News Frontier trading update.

g04tn4d0 · Mar 14, 2016

Quester91 said:
one of the older things that always bothered me was that it takes more time to travel between planets that between system. This is utterly ridiculous and, for me, it's the real reason why this game don't get the scope of space right and totally ruins it. Jumping between systems should be a very big deal.

The Elite series has always had lengthy in-system travel and near-instantaneous hyperdriving to other systems. It takes a while to get to another system because the navcomputer has to calculate the jump, the jump must not be obscured, and if it's REALLY far sometimes you can see the hyperspace jumping wormhole looking part for upwards of 15 seconds.

I'm not really certain what you are expecting, but the experience is on rails with the previous games... especially the original Elite.

dynamicbob · Mar 15, 2016

I think frontier are taking a good approach but perhaps going forward should look at the suggestions forums and actually if needed change tack with things on their development profile, perhaps Braben can take a step back and stop enforcing his will so much and crowd source successful ideas

Patrick_68000 · Mar 15, 2016

dynamicbob said:
I think frontier are taking a good approach but perhaps going forward should look at the suggestions forums and actually if needed change tack with things on their development profile, perhaps Braben can take a step back and stop enforcing his will so much and crowd source successful ideas

I think that he listens the community. But the management of his company, must limit its desire to satisfy everyone

OriginalBadBoy · Mar 15, 2016

dynamicbob said:
I think frontier are taking a good approach but perhaps going forward should look at the suggestions forums and actually if needed change tack with things on their development profile, perhaps Braben can take a step back and stop enforcing his will so much and crowd source successful ideas

Why should they take suggestions from people who are not game developers?

Don't get me wrong, sometimes the community can come up with some good ideas for sure (look at the DDF), but in the end the dev then has to work out what is practical , was isn't going to break the game etc.

I love the way people come on the forum with the attitude of 'I am a gamer so therefore I know whats best for this game'. FD knows what' best, they take the criticism and they adjust things as required. But they are still doing it THEIR way in the end, which is the way it should be.

amigacooke · Mar 15, 2016

Patrick_68000 said:
But the management of his company, must limit its desire to satisfy everyone

I would have thought completely conflicting demands from the user base must limit the capacity to satisfy everyone.

[VR] Mad Mike · Mar 15, 2016

dynamicbob said:
I think frontier are taking a good approach but perhaps going forward should look at the suggestions forums and actually if needed change tack with things on their development profile, perhaps Braben can take a step back and stop enforcing his will so much and crowd source successful ideas

Frontier have already charged players real money to be part of the suggestions process, and a list of "stuff" agreed by both the community and the devs themselves was generated.

*IF* FD decide they need to dip into the pool of great ideas outside of their own office, then this is where they need to look, after all, many players paid a lot of money to have their voices heard, and the legwork has already been done and signed off by FD.

the Design Descision archives have it all there, all it is lacking is a pretty bow wrapping it all up. A lot of sales were made off the back of the gold in the DDF/DDA

once all that is covered and put into the game, then maybe they can cast their net wider, but until it is, then there is no need to.

Patrick_68000 · Mar 15, 2016

amigacooke said:
I would have thought completely conflicting demands from the user base must limit the capacity to satisfy everyone.

Yes also

LKx · Mar 16, 2016

who? said:
Neither he nor I knows what's going to happen (I'm just hoping Frontier does!).

If 2.1 launches mid-year, it's hard to see how the others will remain on schedule, they'll need to be pushed back somewhat. Frontier's ace in the hole is the 2.4 update, they haven't announced anything about it yet so may be able to pare it back in order to squeeze it in towards the end of the season. I thought they were clever last year in making Ships the last update of season 1. New ships - while time consuming to create - are probably not as time consuming for QA and bug-fixing as something like Arena or Powerplay. Having an 'easy' update at the end of the season gives you a bit of a buffer if things are behind schedule.

But yes, I do think it's possible that season 3 might be announced but not launched before Christmas. I think you're right that they'd really want to have a big end-year announcement. But, given how little we know about 2.4, I guess they might repeat what happened in Season 1 and have 2.4 and 3.0 launch simultaneously.

They might even actually SELL season 3 for Christmas, and release it later in 2017...

It would initially be an early access/proof of concept like 2.0 anyway.

Patrick_68000 · Mar 16, 2016

LKx said:
They might even actually SELL season 3 for Christmas, and release it later in 2017...
It would initially be an early access/proof of concept like 2.0 anyway.

Yes as for the lifetime expansion pass

wdipalma · Mar 24, 2016

vernonator - If you drop your GPU Clock speed by 50Mhz those failures will go away.

unload · Apr 7, 2016

amigacooke said:
I would have thought completely conflicting demands from the user base must limit the capacity to satisfy everyone.

exactly. Reminds me of star wars galaxies. a prime example of what happens if devs listen to much to the userbase

having a nice idea is one thing...implementing it and not breaking the game while doing so is another

Dave1235 · Apr 24, 2016

Marcus Tullius said:
Zac, the more important question is, are you still working on *one year – one gameplay feature* scheme or we will have fully working clan system before season 5 for example? I really doubt that our huge groups of players will survive 4 more years. Moreover, I have a bad feeling that your * fantastic community of players* is melting like snow in springtime because of the lack of the gameplay features. Believe me Zac, the first space sim with all gameplay features in it will blow you from the market regardless of how ED is qualitative, bugless and etc. ED needs the content Zac, not the shine only.

Do you have a link to fd saying that they intend to add a "full working clan system"? I would be interested to read more.
The only info I remember seeing from fd on clans is dbobe on the egx video stating all the reasons he wont introduce clan support in ed
Thanks.

Ian Skippy · Apr 24, 2016

Dave1235 said:
Do you have a link to fd saying that they intend to add a "full working clan system"? I would be interested to read more.
The only info I remember seeing from fd on clans is dbobe on the egx video stating all the reasons he wont introduce clan support in ed
Thanks.

You are correct, there is no 'fully working clan system' planned, this season or otherwise.

rootsrat · Apr 24, 2016

sleutelbos said:
You are correct, there is no 'fully working clan system' planned, this season or otherwise.

Saying that, Michael said some time ago that he'd love some sort of mechanics allowing players to pledge to the minor factions, so that the players can associate themselves with their faction, but there was no ETA.

Robert Maynard · Apr 24, 2016

rootsrat said:
Saying that, Michael said some time ago that he'd love some sort of mechanics allowing players to pledge to the minor factions, so that the players can associate themselves with their faction, but there was no ETA.

Sounds good to me - with Minor Factions tied in to the BGS as they are....

tarragon · Apr 26, 2016

Has they delay to June been announced yet?

Tinman · Apr 26, 2016

tarragon said:
Has they delay to June been announced yet?

You mean like in the trading update that was published almost two months ago when they wrote:

Frontier Developments plc (AIM: FDEV, "Frontier”, the "Group"), a leading developer of video games, announces that following a review of the development of the next stage of Elite Dangerous: Horizons (“EDH”), the Board of Frontier has determined that this will take place after the end of the current financial year, being 31 May 2016.

As previously announced, EDH was initially released in ’early access’ in December 2015. Coming out of ‘early access’ was originally expected to take place during April 2016, coinciding with the planned launch of EDH’s next expansion, “The Engineers”. However, this – along with associated revenues - will now take place in the first half of the next financial year.

http://frontier.co.uk/investor_relations/reports/news/?artid=575&pageNum=0&blk=275

The "next financial year" is after May 31:st...AKA June.

So yes...it was announced quite some time ago.

Theta Sigma · May 28, 2016

Rumour Control

tarragon said:
Has they delay to June been announced yet?

Tinman said:
You mean like in the trading update that was published almost two months ago when they wrote:

http://frontier.co.uk/investor_relations/reports/news/?artid=575&pageNum=0&blk=275

The "next financial year" is after May 31:st...AKA June.

So yes...it was announced quite some time ago.

UPDATE: 'The Engineers' actually ended up launching before May 31st - AKA in "the current financial year"
- the news was reported to the city on Friday, 27th May @7am - share price rose 1.51% on the day

Business Update 27 May 2016

"Elite: Dangerous

Frontier yesterday launched the next major expansion of Elite Dangerous: Horizons, 'The Engineers'. This release comes slightly earlier than previously anticipated following a successful Beta period, and in combination with sales performance to date, will have a positive impact on revenues and profitability in the financial year to 31 May 2016. The Group has also announced that it plans to release Elite Dangerous: Horizons for Xbox One on 3 June."

http://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-detail/FDEV/12831985.html

babelfisch · May 28, 2016

Theta Sigma said:
UPDATE: 'The Engineers' actually ended up launching before May 31st - AKA in "the current financial year"
- the news was reported to the city on Friday, 27th May @7am - share price rose 1.51% on the day

Business Update 27 May 2016

"Elite: Dangerous

Frontier yesterday launched the next major expansion of Elite Dangerous: Horizons, 'The Engineers'. This release comes slightly earlier than previously anticipated following a successful Beta period, and in combination with sales performance to date, will have a positive impact on revenues and profitability in the financial year to 31 May 2016. The Group has also announced that it plans to release Elite Dangerous: Horizons for Xbox One on 3 June."

http://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-detail/FDEV/12831985.html

I guess some people owe them an apology.

Theta Sigma · May 28, 2016

babelfisch said:
I guess some people owe them an apology.

Sadly, an apology is not a response generally associated with whiny man-child narcissists suffering from self-righteous entitlement complexes.

I can however suggest an effective remedy for their pain.