Elite: Dangerous Discussion

[Chaz]

That said, when Horizons failed to sell well, I think FDEV was forced to move on from Elite. Look for new sources of revenue. The game went on the back burner, and I honestly dont think its has its own dedicated dev team since Horizons. All of the mechanics are so clearly rushed and bolted on, it really suggests scatter brained, part time development.

They’re a games developer, I don’t think their intention was or has ever been just to rely on Elite as their sole source of income. Of course they’re going to be making other games like Planet Coaster and Jurassic Park thingy. The latter of which I believe has sold quite well. They made other games before Elite and they’ll continue to do so afterwards. Most reasonably sized game developers and many not so big ones, will usually have a few irons in the fire. Also they have stated time and time again that ED has its own development team, apparently around about 200 strong, and I’m guessing that includes everyone from artists to server techs etc.

I don’t think ED is on the back burner over at FD towers, but development is certainly slow that’s for sure, or certainly seems that way from our perspective, but then we have no idea what else they’re been working on in the background for the game as they’re always so secretive about it. We know they’ve got much improved planetary tech, because they demoed it and it was at one point going to be part of this update, but have held it back until… when? We don’t know, because we don’t know what they’re working on for the next major paid milestone update as they put it.

[ThatFuzzyTiger]

Jurassic Park apparently didn’t do so well. Dunno about Planet Coaster, that seems to be doing pretty okay (and the DLC if any indicator is keeping that title nicely profitable). That said, I’ve a nasty feeling E:D will be moving to maintenance mode now Beyond is done, because there’s not the funds to really do much with it. There’s not an increasing playerbase, there’s not a glut of people buying into Horizons to get all the new stuff, content drops tend to be individual ships or cosmetics they can monetise, and other games are coming out which whilst not nailing ED’s flight model, are proving to be more complete experiences (X4 being a good example).

And as much as I hate to say this - No Man’s Sky has gone from being terribad proc-gen mess to actually good game where proc-gen underpins the goings on, but it has a lot more to it where you can just mess around in a big sandboxy environment. ED isn’t evolving beyond throwing thargoids at us, it’s not even managed ice or lava planets yet.

[Det.Bullock]

I just reached Sagittarius A for the first time yesterday (it took me two months of playing on and off to get there):

I also did a good a good chunk of the return trip to Gandharvi, at first I used a route generator to shave off a few jumps using neutron stars but then I got annoyed with all that alt-tabbing, so now I’ll probably do the remaining 130 jumps according to the in-game route generator.

I just wish there was an option to privilege neutron stars a bit more in-game, sometimes the in-game route generator seems to actively avoid them even if I check the relative options.

[Chaz]

I just reached Sagittarius A for the first time yesterday (it took me two months of playing on and off to get there):

Congratulations, nice one! I’ve still not bothered to make that trip yet, and certainly not Colonia, but I will some day. The furthest I’ve been out is about 5000ly. With the new scanning mechanics now though, my next trip out should be a bit further and faster, although that would depend of whether I bother to map stuff too. So far I’ve only bothered mapping the odd few planets that have geological activity.

[Det.Bullock]

I just reached Sagittarius A for the first time yesterday (it took me two months of playing on and off to get there):

Congratulations, nice one! I’ve still not bothered to make that trip yet, and certainly not Colonia, but I will some day. The furthest I’ve been out is about 5000ly. With the new scanning mechanics now though, my next trip out should be a bit further and faster, although that would depend of whether I bother to map stuff too. So far I’ve only bothered mapping the odd few planets that have geological activity.

For now I’ve only surface mapped earth-likes and also terraformables if they weren’t too remote and the odd landable planet I wanted to to land on, recently I have passed a neutron star binary system that had 5 terraformables but I didn’t bother because the star they orbited was at 35.000 light seconds.
I always to an integral scan of the system though, unless the system is a monstrous orrery of tens of rocky planets in eccentric orbits it’s usually over in less than a minute.
I got close to Sagittarius A two years ago already but I travelled with a Python then and I was on a timer because of a long range passenger mission, it’s much more relaxing with a real long range ship and without a timer.

[Det.Bullock]

Got back to Gandharvi and I almost doubled my fortune upon selling the data, there is a strong possibility the rest of my return trip might make me a billionaire.

I had to play in Open because of a Solo server problem but fortunately I didn’t get ganked on my unarmored unarmed AspX, also I finally got my hull repaired after that scrape I took trying to to a canyon run.

I just wish the codex allowed to see my total discoveries instead of only the ones in a selected sector.

[Dave_L]

So the big Liberum financial report on Frontier that came out today makes your and Blackcompany’s gleeful handwringing about Frontier’s dire financial state look pretty stupid right about now.

[Blackcompany]

I wasnt hand wringing. I was only citing the truth of their last reveal. If they are doing better now, great.

Care to explain why, if things are so wonderful, they still cannot be bothered to add fun, engaging game play mechanics to their game?

[Det.Bullock]

I wasnt hand wringing. I was only citing the truth of their last reveal. If they are doing better now, great.

Care to explain why, if things are so wonderful, they still cannot be bothered to add fun, engaging game play mechanics to their game?

Because they chose the MMO route and thus they need the experience to be consistent for everyone, it’s not a single player game where you can add and change stuff to make the player more the center of the universe without ruining someone else’s fun in the process.

[Blackcompany]

Nice strawman.

No one is asking to be the center of the universe. Just for something more engaging than RNG Grind and mobile style minigames.

But I guess they cant so that, either.

[Det.Bullock]

Nice strawman.

No one is asking to be the center of the universe. Just for something more engaging than RNG Grind and mobile style minigames.

But I guess they cant so that, either.

Have you ever played any other open world spacesim? They are basically made of grind in single player already, making them on-line only exacerbates these problems. Hell, I still remember when X3 asked me to do an effing Sudoku for a hacking minigame. Also, you alternatively lamented both lack and excess of gameplay over the years, it’s quite clear you don’t know what you want, why for example the pool table to get parts in RGO isn’t a mobile minigame while tuning sensors is?

[BillButNotBen]

I realize this might start another argument, but hopefully not, but I was wondering which game people would recommend for an immersive experience flying around, exploring and mostly seeing cool stuff, with a gamepad or mouse rather than a joystick.

I’d looked at these games from a distance, but didn’t have the hardware to run any of them. Now, suddenly, games like Elite and No Man’s Sky are possibilities and I can put them back on my wishlist.

I used to love space sims back in the day (Tie Fighter, etc…) but I’m usually of the opinion that without a joystick they suck. But I don’t have a joystick these days, and i do like the idea of exploring beautiful looking space/worlds.
I doubt I’ll commit a lot of time, so deep complex mechanics aren’t really necessary.
Am I right in thinking NMS’s strengths are on-planet, and ED’s strengths are in space?
I can’t say I’m all that interested in the base building bit.

[TheDreamlord]

Am I right in thinking NMS’s strengths are on-planet, and ED’s strengths are in space?

Sounds about right. I would say give NMS a go, it plays great with mouse and keyboard (and controller too) and it has a creative mode which allows you to do away with the grind and just move about the universe and planets to your heart’s content to see the sights.

[alms]

I almost bought No Man’s Sky in the Lunar sale, but I was left the impression the game has responded to ‘walking sim’ criticism by throwing the whole survival’em up kit and particularly the kitchen and sink, except it’s not terribly well realized.

NMS is often compared unfavorably to Subnautica, too, which did not help in my case.

/ OT

[Chaz]

I used to love space sims back in the day (Tie Fighter, etc…) but I’m usually of the opinion that without a joystick they suck. But I don’t have a joystick these days, and i do like the idea of exploring beautiful looking space/worlds.

I would say go for NMS then. The space flight bit is rather ropey, but it’s serviceable. There is a base building aspect to it now, but it’s entirely optional as it was never there from the get go and has just been added as a bit of extra fluff, as folks were asking for it. You can buy a big capital ship and use that as a moveable base too. So you don’t have to set up camp on a home planet is you don’t want to. No idea what the grind is like now, but when I tried it quite a while back it was pretty heavy, and considering I like playing Elite a lot, that’s probably saying something. The grind btw, primarily seemed associated with unlocking more inventory slots, which when you first start, is by far your biggest limitation. They’ve improved a lot about the game since I last tried it though, so it could be a lot better now.

[Blackcompany]

Late 2020. Officially. The next content release is now late 2020.

I’m sorry folks. I didn’t want to right, but…well, dont forget to turn out the lights.

[Chaz]

Here is the official post by the community manager regarding it.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/479122-Important-Community-Update-(01-03)

Well that’s one fuck of a wait, even if there are going to be minor QoL improvements along the way. Speculation of course is rife as to what the next big update will be, but most are thinking it’s going include a major overhaul to the game engine, which I get the feeling is kind of holding them back somewhat currently with the kind of game related stuff they’re able to implement. But well, 2nd half of 2020, that’s quite some time, even Star Citizen might be out by then.

[Sarfrin]

even Star Citizen might be out by then

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

You were joking, right?

[riesje]

welp we now know the reason https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2019/03/06/frontier-making-mysterious-new-licensed-game-and-i-bet-i-know-what/

basicly its the same trick they did when Beyond was announced (and put all effort into JWE), only now they have even less resources commited to ED.

[TheDreamlord]

Indeed, I had the same thoughts.