![]() It’s a game where there’s a definite way to make money faster/better, but the real fun is to be found in going at your own pace. This kitchen-sink approach to game design means that you can spend an hour managing your business logistics, and as soon as you hit your limit and get bored, you can just hop into your destroyer and go smash alien space stations until you feel better before sitting down to finish your paperwork. While played entirely from a first-person perspective, as you buy more ships and hire crews to staff and fly them, the game becomes something of an RTS in combat and a business management game as you build and manage factories. It’s specifically designed to feed that sense of desire to acquire more, more, more insatiably, and if you’re the sort that’s vulnerable to that sensation, welcome to your latest (fortunately up-front priced) addiction! The X-series isn’t so much a single game as a grab-bag of random game loops constantly on tap where individual opportunities are nevertheless available “only for a limited time”, playing on that same Fear of Missing Out that drives you to buy things on sale. The X-series, for those new to it, are immersive space simulator sandbox games that simulate what it would be like if you spent thousands of hours obsessively piling up money so you can build bigger and bigger factories until you’re the largest economic powerhouse in the galaxy that turns traitor and declares war on the rest of the universe just to watch all the things everyone built go “boom”. Both are basically pure sandbox games, though there is a plot/story in TC, afaik.X4: Foundations first came out 2 years ago, and Psygineer reviewed it then, but he also said, “Perhaps you might want to wait until it is more complete with its upcoming expansions first though.” Well, we’re now two expansions in, and several of the major systems have been reworked, or in the case of things like Ventures (a vaguely multiplayer feature that let player-owned ships appear in other people’s games), added then removed again! That being the case, while I was asked to review the DLC, I thought it would be worth doing an “updated review” to put out a review upon the current state of the game as a whole to go alongside the DLC review. I'd say get X4 if you have the hardware for it and X3 later if you like it, but I guess it could work the other way around. TC/AP has considerably lower hardware requirements, obviously. If you only want to pick one, it's a tough call. ![]() X3:TC/AP - More ship/weapon variety, more sectors (though some of them look rather generic), more danger (can you get one-shot killed in X4?), faster pace (station building doesn't take time, SETA is better), faked economy (faction ships appearing out of thin air), AI feels more capable than X4 if you disable collisions in the cheat menu mod (that is, it feels more capable at stuff not involving collisions). X4 - much better actually simulated economy, huge improvement in immersion and graphics, slower pace (especially building stations takes a LOT of time), shitty SETA that has to be crafted (bloody crafting/grind mechanics have to be in everything nowadays), enemy sectors completely unthreatening to player-driven ships thanks to travel drive, custom assembly of stations from modules. No, you cannot play X3TC story missions in X3AP. The difference between the two is that X3TC has some more storylines but X3AP has a bunch of gameplay additions. Btw you need X3: terran conflict to play Albion prelude. If money is a bigger issue then get X3, as the whole ideal X4 package requires both DLCs. Imo, if you only have time to play one and money isn't a large issue get X4. That said there are mods such as Litcube's Universe that makes X3 more complex, but you're going to need to understand the base game first. You hire crew in X4 and can see them in game. Furthermore, all your ships are piloted by AI (no crew) in X3. When you dock in X3 a docking arm connects you to the station and a UI pops up to do whatever and that's it. ![]() In X3 you can only space walk to get that scale. Then there's that whole immersion thing with being able to walk on space stations and bigger ships to get that sense of scale in X4. X3 just poofs their ships out of thin air. If you wanted to blockade a sector that contains a faction's shipyard, whereby the shipyard doesn't receive ship building materials, you'll eventually starve their merchant and war fleet in a war of attrition if you desire.
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