Couple of sizeable complaints about x3, Egosoft

[Chemical-mix]

Just before i start this long rant, i have to say that i am a HUGE die-hard fan of the X-Series. I've lost many a month at the PC, lovingly building my empire. Ok, the scene...

X3 2.0.02, no mods or scripts.
Xenon Invasion Mission, 18 Billion, im in a Nova:

a) 40-odd Xenon ships surrounding the Teladi Trading Station, i shoot at one, miss and a couple of stray AHEPT shot hit the Station. My rep drops from 52% Majority Share holder to 66% Shareholder. Not fair. Absolutely huge drop for a few accidental shots during a SECTOR-THREATENING invasion. Now i can't dock there. Sort that one out Egosoft.

b) Some Do-gooder Paranid Task force turns out to aid us. Aye right. Phased Shockwave energy everywhere that i can't out run, my shields get hammered, hull down to 75%. So i decide to kill the Paranid to save my own life. Nope. Won't let me. Allows me to take his hull down to 90% and NO MORE. 5 hornets slamming into his undefended hull and he is unkillable. I am being punished for taking on a XI mission. If i had have done that to him, my rep would be torn to shreds, but they can happily deck me with as many wayward shots as they want. Sort that one out as well please.

c) Now i have a pretty good computer, but still have to run the game on Low-graphic everything, explorer task ended, and virus scan off. Thats fine by me. BUT, i have just got my friend into the game (who loves it too), who happens to have a computer more powerful than anything the production line throws. Observe:

-AMD Athlon dual 2.6 ghz (5.2ghz total) 2x 1mb Cache
-4096 MB DDR2 800mhz RAM
-1024MB Geforce 7950 GX2 graphics card
-XF Elite Pro sound card
- 200 GB Raptor ultra fast HD (not really relevant, but still cool)

Now, even with this mammoth set up, which makes Deep Blue look like a pocket calculator, He STILL gets serious lag and very low frame rate in XI missions that involve Plasma Shock Generators, at MEDIUM settings. Is the game properly designed for any computer?

Anyway, in the next patch, please sort out the top 2 problems. Thanks for listening...

[esd]

AMD Athlon dual 2.6 ghz

It's dual core. X³ doesn't utilise the second core, so he's basically playing it on a 2.6ghz machine (with the other processes on the other core).

in the next patch

There are no further patches planned for X³.

[Chemical-mix]

Like i say, i love this game and i know the hard work that has gone into it, but 2.6ghz along with the other huge set-up surely should be enough for the game to run uninterupted on medium settings???

Re: the no more patch thing- can you send something even to allow us to kill the task forces, or at least lower race rep drop during XI missions? I dont want to have to use the console to cheat

[Graphil]

Yes it is a PITA doing XI missions when everything is flying around the station. I always have to turn off the attack my target commands from the turrets to stop them hitting the station. After that a bit of straffing to ensure the station isn't in the line of fire and it is OK to clean up the Xenon without hitting the station.

[Sirus5]

a) couple of stray AHEPT shot hit the Station. My rep drops from 52% Majority Share holder to 66% Shareholder. Not fair.

b) So i decide to kill the Paranid to save my own life. Nope. Won't let me. Allows me to take his hull down to 90% and NO MORE. 5 hornets slamming into his undefended hull and he is unkillable. If i had have done that to him, my rep would be torn to shreds, but they can happily deck me with as many wayward shots as they want.

Sympathise with you m8 - I know those Paranid "Do Gooders" they are just awful...

c) Now i have a pretty good computer, but still have to run the game on Low-graphic everything, explorer task ended, and virus scan off. Thats fine by me.

I am running on a Dell Laptop over 3 years old and due to on-board graphics card being so old, it will not run anything after 1.2 (again, Explorer task ended etc.) - and I have to pick my sectors - I can only fight in a few sectors due to lag!
Still, hopefully a new machine is on it's way just after Xmas... Then I will be able to enjoy some more...

So, we'll just have to be careful with those XI's - try luring a few away from the "Do-Gooders".... Not much help I know...

Best of luck

[Chemical-mix]

lol! Yep, tried the "luring technique", but it seemd that i attracted a little fan base of... yep, you got it: Indestructable PSG totin' Do gooder Paranid!

AAAAGGGGHHHH!!!! WHY WONT YOU DIE, STOP SHOOTING ME AND SLOWING DOWN MY FRAME RATE!!!

[Tenlar Scarflame]

I think what needs to happen first is, the Paranid need to learn how to use their beloved PSG, along with the rest of the PSG-firing universe.

[xeon_1]

-AMD Athlon dual 2.6 ghz (5.2ghz total) 2x 1mb Cache
-4096 MB DDR2 800mhz RAM
-1024MB Geforce 7950 GX2 graphics card
-XF Elite Pro sound card
- 200 GB Raptor ultra fast HD (not really relevant, but still cool)

please with that system you should be able to run everthing on high without problems even with XI

besides there isn't a raptor 200gig disk so i going to asume that you don't have anything of what you stated and you are just some kid that has nothing better to do
and apperently knows nothing of computers or how to configure them proberly to run a high demanding games
oh and before you go an shouting there is one here is the official site http://www.westerndigital.com/en/produc ... anguage=en

[fiksal]

Here's a brand new idea... AI is dumb... and so are the game "rules".

I'd be impressed if Egosoft would spend time fixing and reworking missions and rules.

In the mean time, an 'instant ship kill' script would be useful, or better yet a mod that would make AI "smart" - just so it at least checks its line of fire for allies. Or maybe, the hell will freeze over and OOS combat will be rewritten into a very close approximations of IS combat.

[gunman127]

Xeon_1 is right, saying "dual 2.6 ghz (5.2ghz total)" Is a major indicator of someone who doesn't have a clue how computers really work.

[/quote]

[esd]

*snip*

While you're free to contradict what someone's posted, there's no need to be quite so rude about it.

[fig]

Well, just to give you a feel of how much I like this game, I'm still playing X2. I bought X3 ages ago but it won't even get installed until I'm completely finished with my X2 empire.

The same problems are in X2 as well, so here are my thoughts:

a) I agree that this is completely ridiculous. Friendly stations and ships need to have an increased tolerance to friendly fire when they are under attack from Khaak, Xenon or pirates.

It might also be good if the races treated you differently depending on your current rank. So at high level instead of the Teladi telling you to "consider the firepower of their ship" they treat you with more respect and take a more reasonable attitude.

b) In X2 I really hate it when anything with a PSG turns up, they are just too powerful. One time I was chasing down some pirates in my raptor and all of a sudden I heard these strange noises that I couldn't place and wondered what on earth was going on. Then I spotted that my shields had gone down to 20% and I remembered, Pirate ships sometimes carry PSGs! Another time I watched as a lone Paranid Nemesis was chasing a Xenon K. I thought the K was going to get away but 3 or 4 blasts of PSG later and it was dead...

c) From what I hear the Athlons are not the fastest anymore. The latest Intel chips (Core 2 or whatever they are called) are faster. Don't forget that the game has to do all the calculations for the economy and OOS ships as well as handling the in-sector stuff. Maybe for X4 they could make use of the second processor to handle the economy, OOS calculations and ship AI. That would leave the first processor to do the important work of keeping the frame-rate high enough for the game to be playable.

[Hg|Merc]

the system is fine, i have a very dated system that runs everything on high, i expect you just havnt correctly configured your system.

yes the station going red is a pretty big one, it happens. and the psg's yes that one is a real pig as is the PSG issue. live with it.

[xeon_1]

so i going to asume that you don't have anything of what you stated and you are just some kid that has nothing better to do
and apperently knows nothing of computers or how to configure them proberly to run a high demanding games

While you're free to contradict what someone's posted, there's no need to be quite so rude about it.

didn't mean to be rude but he shouldn't make a post and say he has something that he can not have and except people will take him serious
i mean people are not going to make fun of him if he only has an old machine to play the game on

[rizzo420]

Yeah, I've got a 3000 Athalon XP and a 256MB ATI card with 1.5GB of ram and can run everything on high during XI missions just fine. I don't even kill Explorer(cause then the game won't load, duh).
Find out what adware and viruses are slowing down your rig, remove them, then try again.

[esd]

didn't mean to be rude but he shouldn't make a post and say he has something that he can not have and except people will take him serious

Feel free to say "that's not right", but I thought you were exceptionally rude about it.

If you wish to discuss this further, take it to PMs.

[Alienmoe]

Ok, so you cant get your game to run without a big fps hit?

I'm running a 3gig P4 with 512 of ram, a 6800 Gforce (no idea how much mem, i *think* 128). And the only time I EVER get lag is when I first enter the worst systems (AP, Siesewell ect). Basicly it will give me 1 - 2 fps for the first 20 frames, them all is well. Never had lag on an XI mission, and I've gotten the the 2J 2K level.

Further more I don't close explorer, I have my antivirus (AVG) running, XFire going, as the new patches mean the game doesnt die on minimisation, AND winamp playing music. All whilst i play.

How are you experiencing problems?? Do you have 3gig of malware on your pc or something?? Are you trying to run it with everything maxed?

[Sirus5]

Yeah, I've got a 3000 Athalon XP and a 256MB ATI card with 1.5GB of ram and can run everything on high during XI missions just fine. I don't even kill Explorer(cause then the game won't load, duh).
Find out what adware and viruses are slowing down your rig, remove them, then try again.

Hi rizzo420, Whilst you are probably right on most things (adaware and viruses), I also kill explorer at the moment on my VERY OLD Dell laptop before starting X3..
If you press [ctrl] [alt] [del] (what used to be the old reboot). then you will get the task manager.. If you then select [File] [Run] you can then type in the path to X3.. And when you have finished, you can run explorer again by typing the path to explorer. You can also end tasks here, but be careful.

So it's not quite as silly as it seems (for older machines like mine which need every ounce of help)... Some people don't have the latest hardware all the time. I bought my first PC in 1983 and tend to upgrade desktop and laptop about every 3 years (2 daughters and a son permitting)... mainly for my development work as a computer consultant.

Please try not to pull other people apart whether they are asking for it or not! We are all here to help and be helped, and even if someone is really stupid, I will still help them because they might get some enjoyment out of my advice, as I hope most others will because we all have one thing in common (X).

Cheers

[Sesk]

Xeon_1 is right, saying "dual 2.6 ghz (5.2ghz total)" Is a major indicator of someone who doesn't have a clue how computers really work.

I second that, if he can't run X3 on High w/all turned on, there is a problem physically (put your mobo in the dishwasher lately ?), or he full of viruses, or hes just beefing his computer to look cool.
Im running AMD Opteron 165 (Dual core) OC @ 2.9, 2gb ram, only ATI Radeon x800 256 AGP and Audigy 4, 1Tb Hdd, and im running all on, no issues, EAX disabled tho... no biggie.

If you shoot the Paranid or whoever with a salvo of HEPT or GPPCs, they wont be happy, in the worst case scenario, get the Cheat pack and use the cheat set friend.foe (or something) and make them neutral, it's not a glitch it's how the game is made, and it should happen too often now that you leanred your lesson (like i did).

PSG can be a big FPS killer, and just a plain killer, i just modded the TBullets and TLasers so they wont shoot (PSG bullets use 100k Energy, PSG guns have 0 Energy, 0 life time, 0 rpm), problem fixed, no need to make a rant post or w/e u wanna call this. Next step is to mod the Jobs so no ships carry this (therefore are very vulnerable).

[arcana75]

I think the main culprit is his dualcore cpu. Since X3 isn't written to use more than 1 CPU he's playing the game on 2.6Ghz.

Also, since it's an AMD I understand there's a problem with the dualcore chips on XP, u need a patch.

It could also be a codec or driver problem. Are the drivers up to date or CD versions?

What about the habits of the gamer? He could be downloading torrents or doing an auto virus scan or XP update or something that would slow down the rig.

However, I also do think that uber rig is "imagined". It's easy to pull uber rig specs off the web and use them to "justify" bashing a game. U see these type of threads in other forums; uber rigs that don't seem to work with that game. Building rigs isn't just about throwing the best money can buy into a rectangular box; it's also about synergy. What the PSU in that box?

Performance is subjective. "Low" framerate could be 5fps for a seasoned long time gamer, while it could be 20fps for a young FPS-twitch gamer, and "High" could be 20-24fps (~25fps is the max the human eye can perceive) for someone but that same "high" is 100fps for someone else.

My rig is a P4-530, 7900GT, 2GB DDR2 and X-Fi, all max settings @12x10 with 2xAA 4xAF and the game plays great (again subjective), including PSGs. It does slow to a crawl (1-2fps) during huge XI missions and when lots and lots and lots of bullets are flying.