I got these years ago on steam and while I did find them enjoyable (300 and 270 hours respectively oO) I ended up becoming equally frustrated with this series and it's bugs. Some minor, like auto-docking collisions, and some others that were game breaking, crashes, etc. The fact that some of these bugs seemed to persist thru iterations of the game lead me to believe it was the game engine itself that was mostly to blame. Full disclosure I did mod quite heavily and the developers would surely be quick to point out that was my problem. But I encountered most of the bugs in an unmodded game as well. Not to mention I personally enjoyed these games only in their modded forms.

That all said I was wondering if the X series has become more stable over the years? It might bring me back if that's the case...

*edit* Looking at steam reviews for X:AP it appears there is still some issues (performance mainly) with large engagements or station complexes when in system. Even with a newer machine. My guess is the underlying engine doesn't multi-thread well. The solution seems to command your fleets (or station building) from OOS (out of system, aka remotely). Which reminded me of some of the headaches of complex building in X:TC. Because of collision detection being enabled/checked if you were in system while trying to place a space station it was better to do OOS so the transport didn't run into another ship or station trying to maneuver (especially in crowded systems). It is interesting that they added the stock exchange for further money making in X:AP. It's just sad to think it's very hard to impossible to have large Cap vs. Cap battles.