Second this. Still new to the game, need to pick it up again, but it's exactly what I was looking for (Freelancer like). They are still release new content as well... Good Devs!
All of them will offer different kinds of gameplay.
If you like flying and exploration and somewhat realistic aproach Elite is the best option.
Everspace and Rebel Galaxy are more arcade but good no nonsense fun.
X4 is more strategic and empire building.
Elite Dangerous is awesome for a lonely space trucker, bounty hunting wont disappoint you either (go for massacring pirates or targeted assassinations). Core mining is also really satisfying, it has probably the best visuals/audio of space rocks cracking open in any game.
Maybe you'd also enjoy the exploration in a real scale galaxy.
Everspace2 is awesome in its own way, the combat and exploring the maps for secrets is cool.
ED is such a churn… You think you know shit but then you find out what engineering, cold orbiting and AX is and then another massive journey starts. I had to take a break from the game. As a first time player though, I was so absolutely blown away by everything. Especially with the odyssey expansion which is very imperfect but playable, it tries to deliver the full experience though I wouldn’t recommend odyssey without it being on sale.
I want to reiterate many of the ideas here. Elite can be very grindy, especially if you let it. But you don't have to grind. You don't have to do engineering, or do it all the way. You can, there are benefits to it, but it's not necessary outside of PvP applications.
Money may seem grindy at first, but if you learn some of the more profitable activities, you'll be making tens or hundreds of millions in no time. It can still be a grind from the perspective of repetition, but if you're having fun it will go quick.
And all games have elements of repetition. Elite just makes you repeat certain tasks excessively if you want certain specific benefits.
It really is… and FD’s too lazy to fix it. So much potential… horrible design and implementation. They passed it as a DLC because it “works”… pay the lowest price you can possibly pay for it. I did say it just “tries”
If you want to do cargo hauling and mining foremost as a solo operator, I reckon Elite Dangerous is the one to go for.
Everspace 2 and Rebel Galaxy Outlaw focus much more on the pew pew and single player narrative. (you can do cargo runs in RGO but it's very much not the point). (See also: Chorus, Between the Stars)
X4 is in-depth, fiddly, and I think you're probably missing out a fair chunk of it if you don't engage with the fleet/empire building side.
Elite is -the- spacetrucker / mining game imo. Vast galaxy with many markets and avenues to approach profit. Can be very grindy and time consuming - some stations can take 10+ irl minutes to reach. You're limited to only 1 sip (+ small fighter) and its selection of ships is less than X4
X4 does the same but imo has less content in that direction. It is much easier to trade & mine your way to a big ship and then have nothing else to do with excess money but engage with the station / empire systems. Has mod support though so some mods may extend the game more towards what you're looking for.
Everspace and rebel galaxy are more rpg and story focused rather than being sandboxes. You can trade/mine in them but they're more of an arcade experience where you do that just to get some money to get a ship and continue story and not as a main form of gameplay.
It's such a fake environment and travel system. The "roads" and things are just dumb. Planets and stars mean nothing. It's entirely possible to just play using the map interface and I don't feel like I'm missing much. There's no personality in anything anywhere.
Freelancer is still the best single-pilot single-ship space game out there in my opinion.
Rebel Galaxy is probably closest to what you want if you don't want sim elements and management gameplay, but it's very shallow and repetitive.
Everspace and X4 to my knowledge are only really good if you want to forsake arcadey fun for simulation.
Elite Dangerous is probably next closest.
Man, Freelancer is so fucking good. I would love a remake or a sequel. I load it up and play it every couple of years still. It doesn't get enough love
there is a spiritual successor, can't remember the name but someone basically made a game that looks like a modded version. You can probably find it just looking for space sim alternatives... there are a lot of smaller ones coming around. I think they'll be the next trash heap series with 50 solo developers all making terrible games by themselves.
Everspace 2 is like a middle ground between being arcadey and realistic. You have a full 6 degrees of freedom and can turn off the inertia dampeners for more realistic flight physics (not full on Newtonian though), but it's much more forgiving than ED. Like, you aren't going to put yourself into an uncontrollable spin in Everspace, but you still get all the freedom of movement that ED gives you. Chalk it up to more advanced flight computers in the Everspace universe.
This is not my experience at all. As a huge fan of freelancer, everspace plays VERY similar to it and is not simulation-like. Rebel galaxy and everspace are pretty similar in the flying/ship handling portions but everspace is much more polished IMO.
Can't recommend everspace enough, really great game with an attentive developer and decent patches.
x4 isn't nearly as much of a sim as x3. The problem is the timelapse turned a lot of the game into waiting for shit to happen in a dead zone so there wouldn't be massive physics collisions. They changed it to be the standard cruise speeds to get around.
x4 just has awful controller setup because of all the fleet management stuff and options.
You probably mean Freespace as Freelancer really is made for keyboard + mouse. Nonetheless both great games! Remember playing Freespace 2 with upgraded visual mods not too long ago.
I'm desperate for a game that has the fleet management and empire building aspects of X4 or Starsector with the gameplay of Freelancer.
I really, really want to like X4 but I play an hour and get so annoyed with the janky controls and "try hard" sim nature of actually flying the spaceship and I find it really dull. It's just not my sort of fun, and no game has come anywhere near close enough to Freelancer which is diabolical considering it's been 21 years.
I really held out hope for Everspace 2 but I found it extremely shallow and not what I was looking for at all
Everspace 2 was awesome. I did pick up X4, but I want the fleet and management stuff. Elite dangerous is fun but I struggled to stay engaged. I do know it has a ton of cool new stuff that I have not played so take my experience with elite with a grain of salt. It could be crazy amazing now.
So, I've played all of these games. Everspace 2 most recently, but hundreds of hours in all the others.
X4: Ends up being more of a strategy game. You want to fly around and do your own thing without managing everything else. So we'll just write that off.
Elite Dangerous: Probably fits the bill for what you're looking for the closest. But it's a bit of a slog. Space is huge and ED captures that wonderfully. But it just takes a long time to get anywhere, both literally and in terms of progression. It can be a very frustrating game at times. But the flight model is second to none and you can kind of do whatever you want.
Rebel Galaxy Outlaws: Great game, but has the simplest flight mechanics out of all the games. Firmly in the arcade camp. It's basically No Man's Sky flight physics with a tiny bit on top of it. But you can take bounty jobs, mine, haul cargo, etc. Would recommend playing this one on controller, even if you have HOSAS or something.
Everspace 2: Strikes a good middle ground between realistic and arcade flight physics. You have a full 6 degrees of freedom and if you turn of the inertia dampeners (recommend binding a key for toggling it), you can get some really good flying in. But it is much more forgiving than elite, where spinning out with FA off is pretty easy to do. The abilities and such are kind of out there, but the flying is solid. There really isn't any "bounty" type mission, it's more "go here and kill everything", but same idea I guess. You can haul cargo to make money, but the economy is static, so you can always just do the same routes to profit. You can't tank demand or anything like that. Overall, it's probably the best game you listed for most people. Would recommend playing on KB+M or HOSAS if you have them (KB+M is great though with this game, just need to rebind some things), controller is ass with this game even though it supports it.
Also want to add that everspace and rebels are more more of an ARPG experience. They are great games but not very open ended if that’s what you want. I like the story of rebels more but everspace has better gameplay imo.
Everspace does have a pretty good endgame after the story though, sort of the space version of dungeons. It’s also firmly a looter shooter like borderlands where for most of the leveling you will constantly be buying new ships and picking up new weapons. I love it, but you won’t have a “build” until you hit max level.
It seems as if I've picked two pairs of games that are similar to each other. Perhaps now I must pick one of each. Maybe because they're so different I can play at least two of them at once
X4 is the oddball in the group. It's nothing like Elite Dangerous. I don't know why anyone would make the comparison. The only things they have in common are similar graphics and "space". The flight model in X4 is closer to Everspace than it is to ED.
It's a great game, but the flight model is not strong. It's much more about what you build than what you do with your own ship.
It really depends how tedious you want your space sim to be. Shallow but fun? Rebel Galaxy all the way. Immersive to the point you have to match orbital speed and rotation to slowly dock with a space station? Elite Dangerous baby.
Rebel Galaxy is a bit more arcade action kind of space sim. It's game loop revolves around doing one of a few things to get money and upgrade your ship. Its combat is on rails and you fire broadside from your ship. Everspace 2 has a bit more going for it with a the focus a bit more on exploration and 360 degree flight. They are both probably about 30 to 40 hours worth of fun.
I recently was craving Elite Dangerous, but thought of trying X4 and Everspace 2. I will admit these two are great games, but the sound design and feel of driving a spaceship is probably the best in Elite Dangerous.
Do note, that the game is pretty old at this point so game changing updates are very rare.
I would vote ED. I love that game. I played xbox for hundreds and hundreds of hours. Still sad today that support for console was suspended. I’m sure I’ll end up buying on PC one day, but the grind to get back to where I was is daunting. I had an imperial cutter engineered and kitted worth over 1.1 billion by itself. I miss that game.
Star citizen has fleeting moments where it’s quite fun, but it’s not a game. It’s a poorly optimised tech demo with very little gameplay loops.
I don’t expect to see a proper release candidate before *2035* at the rate they keep selling very expensive .jpgs
ED does everything it can do in terms of the space part in a far less buggy manner.
You can do cargo hauling. You can do space pew pew. You can mine.
In its current form, SC doesn’t do much more than that. In terms of current gameplay loops, what does SC do more than ED? I’m not talking about future promises that may be delivered in a decade, now.
X4 and ED are space sims. ES2 and RGO are arcade space shooters. Really depends what type of gameplay you're looking for. I would recommend watching a review for each one.
Unfortunately on Steam deck and Never been good with Monthly subscription game things. It is probably a very good deal but I don't play a whole lot of games and I have very little time to play games so I feel like I'd end up spending more money on the service then playing games.
I just got it so I'm too fresh in the honeymoon period to know if I can stick to it because it is a notriously hard game to learn needing constant 3rd party information but x4 Foundations is blowing my damn mind.
So far the traveling is more interactive and interesting then Elite, (you quickly go into contested areas with a lot going on, using things like space highways and hyper gates, and you're fast speed movement is a lot more tactile then Elites)
also the grind seems much more managable, my first day of playing just doing some random missions and checking things out I got enough money to buy a freighter and send him out on trade routes almost paying for himself in a matter of in game days while I am free to keep exploring and doing missions.
Elite is a grind fest unfortunately, I would much prefer it single player and modded, which is not really a possibility. It would take like a week at least of irl time to just buy a freighter, and you would have to manually do all that trading yourself, which would be not very exciting. Where as in this game I can escort my freighter with my pilot, or take over and do a run myself just to fly the ship if I wanted to just for the hell of it, but wouldn't spend a lot of irl time doing that.
From my research though if you want to be more immersed in the actual "little guy" perspective, Elite is superior because of the immersion of the combat mechanics and the individual mechanics like mining. Where as x4 is created more to turn into a 4x empire building game. But I think there is a lot of really cool sandbox potential in that where you could create your corporation/empire in a lot of different ways, and not need to grind thousands of hours to be locked into just one playthrough.
Idk if you ever played EV nova which was amazing at the time GOATED (top down, 2d space game) but there is free community project game inspired by it called Endless Sky which is cool.
Thank you this is actually some very detailed information. I've played a little bit of elite and I did have quite a hard time understanding it but it is pretty fun. But I will definitely agree with you that it is a major time sync because I think I played for 4 hours and got like two or three missions done just because all that goes into landing on a planet and traveling to places and fuel scooping in between and all that
Yea I mean maybe that stuff is superior in elite (not to my memory, star citizen will be the most immersive for minutia imo) but im definitely getting the "wow immersion" factor in this honeymoon period in x4. And honestly the whole economy, empire building I think will go really well into this game/genre, first of all because it will shape your play through, and secondly it is stuff to do while on autopilot going on longer trips. Like right now if a mission is taking me far and I can be searching the map for more trade routes and create a new route for my freighter while I'm just in auto pilot.
I have 1,400 hours in elite dangerous and I don't ever feel like I've finished it because there's literally thousands of systems to go to, multiple playstyles (mining, trading, mercenary work, exploring, landing on planets driving a rover, carriers.
I really enjoyed playing Elite Dangerous with a HOTAS, I don't recommend it without one. the flight controls are amazing and playing with stick and throttle is a big part of the experience. it feels like you are controlling a ship, clunky at first to get used to it, but once you get the hang of flying it feels awesome and all of the ships feel different to fly from small and nimble ones to big freighters.
Just a warning, Elite Dangerous has a horrendous grind to it when you get to the point where you want to Engineer your ships for combat. You will be making hundreds jumps across the galaxy for hours just to unlock shit, it's terrible.
Look up the jump animation on youtube, it's a countdown and some annoying sounds, the shit will absolutely drive you insane after days of jumping. So get a good second monitor to put movies and shit on it while you grind.
Yeah I got around 1k hours in that game easily from launch to Horizons and between the rep/engineers grind made me just give up at one point. I think I got all the ships up to the Federal Corvette. I think it also had something to do with how they revamped the rep system so it'd be a lot grindier to get the Imperial stuff since I started with Federal or whatever. Was a great game otherwise, especially bounty hunting/pvp with a duo/small group was always super duper fun.
Have you thought about No Man’s Sky? Cargo hauling, mining, and bounty hunting are all pretty big features in terms of money generation. The capital ship system is nicely fleshed out in a very arcadey sort of way, and there’s a rudimentary story to boot. Base building is fun but not necessary. Exploration is satisfying, albeit a little repetitive but I think it’s what you make of it. But beyond all of that, I think it’s one of the easiest games to pick up, and put down without dealing with massive learning curves every time.
Of those games I prefer X4. X4 is the only of those games that supports building up a fleet/stations that your character owns and I'm a sucker for empire builders like that. It, uh, doesn't have the best voice acting or story line, but especially after all the expansions it's a pretty damned fun experience. I'm not sure I'd get it if I couldn't also get the expansions, though - I like having "plots" to go through and the expansions really, well, expanded on those compared with the base game.
Elite Dangerous has decent moment to moment gameplay, but it has extremely limited variety and I find it really boring with nothing much to do of consequence. Scale isn't always a good thing. No "plots" or missions of consequence at all; every mission is one of a very small number of highly predictable randomly generated templates. Bleh.
I like Rebel Galaxy Outlaws, but it's very retro feeling. If you didn't play the old Wing Commander: Privateer and have nostalgia for it you may not like the retro stylings, but I loved them. I really enjoyed it and need to pick it up again at some point.
Everspace 2 feels very arcady and gamey compared with any of the previous games. It's better than Everspace, but eh.
Star Citizen is something you should look into when/if it finally releases, but I wouldn't pick it up if you're wanting to play right now.
>I like Rebel Galaxy Outlaws, but it's very retro feeling. If you didn't play the old Wing Commander: Privateer and have nostalgia for it you may not like the retro stylings, but I loved them. I really enjoyed it and need to pick it up again at some point.
It's literally a Privateer remake with the Wing Commander edges rounded off, there are many very clear callbacks.
That was the game's purpose. When Elite and Star Citizen started development, they thought the space was too crowded and expected that someone with more resources would make a privateer successor. But no one did, so they came back years later and did it themselves.
X4 is probably the most in depth game of the group, looks great, just a fair warning it's a learning cliff not a curve. Elite is fun if you like trucking and feeling alone. No experience with the other two.
Yes all of its systems are interactive, end game content can consist of designing your own stations, and building your own mini empire, managing your AI pilots trade routes, and military conquest if you feel like it.
Everspace 2 won't let you out of the cockpit, but that's not a bad thing as the focus remains on ship to ship combat that way. You also won't be able to fly any frigate class ships, these are all fighters although they range in size, light, medium and heavy. The big difference between Everspace 2 and Elite Dangerous in my opinion is the flight controls. Elite Dangerous is more like a flight simulation whereas Everspace 2 is very arcade like. If you have played any of the Descent games, Everspace 2 will feel very natural to you. Personally I love Everspace 2 and have never been able to get into Elite Dangerous for just that reason.
Are you speaking rebel Galaxy or Rebel Galaxy Outlaws question mark they are Different games Period I think Outlaws is the one that's the most like everspace
Fwiw Rebel Galaxy Outlaw is 80% off (5.99 USD) on Steam currently. Haven't played it. Mixed reviews but it looks interesting enough that I'd pick it up for that price even if I played it one time.
Of the others, Everspace 2 is the one I'd recommend to anyone, in general. But it's definitely a very, very different game from x4 and ED.
I tried x4 and couldn't get into it. Just too obtuse and the controls made it hard for me to really get lost in. Definitely feels like you're playing a strategy game and not a space Sim.
ED is the most Sim-ish and if mining and space trucking are your thing, this might be the thing for you. It can get grindy, but if it feels that way you can always let yourself get distracted and do just... Anything else. Start exploring. Mine some stuff. Eventually you'll find that you're close to one of the engineers without even realizing that. You really need to let yourself wander, but when you do it's very rewarding.
ES2 is a ton of fun. Fast paced, great combat. It's really more of an ARPG than anything else though. It's like Destiny in Space (without the multi-player and Mtx, obviously). Stuff is blowing up and the gameplay loop is easy to follow. But it also has the least developed economy and mining.
RGO is a small game, in terms of story completion. The ship handling feels good to me, and I mean in the sense that it has mechanics and flight cameras that I want. The out-of-ship segments are not fleshed out, but kind of what I expect for this game. The trading and combat aspects are simple and enjoyable. The ship variety is limited, and doesn't feel majorly impactful. Good, cheap game that will likely scratch your itch.
Elite Dangerous if you want a hyper involved sandbox. It is, by far, the most "simulation" style of these games. You have controls for EVERY aspect of your ship, and even the in-ship UI is fully functional; IE, you can interact with every menu and dial that's actually in your ship. It's not just "sci fi tech" window dressing.
If you actually want to feel like a space pilot living in a realistic space world, play Elite Dangerous. However, it is a COMPLETE sandbox, with virtually zero story, very little lore, and a bunch of "factions" and mission givers which are only differentiated from each other by their names. There is very little sense of it being a living, breathing world. However, it is essentially an MMO and you can join up with other players to create your own sense of meaning and belonging in the game.
If you want fast paced, arcade-y flying with much less of an involved learning curve play Rebel Galaxy Outlaw. It is an almost pitch perfect spiritual sequel to Freelancer, which was itself a copy of Wing Commander. It's much of the gameplay loop of Elite Dangerous, but much more casual and accessible and with an actual story and a sense of belonging. However, it is MUCH more simplistic.
I haven't played the other 2, so I can't comment on them.
Thank you for the info period I've heard of freelancer but never got to play it back in the day comma however I did play Wing Commander three and four on the PlayStation and I loved those
My vote would be elite, the game used to be in a bit of a limbo state but they’ve been adding more content. It has a rags to riches playstyle but once you get at the top it becomes extremely grindy.
For my opinion:
Elite Dangerous felt waaaay to grindy for me, right from the beginning.
X4- is awesome and you can do exactly what you want to do, but at the same time I feel like you will be missing out on a big portion of the game if you don't want to get into fleet or running a business.
Rebel Galaxy Outlaw- Love this game because it is just like Wing Commander Privateer.
Everspace 2- I own this game, but I haven't actually played it yet.
Something else to consider is Spacebourne 1 and 2. These games feel like a Freelancer like game. Made by a solo developer, the game seems like one of those low effort type games, but once you actually get into you you realize that its far from a low effort type games, but games where the developer put a lot of features, details, and gameplay into it. SpaceBourne 2 has the same features/gameplay as the first game, but it has a lot more features that Spacebourne 1 doesn't have, it is early access though.
Another one to look into is 3030 Deathwar Redux. it's a 2d game, 2d while flying the ship that you see from the top, and 2d side scrolloer when on space stations or exploring wrecked ships. But it has everything you want in it, mining, cargo hauling, you can take on missions to deliver stuff, bounty hunting, being a "taxi" for NPCs, and many more other type of missions, you can even be a pirate. You can explore wrecked ships in your space suit in a 2d side scrolling adventure. It really is one of the best space games out there.
Absolutely love star citizen, but for now I'm looking for games I can play on my steam deck, and I don't foresee Star Citizen running at all on there LOL
SC does indeed run on the Steam Deck, but not well.
But if you want to play a game, stay away, it's expensive for what it offers, it's not even worth the $45 of the basic package. There's zero gameplay there, everything is broken and there's no persistence, they wipe progress regularly. The only "impressive" things are the space to planet transitions because it's a bit more seamless than other games, and that's it.
Oh don't worry I've been following this game for a long time. I've gotten the initial package and I think I've maybe bought one or two ships on sale and had a ton of fun with the game but I definitely know it's still got a long way to go. I am very glad to see that progress seems to be accelerating as they have an entire new system implemented I believe. And I'm not sure if server meshing is working yet but I think once they get that going it'll speed up everything else too because that was like the big thing. Any idea what frame rates people are getting on the deck?
Elite is very difficult and really doesn’t hold your hand at all. It can be overwhelming. If you have the patience to learn a lot (much of which the game won’t tell you) and are looking for something more realistic, it’s the best option.
My top 2 would be X4 and ED.
I'll be honest I've never played X4 but have several hundred hours in X3.
But if you're not into the bases or fleets of X I'd 100%reccomended ED.
Yeah x4 is pretty much the best space sim out there. You don't _need_ to build a huge fleet you can direct mine and trade everything yourself. its a sandbox game do what you like.
ED
I've got over 600 hours in it, that's not even a big number comparing with people in their sub but considering how shallow the game is the number is huge imo.
Its funny this topic came up as I've been looking for a space game myself to sink into! So I'll break down what I've learned, hopefully it will help you as well!
**Elite Dangerous**
Probably the best in terms of flight model. Highly recommend having a HOTAS setup as it just adds so much to the experience. There are quite a few activities to do such as transporting, mining, bounty hunting, combat missions, and exploring. That being said, it is a heavy grind. And there are times that you should just fire up a movie, youtube, or podcast and just have that going on in the background while playing as there will be downtime. As someone else mentioned, you will have moments it takes 10+ minutes or so to reach certain stations. Other times, it might take quite a while to find your particular rock to mine for minerals. Primarily a solo game with a chance to see other players but I've got 100+ hours (which isn't a lot, I know) and I've yet to see another player.
If you want some space trucking, outfitting ships, and some simple missions or goals that you set yourself, or even something to just chill and kick back with, Elite would be the way to go. That being said, the Odyssey expansion has not been well received and I only recently got it and thought it was kinda "eh". Otherwise, you won't ever really leave your ship. It also feels like everything you do in the game is just for you. Unlike other games like X4 and EVE that the universe feels alive and reacts to some things you do, the universe in Elite is just a background while you play. Also, I'm personally concerned for the future of the game as I've been reading that support for it is on the decline with fewer updates, especially the layoffs that have happened at Frontier. We will see what plays out though.
**X4: Foundations**
X4, while a great game, is more of a management game. True, you start off flying your ship(s) and doing combat, mining, hauling, etc, but the game is focused around the universe and its simulated economy. If you build a station that produces Energy Cells, you well affect the price of those in all nearby zones. If you set up a whole fleet of mining ships, you'll attract the alien races to stop you. It does a great job simulating a universe with cause and effect situations. Flight model, is not that great and the same goes for its U.I. The game generally aims to turn into an RTS game about halfway or so as you will manage your fleet and stations. You can also walk around your ships as stations, but its kinda bare to do so. Based on what you were looking for, as much of praise as I can say about X4, I don't think this is what you are looking for. X4 recently had a new expansion come out along with a whole game update to 7.0 which just keeps adding more and more features and Quality of life improvements and I can see more being added in the future as well!
**Everspace 2**
I've not played too much of this one but what I did, it was alright. Its a VERY arcade like flying shooter. Its fun, but not a simulation at all. More of a Diablo ARPG in space as you will find all kinds of loot to upgrade and outfit the ships. My experience with it was mostly on rails with where to go and the mission objective but I might not have gotten far enough into it to really experience all of it. I also know you don't leave the ship at all. And there will be a lot more puzzles and such later in the game, some of which that I heard get rather repetitive. Not a space Sim, but still a fun game if you are looking for a game that does have an ending.
**No Man's Sky**
Honestly, based on what you said, I'd suggest No Man's Sky. True it will be a bit more cartoony but don't let that put you off. Its got a fun, a bit arcade like flight model. You can get out of your ship and run around. Like Elite, there are several things to do and you are better off setting your own goals. Take up some hauling missions, combat missions, explore, or even jump into the expeditions and such. Build up your own capital ship and fleet, that's pretty easy to manage by just telling the ship to go out on missions from a screen. And its cool to see all the different planets and such as there is a nice variety. The economy in the game isn't really fleshed out, so hauling things around, I never noticed me selling stuff really affecting the prices but I could be wrong. Eventually, you might even find a planet you really like and wanna settle down on it and build a base, but its entirely optional. And the game is still getting massive updates which is cool that they are keeping the game alive! It does feel that its as wide as the ocean but only 2 inches deep though. But that also makes it easy to play for a while, take a break, then come back when a new update comes out to see the changes. And it does have multiplayer, so you can join up with a friend and enjoy the game together.
Hopefully that will help. Personally, even though it sounds like I dissed it a bit, I've been having a lot of fun playing Elite this past week. I was really torn between Elite and EVE (as I'm taking a break from X4) . And I love everything about EVE except for playing EVE... So that's why I decided to commit to Elite Dangerous. I've had a fun, even just casually playing. Its brought some seriously funny moments, like when I did core mining to blow up an asteroid and I didn't get far enough away from it and blew up my ship as well. Little bit of swearing and laughing at the same time but I was fine with it. If you have a HOTAS (or can get one), I'd suggest Elite, otherwise No Man's Sky might be closer to what you are looking for.
Feel free to ask any other questions if you have them and I'll do what I can to answer them!
Oh I've played No Man's Sky since the beginning. And I'm one of the weirdos who liked it in the beginning. It's really fun but I've played it for like what 7 years now? And I'm also looking for something a little bit less survival crafting and artsy, and little bit more "realistic" artstyle, and a bit more immersion. I really like Star Citizen but it will definitely not run on the deck and it's obviously not a real game yet, and I do really like Starfield but it's just missing a lot of those immersive elements that I want too many loading screens and your vehicle doesn't need gas or ammo, and cargo runs were really disappointing you literally just launched and fly to the place and land and it's done. I get that there's not much more that can be happening with it, but it's that immersive thing where I'd like to go at least to a terminal or to a person and say Here's your delivery. Same with mine and it was just shooting at rocks and then you get the stuff. Which makes sense that's what you do in every game basically but it's that immersion again, I want to do it with a mining laser and I want to maybe have to scan for the proper rocks. I don't want to shoot missiles and ballistic ammo at a rock and somehow get minerals from it
Check out Elite Dangerous mining videos, especially ones on Core Mining! Elite doesn't have the on foot delivery of objects, but you are scanning for minerals and either gonna laser parts off to scoop up via ship or limpets. Or you will look for "cores", launch seismic charges and blow the damn thing up. Then use some tools to break off the ores and collect. Hella sayisfying!
That sounds really cool period I'll have to check it out. I still await the perfect space game that has equal parts space and ground. I used to think that was going to be Starfield but they really disappointed me with the space stuff even after crafting such a fantastic shipbuilder that point it all directions to space being important. Who knows maybe Star Citizen will be finished one of these days and become perfect
I haven't played them all, but I can say for the first few weeks of E:D, I was constantly floored by the sound design in the game. Just picked up x4 and so far it's been pretty meh all around, but I haven't given it a fair shake yet.
If you don't mind the gray market, global steam keys for Rebel Galaxy Outlaw go for like, a dollar on steam key seller websites.
I really like the game but it has a mid score on steam.
Don't go for rebel galaxy outlaws then but rebel galaxy. The first game. You have your own ship, you can do missions, you upgrade, fight and the combat is really damn fun.
Yes but you are a fighter type.
In the original you have much bigger ships you can choose from with way more guns.
I found that to be much more fun than the dogfights in RGO
I'd personally recommend the first Rebel Galaxy over Outlaws. Absolute BLAST if you haven't played it yet. Otherwise, I don't really have a horse in this race.
X4 for MASSIVE Space Sim
Elite Dangerous for Large, Solo Ship Space Sim-lite
Also I can Suggest Space Bourne 2 (Even though its in Early Access its is EXCELLENT)
I tried an hour or so of spaceborne but couldn't tell if it was just hanky or an asset flip or what. It's interesting, but so far nothing really works well. Sounds, textures mechanics, everything feels half done. I guess that makes sense for early access but it is indeed very rough for me right now
You tried Spacebourne 2?
Its Very Good if you REALLY get into it and understand all of the Systems
I saw your other comment that you are a on a Steam Deck, so that will probably limit your choices and I don't have any experience with since I only PC with Keyboard and Mouse
IDK maybe it's just me but nothing really felt good. The movement was weird The Sounds were weird the textures are all over the place there doesn't really seem to be like a vision for the art style that's why I assumed at first that it was like an asset flip. It might just be that it's not good with controller because everything just feels bad the flying especially as a very kind of rigid jagginess to it and rolling is very awkward too
I guess to add to my comment, it looks very interesting but as of right now nothing feels good which kind of ruins any sort of interestingness about it for me. But this might also be a me problem because one area that is extra rough is controller support and I'm playing on Steam deck so it's important on my end and there's just several things that just don't work on a controller and several buttons that seem to be mapped but it doesn't tell me what button they're mapped to and none of the buttons seem to do anything so I'm assuming it's a combination of buttons that it's just not telling me so I'm having a very rough time trying to play it
Everspace 1 is better game to E2 IMO. First game was more rouge like and difficult on Normal even. Should be super cheap. You also collect materials for upgrades on each run. But it's 99% space shooter.
I’ve only played Elite Dangerous and Rebel Galaxy Outlaws. I adored the first Rebel Galaxy but found Outlaws kind of annoying. All the enemies level up with you so there’s no point in getting more powerful. Elite Dangerous is super cool at first, then it feels really shallow.
Get Freelancer :)
Well I've been playing no man's Sky for about seven years And honestly I'm looking for something a bit more immersive And With a more realistic art style than artsy and survival crafty. I also didn't love the space content as much as the planetary content. The flying was a bit boring as well.
That's fair. I only picked it up a few weeks ago, and I'm pretty into it so far.
I have played Everspace 2 and Elite Dangerous. Everspace 2 was a little too "arcadey" for me, while Elite Dangerous was just wayyyyy too intense.
Everspace 2 was really good, very reminiscent of it. I never got around to quite finishing it, I think about halfway through. Recently reinstalled it on my Deck, need to get around to beating it.
I like Everspace 1 a bit better than 2. The open world means too much traveling, its not bad but 1 is still a bit better. Best about RGO is the soundtrack, story is superthin, missions are not really fun and no strafe feels weird...especially in space where you need alot of thrusters for full control.
ED and SC are just a bit too complicated. Do I wanna keep an eye on the laser temperature while mining shit? No only that it makes abs no sense, but its just a bit tooooo much.
Everspace 2! A little bit of Freelancer combined with a lot from Diablo
Second this. Still new to the game, need to pick it up again, but it's exactly what I was looking for (Freelancer like). They are still release new content as well... Good Devs!
Diablo you say? I tried the game out a while back but couldn’t get into it. What kinds of things does it use from Diablo?
fast paced gameplay, skills, items, basically the whole arpg gameplay loop of playing, gearing and optimizing
Ah right on! I’ll check it out, thanks!
All of them will offer different kinds of gameplay. If you like flying and exploration and somewhat realistic aproach Elite is the best option. Everspace and Rebel Galaxy are more arcade but good no nonsense fun. X4 is more strategic and empire building.
Elite Dangerous is awesome for a lonely space trucker, bounty hunting wont disappoint you either (go for massacring pirates or targeted assassinations). Core mining is also really satisfying, it has probably the best visuals/audio of space rocks cracking open in any game. Maybe you'd also enjoy the exploration in a real scale galaxy. Everspace2 is awesome in its own way, the combat and exploring the maps for secrets is cool.
ED is such a churn… You think you know shit but then you find out what engineering, cold orbiting and AX is and then another massive journey starts. I had to take a break from the game. As a first time player though, I was so absolutely blown away by everything. Especially with the odyssey expansion which is very imperfect but playable, it tries to deliver the full experience though I wouldn’t recommend odyssey without it being on sale.
I want to reiterate many of the ideas here. Elite can be very grindy, especially if you let it. But you don't have to grind. You don't have to do engineering, or do it all the way. You can, there are benefits to it, but it's not necessary outside of PvP applications. Money may seem grindy at first, but if you learn some of the more profitable activities, you'll be making tens or hundreds of millions in no time. It can still be a grind from the perspective of repetition, but if you're having fun it will go quick. And all games have elements of repetition. Elite just makes you repeat certain tasks excessively if you want certain specific benefits.
Odyssey is so bad lmao
It really is… and FD’s too lazy to fix it. So much potential… horrible design and implementation. They passed it as a DLC because it “works”… pay the lowest price you can possibly pay for it. I did say it just “tries”
Also if you have a VR setup, playing Elite Dangerous in VR is a must.
Should be noted that the latest version (Odyssey) regressed VR support a bit with the addition of "space legs".
Elite dangerous for sure
If you want to do cargo hauling and mining foremost as a solo operator, I reckon Elite Dangerous is the one to go for. Everspace 2 and Rebel Galaxy Outlaw focus much more on the pew pew and single player narrative. (you can do cargo runs in RGO but it's very much not the point). (See also: Chorus, Between the Stars) X4 is in-depth, fiddly, and I think you're probably missing out a fair chunk of it if you don't engage with the fleet/empire building side.
Elite is -the- spacetrucker / mining game imo. Vast galaxy with many markets and avenues to approach profit. Can be very grindy and time consuming - some stations can take 10+ irl minutes to reach. You're limited to only 1 sip (+ small fighter) and its selection of ships is less than X4 X4 does the same but imo has less content in that direction. It is much easier to trade & mine your way to a big ship and then have nothing else to do with excess money but engage with the station / empire systems. Has mod support though so some mods may extend the game more towards what you're looking for. Everspace and rebel galaxy are more rpg and story focused rather than being sandboxes. You can trade/mine in them but they're more of an arcade experience where you do that just to get some money to get a ship and continue story and not as a main form of gameplay.
in my experience, X4 is eventually empire-building (whether military or trading) and the RPG elements help you learn the system.
The new update is supposed to have some good tutorials now apparently.
Everspace 2 is a blast. I can not get into X4. It does nothing to make itself feel less like a simulation.
Could you elaborate on that a bit?
It's such a fake environment and travel system. The "roads" and things are just dumb. Planets and stars mean nothing. It's entirely possible to just play using the map interface and I don't feel like I'm missing much. There's no personality in anything anywhere.
OK thank you. I'll have to keep that in mind.
Freelancer is still the best single-pilot single-ship space game out there in my opinion. Rebel Galaxy is probably closest to what you want if you don't want sim elements and management gameplay, but it's very shallow and repetitive. Everspace and X4 to my knowledge are only really good if you want to forsake arcadey fun for simulation. Elite Dangerous is probably next closest.
Man, Freelancer is so fucking good. I would love a remake or a sequel. I load it up and play it every couple of years still. It doesn't get enough love
there is a spiritual successor, can't remember the name but someone basically made a game that looks like a modded version. You can probably find it just looking for space sim alternatives... there are a lot of smaller ones coming around. I think they'll be the next trash heap series with 50 solo developers all making terrible games by themselves.
Underspace market themselves as being a spiritual successor to Freelancer, that's not what you're thinking of, is it?
Everyplace 2 is arcadey right? ED seems more sim to me
Everspace 2 is like a middle ground between being arcadey and realistic. You have a full 6 degrees of freedom and can turn off the inertia dampeners for more realistic flight physics (not full on Newtonian though), but it's much more forgiving than ED. Like, you aren't going to put yourself into an uncontrollable spin in Everspace, but you still get all the freedom of movement that ED gives you. Chalk it up to more advanced flight computers in the Everspace universe.
I don't think you are thinking of the right game re Everspace. It's quite arcadey in the best possible sense.
This is not my experience at all. As a huge fan of freelancer, everspace plays VERY similar to it and is not simulation-like. Rebel galaxy and everspace are pretty similar in the flying/ship handling portions but everspace is much more polished IMO. Can't recommend everspace enough, really great game with an attentive developer and decent patches.
x4 isn't nearly as much of a sim as x3. The problem is the timelapse turned a lot of the game into waiting for shit to happen in a dead zone so there wouldn't be massive physics collisions. They changed it to be the standard cruise speeds to get around. x4 just has awful controller setup because of all the fleet management stuff and options.
Freelancer was (is) fantastic. Get a joystick and go for the early 2000s nostalgia.
You probably mean Freespace as Freelancer really is made for keyboard + mouse. Nonetheless both great games! Remember playing Freespace 2 with upgraded visual mods not too long ago.
Freespace 2 is so damn good
God damn I miss Freelancer. Still one of my favourite games of all time. Starpoint Gemini 2 is also pretty good, but its just not quite there.
Try Underspace, it's about as Freelancer as you can get these days without being sued.
I'm desperate for a game that has the fleet management and empire building aspects of X4 or Starsector with the gameplay of Freelancer. I really, really want to like X4 but I play an hour and get so annoyed with the janky controls and "try hard" sim nature of actually flying the spaceship and I find it really dull. It's just not my sort of fun, and no game has come anywhere near close enough to Freelancer which is diabolical considering it's been 21 years. I really held out hope for Everspace 2 but I found it extremely shallow and not what I was looking for at all
Everspace 2 was awesome. I did pick up X4, but I want the fleet and management stuff. Elite dangerous is fun but I struggled to stay engaged. I do know it has a ton of cool new stuff that I have not played so take my experience with elite with a grain of salt. It could be crazy amazing now.
So, I've played all of these games. Everspace 2 most recently, but hundreds of hours in all the others. X4: Ends up being more of a strategy game. You want to fly around and do your own thing without managing everything else. So we'll just write that off. Elite Dangerous: Probably fits the bill for what you're looking for the closest. But it's a bit of a slog. Space is huge and ED captures that wonderfully. But it just takes a long time to get anywhere, both literally and in terms of progression. It can be a very frustrating game at times. But the flight model is second to none and you can kind of do whatever you want. Rebel Galaxy Outlaws: Great game, but has the simplest flight mechanics out of all the games. Firmly in the arcade camp. It's basically No Man's Sky flight physics with a tiny bit on top of it. But you can take bounty jobs, mine, haul cargo, etc. Would recommend playing this one on controller, even if you have HOSAS or something. Everspace 2: Strikes a good middle ground between realistic and arcade flight physics. You have a full 6 degrees of freedom and if you turn of the inertia dampeners (recommend binding a key for toggling it), you can get some really good flying in. But it is much more forgiving than elite, where spinning out with FA off is pretty easy to do. The abilities and such are kind of out there, but the flying is solid. There really isn't any "bounty" type mission, it's more "go here and kill everything", but same idea I guess. You can haul cargo to make money, but the economy is static, so you can always just do the same routes to profit. You can't tank demand or anything like that. Overall, it's probably the best game you listed for most people. Would recommend playing on KB+M or HOSAS if you have them (KB+M is great though with this game, just need to rebind some things), controller is ass with this game even though it supports it.
This is actually very detailed and gives me a lot to think about. Thank you very much
Also want to add that everspace and rebels are more more of an ARPG experience. They are great games but not very open ended if that’s what you want. I like the story of rebels more but everspace has better gameplay imo. Everspace does have a pretty good endgame after the story though, sort of the space version of dungeons. It’s also firmly a looter shooter like borderlands where for most of the leveling you will constantly be buying new ships and picking up new weapons. I love it, but you won’t have a “build” until you hit max level.
It seems as if I've picked two pairs of games that are similar to each other. Perhaps now I must pick one of each. Maybe because they're so different I can play at least two of them at once
X4 is the oddball in the group. It's nothing like Elite Dangerous. I don't know why anyone would make the comparison. The only things they have in common are similar graphics and "space". The flight model in X4 is closer to Everspace than it is to ED. It's a great game, but the flight model is not strong. It's much more about what you build than what you do with your own ship.
Oh ok I must have it all wrong. I saw tons of comments in the review that it was a better elite and people were dropping elite for it
It really depends how tedious you want your space sim to be. Shallow but fun? Rebel Galaxy all the way. Immersive to the point you have to match orbital speed and rotation to slowly dock with a space station? Elite Dangerous baby.
That makes sense. Would you be able to explain why you'd pick rebel galaxy over everspace
Rebel Galaxy is a bit more arcade action kind of space sim. It's game loop revolves around doing one of a few things to get money and upgrade your ship. Its combat is on rails and you fire broadside from your ship. Everspace 2 has a bit more going for it with a the focus a bit more on exploration and 360 degree flight. They are both probably about 30 to 40 hours worth of fun.
I recently was craving Elite Dangerous, but thought of trying X4 and Everspace 2. I will admit these two are great games, but the sound design and feel of driving a spaceship is probably the best in Elite Dangerous. Do note, that the game is pretty old at this point so game changing updates are very rare.
Rebel Galaxy Outlaws has a great story and style.
Everspace 2 or Rebel Galaxy. 2nd is a 2.5D game though.
Rebel galaxy outlaws is a 3d open world game. The first one was 2.5d
I would vote ED. I love that game. I played xbox for hundreds and hundreds of hours. Still sad today that support for console was suspended. I’m sure I’ll end up buying on PC one day, but the grind to get back to where I was is daunting. I had an imperial cutter engineered and kitted worth over 1.1 billion by itself. I miss that game.
Star Citizen. *runs for life*
Actually love Star Citizen but I'm fairly certain it will not run on my steam deck in any playable manner
I have seen posts in the SC sub of people playing it on steam deck I think, but I don't know much about steam deck myself.
Star citizen has fleeting moments where it’s quite fun, but it’s not a game. It’s a poorly optimised tech demo with very little gameplay loops. I don’t expect to see a proper release candidate before *2035* at the rate they keep selling very expensive .jpgs ED does everything it can do in terms of the space part in a far less buggy manner.
[удалено]
You can do cargo hauling. You can do space pew pew. You can mine. In its current form, SC doesn’t do much more than that. In terms of current gameplay loops, what does SC do more than ED? I’m not talking about future promises that may be delivered in a decade, now.
Check out **Starsector** and **Approaching Infinity**.
X4 and ED are space sims. ES2 and RGO are arcade space shooters. Really depends what type of gameplay you're looking for. I would recommend watching a review for each one.
Everspace 2 is on GamePass.
Unfortunately on Steam deck and Never been good with Monthly subscription game things. It is probably a very good deal but I don't play a whole lot of games and I have very little time to play games so I feel like I'd end up spending more money on the service then playing games.
I just got it so I'm too fresh in the honeymoon period to know if I can stick to it because it is a notriously hard game to learn needing constant 3rd party information but x4 Foundations is blowing my damn mind. So far the traveling is more interactive and interesting then Elite, (you quickly go into contested areas with a lot going on, using things like space highways and hyper gates, and you're fast speed movement is a lot more tactile then Elites) also the grind seems much more managable, my first day of playing just doing some random missions and checking things out I got enough money to buy a freighter and send him out on trade routes almost paying for himself in a matter of in game days while I am free to keep exploring and doing missions. Elite is a grind fest unfortunately, I would much prefer it single player and modded, which is not really a possibility. It would take like a week at least of irl time to just buy a freighter, and you would have to manually do all that trading yourself, which would be not very exciting. Where as in this game I can escort my freighter with my pilot, or take over and do a run myself just to fly the ship if I wanted to just for the hell of it, but wouldn't spend a lot of irl time doing that. From my research though if you want to be more immersed in the actual "little guy" perspective, Elite is superior because of the immersion of the combat mechanics and the individual mechanics like mining. Where as x4 is created more to turn into a 4x empire building game. But I think there is a lot of really cool sandbox potential in that where you could create your corporation/empire in a lot of different ways, and not need to grind thousands of hours to be locked into just one playthrough. Idk if you ever played EV nova which was amazing at the time GOATED (top down, 2d space game) but there is free community project game inspired by it called Endless Sky which is cool.
Thank you this is actually some very detailed information. I've played a little bit of elite and I did have quite a hard time understanding it but it is pretty fun. But I will definitely agree with you that it is a major time sync because I think I played for 4 hours and got like two or three missions done just because all that goes into landing on a planet and traveling to places and fuel scooping in between and all that
Yea I mean maybe that stuff is superior in elite (not to my memory, star citizen will be the most immersive for minutia imo) but im definitely getting the "wow immersion" factor in this honeymoon period in x4. And honestly the whole economy, empire building I think will go really well into this game/genre, first of all because it will shape your play through, and secondly it is stuff to do while on autopilot going on longer trips. Like right now if a mission is taking me far and I can be searching the map for more trade routes and create a new route for my freighter while I'm just in auto pilot.
You could also try Homefront 3 or the monster that is EVE Online!
I never could get I to EVE. the best part about being in a space ship is flying it.
I have 1,400 hours in elite dangerous and I don't ever feel like I've finished it because there's literally thousands of systems to go to, multiple playstyles (mining, trading, mercenary work, exploring, landing on planets driving a rover, carriers. I really enjoyed playing Elite Dangerous with a HOTAS, I don't recommend it without one. the flight controls are amazing and playing with stick and throttle is a big part of the experience. it feels like you are controlling a ship, clunky at first to get used to it, but once you get the hang of flying it feels awesome and all of the ships feel different to fly from small and nimble ones to big freighters.
Just a warning, Elite Dangerous has a horrendous grind to it when you get to the point where you want to Engineer your ships for combat. You will be making hundreds jumps across the galaxy for hours just to unlock shit, it's terrible. Look up the jump animation on youtube, it's a countdown and some annoying sounds, the shit will absolutely drive you insane after days of jumping. So get a good second monitor to put movies and shit on it while you grind.
Yeah I got around 1k hours in that game easily from launch to Horizons and between the rep/engineers grind made me just give up at one point. I think I got all the ships up to the Federal Corvette. I think it also had something to do with how they revamped the rep system so it'd be a lot grindier to get the Imperial stuff since I started with Federal or whatever. Was a great game otherwise, especially bounty hunting/pvp with a duo/small group was always super duper fun.
Fdev said that they’d be updating the engineering grind, hopefully this means less grind overall
Have you thought about No Man’s Sky? Cargo hauling, mining, and bounty hunting are all pretty big features in terms of money generation. The capital ship system is nicely fleshed out in a very arcadey sort of way, and there’s a rudimentary story to boot. Base building is fun but not necessary. Exploration is satisfying, albeit a little repetitive but I think it’s what you make of it. But beyond all of that, I think it’s one of the easiest games to pick up, and put down without dealing with massive learning curves every time.
Of those games I prefer X4. X4 is the only of those games that supports building up a fleet/stations that your character owns and I'm a sucker for empire builders like that. It, uh, doesn't have the best voice acting or story line, but especially after all the expansions it's a pretty damned fun experience. I'm not sure I'd get it if I couldn't also get the expansions, though - I like having "plots" to go through and the expansions really, well, expanded on those compared with the base game. Elite Dangerous has decent moment to moment gameplay, but it has extremely limited variety and I find it really boring with nothing much to do of consequence. Scale isn't always a good thing. No "plots" or missions of consequence at all; every mission is one of a very small number of highly predictable randomly generated templates. Bleh. I like Rebel Galaxy Outlaws, but it's very retro feeling. If you didn't play the old Wing Commander: Privateer and have nostalgia for it you may not like the retro stylings, but I loved them. I really enjoyed it and need to pick it up again at some point. Everspace 2 feels very arcady and gamey compared with any of the previous games. It's better than Everspace, but eh. Star Citizen is something you should look into when/if it finally releases, but I wouldn't pick it up if you're wanting to play right now.
>I like Rebel Galaxy Outlaws, but it's very retro feeling. If you didn't play the old Wing Commander: Privateer and have nostalgia for it you may not like the retro stylings, but I loved them. I really enjoyed it and need to pick it up again at some point. It's literally a Privateer remake with the Wing Commander edges rounded off, there are many very clear callbacks. That was the game's purpose. When Elite and Star Citizen started development, they thought the space was too crowded and expected that someone with more resources would make a privateer successor. But no one did, so they came back years later and did it themselves.
EVERSPACE 2!! It really is a freelancer clone brought into the modern era. Can't recommend it enough!
They are very different games. It depends on what you enjoy.
X4 is probably the most in depth game of the group, looks great, just a fair warning it's a learning cliff not a curve. Elite is fun if you like trucking and feeling alone. No experience with the other two.
You would say X4 is more complicated than elite?
Yes all of its systems are interactive, end game content can consist of designing your own stations, and building your own mini empire, managing your AI pilots trade routes, and military conquest if you feel like it.
Everspace 2 won't let you out of the cockpit, but that's not a bad thing as the focus remains on ship to ship combat that way. You also won't be able to fly any frigate class ships, these are all fighters although they range in size, light, medium and heavy. The big difference between Everspace 2 and Elite Dangerous in my opinion is the flight controls. Elite Dangerous is more like a flight simulation whereas Everspace 2 is very arcade like. If you have played any of the Descent games, Everspace 2 will feel very natural to you. Personally I love Everspace 2 and have never been able to get into Elite Dangerous for just that reason.
Thanks for all the information. What are The Descent games you're talking about?
Was a long time ago, but some really great games in their time. [Descent (video game) - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Descent_(video_game))
Rebel Galaxy I disliked. It felt like it was wasting my time.
Are you speaking rebel Galaxy or Rebel Galaxy Outlaws question mark they are Different games Period I think Outlaws is the one that's the most like everspace
X4 with mods.
What kind of mods does that game have?
Fwiw Rebel Galaxy Outlaw is 80% off (5.99 USD) on Steam currently. Haven't played it. Mixed reviews but it looks interesting enough that I'd pick it up for that price even if I played it one time. Of the others, Everspace 2 is the one I'd recommend to anyone, in general. But it's definitely a very, very different game from x4 and ED. I tried x4 and couldn't get into it. Just too obtuse and the controls made it hard for me to really get lost in. Definitely feels like you're playing a strategy game and not a space Sim. ED is the most Sim-ish and if mining and space trucking are your thing, this might be the thing for you. It can get grindy, but if it feels that way you can always let yourself get distracted and do just... Anything else. Start exploring. Mine some stuff. Eventually you'll find that you're close to one of the engineers without even realizing that. You really need to let yourself wander, but when you do it's very rewarding. ES2 is a ton of fun. Fast paced, great combat. It's really more of an ARPG than anything else though. It's like Destiny in Space (without the multi-player and Mtx, obviously). Stuff is blowing up and the gameplay loop is easy to follow. But it also has the least developed economy and mining.
Thanks for the info. Is it Rebel Galaxy that's on sale or Rebel Galaxy Outlaws?
Both, on Steam. Rebel Galaxy is $1.99
RGO is a small game, in terms of story completion. The ship handling feels good to me, and I mean in the sense that it has mechanics and flight cameras that I want. The out-of-ship segments are not fleshed out, but kind of what I expect for this game. The trading and combat aspects are simple and enjoyable. The ship variety is limited, and doesn't feel majorly impactful. Good, cheap game that will likely scratch your itch.
Elite Dangerous if you want a hyper involved sandbox. It is, by far, the most "simulation" style of these games. You have controls for EVERY aspect of your ship, and even the in-ship UI is fully functional; IE, you can interact with every menu and dial that's actually in your ship. It's not just "sci fi tech" window dressing. If you actually want to feel like a space pilot living in a realistic space world, play Elite Dangerous. However, it is a COMPLETE sandbox, with virtually zero story, very little lore, and a bunch of "factions" and mission givers which are only differentiated from each other by their names. There is very little sense of it being a living, breathing world. However, it is essentially an MMO and you can join up with other players to create your own sense of meaning and belonging in the game. If you want fast paced, arcade-y flying with much less of an involved learning curve play Rebel Galaxy Outlaw. It is an almost pitch perfect spiritual sequel to Freelancer, which was itself a copy of Wing Commander. It's much of the gameplay loop of Elite Dangerous, but much more casual and accessible and with an actual story and a sense of belonging. However, it is MUCH more simplistic. I haven't played the other 2, so I can't comment on them.
Thank you for the info period I've heard of freelancer but never got to play it back in the day comma however I did play Wing Commander three and four on the PlayStation and I loved those
Everspace 2 for sure. Its gorgious.
I'll have to give the demo another shot. Last time the flight felt weird
You can fly around on planets...and even underwater!
That's kind of interesting I didn't know that.
My vote would be elite, the game used to be in a bit of a limbo state but they’ve been adding more content. It has a rags to riches playstyle but once you get at the top it becomes extremely grindy.
For my opinion: Elite Dangerous felt waaaay to grindy for me, right from the beginning. X4- is awesome and you can do exactly what you want to do, but at the same time I feel like you will be missing out on a big portion of the game if you don't want to get into fleet or running a business. Rebel Galaxy Outlaw- Love this game because it is just like Wing Commander Privateer. Everspace 2- I own this game, but I haven't actually played it yet. Something else to consider is Spacebourne 1 and 2. These games feel like a Freelancer like game. Made by a solo developer, the game seems like one of those low effort type games, but once you actually get into you you realize that its far from a low effort type games, but games where the developer put a lot of features, details, and gameplay into it. SpaceBourne 2 has the same features/gameplay as the first game, but it has a lot more features that Spacebourne 1 doesn't have, it is early access though. Another one to look into is 3030 Deathwar Redux. it's a 2d game, 2d while flying the ship that you see from the top, and 2d side scrolloer when on space stations or exploring wrecked ships. But it has everything you want in it, mining, cargo hauling, you can take on missions to deliver stuff, bounty hunting, being a "taxi" for NPCs, and many more other type of missions, you can even be a pirate. You can explore wrecked ships in your space suit in a 2d side scrolling adventure. It really is one of the best space games out there.
I'll have to check those out. Thanks a ton
Star Citizen, All Hail The King!
Absolutely love star citizen, but for now I'm looking for games I can play on my steam deck, and I don't foresee Star Citizen running at all on there LOL
SC does indeed run on the Steam Deck, but not well. But if you want to play a game, stay away, it's expensive for what it offers, it's not even worth the $45 of the basic package. There's zero gameplay there, everything is broken and there's no persistence, they wipe progress regularly. The only "impressive" things are the space to planet transitions because it's a bit more seamless than other games, and that's it.
Oh don't worry I've been following this game for a long time. I've gotten the initial package and I think I've maybe bought one or two ships on sale and had a ton of fun with the game but I definitely know it's still got a long way to go. I am very glad to see that progress seems to be accelerating as they have an entire new system implemented I believe. And I'm not sure if server meshing is working yet but I think once they get that going it'll speed up everything else too because that was like the big thing. Any idea what frame rates people are getting on the deck?
Dont overlook Chorvs please!
Elite is very difficult and really doesn’t hold your hand at all. It can be overwhelming. If you have the patience to learn a lot (much of which the game won’t tell you) and are looking for something more realistic, it’s the best option.
My top 2 would be X4 and ED. I'll be honest I've never played X4 but have several hundred hours in X3. But if you're not into the bases or fleets of X I'd 100%reccomended ED.
Yeah x4 is pretty much the best space sim out there. You don't _need_ to build a huge fleet you can direct mine and trade everything yourself. its a sandbox game do what you like.
I only ever trade/haul in elite dangerous and love it. Great sense of economy and so chill doing a huge journey for a nice payoff
ED I've got over 600 hours in it, that's not even a big number comparing with people in their sub but considering how shallow the game is the number is huge imo.
Its funny this topic came up as I've been looking for a space game myself to sink into! So I'll break down what I've learned, hopefully it will help you as well! **Elite Dangerous** Probably the best in terms of flight model. Highly recommend having a HOTAS setup as it just adds so much to the experience. There are quite a few activities to do such as transporting, mining, bounty hunting, combat missions, and exploring. That being said, it is a heavy grind. And there are times that you should just fire up a movie, youtube, or podcast and just have that going on in the background while playing as there will be downtime. As someone else mentioned, you will have moments it takes 10+ minutes or so to reach certain stations. Other times, it might take quite a while to find your particular rock to mine for minerals. Primarily a solo game with a chance to see other players but I've got 100+ hours (which isn't a lot, I know) and I've yet to see another player. If you want some space trucking, outfitting ships, and some simple missions or goals that you set yourself, or even something to just chill and kick back with, Elite would be the way to go. That being said, the Odyssey expansion has not been well received and I only recently got it and thought it was kinda "eh". Otherwise, you won't ever really leave your ship. It also feels like everything you do in the game is just for you. Unlike other games like X4 and EVE that the universe feels alive and reacts to some things you do, the universe in Elite is just a background while you play. Also, I'm personally concerned for the future of the game as I've been reading that support for it is on the decline with fewer updates, especially the layoffs that have happened at Frontier. We will see what plays out though. **X4: Foundations** X4, while a great game, is more of a management game. True, you start off flying your ship(s) and doing combat, mining, hauling, etc, but the game is focused around the universe and its simulated economy. If you build a station that produces Energy Cells, you well affect the price of those in all nearby zones. If you set up a whole fleet of mining ships, you'll attract the alien races to stop you. It does a great job simulating a universe with cause and effect situations. Flight model, is not that great and the same goes for its U.I. The game generally aims to turn into an RTS game about halfway or so as you will manage your fleet and stations. You can also walk around your ships as stations, but its kinda bare to do so. Based on what you were looking for, as much of praise as I can say about X4, I don't think this is what you are looking for. X4 recently had a new expansion come out along with a whole game update to 7.0 which just keeps adding more and more features and Quality of life improvements and I can see more being added in the future as well! **Everspace 2** I've not played too much of this one but what I did, it was alright. Its a VERY arcade like flying shooter. Its fun, but not a simulation at all. More of a Diablo ARPG in space as you will find all kinds of loot to upgrade and outfit the ships. My experience with it was mostly on rails with where to go and the mission objective but I might not have gotten far enough into it to really experience all of it. I also know you don't leave the ship at all. And there will be a lot more puzzles and such later in the game, some of which that I heard get rather repetitive. Not a space Sim, but still a fun game if you are looking for a game that does have an ending. **No Man's Sky** Honestly, based on what you said, I'd suggest No Man's Sky. True it will be a bit more cartoony but don't let that put you off. Its got a fun, a bit arcade like flight model. You can get out of your ship and run around. Like Elite, there are several things to do and you are better off setting your own goals. Take up some hauling missions, combat missions, explore, or even jump into the expeditions and such. Build up your own capital ship and fleet, that's pretty easy to manage by just telling the ship to go out on missions from a screen. And its cool to see all the different planets and such as there is a nice variety. The economy in the game isn't really fleshed out, so hauling things around, I never noticed me selling stuff really affecting the prices but I could be wrong. Eventually, you might even find a planet you really like and wanna settle down on it and build a base, but its entirely optional. And the game is still getting massive updates which is cool that they are keeping the game alive! It does feel that its as wide as the ocean but only 2 inches deep though. But that also makes it easy to play for a while, take a break, then come back when a new update comes out to see the changes. And it does have multiplayer, so you can join up with a friend and enjoy the game together. Hopefully that will help. Personally, even though it sounds like I dissed it a bit, I've been having a lot of fun playing Elite this past week. I was really torn between Elite and EVE (as I'm taking a break from X4) . And I love everything about EVE except for playing EVE... So that's why I decided to commit to Elite Dangerous. I've had a fun, even just casually playing. Its brought some seriously funny moments, like when I did core mining to blow up an asteroid and I didn't get far enough away from it and blew up my ship as well. Little bit of swearing and laughing at the same time but I was fine with it. If you have a HOTAS (or can get one), I'd suggest Elite, otherwise No Man's Sky might be closer to what you are looking for. Feel free to ask any other questions if you have them and I'll do what I can to answer them!
Oh I've played No Man's Sky since the beginning. And I'm one of the weirdos who liked it in the beginning. It's really fun but I've played it for like what 7 years now? And I'm also looking for something a little bit less survival crafting and artsy, and little bit more "realistic" artstyle, and a bit more immersion. I really like Star Citizen but it will definitely not run on the deck and it's obviously not a real game yet, and I do really like Starfield but it's just missing a lot of those immersive elements that I want too many loading screens and your vehicle doesn't need gas or ammo, and cargo runs were really disappointing you literally just launched and fly to the place and land and it's done. I get that there's not much more that can be happening with it, but it's that immersive thing where I'd like to go at least to a terminal or to a person and say Here's your delivery. Same with mine and it was just shooting at rocks and then you get the stuff. Which makes sense that's what you do in every game basically but it's that immersion again, I want to do it with a mining laser and I want to maybe have to scan for the proper rocks. I don't want to shoot missiles and ballistic ammo at a rock and somehow get minerals from it
Check out Elite Dangerous mining videos, especially ones on Core Mining! Elite doesn't have the on foot delivery of objects, but you are scanning for minerals and either gonna laser parts off to scoop up via ship or limpets. Or you will look for "cores", launch seismic charges and blow the damn thing up. Then use some tools to break off the ores and collect. Hella sayisfying!
That sounds really cool period I'll have to check it out. I still await the perfect space game that has equal parts space and ground. I used to think that was going to be Starfield but they really disappointed me with the space stuff even after crafting such a fantastic shipbuilder that point it all directions to space being important. Who knows maybe Star Citizen will be finished one of these days and become perfect
I haven't played them all, but I can say for the first few weeks of E:D, I was constantly floored by the sound design in the game. Just picked up x4 and so far it's been pretty meh all around, but I haven't given it a fair shake yet.
If you don't mind the gray market, global steam keys for Rebel Galaxy Outlaw go for like, a dollar on steam key seller websites. I really like the game but it has a mid score on steam.
Don't go for rebel galaxy outlaws then but rebel galaxy. The first game. You have your own ship, you can do missions, you upgrade, fight and the combat is really damn fun.
Is that not the case for the second one?
Yes but you are a fighter type. In the original you have much bigger ships you can choose from with way more guns. I found that to be much more fun than the dogfights in RGO
I'd personally recommend the first Rebel Galaxy over Outlaws. Absolute BLAST if you haven't played it yet. Otherwise, I don't really have a horse in this race.
X4 for MASSIVE Space Sim Elite Dangerous for Large, Solo Ship Space Sim-lite Also I can Suggest Space Bourne 2 (Even though its in Early Access its is EXCELLENT)
I tried an hour or so of spaceborne but couldn't tell if it was just hanky or an asset flip or what. It's interesting, but so far nothing really works well. Sounds, textures mechanics, everything feels half done. I guess that makes sense for early access but it is indeed very rough for me right now
You tried Spacebourne 2? Its Very Good if you REALLY get into it and understand all of the Systems I saw your other comment that you are a on a Steam Deck, so that will probably limit your choices and I don't have any experience with since I only PC with Keyboard and Mouse
IDK maybe it's just me but nothing really felt good. The movement was weird The Sounds were weird the textures are all over the place there doesn't really seem to be like a vision for the art style that's why I assumed at first that it was like an asset flip. It might just be that it's not good with controller because everything just feels bad the flying especially as a very kind of rigid jagginess to it and rolling is very awkward too
I guess to add to my comment, it looks very interesting but as of right now nothing feels good which kind of ruins any sort of interestingness about it for me. But this might also be a me problem because one area that is extra rough is controller support and I'm playing on Steam deck so it's important on my end and there's just several things that just don't work on a controller and several buttons that seem to be mapped but it doesn't tell me what button they're mapped to and none of the buttons seem to do anything so I'm assuming it's a combination of buttons that it's just not telling me so I'm having a very rough time trying to play it
Everspace 1 is better game to E2 IMO. First game was more rouge like and difficult on Normal even. Should be super cheap. You also collect materials for upgrades on each run. But it's 99% space shooter.
I agree with this completely. The second's attempt at being a looter shooter just feels grindy to me
I’ve only played Elite Dangerous and Rebel Galaxy Outlaws. I adored the first Rebel Galaxy but found Outlaws kind of annoying. All the enemies level up with you so there’s no point in getting more powerful. Elite Dangerous is super cool at first, then it feels really shallow. Get Freelancer :)
Why aren't you considering No Man's Sky? Seems to fit right in amongst these.
Well I've been playing no man's Sky for about seven years And honestly I'm looking for something a bit more immersive And With a more realistic art style than artsy and survival crafty. I also didn't love the space content as much as the planetary content. The flying was a bit boring as well.
That's fair. I only picked it up a few weeks ago, and I'm pretty into it so far. I have played Everspace 2 and Elite Dangerous. Everspace 2 was a little too "arcadey" for me, while Elite Dangerous was just wayyyyy too intense.
That's the thing for me. Nms is arcadey combat and stuff, but although I love how detailed elite is, it's soo damn complicated
They keep adding more stupid shit to Star Citizen, and I literally just want Freelancer 2 FFS.
Well I've been told that everspace 2 and rebel galaxy outlaws are very much like freelancer
Everspace 2 was really good, very reminiscent of it. I never got around to quite finishing it, I think about halfway through. Recently reinstalled it on my Deck, need to get around to beating it.
I like Everspace 1 a bit better than 2. The open world means too much traveling, its not bad but 1 is still a bit better. Best about RGO is the soundtrack, story is superthin, missions are not really fun and no strafe feels weird...especially in space where you need alot of thrusters for full control. ED and SC are just a bit too complicated. Do I wanna keep an eye on the laser temperature while mining shit? No only that it makes abs no sense, but its just a bit tooooo much.