IAmSinistar: Damn regional pricing. It's 50% off ($20) in the US. I went ahead and bought it, then used the extra Blue Coins to pick up The Inner World. :)
Thanks again for the offer mate, I really appreciate it. But I would have felt really bad if you had picked it up at that European price.
Well, congratulations on your purchase. Now you have the hard choice of deciding which game to play first :D. I haven't played the first yet, but X2 is a bit more difficult then X3:R. Also I've played X3:TC for the longest time and have the largest empire (because of a plot of course).
On the other hand X3:R had a nice bug which let you group a huge imensely, huge complex in some sector.. but that can be done through scripting too.
There are some mods that can make life easier, without being cheats, but they will mark your savegame as modified. So it's up to you if you want to use them...