For the sake of their sanity Fdev please. Throw Explorers a bone with this update.

Iskariot

Iskariot
Punished Mobius said:
If I were a full time exploration player I would be absolutely losing my mind right now. An entire year goes by and you guys get diddle and squat. It doesn't matter what the focus of the update it. In this case multi crew. Each update should bring a little something for everyone. A new ship is great for everyone. You can fly it yourself or just murder anyone else doing so. You can't really go wrong adding a new ship. They were hyping up unshown features on the stream so it either means they are going to blow our minds with Comets or something. Or whatever they had up their sleeve simply wasn't impressive enough to show on stream. I hope I am horribly wrong but it seems more likely to be the latter. Exploration is already a major disappointment it doesn't need any more neglect. I took a trip out to Sag A while back and was so underwhelmed by it all I killed myself right there on the spot. Cursing all the time I wasted. For me the exploration aspect wore itself thin so fast that despite my best attitude going into this jump fest I came away with pure distaste for it all (albeit with some sick screenshots). I genuinely don't understand how you explorers tolerate such a boring galaxy. In between Jumps all I would think about is "Gee a Comet or two would really liven this experience up." Maybe even make it tolerable. Nope just same looking star to same looking star rinse and repeat until you hit a nebula then putz around in the SRV until you decide to get moving again.

One long range trip was enough to drive me mad. I know you super explorers are a special breed of crazy. But it must be wearing thin by now even for you lunatics.
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I have not done real deep space exploration yet.
I will patiently wait for access to more planet types, like volcanic planets and planets with atmospheres.
That is when it will get really interesting and exploring will become engaging.

I will just have to be patient. FD has its own schedule and I respect that.
I do not think a thread like this will make FD change their schedule... and rightly so.
 

X-Terminator

Banned
X-Terminator
Next FD News Letter will go something like this: -

"So we have something new for Explorers out there. We have coded a BONE for you to find!" [haha]
 

JosiahD

JosiahD
Blackcompany said:
Did the Eagle Nebula and back and it sank in: Exploration isn't really doing anything. Honk. Point. Listen to beeps while waiting.

Wait to jump. Wait to scoop. Wait to scan. Wait to jump. This game feels like 90℅ waiting, 10% playing, outside of combat.

I want so badly to see this change, but I fear engine limitations are an issue.
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I assume by engine limitations you mean jump range? That has nothing to do with the issues exploration has - all it would do is allow people to cover greater distances while seeing the same things. No, the issue with exploration is not engines or jump ranges but simply the lack of things to actually do in a system. It needs more planetside features to discover, new scanning options like geophysical scans to more easily detect items of interest (instead of the current mindless wandering), ability to make discoveries on the surface that add (significantly) to the income made, and so on. The biggest boon explorers will get is when we can land on planets with life and ecosystems, with all the associated things to discover (and hopefully earn money from), with hopefully the ability to name lifeforms and maybe have missions to collect specimens and such. We need more reasons to linger in a system, such as comets that might be passing through, rogue asteroids passing through and perhaps even to watch as they collide with a planet or moon, skim gas giants for rare materials. The sooner we can at least land on planets with atmospheres the better exploration will be, and I'm really hoping the 2.4 surprise is the first iteration of this (ie atmospheres but not planets with ecosystems/complex life).

Edit: I see from Liqua's post that you may have actually been referring to the game engine. Apologies if that was the case as I hadn't thought of that. Been seeing too much of people wanting longer jump ranges I think so naturally thought that was what you meant.
 
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Aewarin Jameson

Aewarin Jameson
Blackcompany said:
Did the Eagle Nebula and back and it sank in: Exploration isn't really doing anything. Honk. Point. Listen to beeps while waiting.

Wait to jump. Wait to scoop. Wait to scan. Wait to jump. This game feels like 90℅ waiting, 10% playing, outside of combat.

I want so badly to see this change, but I fear engine limitations are an issue.
Click to expand...

imo it has little to do with the engine.

engines are simply interfaces between software and hardware* - they allow you to draw things on a screen with pre/post effects and make use of hardware in a PC by abstracting it. the logic that presents options and outcomes to players is the game (ed software) - the real limitation is going to be down to how much resource fd can allocate on a zero-value feature (I doubt jazzing up exploration will generate new sales like say Horizons did) combined with ensuring the resultant new code will still run on a potato.

FD catering to a VERY low demoninator severely limits what you can do. sure fd devs can optimise and squeeze every bit out of low end pcs but there's a limit.

FWIW +1 to more explorer options as I detest the current implementation.


Edit: Think Unity engine ... it gives the freedom for devs to cut time in making a game by presenting them with a common interface to hardware so titles like Rust and what have you can exist. A poorly built game is not often down to choice of engine.
 
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JosiahD

JosiahD
PyrateLV said:
I have 2 theories about this. I know no one wants to hear it, but here goes anyway.

1- FDev is trying to build on Combat first, as that is probably the easier to develop and get into the game. Then work on the Long Term, more labor intensive content (Exploring,Mining,Planetary,etc) once the Combat stuff is fleshed out and finished

OR

2- FDev has decided that they would rather have ED be a more Combat/Actiony, get in and get out, Insta-Play Lobby game as that is the better paying demographic. Leaving all the Non-Combat content as is (maybe some minor content updates) as it takes much more development time and money. (think of why SOE did the NGE to SWG)
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I don't think so. I think we'll find that Frontier already has a lot of work done towards things like earth-likes and such. It's easy to think that because we haven't seen any teasers that they've not done any work on it at all, or have decided on another direction for the game. It would not surprise me to find that when we do start to get a look at planets with atmospheres, earth-likes etc that it'll all be much further along than many think. I just wish Frontier would start to give us a few more hints about how they're coming along, maybe a Dev update on the progress thus far and the work yet to be done. But then I can understand why they wouldn't do that as we, as a community, tend to be pretty hard on em in response to such updates. Besides, I think Braben and the team get a kick out of surprising us by revealing out of the blue things that we didn't really expect.....
 

h347h

h347h
Greyza Badger said:
Since the last bone (planetary landings), explorers have been given the royal shaft at every turn.
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Seriously?

Sure combat gets its gameplay fleshed out but exploration got the only content added to the game. For exploration to get more gameplay FD is going to have to do more ground work.
 
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Colonel Kenney

Colonel Kenney
I will give them credit for a fantastic camera system. I am more willing to buy paint jobs now!! (If i reinstall at some point when there is explorer content)
 
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Wylie28

W
They added tons of things for explorers in 2.2. Most explorers take a lot of pictures and will get a lot from the new camera. They will also hopefully fix the beige planets bug. However from the sounds you simply are not an explorer. I suspect you will never like exploration. I suggest you stop trying to tell yourself otherwise and do something else.
 

Greyza Badger

Greyza Badger
h347h said:
Seriously?

Sure combat gets its gameplay fleshed out but exploration got the only content added to the game. For exploration to get more gameplay FD is going to have to do more ground work.
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You're going to have to run that by me again.
It may be the beer. I've had a couple.
 

bladebss

bladebss
Arnt we getting the planet scanner thingy that tells us if there are ruins on the planet. I love this and think it should be extened to other things of interest
 

Kiwirat

Kiwirat
IMHO whinging and whining just may pay off eventually.... Why?

FD is above all run by Corporates, Shareholders and a Board who are looking at a $$ return. They already have my money and your money, so they are focussed on enhancing a product to new customers (franchise units) thus looking at short term stuff to achieve that goal. Do they care if you or I hang up our space boots.. maybe not.. the only way you or I will really matter to FD is if we continue to give constructive feedback on why ED is not holding players on board which has the potential to discourage new customers to buy the product.

Check out the Chief Executives Statement on page 2 of Frontier Developments Annual Report & Accounts for 2016:
"The expected full release of Planet Coaster will mark the successful completion of our transition, with all development staff working on revenue-generating franchises under our new self-published business model."

..and in the section titled Outlook and Current Trading Update:

"We plan to continue to increase the audience for Elite Dangerous via new distribution channels and platforms, and to further enrich the Elite Dangerous experience with new activities and new ways to play. The Board expects sales of Elite Dangerous to continue to build over the rest of the financial year as new players are recruited and adoption of Elite Dangerous: Horizons continues."


...and this:
"Frontier uses online channels to create and engage with a fan-base or community during its self-published developments, which provides a valuable source of feedback and an enthusiastic community for each franchise before first release."

So: keep up the whinging and whining guys, but make it constructive. Just saying...
 

Some1else

Some1else
Greyza Badger said:
Since the last bone (planetary landings), explorers have been given the royal shaft at every turn.
Even landing on planets outside the bubble is dull. There's just no content, when there could be so much.
I'm currently hopping between neutron stars but, once I've done enough of that, I don't know where to go next or what to do.
I might just go back to Colonia to cash in all my ELWs. Woooo!!!

Come on FD, give us something to look forward to. Engage us in specifying what explorers want and need to keep playing.
Work with us and we'll work with you.
Click to expand...


I do not think it is fair to say that explorers have gotten the "royal shaft" sense planetary landings. Engineers brought us some very nice and need upgrades for our ships. And the game remembering your route is also very nice.

Where the failure comes in is that none of these new features, save the route plotting, are really exploration motivated. Planetary landing was a good way for FD to close the gate on engineers for non horizon owners. Engineers is far more combat oriented. And the DDS giving the landable planets content in the system map was for bubble players, so they could find engineer materials easier. Not for explorers to find them easier.

So, sure explorers have gotten new stuff, but it could be argued that the stuff was merely a side effect of pleasing other game types.


bladebss said:
Arnt we getting the planet scanner thingy that tells us if there are ruins on the planet. I love this and think it should be extened to other things of interest
Click to expand...


Sorry, but once again you are talking about something that came along after an out cry from player frustration with that sad "hunt & peck" mission.

LLaP

S1E
 

bladebss

bladebss
Well sooOOoory for not being all bitter. I oh look.. a beutiful butter fly. Suppose we had best crush it like the evil fdev crushed our dreams. Be glad your not a pirate...
 
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Vermill

Banned
Vermill
I wish exploration in Elite will be made like in No Man's Sky where exploration is much much better and fun with life on the planets and chnging environments. Not like here only sitting in SRV and pretenting to explore anything in this emptiness.
 
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