Lower your Expectations for ED

[IstvaanDCIV]

I'd just like to remind people that this entire debate started because X4 was "disqualified" as a comparable game to Elite Dangerous (despite the great big long list of similarities I provided) because it's not an "MMO", whereas supposedly Star Citizen is, and thus that is why Star Citizen is the only comparable game to Elite Dangerous, and since Star Citizen is just a broken alpha tech demo, that means Elite Dangerous is the ONLY true (and bestest ever) space game out there.

Somehow I'm playing X4 almost identically to the way I spent most of my time playing Elite (only better), but I guess that's because of my ignorance of what an MMO is.

I'm not familiar with X4. Looking it up, the latest game appears to be a single player offering. I suspect that lack of inter-player interaction - even if indirect, as in ED's Solo mode - is largely the reason why people are discounting it.

I've not played Star Citizen, and likely never will because its monetisation structure is complete gash. But from what I understand, it "is set to feature over 90 star systems with around 300 planets", according to GameRant. That sounds positively microscopic in comparison.

 

[Northpin]

So basically, it's an mmo I can play as a single player game by using Solo mode. Got it.

you actually dont seem to get it, since there is no single player game in solo mode.
it's just another instance.

and it's valid for PG too not only for Solo mode and to a lesser extent to Open too (if i'm in open but not in the same instance with you it's still a mmo)

 

[Ian Doncaster]

It's unfortunate that "Massively Singleplayer Online" never really took off as a description, because it's a much better one for Elite Dangerous (and various other games as well):
- you can in theory meet any one of the other hundreds of thousands of players because you are all in the same shared game universe, but you don't have to
- there are minimal quantitative incentives or requirements to do so if you aren't into socialising as an end in itself, and very limited in-game tools to discover players you don't already know

ED adds an interesting twist to the MSO genre in that the background simulation layers mean that you can't always avoid the indirect consequences of other players doing things, and some people might not consider it a "proper" MSO on that basis.

Elite Dangerous is a Massively Multiplayer Space Sim. It features cockpit-based combat, trading, and exploration, all in a massively multiplayer online environment. The only game that come close to this is Star Citizen. To the best of my knowledge, the only other developing games aiming for this type of gameplay were Starbase and Dual Universe... both of which seem to have died in the past year or two.

I think there is an extremely narrow overlap between "crazy enough to attempt a jack-of-all-trades space game" and "grounded enough to get something playable released at all".

No-one sensible would attempt to support galaxy-scale lone exploration and EVE-style multiplayer territory conflict in the same game (for one example of many!). The things needed to do one well actively conflict with the things needed to do the other well far beyond mere dilution of effort. And yet ED wouldn't be ED if people couldn't have come back from exploring together on Distant Worlds (the original) to immediately start yelling at each other about who should have the honour of coming second to Yuri Grom in the Dangerous Games.

 

[Shabine]

you actually dont seem to get it, since there is no single player game in solo mode.

Oh no, I get it. The point I'm making is that the experience is effectively single player, so I'm just calling it what it is. I mean, you can keep deluding yourself that it isn't, but in practice it is. Solo mode is single player. You play alone. No one else can instance with you. No one is in your system. No one can talk to you or do anything with you. Because you're completely alone in your own instance that encompasses the entire galaxy.

And I'm done arguing about this, because it's silly.

 

[Morbad]

For me, you need a good single player game before you can make a good MP game.

Most of the best multiplayer games I've played either didn't have a single player game, or the single player aspects were an afterthought that was essentially ignored.

Not saying a single player game can't be used as a foundation for a good multiplayer experience, but the goals and considerations are usually quite different.

ED is a peer-to-peer multiplayer game with a solo play mode. To pretend that it's an mmo is pointless. It isn't one, because no other game within the category has the option to completely opt out of multiplayer encounters while still affecting a gameworld we all share.

I'd argue a significant fraction of games that are explicitly marketed as MMOs are less multiplayer than Elite: Dangerous.

Most PvE MMOs and most especially the party-based theme park types, have very little in the way of multiplayer encounters outside the parties one must explicitly opt into. They also don't have any persistent background game/narrative that one can influence.

ED isn't an mmo, not because everyone isn't on a single shard, but because it's a game that can be played as a single player title while also being online and affecting a shared galaxy.

Most MMORPGs I've played can be played as single player titles, but don't have any shared game to influence (outside of things like auction houses perhaps). I'm not sure how lack of the shared game, lack of any requirement for even abstract multiplayer, is supposed to make these games more massively multiplayer.

 

[Shabine]

I think we've reached a point where we can say, without any hesitation, that everything is an mmo. GTA5? mmo, because it has an online mode. Raft? That's an mmo, because people can see other people's rafts at the login screen. Total War games? Totally mmos, because there are multiplayer battles that a lot of people participate in. Uno? That's an mmo. I mean, you can't play it alone. Pogostuck? Another great mmo. I can see all the other players who are playing it at the same time as me.

These are all mmos. I think we can all agree on that.

 

[Old Duck]

I'm not familiar with X4. Looking it up, the latest game appears to be a single player offering. I suspect that lack of inter-player interaction - even if indirect, as in ED's Solo mode - is largely the reason why people are discounting it.

I totally understand people who play Elite for the multiplayer aspect discounting X4 because of the lack thereof. I just don't think that's the majority of players, as becomes very clear whenever someone suggests "Open Only XYZ", so discounting X4 en masse because of this one difference is doing a disservice to solo players who don't care about ED as an "MMO" (of which there are many).

As for the BGS, X4 also has a BGS, and a way better one at that. The difference is that in Elite, players shape the BGS, whereas in X4, NPCs shape the BGS. There are literally thousands of persistent NPCs in X4 that actually have to fly their ships just like I do in order to move goods from station to station, flip systems though combat and other means, affect prices and supply chains, etc. This effect is way more noticeable in X4 than it ever was in Elite to me. The only thing missing is the ability to get on Discord and talk about religion and politics how your friends are going to work together to manipulate the BGS, if that's your thing, but on the other hand, I can hire as many NPCs as I want to fly my ships and affect X4's BGS as a "team". So it's not Elite's BGS that makes it different than X4, unless you're specifically using the BGS as a social gathering, kinda like Bingo night at the senior home.

One of the reasons I'm so vocal about this is that I avoided X4 Foundations for well over a year because people, like the ones in this thread, kept telling me that X4 is not at all comparable to Elite, and I believed them. They were and remain to be wrong, and I'm glad I finally tried it for myself to see just how wrong they are. Not that any of this has anything to do with the OP... I blame the dude that started with "Elite is the only true and bestest space game out there!"

 

[Jack Winter]

I'd imagine that it's probably always worthwhile to form one's own opinion about a game instead of relying on hearsay!

 

[Old Duck]

I think we've reached a point where we can say, without any hesitation, that everything is an mmo.

No Man's Sky is definitely an MMO by definitions in this thread. I'm being serious, and I've played it that way myself. But people will disqualify it as a valid comparison to Elite because of art style or flight model (something X4 does much more comparably to Elite). So this really isn't about Elite being an MMO or not, it's about arbitrary rules that prevent anyone comparing any space game except Star Citizen to Elite, which in this forum is always done to make Elite look good.

 

[Shabine]

So this really isn't about Elite being an MMO or not, it's about arbitrary rules that prevent anyone comparing any space game except Star Citizen to Elite, which in this forum is always done to make Elite look good.

To be fair, this old pig needs all the lipstick it can get.

 

[metatheurgist]

I think we've reached a point where we can say, without any hesitation, that everything is an mmo. GTA5? mmo, because it has an online mode. Raft? That's an mmo, because people can see other people's rafts at the login screen. Total War games? Totally mmos, because there are multiplayer battles that a lot of people participate in. Uno? That's an mmo. I mean, you can't play it alone. Pogostuck? Another great mmo. I can see all the other players who are playing it at the same time as me.

These are all mmos. I think we can all agree on that.

That's cool. Like how all games are RPGs, 'cos you play a role in all of them.

 

[Morbad]

I think we've reached a point where we can say, without any hesitation, that everything is an mmo. GTA5? mmo, because it has an online mode. Raft? That's an mmo, because people can see other people's rafts at the login screen. Total War games? Totally mmos, because there are multiplayer battles that a lot of people participate in. Uno? That's an mmo. I mean, you can't play it alone. Pogostuck? Another great mmo. I can see all the other players who are playing it at the same time as me.

These are all mmos. I think we can all agree on that.

Some incarnations of GTA5 might be MMOs. There are persistent servers that accept and react to contributions from far more players than my arbitrary cut off, but this is not the standard state of the base game.

I wouldn't consider any of your other examples to be MMOs, even if I unequivocally consider Elite: Dangerous to be one.

You need to define MMO. My definition is the in-game ability to interact with a number of other players past a certain threshold. My entirely arbitrary threshold will be 256 because I played on a lot of 256 player Tribes 2 servers back in the day, and that didn't quite feel MMO in a match-based tactical FPS with no persistent worlds.

Elite: Dangerous is an MMO because I actually cannot play it, outside of the tutorial or training missions, without playing with many thousands of others, via the shared, persistent, setting. Even without that shared setting, there have been many occasions where my CMDR has encountered way more than 256 other discrete CMDRs in a single play session. That's difficult to accomplish in the current game, but it used to be fairly common. Regardless, the BGS is a huge part of the game; everyone influencing it any time they do anything means that I regularly play with all active players, even if that play is heavily abstracted.

Something like Dungeons & Dragons Online certainly can be an MMO, but I can and have played it as a near single-player game for years at a time. I can flatly ignore all other players, as it's a theme park game and I do not need to have my character group with anyone. I can select quest difficulty sufficient for whatever single character I bring and experience the same rides on this theme park as anyone else. Only a tiny handful of content is categorically impossible to do alone, and it doesn't need to be done.

I expect everyone to have their own definitions and cut offs, but even assuming the mean definitions commonly citied, I would not hesitate to describe Elite: Dangerous as an MMO and most of the titles you refer to as not MMOs.

That's cool. Like how all games are RPGs, 'cos you play a role in all of them.

Not all games presume or account for role other than 'player'. It's a lot easier to role-play in Counter-Strike, or Flight Simulator than in Tetris. I mean, you can pretend to be a block, or something that for some reason has to order blocks, but it's a real stretch compared to any game that explicitly presents one with a character/avatar to play (a terrorist in CS, for example) and a relatable scenario for one to play in.

 

[Christopher Roberto]

you actually dont seem to get it, since there is no single player game in solo mode.
it's just another instance.

A peer to peer game with the matchmaking disabled is a single player game.

 

[Morbad]

A peer to peer game with the matchmaking disabled is a single player game.

Not if the BGS also falls under the purview of 'game', which I'd argue it does.

Even in Solo, you're all are crapping all over my CMDR's efforts.

 

[metatheurgist]

Not all games presume or account for role other than 'player'. It's a lot easier to role-play in Counter-Strike, or Flight Simulator than in Tetris. I mean, you can pretend to be a block, or something that for some reason has to order blocks, but it's a real stretch compared to any game that explicitly presents one with a character/avatar to play (a terrorist in CS, for example) and a relatable scenario for one to play in.

Exactly, every game is an RPG now.

 

[Christopher Roberto]

Not if the BGS also falls under the purview of 'game', which I'd argue it does.

I'd not say it makes solo into a multiplayer game. Spore didn't get called a multiplayer game despite other players having a much more noticeable effect.

 

[Shabine]

I expect everyone to have their own definitions

What is the point of having definitions if everyone's definitions are different?

 

[Fixitman]

MMO literally stands for Massive(ly) Multiplayer Online. ED is massive, it's multiplayer, and it's online. It's really that simple IMO (In My Opinion).

 

[Shabine]

It's a lot easier to role-play in Counter-Strike, or Flight Simulator than in Tetris.

Exactly. Counter-Strike and Flight Simulator are RPGs. Clearly. Because you play a role in them. Hmm. What else is an RPG? Obviously Getting Over It, because you play the role of a man in a cauldron who climbs things with a big hammer. Also DOOM, because we take on the role of the Doomslayer. And also FIFA, because we assume the role of a manager and all the players on the field!

All fantastic RPGs.

 

[metatheurgist]

Mario Kart, Mario, Sonic, Halo (CHIEF!) - all great RPGs.