Are we all just playing a video game about playing a video game in 3303?

[Cablefast]

I can't begin to express how much I HATE the hologram explanation.
It is Warframe all over again: "No, you are no Space Ninja. You are a teenager controlling mindless drones."

Why oh why has it become so trendy to constantly remind us: "Hey, ya know, you are just playing a game!"
I know that already.

As to the: "But it's not realistic anyway argument!"

It doesn't have to be 'realistic' according to the rules of our world. But it has to stick to the background of the Elite Universe.

Imagine Star Wars and one day Luke finds out: "Hey, I'm a hologram. I'm actually controlling this cool Jedi dude from my X-Box at the Toshi station!"
I'd be out of the cinema so fast, you'd find an Aidan-shaped hole in the wall!

Your thoughts line up with mine exactly. Good response +1.

I will say that I like some of the new features. For example, on its face, I like the idea of instant multicrew in a game like ED. However, I don't like that it goes against much of the game's previously created lore and rules.

 

[bitstorm]

Your thoughts line up with mine exactly. Good response +1.

Except it's based on the fundamental misunderstanding that your CMDR is not a flesh and blood person sat in a ship.

 

[Privata]

There have been some very odd stuff.

Like 2.0s idea that POIs should only spawn when on the ground with an SRV (it got fixed during beta but it was not a bug)
Or Rise to power (that in game olympics that made no sense in-universe and would cause a moral panic if it was real , felt like a cartoon plot)
Telepresence that has been shown to have 30KM max range now has unlimited range as long as you are using it to multicrew (why does anyone do anything in the elite universe? you could just telepresence to work instead)

A while back , I remeber FD saying they would only do something if it made sense in universe , if it would fit in the lore...
Maybe I changed and I just dont understand anything , but it seems like that has been droped for instant gratification and zero logic.

Thing is , I like the two roles we have in multi-crew. but they sound/look like the ''bonus'' roles you give someone. what happened to engineering or a navigation role? or even a shield role that can redirect a 50% bonus to areas of the ship dynamicly (up , down , left , right)
It just feels as safe as possible and as if they are trying to avoid anything that might cause situations that need players to adapt , think and learn from the mechanics.

I am not going to say its a failure , because its not.
But its less than I hoped for , even when I was expecting QTEs to be part of it (not that I like QTEs I hate them)

However holo-me is awesome ! however... its a system that leads to lots of questions?
Is it like the reflectron from fallout? thats just a clever way to do a mirror?
Is it not realy you?
Is it a justification for something did not need it , thus making more questions than awnsers?
Am I just a hologram in elite?

 

[Marcusfalden]

But why make the crew holograms? Just have a simple animation of everyone walking into the bridge and sitting down. Whats so hard about that this is a video game anyway. The whole concept of holograms from the ship launched fighter and now for multicrew is so DAMN DUMB. Seriously why do ship launched fighters even have a pilot in them. I am very disappointed all though I know my opinion is as useful as "Spitting in Vacuum" I am glad I stopped buying things from the ED store. I wont be for a long time.

 

[Privata]

Except it's based on the fundamental misunderstanding that your CMDR is not a flesh and blood person sat in a ship.

You are (based on lore) sat in your normal ship and your SRV.
You use telepresence when on a multicrew ship or a shiplaunched fighter.

I have nothing against telepresence , but it feels off to me.

- - - Updated - - -

But why make the crew holograms? Just have a simple animation of everyone walking into the bridge and sitting down. Whats so hard about that this is a video game anyway. The whole concept of holograms from the ship launched fighter and now for multicrew is so DAMN DUMB. Seriously why do ship launched fighters even have a pilot in them. I am very disappointed all though I know my opinion is as useful as "Spitting in Vacuum" I am glad I stopped buying things from the ED store. I wont be for a long time.

For fighters its to avoid going to the rebuy screen
And for multicrew its to make it make ''sense'' when you can join a ship 900.000LY away.

I hope in the future we have both options.
To be physically on the ship or to telepresence.

But I am starting to wonder if the idea of walking around , bording other player ships and all that dynamic stuff it going to be canceled in order to make for a ''safer'' more predictable gameplay enviroment.

For example wrecks , they have talked about exploring them. I wonder if the ones we will walk around will be special ones that you select and press the explore button and then it makes an instance. rather than leaving your cockpit and jumping out the airlock

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

I don't believe the two completely relate. Regardless, when I want to change my avatar (representation of myself), I do it through the Settings menu, not mid-conversation.

I am all for immersion, but come on, there really is no issue. Once you have done it, don't go back unless you want to change your clothes.

If people want to change it whenever they want to it doesn't really bother anybody. Basically after creating your look, look at it as a wardrobe to change your clothing afterwards.

As for telepresence though, yep that is just rubbish and crap all over the ingame lore.

 

[Sadbot]

But why make the crew holograms? Just have a simple animation of everyone walking into the bridge and sitting down. Whats so hard about that this is a video game anyway. The whole concept of holograms from the ship launched fighter and now for multicrew is so DAMN DUMB. Seriously why do ship launched fighters even have a pilot in them. I am very disappointed all though I know my opinion is as useful as "Spitting in Vacuum" I am glad I stopped buying things from the ED store. I wont be for a long time.

Because the alternative explanation is that people are teleporting hundreds or thousands of light years onto your ship. Holographic remote teleprescense via FTL communications is a nice, logical way to explain how your friends are suddenly on your bridge despite wherever else they might be in the galaxy.

FD wants things to be playable, make sense (within the game's setting) and be consistent whenever possible, and this checks all of those boxes.

 

[bitstorm]

But why make the crew holograms? Just have a simple animation of everyone walking into the bridge and sitting down. Whats so hard about that this is a video game anyway. The whole concept of holograms from the ship launched fighter and now for multicrew is so DAMN DUMB. Seriously why do ship launched fighters even have a pilot in them. I am very disappointed all though I know my opinion is as useful as "Spitting in Vacuum" I am glad I stopped buying things from the ED store. I wont be for a long time.

"this is a video game anyway"

So what's the problem then?

The issue is if you have people walk in and sit down, the realism crowd throw a wobbly. How did they get there! [mad] Can only transfer at stations, this is stupid etc...

You do one thing people through a wobbly, you do something else people throw a wobbly.

Which people that don't appreciate that it's just a video game are you going to listen to?

The right answer is none, because none of them are sufficiently grounded in reality.

 

[The Wallet Inspector]

So can traders now have a decent trade computer that is ingame please? It will add gameplay, make things cooler, and fit with the lore.

 

[Aidan Brooder]

Except it's based on the fundamental misunderstanding that your CMDR is not a flesh and blood person sat in a ship.

It would be the next logical step. If I can use the guns of another captain's ship via a hologram. Can even fly a fighter. Why should I steer my own ship and risk being killed/ending in an escape pod?

What would have been so hard about them finding a better explanation than holograms? It is still more efficient from all we've seen to team up in a wing anyway.

To fly as a wing, you have to meet. Why not meet if you want to board another ship? You don't have to "walk" over because obviously we still can't atm. But have them meet at a station and good is.

Or go Star Citizen's way and play a crew member instead of yourself, when you do multi-crew? Can be instant, but you are not playing your commander, unless you boarded that ship physically.

EDIT: Typo

 

[Khelder]

Is it a justification for something did not need it , thus making more questions than awnsers?

For fighters its to avoid going to the rebuy screen
And for multicrew its to make it make ''sense'' when you can join a ship 900.000LY away.

I go with justification for something that didn't need it.

It's game. We realise that. For some things there is an issue of continuity (not "realism"). But for others, simple compromises would make more sense.

We already have "gamey" death mechanics. Loss of ship takes you instantly back to station via rebuy. Loss of SRV takes you instantly back to ship. Why did we suddenly need something different for fighters? Or even multicrew?

 

[Arkadi]

The pilots of the ships are flesh and blood people.

When other pilots join your ship remotely they are displayed on your bridge via holograms. At their end your ship's bridge and you are displayed to them with holograms, similar to the Star Trek's holodeck. Or maybe they put on a VR helmet, it has not been 100% explained and there are multiple ways to explain the precise mechanisms that are consistent with the lore and technology displayed in the setting.

If you don't like it I don't know what to tell you, it's in the lore and the technology behind it has been a part of the lore since 1984. You are free to pick and chose which parts of the lore you want to allow and which you want to disallow in your own personal head canon but then you are playing Arkadi's Elite Dangerous, not Elite Dangerous.

It makes a littel more sense then the 3D-printing excuse F-Dev had for instant ship transfer back then, admitted.

For my taste it would just have been a bit better to call the holo-me creator simply commander-creator. Of course one can always argue why we can change our appearance anytime we wish. Becouse it's just a game, becouse it's a holo-projection, becouse we have a plastic-suregery unit on each ship now, becouse, becouse...

However I really hope we alway will be real pilots and not "surrogates" like in this movie (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGwQ74cH5O0). I always had the impression of Elite universe being rather low-tech lacking in reliable interstellar communication technology or basic navigation-computers or auto-pilot functionality and shining more on martial things like space-stations, battleships and bulk-carriers and of course gigantic sensor-techonolgy that can scan whole systems at a honk but fails at planetary detail scans.

But my view of things might be totally wrong since I am not an Elite Follower since the 1980s...

 

[bitstorm]

To fly as a wing, you have to meet. Why not meet if you want to board another ship?

I think this argument had been done over and over and over on the forums.

But fair enough, if you are asking why, I guess there's a slim chance you haven't seen the many many discussions on this and you genuinely don't know what the why is.

Thy "why" is simply that Frontier want the feature accessible, they do not want to place barriers like that. That sort of barrier will ultimately be a disincentive to people getting together and having fun with friends in what in the end is a "computer game".

 

[X-Terminator]

+1 I want this one question answered too:-

"Are we the pilot in that cockpit and if not then where are we?
(assuming that we do use our escape pods)"

Only then, I can accept certain methods of Multi-Crew like GUNNER VIEW. However, if my damned Ship has this view then why doesn't the Captain get one the same or at least be able to use that same seat?

 

[Aidan Brooder]

Which people that don't appreciate that it's just a video game are you going to listen to?

The right answer is none, because none of them are sufficiently grounded in reality.

You are getting quite personal here now.

I have a job that keeps me on my toes and in reality very much all day, every day.

But I still have that thing called imagination and when I read a book or play a game in a fictional world, I want to lose myself in that world, not constantly be reminded that I'm playing a game or reading a book. It's pretty much like dreaming or day-dreaming for people with intact imaginations.
You forget yourself for a little while.

I know there are many people these days afraid to use their own imagination or let loose.
But as far as I'm concerned I feel I should pity them, not emulate them.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Like it or not holotech is in the original Elite.

Hey, I have no issues with holotech like the SLF, it has a believable range, in fact I think the range should be higher, but I think it's a limitation on the instancing tech.

But Holopresence that is instant and unlimited range to me is just wrong and pretty much invalidates large sections of the game including the last update 2.2.

It looks like we are getting a hodgepodge of different mechanics that don't make sense just for convenience because it is easy to implement.

It has been a long time since I played the original Elite, over 30 years ago and don't remember anything about instant unlimited range Holopresence. But my memory maybe playing tricks on me.

The other issue with this, is that I can see cheapen the space legs update. Basically no need to map out the stations when we can Holopresence into the faction headquarters. It's the first time that I am beginning to worry about the games future.

 

[Khelder]

I am all for immersion, but come on, there really is no issue. Once you have done it, don't go back unless you want to change your clothes.

If people want to change it whenever they want to it doesn't really bother anybody. Basically after creating your look, look at it as a wardrobe to change your clothing afterwards.

You can change your Cmdrs appearence as many times as you want. You can actively swap between male and female whenever you want now. But why would you do that in-game, on the bridge of your ship? The creator looks really good. But why not have that as part of the game menu? Like the OP said, it's kind of like you're playing with the game settings of the game you are playing within the game.

 

[bitstorm]

You can change your Cmdrs appearence as many times as you want. You can actively swap between male and female whenever you want now. But why would you do that in-game, on the bridge of your ship? The creator looks really good. But why not have that as part of the game menu? Like the OP said, it's kind of like you're playing with the game settings of the game you are playing within the game.

The holo tech is in game, it's an in game thing, it exists in the game.

While something like say graphics settings aren't an in game thing, so they go in the settings menu.

You have two tiers of settings in ED.

In game, not in game.

In game settings go in the ship panel. Out of game setting go in the settings menu.

Because the holome is in game it makes sense for it to go in the in game menu.

 

[Privata]

I can't begin to express how much I HATE the hologram explanation.
It is Warframe all over again: "No, you are no Space Ninja. You are a teenager controlling mindless drones."

Why oh why has it become so trendy to constantly remind us: "Hey, ya know, you are just playing a game!"
I know that already.

As to the: "But it's not realistic anyway argument!"

It doesn't have to be 'realistic' according to the rules of our world. But it has to stick to the background of the Elite Universe.

Imagine Star Wars and one day Luke finds out: "Hey, I'm a hologram. I'm actually controlling this cool Jedi dude from my X-Box at the Toshi station!"
I'd be out of the cinema so fast, you'd find an Aidan-shaped hole in the wall!

I see it now
''Rey walks up the steps of the old temple on Ahch-To , at the top she meets luke.
She hands over his old lightsaber , after a while luke says ''I cant actualy take it , this is telepresence... yeah sorry , I am actualy at the galactic core hanging out with the force priestesses they are very nice !''
Rey then uses instant ship transfer and spawns in a brand new ship from the corellian shipyards and sets off''

 

[Aidan Brooder]

I see it now
''Rey walks up the steps of the old temple on Ahch-To , at the top she meets luke.
She hands over his old lightsaber , after a while luke says ''I cant actualy take it , this is telepresence... yeah sorry , I am actualy at the galactic core hanging out with the force priestesses they are very nice !''
Rey then uses instant ship transfer and spawns in a brand new ship from the corellian shipyards and sets off''

She'd say: "No worries, Luke. We're just playing a game anyway..."