Elite: Cryptic Dangerous

It's time for FDEV to expand the gameplay design team with people who can think on a larger scale than a single instance in normal space.
 
Kinda feels like the Elite Dangerous Cambridge Science Club now. DBOBE's favourite little gang just doing their own little thing.
... I'm almost glad that SDC broke up the party.
FD might begin to realise things are getting a bit messy.

Damn I hate being negative.

Frontier having favourites? Well I never.. [sad]

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Yup. This is getting a bit much.

There was another MMO that had puzzles to solve. Including a morse code puzzle, if I'm not mistaken. Forgot the name of that MMO though. But each character had to solve the puzzle themselves (or Google and find the answer) in order to progress their character.

Here, it just seems that a few people (great kudos to The Cannon, by the way,) are solving the puzzle in order to progress the entire game universe and the rest of us basically sit and watch. Or participate if we can either bother to go into open or clear our schedule for clues and deciphering them out of game.

Have fun, fly safe. o7

I think you are refering to The Secret World.. Was a game I enjoyed playing a while back but you speak the truth bruva. ;)

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Its because you did a "Frontier" and instead of coming up with something original, you just posted something that had been done before. A bit lame.

I'm gonna have a word with myself before I go to sleep tonight [haha]
 

verminstar

Banned
Sorta feel like a passenger on a bus on a mystery tour now...yesterday was a complete anti climax and that's being nice. Nothing...as in literally nothing happened...lost interest wandering off again with no intention of so much as a backward glance...which right now feels like more than FD would give us.

Whatever...knock yerselves out role players ^^
 
i think its just a mini game that some people enjoy playing if other dont then dont. there are enough other things to do in the game. also there are other mysteries in the game and other things to find that we havnt if others want to start their own quest they can. this is nothing but a prelude to whats coming in 2.2 i dont think anyone will be left out. relax and fly happy commanders o7
 
Agreed wit OP and others.

These puzzles seems to be made by and for programmers, not for actual average players. The worst of these was UP transmission - when I've read how it was solved, I've understood literally nothing except system name. What's next - they'll write puzzle in some garbled C#, and you'll have to decode it, then fix the code, then compile it?

The decision to hold this event in Open is another bad thing. First of all, a big percentage of players who don't fly in Open was effectively cut. Second, many players in Open never saw these encounters due to how the P2P-based instancing works.
 
There are apparently a lot of people enjoying this stuff, as there are a lot of people enjoying flying close to the ground to find a needle in the galactic haystack. I say : let them. It's not like it is taking much dev time and it can sometimes create popular events.

But I agree with the OP, this is not "real content" in my eye. Real content is something almost everyone can play. Yes, I know anyone can try to solve these riddles, but they are solved quickly and in effect, the vast majority of the player base will just read / watch the results on twitch / youtube.

The main goal should always be to have the majority involved in actually *doing* something.
 
Can we knock it off with the endless cryptic out of game ARG stuff.. Its tedious and in my view is becoming an excuse for real game content..

No, leave it in, please. Expand upon it, even.

Some of us really enjoy it.

If you don't like this content, don't play this content; it doesn't affect you. Not all content is there for every player.

Alternatively: What is your favourite part of the game? Yeah: Whatever that is: Take it out of the game because it is tedious and *I* don't like it.I don't like football either, so we should get rid of that, too.

This game covers a lot of ground and a lot of play styles. There is nothing to be gained by telling FD to take out the parts of the game that you don't like but other people enjoy.

I don't enjoy several elements of the game, but I'm really glad they are part of this broad game, and I am happy that people who enjoy those elements have content available for them in this game.

Elite is many things to many people.

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Nope, but I'm not following that link, either. Got a non daily Fail link, or one sentence summery, please?

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"Ultimate Play the Game Atic Atac" logo

Wow.

I mean wow.

Awesome.

The first computer game I ever drew a map for.
 
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From reddit - was reading these just now...



"I begrudgingly jumped into open to see if I could get a little information without begin griefed. This has been the most fun I've had with the game, even if I'm not the one fining anything."

"I had great fun"

"Elite is a game that rewards you with stories."

"I'm enjoying the ARG stuff more than I ever did flying around going pew-pew :D"

" I really like this whole scavenger hunt, even though I don't expect to really be able to play a part in it."

"Thank you FDev, Im absolutely in love with the tension and mystery you have been building and i hope we get more of this in the future."

"I've actually never had so much fun with the community - even if we aren't really getting anywhere at the moment."

"I'm very happy with the way they did all this. Of course it is not perfect, but nevertheless very interesting."

"I'm really enjoying the way this is all getting rolled out."

"I've seen and chatted with more CMDRs today than in the last 18 months combined. I'm having a blast even if we aren't finding anything."

"Same. I definitely think these hunts could be drastically improved with persistent NPCs that show up at the right time, in all instances...but all in all its been great fun so far even though I haven't actually seen any of the NPCs myself. Looking forward to the next clue."

"I love this event. Its messy, frustrating and unpredictable, but thats the beauty of it. Modern gaming is oh so much about quest logs, transparent goals and easy achievements that this change of pace is welcome. ... If you have open mind and willing to close your eyes on some mechanical and tech difficulties, this hunt is an amazing puzzle exploration live event.. We don't get much of those."

"I'm way out by Jacques station and I can't be a part of the hunt, but I love watching people figure it out and it makes the galaxy feel more alive. This is a part of the depth we want."

"Frontier should keep this going even post updates, for a game thats a million miles wide and sometimes feels an inch deep, it adds an atompshere to an empty void that there is persistence, the universe is "alive" and that we are actually part of something."
 
There are apparently a lot of people enjoying this stuff, as there are a lot of people enjoying flying close to the ground to find a needle in the galactic haystack. I say : let them. It's not like it is taking much dev time and it can sometimes create popular events.

But I agree with the OP, this is not "real content" in my eye. Real content is something almost everyone can play. Yes, I know anyone can try to solve these riddles, but they are solved quickly and in effect, the vast majority of the player base will just read / watch the results on twitch / youtube.

The main goal should always be to have the majority involved in actually *doing* something.

It is difficult these days with 'puzzle quests', because of the endemic nature of the Internet.
The truth is that even if a puzzle was a solo quest line, the majority of players would still click through with a solution guide up on the other screen; completing the quest without ever solving the puzzles. The idea of making the puzzles really obscure and then relying on a community solution seems to be quite a good one in many ways. Opening up to more numbers would obviously be ideal, but difficult, as yesterday showed. By widening participation it inherently becomes less personal.

A nice compromise is to rely on some parts of the puzzle being brute forced en masse, such as a search over an entire sector or part of the quest being delayed by a community goal. Then a mass of players need to be involved. However, people then are very unlikely to feel individual satisfaction: Only one person will find The McGuffin, or the group will reach the goal. In either case it would be very difficult for an average player to obtain *individual* satisfaction from a community effort. Some people are quite happy with the success of a community, where others feel like afailure and are upset unless they are personally responsible for the solution in some manner.

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Agreed wit OP and others.

These puzzles seems to be made by and for programmers, not for actual average players.

Problem is that an average difficulty puzzle will get solved in about three seconds by a crowd-community.

The puzzles need to be hard, or they will not be puzzles.

example: I noted the binary in the DB interview. I paused the live stream, transcribed into a binary converter, wrote it down, realised it was backwards... and then went to post on the forums, but it was already solved already. I literally could not have typed any faster and was already comfortably beaten to it.

Apparently subliminal frames of backwards binary buried in interviews are way too easy for us!

You see part of the difficulty?
 
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Yep, this so called content is way too exclusive.

It's absolutely not. Anyone can get involved. There's an EAFOTS sector that needs searching! :)

Some people do the puzzles, some people do the cross-checking and searching. For every puzzle solution, some people have been doing very 'boots on the ground' stuff. For example, scores of people were looking for Federal military convoys to hijack them for UPs a few weeks ago. It's really not too difficult to get involved in some manner. :)
 
I have absolutely no idea what's gone on here.

I was intrigued by the initial announcement of the hunt in Galnet, but now feel like the whole thing's passed me by because I didn't think to look in the right place. Wherever that was.

I love puzzles as CGs, but I agree that they do need to be primarily generated within the game.
 

verminstar

Banned
It's absolutely not. Anyone can get involved. There's an EAFOTS sector that needs searching! :)

Some people do the puzzles, some people do the cross-checking and searching. For every puzzle solution, some people have been doing very 'boots on the ground' stuff. For example, scores of people were looking for Federal military convoys to hijack them for UPs a few weeks ago. It's really not too difficult to get involved in some manner. :)

Yer right, it's not difficult to get caught up in it. I've been at eafots since last week and even poked me own head out of solo fer once...which, considering what put me into solo, was an achievement on its own. I've covered some 40 or so systems scanned and about double that number honked with very little to scan since friday. Really thought there might be something...anything...but I suppose events like this are for the chosen few, while the rest of us are just tagging along on their shirt tails.

Whatever...more fool me fer falling fer it. That's the second time I've tried getting involved and that's the second time I've come away feeling nothing more than a huge anti climax from it all. There won't be a third time and I'm leaving eafots to the real explorers who don't appear to even want amateurs like me around.

Have a nice day ^^
 
I agree with the OP, but not entirely against these clue-based mysteries - if they made sense in the game world, for example, when a rich recluse organises a treasure hunt.

However, to think that every human npc in the game are fond of word games, mythology and morse code stretches disbelief.

It comes off as lazy: there are close-to-infinite ways of creating in-game challenges, especially with mission board: could they not make more of that?
 
These technical puzzles are for community to be solved and are good as are, no observations to this. What is imo needed, and is very lacking, is prepare small rewards (reveals) here or there also for others (= this 90% majority of players) and this directly in game using given game mechanics. With this will everyone have fun and enjoy play even more.
 
I'm going to post a comment with a prize to win, but it will be very cryptic and must be solved using third-party resources. Also only a small portion of this audience will be able to experience the content after going through these steps.

Next we will play a lottery to see who will even get to participate in the first place while also having to stand in traffic         people trying to run you over. Lastly if you’re not in the right time zone for me to be on in order to host this content then you’re SOL, even though I don’t advertise up front these requirements for participation.

Good LUCK!
 
Yer right, it's not difficult to get caught up in it. I've been at eafots since last week and even poked me own head out of solo fer once...which, considering what put me into solo, was an achievement on its own. I've covered some 40 or so systems scanned and about double that number honked with very little to scan since friday. Really thought there might be something...anything...but I suppose events like this are for the chosen few, while the rest of us are just tagging along on their shirt tails.

Whatever...more fool me fer falling fer it. That's the second time I've tried getting involved and that's the second time I've come away feeling nothing more than a huge anti climax from it all. There won't be a third time and I'm leaving eafots to the real explorers who don't appear to even want amateurs like me around.

You were one of the few: You were out in EAFOTS. (which also has its own rewards of course: A few systems with your name on, Explorer Rank and some cash. Also a good time to catch up on some movies!)

There are 400,000 stars there, and we are pretty much brute forcing the area in an only slightly enlightened manner.
Trust me: It's not 'pro' exploring out there... were just poking stuff and looking under rocks in a disordered manner. The puzzle is also in its early days. I don't think it is 'meant' to be solved yet. We could do -as we have been told that 'It' is already there - but it would be astonishing if we did.

I'll be heading back there soon. Not because *I* expect to find anything, but because *we* will eventually get there, and I will have helped. I think people looking at these puzzles as a solo effort are going to be let down by the nature of the game: It is not a galaxy that revolves around individuals. Instead, the puzzles are more collaborative in nature.
 

verminstar

Banned
You were one of the few: You were out in EAFOTS. (which also has its own rewards of course: A few systems with your name on, Explorer Rank and some cash. Also a good time to catch up on some movies!)

There are 400,000 stars there, and we are pretty much brute forcing the area in an only slightly enlightened manner.
Trust me: It's not 'pro' exploring out there... were just poking stuff and looking under rocks in a disordered manner. The puzzle is also in its early days. I don't think it is 'meant' to be solved yet. We could do -as we have been told that 'It' is already there - but it would be astonishing if we did.

I'll be heading back there soon. Not because *I* expect to find anything, but because *we* will eventually get there, and I will have helped. I think people looking at these puzzles as a solo effort are going to be let down by the nature of the game: It is not a galaxy that revolves around individuals. Instead, the puzzles are more collaborative in nature.

You really believe there's something already there? More likely it will be put there when needed and the player that makes the "discovery" will be a pre selected role player. It's not random, it's just a part of a script because the "discovery" will have to happen at predetermined intervals to keep the hype going for when they wanna release thargoids.

Anyway whatever...already heading outward...good luck ^^
 
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