Horizons Elite Needs Game Designers

[Blackcompany]

Just because the game has a ten year plan doesn't mean it should take 9 more years to finish every single mechanic.

Exploration is in, but its very basic. Power play, USS, POI, Missions... All are present, none are finished.

The ten year plan excuse is tired. The idea was ten years worth of content, not ten years to finish and polish every single piece of it.

Regardless, that's not really the point here. My point is this: those working on the game don't seem to have a clear design direction nor any real ideas to make the game compelling and engaging. Fix it.

 

[almostpilot]

This is a 10 year project you know!!!!

No. It's just a game released in unfinished form. I pay a full price for it.

 

[CaptainKremmen]

Proposal: Frontier made a game I dislike.

Conclusion: Ergo Frontier can't make a game.

Anyone else see the flaw in this argument?

To me, your post doesn't actually seem to have anything to do with the original one in the thread.

OP sounds like they are mad keen on the ED universe, its potential, its moment-to-moment feel.


What Blackcompany is pointing out is the contrast between the extremely impressive technical achievements FD have ticked off to bring ED into being...

...against some of the means chosen to deliver gameplay mechanics.


OP is asserting that the approach taken in some of these mechanics is as "tick-a-box technical" in style as the hard-engineering aspects of the game.

And what Blackcompany is saying is that a creative approach to some gameplay content is preferable to a dry, technical approach.


When you have a hundred bullet points on your to-do list to build, say, a procedurally generated set of stars and planets, you work through it, assessing...

1. Key aspects of how that item should work.
2. Key aspects of WHY that item should work.
3. How that item interacts with, and influences, other items on the list.

From this, the designers can build a map of HOW and WHY they are to solve each piece of the puzzle... which is actually one big puzzle.

It's good to look at the system as a whole before building everything. If you don't, the bits don't fit together, and your procedurally generated set of stars and planets doesn't work properly.



Now, when you have a hundred bullet points on your to-do list for all sorts of creative flavour, flair, content, style, personality and lore, the same basic approach will get you most of the way.

1. How?
2. Why?
3. Interaction with other bits.

But there is a lot more to it, if the things you're doing are what Blackwater called the "creative" stuff.


Like...

Finding something in space for a mission.

1. How? In Supercruise, "Unidentified Signal Sources" are randomly created. If a player has a mission to find X, adjust the RNG to make it likely that the object they seek is in the USS.
2. Why? Because players need to find the items they seek, and don't want to get bored finding large numbers of other things they aren't interested in.
3. Other impacts/interactions? Wings need to be able to work with them. Make NPC ships fly out of them, to populate the system. Give them virtual mass, so players can decelerate to drop into them.

And that ticks off one item on the list.


But...

• Does it feel real or fake to the player?
• Does it feel like it was implemented with scarce manpower resources, ie. cheap?
• Does it add cohesion to the game world?

Ask yourself these questions about the cold, hard, engineering aspects of ED. Take Horizons' planet surfaces as an example.

- Planet surfaces don't feel fake. They feel damn real. Lighting, feel under your SRV wheels, canyons, plains, all very very very real feeling.
- Planet surfaces don't feel cheap. A huge amount of work has obviously gone into the environment.
- Planets now make the game world feel more cohesive, for sure.


This is what FD absolutely excel at.


For the USS example, though, these "extra" criteria are problematic...

- That USS mechanic feels fake to the player.
- It definitely feels like a bit of a low-effort solution to a gameplay requirement, done with scarce manpower.
- It makes the game world feel less cohesive. The faction giving you the mission don't bother telling you where it is, as they don't know, don't care, and it's not important. The object you are looking for is not actually somewhere; you find it by going through the motions of looking. The act of looking brings the object into existence.



The pattern tends to repeat itself...

• January 2015: "Pirates" would appear wherever you dropped out into planet rings, to ask, "What treats do you carry?". It was horribly fake; Even if you just flew hundreds of light years out of the bubble, chose a random system, random planet, random ring and dropped. Hello, magic pirate!
• January 2016: Horizons "Point of Interest" spawning, for our amusement, still feels horribly fake. So much so, I now ignore them as I fly, and pretend they simply don't exist. They could be aliens, sure... but I don't want to trip over the fake feeling POIs all day while I wait for aliens to appear. They simply feel too fake.

The "cohesion" problem isn't one a new player will spot in their early game...

...but as they get drawn into the game world, and play longer, they are "rewarded" with the need to perform all sorts of mental contortions to resolve a hundred disparate things that fight against each other, instead of building on each other.


It's not that FD aren't good developers. Blackwater is, I believe, simply asserting that the mindset and thought process behind some aspects of game mechanic construction could benefit from a fresh perspective and approach.


Personally, I would suggest that FD take a step back and reassess some of the things they had to implement in 2014 under immense pressure. Look again with fresh eyes at anything that reduces game world solidity and cohesion. If it feels fake as hell to the player, put in on a "second look" list. Put those mechanics on notice, and find truly inspirational alternatives, which build a stronger feeling galaxy for us to play in!


tl;dr...
I like turtles.

 

[Hanni79]

tl;dr...
I like turtles.

Have a Turtle then (with not one, but TWO hardpoints!) :

Also, some Rep

Edit : Something went wrong here .... only wanted one of those pics to show up ?

 

[ruksak]

I´m not so pesimistic. Actually: ED is the only game I play since the Feburary 2015, almost every day (not many hours each day, because job and family makes me happy), so I fly almost any ED session at night - when all are in bed. I´m not a fanboy, but I´m a huge fan of David Braben. The first ELITE changed my life on my C-64 computer when I was 12 years old. Now I will be 40 years old this May and cannot believe that I´m living the same experience again (DK2 only). Back in the future (as I said countless time) moreover with my own son (7 years old boy). Some people think that Ian Bell should be back for a purpose to make content in ELITE. Wrong: David was the one and only truly dedicated ELITE fan, who wanted to revive the ELITE genre forever. Also: David is a pure gamer too, he loves games, even games I cannot touch because of the same themes over and over again (FPS, killing). His business is a pure success and his games were very sucessful indeed. ELITE is not the only one. Frontier is a good company and I´m sure they will do the best with ELITE franchise.


I´m a happy customer and my E-D investment incl. Horizons is worth the 500+ hours I logged into ED. Guess what? I still love trading, combat in RES zones, missions. I have never had the chance to test the Wings (most of my sessions I fly in OPEN) and PowerPlay (not enough free time to go a bit deeper in this content), I still never had a time to test mining, exploring (look forward to it), just smuggling occassionaly. But I found some time to visit the Barnacles site in open and it was a brand new experience and great ride incl. player interaction when I scanned the unexplored planet. I love the planetary landings and the immersive DK2 experience. For me personally: ED is just a free ticket into Space - every day, every night - even when I have just a couple of minutes I always start the game and I´m sitting in my ship (DK2) just for a while...... Do you remember the Mézga Family serial (1968-1978). I watched each episode countless time when I was a kid. ELITE is something very special for me and it will stay that way.


The problem with ED is that they now need to continue build a game around real universe, hence the SC is the very opposite example (they have the game mechanics already on the table) and the universe is just a "background theme" - COD in space, so to speak. Nothing wrong, it will be definitely great and technologically most advanced game for masses. The ED is different, because of the universe scale. You need to think twice about MMO, PVE game mechanics. For my part: I´m glad that ED is under constant development and cannot wait for any update they will provide to dedicated customers.

 

[JeffRyan]

To me, your post doesn't actually seem to have anything to do with the original one in the thread.

OP sounds like they are mad keen on the ED universe, its potential, its moment-to-moment feel.


What Blackcompany is pointing out is the contrast between the extremely impressive technical achievements FD have ticked off to bring ED into being...

...against some of the means chosen to deliver gameplay mechanics.


OP is asserting that the approach taken in some of these mechanics is as "tick-a-box technical" in style as the hard-engineering aspects of the game.

And what Blackcompany is saying is that a creative approach to some gameplay content is preferable to a dry, technical approach.


When you have a hundred bullet points on your to-do list to build, say, a procedurally generated set of stars and planets, you work through it, assessing...

1. Key aspects of how that item should work.
2. Key aspects of WHY that item should work.
3. How that item interacts with, and influences, other items on the list.

From this, the designers can build a map of HOW and WHY they are to solve each piece of the puzzle... which is actually one big puzzle.

It's good to look at the system as a whole before building everything. If you don't, the bits don't fit together, and your procedurally generated set of stars and planets doesn't work properly.



Now, when you have a hundred bullet points on your to-do list for all sorts of creative flavour, flair, content, style, personality and lore, the same basic approach will get you most of the way.

1. How?
2. Why?
3. Interaction with other bits.

But there is a lot more to it, if the things you're doing are what Blackwater called the "creative" stuff.


Like...

Finding something in space for a mission.

1. How? In Supercruise, "Unidentified Signal Sources" are randomly created. If a player has a mission to find X, adjust the RNG to make it likely that the object they seek is in the USS.
2. Why? Because players need to find the items they seek, and don't want to get bored finding large numbers of other things they aren't interested in.
3. Other impacts/interactions? Wings need to be able to work with them. Make NPC ships fly out of them, to populate the system. Give them virtual mass, so players can decelerate to drop into them.

And that ticks off one item on the list.


But...

• Does it feel real or fake to the player?
• Does it feel like it was implemented with scarce manpower resources, ie. cheap?
• Does it add cohesion to the game world?

Ask yourself these questions about the cold, hard, engineering aspects of ED. Take Horizons' planet surfaces as an example.

- Planet surfaces don't feel fake. They feel damn real. Lighting, feel under your SRV wheels, canyons, plains, all very very very real feeling.
- Planet surfaces don't feel cheap. A huge amount of work has obviously gone into the environment.
- Planets now make the game world feel more cohesive, for sure.


This is what FD absolutely excel at.


For the USS example, though, these "extra" criteria are problematic...

- That USS mechanic feels fake to the player.
- It definitely feels like a bit of a low-effort solution to a gameplay requirement, done with scarce manpower.
- It makes the game world feel less cohesive. The faction giving you the mission don't bother telling you where it is, as they don't know, don't care, and it's not important. The object you are looking for is not actually somewhere; you find it by going through the motions of looking. The act of looking brings the object into existence.



The pattern tends to repeat itself...

• January 2015: "Pirates" would appear wherever you dropped out into planet rings, to ask, "What treats do you carry?". It was horribly fake; Even if you just flew hundreds of light years out of the bubble, chose a random system, random planet, random ring and dropped. Hello, magic pirate!
• January 2016: Horizons "Point of Interest" spawning, for our amusement, still feels horribly fake. So much so, I now ignore them as I fly, and pretend they simply don't exist. They could be aliens, sure... but I don't want to trip over the fake feeling POIs all day while I wait for aliens to appear. They simply feel too fake.

The "cohesion" problem isn't one a new player will spot in their early game...

...but as they get drawn into the game world, and play longer, they are "rewarded" with the need to perform all sorts of mental contortions to resolve a hundred disparate things that fight against each other, instead of building on each other.


It's not that FD aren't good developers. Blackwater is, I believe, simply asserting that the mindset and thought process behind some aspects of game mechanic construction could benefit from a fresh perspective and approach.


Personally, I would suggest that FD take a step back and reassess some of the things they had to implement in 2014 under immense pressure. Look again with fresh eyes at anything that reduces game world solidity and cohesion. If it feels fake as hell to the player, put in on a "second look" list. Put those mechanics on notice, and find truly inspirational alternatives, which build a stronger feeling galaxy for us to play in!


tl;dr...
I like turtles.

My original post was rather simplistic and yes, the OP's post does have a lot of points everyone with half a brain would agree with. What I took umbrage with was the tone and the certainties of the failure of the game. It wasn't the post in and of itself that irked me so much as it being yet another post telling how this game is failing and will fail unless the steps taken by the OP are carried out.

 

[JosiahD]

I. Never. Mentioned. End. Game.

That you cannot discern the difference between wanting finished, fleshed out mechanics and wanting "end game" content despite having it explained to you - twice - is not my problem, its yours so I will let you to it.

What I want is for Frontier to recognize that Engineers have done what they can for Elite. The time has come now to take their work and combine it with a creative vision to turn the cold, lifeless Mathematica of this Simulator/tech demo into a fun, engaging game.

By all means, guide the changeover. Keep sturdy hands on the fiscal reins. Braben has more than proven himself capable of turning his highly technical vision into a reality. Now, do the same for another's creative vision.

That is literally all I wanted to express with this thread. A congratulations on realizing a brilliant Simulator, and a hope that now, someone can turn it into a game.

Read your own original post again......
.
'no real end game for any single mechanic or set of them'
.
You indeed used the term 'end game' - again, as per my last, if you'd used the terms 'completed' or 'finished' it would have been less misleading as to your intent. 'End game' has a definite meaning when raised in the context of MMOs (in the eyes of maybe all but you?) and your use of 'end game' implied that was what you meant by 'no real end game for any single mechanic'. Which is all I indicated in my last post. But if you want to have an 'attitude' about it, fill your boots.......
.
But again, Braben and Frontier are anything but uncreative.

 

[Iskariot]

Just because the game has a ten year plan doesn't mean it should take 9 more years to finish every single mechanic.

Who says it will?

The ten year plan excuse is tired. The idea was ten years worth of content, not ten years to finish and polish every single piece of it.

I agree, who says it will?

Regardless, that's not really the point here. My point is this: those working on the game don't seem to have a clear design direction nor any real ideas to make the game compelling and engaging.

I gather you personally do not like the game the way it is, but your conclusion is completely over the top.
The development of this huge project does take time and that is relevant.
I do not disagree at all that things need to get fleshed out, but I also think these negative whiny discussions in which amateurs (almost no forum member has any experience in game design let alone a game of this magnitude) try to decide how FD should do things are pointless. They are also not helpful in any way at all.

 

[Blackcompany]

My heartfelt thanks to Captain Kremmen. For understanding. For helping to express my own thoughts. That pretty well nails it.

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -

Read your own original post again......
.
'no real end game for any single mechanic or set of them'
.
You indeed used the term 'end game' - again, as per my last, if you'd used the terms 'completed' or 'finished' it would have been less misleading as to your intent. 'End game' has a definite meaning when raised in the context of MMOs (in the eyes of maybe all but you?) and your use of 'end game' implied that was what you meant by 'no real end game for any single mechanic'. Which is all I indicated in my last post. But if you want to have an 'attitude' about it, fill your boots.......
.
But again, Braben and Frontier are anything but uncreative.

End Game is merely a figure of speech here. It in no way alludes to "end game content" but rather to a finalizing if individual mechanics.

As in "what's the end game for POIExploration, as a mechanic?" When do they reach their respective, finalized state? Their end game in terms of function.

Apologies for not being clearer there. Bad choice of wording on my part, especially given the context of our discussion.

 

[Commanderhumpster]

Dice didn't delivered with Star Wars. It's very sub par with older battlefront and Battlefields game they also make. Graphic and sounds are not everything. it's for 8 years old kids.

DICE\EA support also shocking

 

[Steve50]

This comes up from time to time. I don't see what Ian could bring to the table at this point. There isn't a lot of info out there, but as far as I can tell he only worked on 2 games. The original Elite, and a beat em up called Free Fall. Both of these were published on the BBC back in the 80's. I know he also had some input in to Frontier as an adviser.

I'm not slagging him off, he was co-creator of one of my favorite games after all, but he hasn't produced a game since 1984. Why do you think he could improve on what we have now in ED?

Simple.. look at the list of "Who did what" on Elite and you'll see Ian's contribution was MASSIVE (look at Elite Programming on this list - http://www.elitehomepage.org/faq.htm#A3 ) I am not against David at all, heck I threw £200 into the pot for ED and have paid lots more for mugs, t-shirts, pins, books etc.. BUT.. I honestly think working together the game would be a far far greater thing than it currently is. David is a genius but he does kind of have "pie in the sky" ideas at times, and Ian would make sure his feet remain on the ground.

Sadly we'll never know because they'll never work together again.

 

[vernonator]

And this is why good criticism can't exist.

It's not a matter of 'thinking' you could do a better job, but allowing those who already have that job work with creativity rather then be bound as they currently are. FD are a competent studio, they have vision, and they need people to take that vision and bring it life, in the game.

It's a 50/50 battle, conflicting emotions. You love ELITE, but at the same time you hate it. You see greatness off in the distance, but can't reach it. The game has moments of brilliance, but often masked with poor decisions.

Harumph!!!!!

Spot on commentary...spot on

 

[Toumal]

Elite Dangerous is tightly controlled by Fdev. Player actions are very limited by the lead-developers. We cannot build castles in this 2 inch deep sandbox. That's a shame, because this game is full of potential.

Building your own base or mining operation on planets.
Outfitting them with the appropriate defenses
Player-built and controlled stations (as in, realtime, not via db inserts)
Gathering funds to build capital ships to defend your station(s)

Yes there's a whole lot of things that would be awesome. Sadly, to date, Frontier's response was that this isn't the game they're making.

They really rather should though. This is a game, not a religion. It's ok to adapt plans. I don't think adding such elements would compromise the existing experience and the wonderful atmosphere of the game. They just need a push in the right direction.


Oh and I don't know Ian personally of course, but his comments regarding ED irked me a bit. (The whole "I totally could make a better Elite successor" thing he had going on...)

 

[xondk]

Hm, you missed the point.
There are only two ways to blaze an actual Trail in ELITE Dangerous (I don't count the 3rd, as this effectively takes place outside the Game). In the entire Game. And one of which can and has been in the past wiped out by Frontier without any care (see Player Group placement/System flipping).
The rest is a rather weak illusion (an outright myth, long debunked), but if it works for you then it's all fine of course.

This is something I don't quite understand.

There's only two? referring to combat and trading, because they have ranks and such? so you only take into account those the mechanics say exist.

Also, exploration is most certainly not 'outside the game' if that is what you are referring to.

I've met several groups in game that do stuff on their own, and guess what, when I ask why they keep it rather silent and don't get posts or whatnot, it is unfortunately answered most of the time, that it is done to avoid people just running over and harassing them, so they keep their roleplay semi closed.

Though one of the examples that have come and is in the open is the fuel rats, there's no stats no anything that they get that marks them mechanic wise, but guess what, they enjoy doing it, and that's in my mind what is meant by blazing ones own trail, the mechanics support your actions, yes right now there are things you cannot do mechanic wise, building bases and sort of things, establish a trade empire that sort of thing, but who knows what we might be able to do supported by mechanics as time goes on, I really think you should re-evaluate your view on the whole matter because, what you call an illusion, I've seen in game, just because you haven't seen it doesn't mean it isn't there, just because people haven't interacted with you like that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. And most importantly, just because it isn't widely known doesn't make it any less valuable or possible paths to take.

 

[Iskariot]

For the USS example, though, these "extra" criteria are problematic...

- That USS mechanic feels fake to the player.
- It definitely feels like a bit of a low-effort solution to a gameplay requirement, done with scarce manpower.
- It makes the game world feel less cohesive. The faction giving you the mission don't bother telling you where it is, as they don't know, don't care, and it's not important. The object you are looking for is not actually somewhere; you find it by going through the motions of looking. The act of looking brings the object into existence.

I do wholeheartedly agree with that.
I think the current USS mechanic is a very artificial mechanic.
The player doesn't search for the USS, but instead waits until the USS shows up on his doorstep.

What the game needs is a more sophisticated use of the scanner mechanic in space.
Why can the SRV do it right and ships can't?
FD needs to implement a more active role for the player in searching for USS and other stuff in space.
It could be made much more interesting and exciting.

I also would love a distinction between active and passive scanners. Passive scanners being safe, but more limited and active scanners more powerful, but dangerous, because they betray your position.

 

[Tom Valkyr]

Mr. Braben and the flight engineers have proven their capability to make a flight sim in space. They have done a marvelous job.
. . .
But games, unlike flight sims, aren't purely technical affairs. Games require heart. Soul. . ./QUOTE]

+1 rep

I agree.
But FD won't listen.
They don't care about what we suggest.

 

[Lestenio]

Yes there's a whole lot of things that would be awesome. Sadly, to date, Frontier's response was that this isn't the game they're making.

They really rather should though. This is a game, not a religion. It's ok to adapt plans. I don't think adding such elements would compromise the existing experience and the wonderful atmosphere of the game. They just need a push in the right direction.

Why? Why should they be pushed into building a game they clearly don't want to build? They have a vision for the game which clearly differs to what you'd like. There are features I'd like too but will never be added. I accept that.

They are going to be more passionate about building something they believe in rather than being pushed to build something they are not in the slightest bit interested in.

 

[CaptainKremmen]

My original post was rather simplistic and yes, the OP's post does have a lot of points everyone with half a brain would agree with.
...

I knew there was a reason I agreed with those points!!!

 

[SentineI]

But let someone else make the GAME going forward. Because right now you don't have a game. You have the best flight model in the history of space games, withering away inside a box full of RNG and disparate mechanics. No cohesion. No depth. And so it seems, no real end game for any single mechanic or set of them.

I'm afraid that you are (mostly) blaming the wrong thing. FDev have a pretty good idea what they want Elite Dangerous to look like. The problem getting there is because the foundations of ED makes things very hard:

1. The unimaginably massive galaxy (400 billions stars, and even the populated part must surely be 10,000 or 100,000 stars) means they cannot have any significant manually-created content. Instead everything has to be procedurally generated, and that is far harder. And making *interesting* procedurally generated content? That's massively difficult undertaking, or even impossible if their developers aren't good enough.

2. A single galaxy state shared between millions of players. Most MMOs split their "universe" into shards or servers, where each server only has to handle a (large but) limited number of players from one country. It's a much much more complex engineering challenge to share one game universe across the entire world, and prevent errors/discrepancies appearing between different servers in different countries. And it makes trying to build anything complex (aka fun & interesting) really hard.

3. Real-time multiplayer done using Peer-To-Peer instances (to reduce server load & costs). Unfortunately the internet upload speeds of most players is terrible compared any proper server (unless you have a *direct* fibre connection). So all the interesting things generated for you to explore... will tend to be kept on your PC (i.e. not visible to others), because sharing all that in real time would overload your internet connection.

So to reiterate. Why do we have a simple RNG for POIs & USSs? Because doing anything better is an extremely difficult engineering challenge. Why do we have boring repetitive missions? Because doing anything better is an extremely difficult engineering challenge. Why can't individual players have much of an effect on the world? Because the shared universe means the tens of thousands of active players would quickly destroy parts of it. Why do things look so samey? Because they have to procedurally generate them for tens of thousands of star systems. Etc. Etc.

Don't believe me? Just look at what *one single developer* can achieve (after 10 years) when they don't have to bother about the above 3 limitations:
Evochron Legacy


Having said all that, FDev could still do better. Balancing gameplay needs to be a higher priority. Fixing core gameplay mechanics needs to be a MUCH higher priority. New features are still needed, but not quite so many, and not to the exclusion of the aforementioned balancing & fixing of gameplay. And there is certainly room for better design of new gameplay elements, as I think PowerPlay proved. And they need to avoid adding unconnected game modes (CQC *cough* PP *cough*) before the core gameplay is improved.

 

[SentineI]

I am stating that a FLIGHT SIM is all that Elite is right now. That, and some technical demos of unfinished mechanics that might well be fleshed out into enjoyable interactions in the end. There is no real game here; more a proof of concept for combat, and another for trading; some poorly fleshed out smuggling mechanic that barely works. All connected - loosely - by a solid flight model.

I would agree with that. ED is a space sim first, and a game second. Mainly because they needed to develop the space sim part, before they could build a game on top of it. The game part is coming... just agonisingly slowly (for reasons I outlined in my previous post).


P.S. While I applaud your enthusiasm for improving ED (you've recently started a ton of threads on how ED can be improved), you need to realise that any changes to ED will come glacially slowly, because game development takes a LONG time. When we see some new feature appear NOW, work actually started on it up to 12 months ago! So even IF the developers agreed 100% with you & started work on all your ideas (which is unlikely), you wouldn't see any obvious signs for up to 12 months (especially if they don't trash all the work they've already put in for up-coming new features).

And you are hardly the first person to realise ED's problems. Hundreds (if not thousands) of players before you have started threads offering suggestions. e.g. Me & many others have been suggesting that the "place holder" missions need improving since ED was released 14 months ago, and we're still waiting (although it seems like our prayers may finally be answered during the Horizons season, starting with big changes for 2.1).

I rather suspect that within a month or two you will quickly become disillusions that the developers "aren't listening to you", and join the ranks of Grumpy Customers not happy with the game. I worry that you will go far beyond that, and start posting 1 star reviews, and slagging ED off every chance you get, out of frustration. If you dramatically reduce your expectations now, and go find some different game to occupy you until FDev fix ED, then maybe that won't happen...

I say this, not from a white ivory tower looking down on you, but as someone (like you) who has been enthused at ED's potential & frustrated at it's slow & erratic development... for the last 14 months. I've also watched other people become quickly frustrated at ED not living up to it's potential. Some of the harshest critics here were some of it's greatest fans 12-24 months ago