Or anywhere in non-fire zone to that matter. Group pics anyone?
External View [A definitive discussion]
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Or anywhere in non-fire zone to that matter. Group pics anyone?
Valuable insight, thanks - now go away......
Every single sim Ive ever looked at makes flying incredibly difficult with an exterior view selected, unless its directly behind the plane, and even then, without the instrumentation, its not a view you would want to be using in a conflict situation. Someone with a TrackIR sat in the seat with all the tools of the HUD etc is instantly at a superior advantage every single time.
Honestly, PvP and multiplayer should add to a games breadth, not be used as reasoning for removing it. If someone is in 3rd person, flicking their camera all over the place to find you, so what? Shoot him! You have the instrumentation, the radar, and best of all you are in complete control of your ships assets, unlike Mr 3rd Person!
Its a beating stick that really should be put to bed. It's potential for exploits can always be worked around anyway, but I want to be clear - if there isn't a fully functional 3rd person camera (ie it is nerfed to the point where you cant actually use it for the purpose most people are actually asking it for - vanity shots as you flyby asteroids or stations etc) then don't bother at all. 'After the event' footage wont do it - I want a LIVE 3rd person rotatable camera than I can control and zoom into the ship, or to a reasonable distance to capture the scale of my ship to larger objects.
If someone happens to be using it in a combat situation, and you still can't kill him, then you were probably going to die anyway.
And if you don't agree with the above comment, go play some pvp in an online flying sim, or ARMA, play purely in external view and see how long you last.
It offers less of an advantage than having a better PC, or a TrackIR or using a HOTAS.
As for immersion, for the hundredth time (I would imagine given how many pages this has gone on for) don't hit the external camera view, voila, immersion resolved.
If much more serious games like Microsoft Flight Simulator, X-Plane, ARMA, DCS & IL-2 Sturmovik et al have players that don't have an issue with external view, then Elite players and devs are just blowing hot air IMO by stubbornly not including it.
FD will financially benefit too by actually selling more decals and skins, I'm certainly past the point now of buying skins purely to support ED, I've paid enough now. From now on I need a visible & personal benefit to future vanity item purchases.
Honestly, PvP and multiplayer should add to a games breadth, not be used as reasoning for removing it. If someone is in 3rd person, flicking their camera all over the place to find you, so what? Shoot him! You have the instrumentation, the radar, and best of all you are in complete control of your ships assets, unlike Mr 3rd Person!
Its a beating stick that really should be put to bed. It's potential for exploits can always be worked around anyway, but I want to be clear - if there isn't a fully functional 3rd person camera (ie it is nerfed to the point where you cant actually use it for the purpose most people are actually asking it for - vanity shots as you flyby asteroids or stations etc) then don't bother at all. 'After the event' footage wont do it - I want a LIVE 3rd person rotatable camera than I can control and zoom into the ship, or to a reasonable distance to capture the scale of my ship to larger objects.
If someone happens to be using it in a combat situation, and you still can't kill him, then you were probably going to die anyway.
And if you don't agree with the above comment, go play some pvp in an online flying sim, or ARMA, play purely in external view and see how long you last.
It offers less of an advantage than having a better PC, or a TrackIR or using a HOTAS.
As for immersion, for the hundredth time (I would imagine given how many pages this has gone on for) don't hit the external camera view, voila, immersion resolved.
If much more serious games like Microsoft Flight Simulator, X-Plane, ARMA, DCS & IL-2 Sturmovik et al have players that don't have an issue with external view, then Elite players and devs are just blowing hot air IMO by stubbornly not including it.
FD will financially benefit too by actually selling more decals and skins, I'm certainly past the point now of buying skins purely to support ED, I've paid enough now. From now on I need a visible & personal benefit to future vanity item purchases.
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Yeah, that argument cracks me up all the time. They simply don't know what they're talking about, is my guess.
Funny thing, my friend plays ARMA in third person a lot (coop, no PvP). Of course he switches back as soon as shots are exchanged, but then it's right back to 3P. Now, I won't say I never use 3P in ARMA, but I honestly prefer the first person view, because yes, it is way more immersive to me, even if it comes with disadvantages.
And don't forget that nice screenshots sell games, too. I frequent a few forums that have dedicated screenshots threads and those shots can create quite a bit of interest in gamers who would otherwise not even know or care that the game exists. It's basically free advertising for Frontier, with little to no effort on their part.
Well... that is more or less my take on external views. I will be sticking with cockpit for piloting, its what I am after in that regard. However I have paid for paint jobs (in the sale) and it would be nice to be able to see the thing outside of the outfitting menu. If I remember rightly the first I-WAR had a selection of camera controls which I never found gave me any edge at all in combat, one view gave an edge with tricky Newtonian manoeuvres and the others were simply "directors" shots. That's what I would like. I'm certainly not buying any more paint until I can see it.
And I would like to be able to view, in a cinematic fashion, the next multi million credit ship I purchase because other than the holo wire frame thing on the dashboard.. I haven't seen any of my ships proper.
Precisely. As soon as shots are fired, your friend switches back to first person, because its the only way of being effective in a combat scenario in any half serious flying game. Your lost without the instrumentation which far outweighs any gains from being able to see which angle your about to die from!
Indeed. And it's hardly surprising that Frontier themselves choose the 3rd person to advertise their own game. Be it screenshots or videos, its all almost entirely 3rd person. So why aren't the players allowed to enjoy that beauty? It obviously looks great, or FD's advertising would be different, yet ingame you are limited. I understand the concept that we are the pilot, not the ship, but allow us a few moments to look at our ship passing by an exoplanets sunrise, or drifting through an asteroid belt, or sitting snugly beside a giant carrier, so we can see the vision Frontier advertise ourselves!
Like you say, all that is free marketing from all the talented youtubers who would make amazing machinma, it would fill up a few newsletters too!
I would even wager they might sell a few copies to people who are into that whole field, who have no real intention of playing the game proper, they just want to make some great mini movies.
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Your absolutely correct, until this is settled I've gone back to my non immersive arcade game of Prepar3d, only now produced by the lowly Lockheed Martin, what would they know about immersion or reality simulators? But Surely ED and Frontier have it correct and Lockheed is wrong nay sayers? And what of Orbiter by Martin Schweiger? Surely that arcade game is of no consequence due to the 3rd party views? I'll tell you what Frontier and nay-sayers, have some bloody respect for the past contributors to simming and some humility- you do not know everything nor will you, this industry was built on the shoulders of great titles and programmers who shared a vision WITH their customers and INDUSTRY - Anything less is just - well - insulting. That being said I've wasted enough of my time worrying about this game which in my life is another $50 down the drain - big deal - see ya guys have fun with your 1st person cockpit with 3 instruments!
Wow. A ragequit because of a camera. I hope to be there to witness the first ragequit because Frontier haven't produced a commemorative bobblehead of Yuri Gagarin, or because some NPC had the same name as a character from a TV show, but with an incorrect spelling ("PATHATIC BARBEN!!! EVERY1 KNOW THAT MOLLARI HAS 2 LS! I AM OUTTA HERE, THIS GAME IS MADE BY PHILESTEINS!!1!").
The paint jobs are an absolute waste of money, imo, without the external view. If you bought them, you may as well have set fire to the money you spent for them. What's the point of them? Especially in solo play. You can only see them to an extent while you are outfitting your ship. <<twirls finger in the air>> WOOOPPEEEE!! I can see part of my ship, in the outfitting bay.
Seriously though, I've been playing flight sims since my Commodore-64 days in the early-mid 80's. Commodore-64, Commodore-128, 8088xt, etc...etc.. I got into computers BECAUSE of flight sims. I've played more of them that can't remember them all. Point of this is that with my experience....and graphics being the way they are now, I cannot figure out for the life of me why Frontier opted to not put an external view in. I think they've taken away part of the game by not including this aspect of it. I'd love to see how well I land my ship from an external view. Rotate around it, check out a cool paint job I'd buy....IF there was an external view!! But there isn't. So Frontier is loosing revenue in that regards because joes like me won't spend their money on the paint jobs. But they will make some money with those that do buy them.
Absolute complete waste of money if you by a paint job!
Seriously though, I've been playing flight sims since my Commodore-64 days in the early-mid 80's. Commodore-64, Commodore-128, 8088xt, etc...etc.. I got into computers BECAUSE of flight sims. I've played more of them that can't remember them all. Point of this is that with my experience....and graphics being the way they are now, I cannot figure out for the life of me why Frontier opted to not put an external view in. I think they've taken away part of the game by not including this aspect of it. I'd love to see how well I land my ship from an external view. Rotate around it, check out a cool paint job I'd buy....IF there was an external view!! But there isn't. So Frontier is loosing revenue in that regards because joes like me won't spend their money on the paint jobs. But they will make some money with those that do buy them.
Absolute complete waste of money if you by a paint job!
I dunno. If you by a paint job, you can see it. If you far away, you can't.
Except there is no tactical advantage with non combat external views.
Besides, there is no tactical advantage at all. Regardless of combat or non combat.
This is no ww1/ww2 game where you have to search the sky to spot the enemy.
We got radar/sensors, remember?
If done right there should be no problem.
When you switch to external view, just swap flight control to external camera control.
So you can zoom and pan the camera but have no control of the ship whatsoever.
This should be enough.
Thanks for contributing so much to this discussion.
External views and review flight feature please
In Flight Simulator there is an external view, a Tower View, flyby etc. In the DCS flight SIM/combat sim, there are similar views with an option, after the end of the flight, to view the flight from various view points. As a "view last flight" feature. This is then erased after you view your flight, thus freeing up memory.
I just think that in Elite Dangerous, with such gorgeous ships and stations, perhaps there could be a similar set of features, so we can marvel at our fighting ability, approach and landing at stations and the beauty of our ship, from a third person view?
We can buy skins for our ships, but we can only see them in the stations outfitting bay! Surely better to see how they look in space?
The tech (and beautiful graphics) was not available with the original Elite, but now I think it would be a nice feature.
In Flight Simulator there is an external view, a Tower View, flyby etc. In the DCS flight SIM/combat sim, there are similar views with an option, after the end of the flight, to view the flight from various view points. As a "view last flight" feature. This is then erased after you view your flight, thus freeing up memory.
I just think that in Elite Dangerous, with such gorgeous ships and stations, perhaps there could be a similar set of features, so we can marvel at our fighting ability, approach and landing at stations and the beauty of our ship, from a third person view?
We can buy skins for our ships, but we can only see them in the stations outfitting bay! Surely better to see how they look in space?
The tech (and beautiful graphics) was not available with the original Elite, but now I think it would be a nice feature.
It unlikely that the engine can't handle it as there are plans for EVA in Stations and Planets, so its not that. Its purely a design decision, Frontier may or may not change their mind. For me its not a big issue, but I get others would like the ability for Video purposes or simply to look at their ship.
Well except for big ships with turrets obviously.
The graphic engine already struggles.....I'm fairly sure it will struggle more with external view. Given an third person view I bet the number of graphic related grumbles will increase by an order of magnitude.
I'm so certain of this that I'll bet you 2 million credits.....Oh, I forgot, we can't transfer them. Oh well Not to worry.
LOL Garik. You may be right. I don't have any problems myself in terms of the engine "struggling" its always smooth and responsive. Maybe they'll just have to up the lower PC spec to accomodate the extra detailing. Besides I'm sure there is LODing going on (say on the non-rendered sides of the ship and its modules too) and when you think how many polygons the ship is as opposed to the number of polygons used in the cockpit (plus all the UI) then I reckon the trade off is about the same if not better. Like I say its a design decision I feel, but thats not to say its set in stone. I reckon its totally doable. We'll see though, time will tell.
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