shots
| X2: The Threat PC preview | |
| developer | Egosoft |
| publisher | Enlight |
| author | Marcin |
| date | Oct. 13, 2003 |
Chromehounds
NA Review by Marcin
Oblivion-The First 3 Hours
PC Quicktake by walTer
Comic Quick Takes January 25, 2006
Feature by Mike
A few issues
There are still a lot of questions for X2. While the open gameplay is definitely well, open (!), it remains to be seen how well the plot can absorb you turning law officer / outlaw / trader / neutral. Morrowind did it by ignoring whatever you did prior to crucial plot points - can today's audience accept that? Or has Egosoft found a way to resolve it without resorting to "it has to be this way because we said so"?
Secondly (and this is hardly worth mentioning due to this being a preview build), the game chugs. While floating about with a lot of objects on the screen is lovely to behold (more on this in a bit), if a few more fighters appear on the screen all hell breaks loose and framerate drops into single digits. I fought about six-eight without major problems, but in one of the sample missions your troop of six friendlies faces six or more baddies, and ... well, suffice to say I stayed far enough away to watch, but not fight. In a year (or even a few months) this won't be an issue, but at the moment (if no optimisations are done, which is unlikely - framerate optimisations almost always happen near the end of the development cycle) a lot of players will be playing in 640x480, all detail off. While the game boasts a "constant optimum detail adjustment", it was either not functional, or there are limits on what it can do (as I said, prior to this 6 vs 6+ furball, everything was hunky dory).
Finally, the dogfighting. As of now, it's not too exciting, mainly due to the enemies' propensity for suicide - heading directly for you. I'm not sure why that is, but a lot of the bad guys that I engaged directly were drawn directly to my ship - you don't last long under those conditions. Hopefully at least this will be resolved - when there are more friendlies on-screen and all the baddies don't focus on you, the dogfights are quite fun. Particularly deadly are the missile ships who will stay back (oh yes), and pelt you with missiles from afar. You'll need a decent joystick to use all of the built-in features, like quick access to the zoom function, viewing port control and target acquisition. It appears that there will be mouse support as well.
Audio Visuals
October 11, 2003: this is the best looking game I have seen to date. The spectacular bump-mapping on all surfaces (ships, stations, asteroids...everything), the fascinating and eye-deceiving station designs (no identical cubes here, everything has its own intriguing style) as well as ship styles, the lighting, the cockpit designs - everything screams not only top of the line, but also ingenuity and imagination.
There's a half a dozen of alien races in X2, and each have their own line of ships, their own base design, and of course, stronger or weaker control of each sector (that each sector has a different character goes without saying). Thus, you will be able to identify ships easily simply by their styling. Only after a few days of playing with the preview, I'm able to identify the graceful, swooping Teladi, organic and twisty Boron and functional, retro-styled Split ships on sight - and no, I have not played X before. I'll shut up about the graphics now, just look at the screenshots. Another cool thing™ that X2 does is saving your screenshots to the load screen directory - so every time the game loads new info (usually between sector jumps or cutscenes) you'll see the screenshots you took. Yet another nice touch is that the pirate ships really look like they're assembled from bits and pieces - an engine, some cockpit space made out of spare container boxes, and a weapon strapped and welded onto the frame. Very cool.
The other aspect that adds verisimilitude to the game is the (warning: technical, pedantic stuff coming up) physics engine. When you fire your weapons you really feel that you've just flung some bad karma at an enemy - this is because the collision detection on every ship is very, very good, and you'll be able to see hair-thin misses, near hits and airballs. I reccommend checking this phenomenon out on a rotating asteroid - you'll be able to see the explosions rotate with the rock itself (not just be a pre-rendered explosion)! I don't know why, but I just find that amazingly groovy - I can actually compare X2's realtime physics engine to something we've only seen in prerendered CGI movies so far (Babylon 5 comes to mind instantly). Every hit on a ship is accompanied by a visible fizzle of the shields - another nice touch.
Ever wished that you could look behind you at the same time you were looking forward? Well, forget that. How about looking back, left, right, up, down, at your enemy, and at your nearest space station (just for kicks) at the same time you're looking forward? Thanks to X2's picture-in-picture, you can set up 5 extra viewports, and connect them to virtually anything (well, in that sector. Come on already!). Missile view, turret views, auto-target view - it's all in there. Keep in mind that the more stuff you're watching, the slower your computer gets. Still, it's almost vital for capital ship handling.
I envision that if we ever DO make it into space (for real I mean, not the near-orbit fumblings we have had so far), we're going to add sound effects to our engines and weaponry. It's amazingly easy to instantly know what level your engines are at just from the sound, and the aural feedback from weaponry is reassuring. X2 eliminates the engine sound from the cockpit (although you can still *hear* it if you choose an outside view) but keeps the weapons, computer AI voice (a slightly robotic female voice) and warnings. There's also background music, something for which a new genre should be created - "atmospheric space sim electronic". You should know what that means by now - light but unobtrusive, will probably last you through hundreds of gameplay hours without bother. A nice touch is that it changes when you're given permission to dock, so you know you can head in even without watching the docking lights come on.
Final thoughts
If at all possible, the preview build has made me even more excited about X2's near future. It's obvious that the universe is well designed, beautifully presented, and full of opportunities. The few story missions I was able to fly show that there will be plenty of opportunities to do your own thing - plenty of information is given to suggest an interesting, dynamic world.
It's also obvious that X2 is not going to be a pick-up-and-play sort of game. The intricate menu systems and the tremendous wealth of information regarding every aspect of the game is quite a bit intimidating at first - however, I was able to figure it out with no manual and only the (still occasionally broken) tutorials. While X2 is firmly in the land of the more realistic, more involved simulators (and not action shooters), it seems that a lot of effort was put into making it newbie friendly as well. Here's hoping for the best of both worlds.