X4 on-boarding is rough. The controls are all over the place and the tutorials are bare-bone. Underneath however lies a gem of a game with an unmatched sense of scale. You can own and/or pilot everything you're eyes can lay on, from the small fighter to the 10km wide space station. You can custom build your stations and gear them to produce goods and even ships, that you'll then be able to plug into the global economy or use for yourself. As everything can be adjusted and automated you can craft the perfect war economy and take over the universe, sectors after sectors... or don't and hone your pilot skills in missions for the other factions or delve into piracy! -1 star for all the jank you have to go through to best experience this game! But it is definitely a warm recommendation from me. Hop on the official discord for help!
The game is easy to get into and is overall solid in its execution. However every aspect lacks depth. The combat is bland, doesn't require aiming or timing your shots. Same goes for trading, which exibits the same issue as 2004 freelancer where every item takes the same amount of space in cargo, so only the most expensive items you can afford remain relevant. Also not much is done in term of immersion, interaction with the environnement is shallow. For example docking at a station is just a matter of being close enouth to instantly transition to a menu screen. At no point do you feel like a pilot at the helm of a ship, you are the ship in a very artificial world.
Game doesn't work out of the box, the website hosting a working patch is down, and honestly no one should have to go through this when buying from gog. Here are the instructions thanks to internet archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20200818184904/http://nox.introverse.net/installguide/ And here is the Nox Gui patch from PCGamingWiki http://server1.awesie.org/NoxGUI_latest.zip
The combat pacing is quite good for a turn based game, however the balance is such that applying status effects or removing them is usually a waste of time and as a result the combat is about the fastest troops and therefore lacks quite a bit of depth. Nonetheless the gameplay is engaging, and the questing starts really strong with multiple ways to finish the first few quests, but the quest system gets dumbed down the more you progress. I was able to finish the game in 2 sittings so it doesn't overstay it's welcome.
