For the first time in months, I felt something playing this game

[Deleted member 94277]

Unbelievable.

One of the most interesting, compelling and well written critiques for ED is assumed by some to be some kind of complaint over how easy it is to kill newbies. The OP was not just reporting a random rant or complaining about certain mechanics, he points out what is currently the biggest flaw in ED: shallowness. A whole galaxy, hundred of thousands of players and a lot of possible content get turned into a grind game by FD, into nearly a korean MMO of sorts, without any quest progression, story, arenas and such. It's a million miles wide game with an inch of a depth. I still play ED, bounty hunting mostly, but I cannot help but feel this subtle sadness as I look at the darkness around me, thinking on what this game is, what it was supposed to be and where it's heading. As I look at the chat box, filled with the mechanic, flat vitriol of NPCs, I long for a more living and breathing community in game. I remember way back when, before Reaper of Sould fixed Diablo 3, we used to just spend hours chatting in Path of Exile and having just a blast talking about the game - and making fun of players who died in hardcore (RIIIIIP!). ED is just... not alive and, by extension, I feel dead when I play it. Some will argue that I'm overreacting, that it's just a game. Well, after two decades as a gamer, this industry has become part of my life and my family and we talk about games all the time in my house, with my friends and loved ones and ED, that can be to some just another item in their steam collection, it was to me a possility to know the galaxy, to feel like a space pilot and to generally have fun. I don't expect these things anymore.

Thanks to the OP for sharing his story.

 

[Talarin]

Now I strongly agree that bounties should be drastically increased... Eravate would then be attractive for bounty hunters who would then give you a challenge.

Mucking around with bounties isn't the answer. Highlighting that there's a seriously wanted criminal in the area (to both players and AI alike) so that people can avoid or engage as they see fit is.

FD really don't seem to have given any thought as to the "realism" of the game. A cop-killer, or known violent criminal in a well armed ship, would have a system navy drop on them.

 

[Ralph Vargr]

Ahem. It is a lot more interesting than Solo where all you see is the same old AI over and over along with bulletin board missions.

Beats humans. The AI's are at least honest about being crazy.

 

[lysan]

Here have some Rep..
Sound like you described ED pretty well,

 

[Sergio Smegolia]

For the first half of my rampage, I "advertised" my presence in the system as a "psycho". I warned players I was coming after them by crooning their names and giggling. I did pseudo-Gollum impressions. I stopped in the middle of fights to type out Wham! and Kajagoogoo lyrics.

I hate you and everything you now stand for. But you get rep for this. I would happily die to you seeing Wham! And Kajagoogoo lyrics appearing in the chat

 

[geoffrey.hdt]

Mucking around with bounties isn't the answer. Highlighting that there's a seriously wanted criminal in the area (to both players and AI alike) so that people can avoid or engage as they see fit is.

Yep, that would be great!

My point is that, except if you have a lot of credits to cover several insurance claims, PvP bounty hunting is not worth the risks (and on top of ultra low bounty, there is also combat logging, legal logout, highwake you can't follow efficiently...). And Eravate is well known to attract psychos.

 

[Captain Hammer]

And what did you expect? It's not a secret that any new players barely know to control their ship and would not focus on leaving their hands from the commands for typing a message. They may not even have noticed your message on the HUD which is all new to them.

Also, what kind of emotion does this bring to you? I mean, killing noobs and driving them to solo? Don't get me wrong, I do also all kinds of activities in this game, from trading to pirate and even psycho (but with a purpose!). Can't you focus on a challenging opponent outside of Noobland? Go to the Lave systems or one of the CGs and focus on combat capable ships maybe? Or do some piracy! Or find a noob without shield, type him a message like "No shield today? Dodge that!", fire a few seeker missiles and teach him a lesson.

Agreed..


--->Psycho<---
No I think a more accurate description of players blasting noobs and, running when they meet up with some real competition is
--->coward<---

 

[deMangler]

The OP is an excellent review of the game as it stands at the moment. I have never had a good enough internet connection for multiplayer but apart from that I have to say to the OP my experience concurs, thanks for putting it so clearly. Hope FD reads it there is good feedback there.

 

[GluttonyFang]

I don't like you. But I like being a psycho too. Perhaps we'll cross lasers or railguns sometime. It should be fun!

Omg, cross rail guns with me, cross rail guns with me!

 

[PiLhEaD]

Not quite sure how I managed to give that impression. I did reference self-loathing and existential misery

Welcome to the game, Dexter Morgan!!!

P.S. you are a bad bad man... and one can only hope that the SJA Assassination Bunnies will soon be on your tail... come 1.4...

 

[Pile_O_Gunz]

You could also come join archon delaine and help reinforcing of our systems. More pvp than lave

 

[KapitainZino]

This post just made me rather sad...

Also if you wanted social interaction the least likely way of getting it is attacking someone who is still working out how to fly.

Signed! Why not helping young player instead dull killing them in a Vulture? Just an advice - try find the pleasure of helping!

 

[Deadlock989]

People seem to have misunderstood. Perplexing as I'm pretty sure that's never happened on the internet before.

This was a terminal experiment. My last attempt to sample what other people do in this game. I'd been blazing my own path and detested it. I tried blazing other people's paths instead, as recommend right here on these forums, because the take-home message from this charming parlour is that if you don't enjoy the game there is something wrong with you.

None of them were a satisfying use of my free time. The only thing left was to see if there was any adrenaline or seratonin available from acting out the part of a monster in the heart of society. There is, but very briefly, and it's an exceedingly mean and narrow kind of pleasure. The main utility of it was to highlight just how shallow and unbelievable this game's universe is.

I'm "done", as our Atlantic cousins say. Not bothering with ED again until the paid expansions which I myopically pre-paid for in PB come out. Thank you to those who suggest I might enjoy this, that or the other instead, but TLDR: I already did.

Doesn't bode well for the other game which I'm prohibited from mentioning, really.

 

[The Booty Peddler]

People seem to have misunderstood. Perplexing as I'm pretty sure that's never happened on the internet before.

One of the most in-your-face and straight to the point reviews of Elite's current state, in which you lay out its expansive shallowness and express what is essentially despair, and people on this board interpret it as you having fun again. I really hope its mostly people who are fairly close to starting out, a period where most of us found the game quite entertaining, because otherwise it is the biggest case of internet Stockholm syndrome I've ever witnessed. You are obviously taking it in stride but I'm just left baffled.

A whole galaxy, hundred of thousands of players and a lot of possible content get turned into a grind game by FD, into nearly a korean MMO of sorts, without any quest progression, story, arenas and such. It's a million miles wide game with an inch of a depth.

Morwys was just as struck as I am and I mostly agree with his post. Except for that part about Korean MMOs. In the ones I've at least heard about, if you feel like grinding your heart out for two thousand hours to get some ridiculous gear and go PvP as a god, you can go nuts. At the end of it all, you are left with something that you can use in the greater scheme of the game. If you grind for thousands of hours in Elite, you are just left with a glazed over look and a sickly feeling in your stomach. Feel like trading to earn the big bucks? Better have Netflix up on a second screen or insanity awaits. Want to get top rank with your faction of choice? Spend a couple of years doing normal missions or prepare to log in and out of the game to turn in 3000 charity ones. Want to get top rank in Powerplay? Forget actually helping your faction. Go kill 500 defenseless NPCs or prepare to log in every half hour 24/7 to haul papers. Do this for the rest of your Elite career, because merits are radioactive isotopes with a half life of one week. Accumulated a billion credits and decked out your Conda? Congratulations you are literally done with Elite 2015.

"Elite: Dangerous - Korean MMOs are better for you"

 

[PiLhEaD]

...the take-home message from this charming parlour is that if you don't enjoy the game there is something wrong with you...

Not quite sure why this made me laugh, but I've not stumbled across that 'nugget of wisdom' before - whereas I've read a squillion '...if you're not enjoying it, maybe it's not the game for you...' responses.

Oh well, nuff said, have fun with SC and NMS when they arrive! I'm looking forward to both, albeit 'not holding my breath' for <one of them>.

 

[Herik]

Learning to accept and eventually to love the insatiable appetite one has buried under years of moral temporizing for the salty tears of others takes hard work and practice, cultivating the discerning tastes needed to relish the nuanced flavors those same tears can present to the cultured palate.

Bravo, good man. Bravo!

There is another internet spaceship game that would welcome you with open arms and a similar appreciation.

Yes, acclimaitions and abominations, more newby's for Solo/group. And once those 'newbys' get on Reddit, hundreds of potential new players not buying the game.

Oh well, it doesn't bother me. Always believed this game would eventually go pure Solo/Co-op; where it belongs...

 

[Spog]

Was the op a post or a philosophical treatise? "The Sickness Unto Death" sprang to mind.

I find the author rather frightening. Here's a man who'll do anything at all just to see how it feels. Is he like this in real life I wonder?

 

[Winterwalker]

the take-home message from this charming parlour is that if you don't enjoy the game there is something wrong with you

I think the take home message is that ED is very much a work in progress. If you go looking, for the absolute limits of a game that has make no excuses for its continuous development (ongoing, large expansions upcoming) .. yes, you'll find those edges. In the meantime you can read posts of people playing subtleties in ED, happy because they are accepting of the known facts, that it needs more, wants more, so the best way to enjoy the game as it stands is to be patient for those improvements, and not to expect the game to feel complete, or to give it all to you.

As it happens even the OP managed to find some enjoyment and, even though he probably should have gone to fight some better equipped PvP, probably the noobs won't have known what hit them, will have restarted without too much concern, of big losses at their stage of the game, but thinking "wow .. this is DANGEROUS". So come find me. I'm an honest trader at the moment, prepared to defend myself but if you kill me, I don't care .. You are the "deadly NPC" that, if I must have it from the DEVS, is still part of their ongoing development work.



I accept a couple of points about policing in the game, so that's valuable feedback and the OP is a good writer, probably with a lot of insight to offer. But the OP I'm afraid does say, I'm not having fun and it's all someone else's fault, when there's more nuance to be found in the game than this post wants to find .. You can go help develop data handling for Thrudds Trade Tools, set up testing of projectile weapons versus armour types at distances (hold still while I just fire THIS), blog cosmological bodies (undercover, in an opposing power's controlled space .. losing that weight advantage, carrying system scanners and mining equipment for sample taking AT the capital) or set yourself up to police Eravate yourself .. there are probably (definitely) more "things to do" .. but none of these many things are given, by the bulletin boards or available in the shipyards, these only provide tools.

 

[Renegade Roach]

Was the op a post or a philosophical treatise? "The Sickness Unto Death" sprang to mind.

I find the author rather frightening. Here's a man who'll do anything at all just to see how it feels. Is he like this in real life I wonder?

Are you another one of these people who can't distinguish between a game and 'real life'? That's infinitely more disturbing than somebody who goes on a minor gaming rampage due to boredom and curiosity.

OP - you are obviously imagining your fun wrong. This is not the game for you. Yo just don't understand Elite like the real players. You probably never even played the original, original fans are loyal. Go back to EVE you psycho griefer person of limited intellectual capability. Blah blah blah etc etc.

Think I covered all the relevant responses from the ultras there.

 

[Guidebot]

Sounds to me like you've comprehensively proven to yourself that this game is not for you, OP.

Time to accept that reality and spend your time more productively, would be my advice.