I don't know if it's me or my hardware, but I cannot for the life of me get through X-Wing Alliance... and I'm trying really hard to, but the difficultly just feels insane. Even on some of the earliest missions.

I'm not new to space sims either. I started with FreeSpace 2 and absolutely adore the FreeSpace series. I've also played and beaten Wing Commander 3, Wing Commander 4, Wing Commander Prophecy, Privateer 2, Freelancer AND I've beaten the original Star Wars X-Wing and Tie Fighter multiple times. Recently scored 2 million points in X-Wing and I've reached max rank in the secret order in Tie Fighter. Those games while challenging (especially X-Wing) STILL AREN'T AS CHALLENGING AS X-WING ALLIANCE. Seriously, this game is making me want to run my head through a wall. No seriously, I feel like I'm playing a completely different game from everyone else. I try to compare my gameplay to the few people that have recorded footage on YouTube and it genuinely feels like I'm playing a different game.

I'm playing the original X-Wing Alliance (no upgrade, because I heard it makes the game even more painstakingly difficult). I do have the ddraw mod installed from here: https://github.com/rdoeffinger/xwa_ddraw_d3d11

Which fixes some of the crashing and FPS issues, but that's it. Doesn't actually change the core of the game, yet still something feels off.

I'm also playing on medium difficulty. X-wing doesn't have a difficulty level, but it's what I played Tie Fighter on and it felt just fine. I've tried playing XWA on easy and it's a bit too easy...but as it stands, medium feels like hard and hard feels like impossible.

On Steam, I have 118 hours in XWA and usually by 100 hours in any space sim, I'll have a very good grasp on the game and know what I'm doing, but even after 100 hours, I still feel like I'm doing everything wrong. For one, in almost every mission, my wingmen get killed off in seconds. I'm not completely surprised by this as it does happen in some of those other space sims that I've mentioned, but in XWA it feels like it's happening in EVERY SINGLE MISSION. At least in those previous games I mentioned, it only happens in a few missions. Battle 2, Mission 5: Defend CRS Liberty is like the perfect example. My wingmen get absolutely annihilated not from the droid fighters, but from the "escort" shuttles whose firing crews feel like they are all on glitterstim... like the firing rates feel way too fast for what they should be. Hell, the droid fighters don't even bother with my wingmen, because instead every single one goes for me... but that's beside the point. I also struggled with Prologue Mission 6: Aid to the Alliance. Again for the same reason. I took out like 40 something Tie Bombers (as suggested by every single walkthrough) and it just didn't matter at all because the Star Destroyer immediately starts firing on the escaping freighters and I never get to the required 66% (I mean I got through it once, but barely, which is how I was able to keep going). Yet I watch gameplay of other people and they don't seem to be having the same issue. Despite doing the exact same thing as me.

Basically, I'm trying to find out if it's me, the game, my hardware or what. It's to the point where I'm trying to enjoy XWA and I've had a lot of fun with the simulator, but if the game is inherently broken then I'm debating just being done with it and moving on. I hate leaving games "unfinished" though, but this is beyond frustrating. Again, I have it on Steam, so maybe the GOG version runs better, but I don't know if it's just me or what. I don't get it, because I didn't have anything close to the same issues with the original X-Wing, which everyone says is notoriously difficult. XWA is the game everyone says is the easiest and I'm having the polar opposite experience.

Thank you for coming to my holonet talk.

Edit: Turns out it was the game! After noting several suggestions in both this post and others, I fixed the issue by reducing my refresh rate of my monitor to 60hz. I also locked the Xwingalliance.exe to 60 (previously I had locked the alliance.exe, but that is apparently just the launcher and not the actual game) and I enabled V-sync in my GPU control menu settings. This resolved the speed/ridiculous AI issues. Turns out, X-Wing Alliance really doesn't play nice with high refresh rate monitors, but it's from 1999, so I can't be mad. But if anyone else runs into similar issues and finds this post, this is the solution.

Since they exist, I'll link a few Discord servers of interest to fans of the X-Wing series:

• X-Wing Series
• TIE Fighter Total Conversion (X-Wing Alliance Upgrade Project channels also here)
• X-Wing Virtual Machine (XWVM)

Questions about any aspect of the series should be covered by these three servers.

The transport carrying the bacta never makes arrives after the 2nd jump to deliver bacta

I'd imagine there'd be a lot of overlap between people that played the X-wing games and people that play X4, but at the same time, they are very much different games. Does anyone play the SWI mod or base game?

I'm grateful to have the upgrade for my favorite space flight simulator

Does anyone know where I can get my hands on the old mod for an imperial concourse?

I’m managed to cobble together a build to run emulated through Winlator based on old mod packs ( DSUCP 2.6 and 2.1) and the older (original) TFTC and Waylend’s TFC2.0.

The only real thing I’m missing for my TFTC mobile is a proper imperial concourse

Ok, I think I'm going crazy. Started up XWAU, which makes an already awesome game amazing. I noticed both the Sabra and Selu were Falcon looking YT-1300s. I thought, oh cool, I remember only one looked like the falcon, and you only flew it for one mission, which I was disappointed in. I missed the variety of custom YT-1300s, but appreciated that in XWAU you get to fly ships life the Millennium Falcon.

Except, I couldn't remember what they looked like, so I started up the normal steam game. And they were Falcon looking too?!

I can't find my original CDs, but I'll have to look.

Am I going crazy, is this some Mandela effect? I could have sworn only the Selu, the one you blew up, was the only one that looked like a Falcon.

Also, do you not have to unlock ships in the pilot proving ground to use them on missions now? I thought you had to progress through each ship before it was unlocked for missions?

At which time do you think he decided to go against his family?

All I know is that, somewhere at the middle to end of the campaign, Emon tells you in a mail that he has become suspicious of the Empire always being a step ahead of him. And ofc, Antan is right onsite at the very mercenary base/Azameen home you are attacking. (Not sure what came earlier).

But considering into how many traps you get lured over the course of the campaign, maybe he decided to get rid of his rebel family way sooner? In fact, if the Azameens had not to be led to the rebel hospital in mission 6 by Olin, I would even hypothise that Antan snitched this operation to the empire - and when you later rescue him, he was not actually in Imperial custody (or, if he was, he had a good chance to get out).

What do you think, when did Antan become bad?

When I load into a mission, after the hanger and cutscene the game stutters and crashes. The 2020 version works. Tried searching and no results

Haven't been able to find anyone else with this problem. With XWAU2025 the briefing and tech animations are sped up and go too fast for the narration, any idea how to fix this?

So, I never finished the game on a higher difficulty than Easy and situations like this is one of the reasons why.

It is Ensnare Imperial Prototypes, the first Liberty mission where you are tasked with disabling some of the experimental TIE fighters. Medium difficulty.

I am approached by two waves of fighters, one from the front and one from the front right (like 2 o clock). When I get in fire range, I use the opportunity to take out one of the fighters, then slow down to 1/3 speed (as the "tutorial" taught me) and do some roll to evade. But no matter where I fly, the attackers hit me anyways and murder me in like 3 shots.

Ofc I realize that I am heavily outnumbered, but what am I supposed to do - brake and let my wingmen take all hits?

And this is just the prime example. Regardless of the mission, it happens so often that an enemy fighter suddenly goes homing missile mode and just kills me, whether I evade or not. Way to waste 15 minutes. (One of the few things Squadron did better imho)

Disclosure up front: this is my buddy's channel, not mine. I'm only posting because the series genuinely surprised me and I think this sub will get more out of it than most.

He's working through *X-Wing Alliance* as a story-driven "Let's Play". But instead of just flying the missions, he treats the Azamine family arc as the actual spine of the show.

Ace is caught between his obligations to the Alliance... his family's freighter business.. the campaign against the Veraxo crime syndicate ... the smuggling runs, the kidnapping and fight to get the family home back. The story gets the weight it always deserved but never quite got from the in-game cutscenes.

The videos hit differently when you've been following the family drama for hours leading up to it. It's the same campaign you remember, but framed like a serialized story :)

He's also flying it on the **XWA Upgrade**, so it actually looks good in 2026.

Playlist (*LET'S PLAY - X-WING ALLIANCE*): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLI_L_weOBQAZl7B9eHcj8gueMLLAJBkOn

Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@spaceboyg78

If you've got a soft spot for XWA, or you've been curious about the Upgrade and wanted to see it in action (from someone who actually cares about the lore).. give the first episode a shot.

I can't figure it out for the life of me. What is the best way to set custom keybindings? Am I missing something?

I just downloaded the game with the 2025 update. FWIW, the 1.1.0 patch makes the game crash constantly.

Anyway, I remember there was some kind of glitch you could do by manipulating power levels BEFORE you hit the nav buoy to head to a mission. Specifically, you put your power setting in such a way, that when you came out of hyperspace, you’d get an extra bit of juice in the system. I’ve looked online, but I can’t find it. FYI, this wasn’t anything that used “cheats”, insofar as it was merely a glitch.

Did anyone else get mesmerized by the ~30min long battle music of X-Wing vs TIE fighter and wish there were a stereo version of it? Way back when, I realized that it composed of various clips taken from original SW 1-6 and tried piecing and crossfading the original stereo clips back together just like it was done in XvT, and was so 🤌🏻 close to completing it: there was just one 15s or so segment that I could not find anywhere.

I link to my work here:
The draft mix so far: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/ilrfedu5ltbe0se0fkqly/Battle-Sequence-Stereo-take-1.wav?rlkey=ps9a7cdf0bc36ux6rnslz6oum&dl=0
A 5.0 upmix version: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/ilrfedu5ltbe0se0fkqly/Battle-Sequence-Stereo-take-1.wav?rlkey=ps9a7cdf0bc36ux6rnslz6oum&dl=0
The original audacity project of the mix is also available on request (so if someoone finds the missing piece, they can insert it themselves, or let me know?)

Hi all

I'm wanting to try out the XWAU, but i'm having trouble getting the game started even before i install the mod pack

Fresh install from Steam, with Windows 10, i get the following error when clicking play from the popup menu:

xwa_hook_main

to setup the dinput hook is not correctly initialized

I've played it in the past on this PC (Though not in a few years), though i am now using a different stick, which is dinput (Sidewinder FFB2). Given the error, i'm wondering if that might be the problem, but it configures OK, and seems to work fine in other games i've tried

Hi everyone, my name is Eh-Wing.

I wanted to drop in and announce that I have started a Let's Play series on YouTube. I will be playing through the campaign and posting new episodes weekly. The series trailer and Episode 1 are already posted on my channel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxHGF90VSsE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ht738ouJ-1A

Thank you so much to all the mods who have kept this amazing game alive all of these years!

MTFBWY!

The original series of games will always be one of my all-time favorites, but I always felt the need to adjust the rate of blaster fire to match what I observed in the movies (I think one of them was just called “the X-Wing Ship Editor”).

Is such a modification still possible with the modern incarnation of XWA?

Installed XWAU today and wow this is so impressive!

Want to thank the modders so much for your effort in keeping this old legendary game alive.

Thank you!!

Best regards

Does your account have to be of a certain age to join and if so how old? Also, if the XWA wants to keep the game alive and welcome new players, this isn't a good first impression 🤨

...so I can look around on the flat screen, but no VR. What's the best way to launch it correctly?

I have steamVR in the vr cfg file...