that many sectors.) At first, Rebirth just had humans. As time went on, the gates were re-activated and new species could be contacted again. Now we've finally got everyone from X3 back in: humans (Argon and Terran), split, paranid, teladi, khaak, xenon, and boron.

In game terms, all that has happened is that a gate has re-activated so the Boron empire can be contacted again. We don't know what's been happening with them over the past several in-game decades, so they might not be as peace-loving as they once were.

(The re-activation of that gate is kinda suspicious. You can see the gate near the end of the video, and it has a bunch of stuff attached to it. Did the Borons force it open?)
This is all very confusing to myself but maybe if i played the game i would understand it better.
 
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Kingdom End is out and, so far, it has been an excellent addition. But wait, there's more! Egosoft is trying to bring Ventures back. They've gone into beta testing now.
View: https://youtu.be/QafAmFaAzrg
 
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