"Beyond" free for Horizon owners - LEP musings

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rucky

rucky
What a full thread of nonsense.
I'm way off / out of ED for some months now, only coming back to the forum to check if there's some new "exciting (tm)" things to discover.
Yes, the forum is "exciting" as ever.

To start with, one question (as I don't have nor want to check all available media), where has FDEV (<== !!!, no Forum babble like the 10 years plan please!) stated, next year is called the 3.x season?
I've only seen mentionings of 2.4 AND BEYOND... but I haven't checked all sites, streams, whatever...

Next, now I'm exaggerating. Extremely. On purpose. Only to make that clear, it's my personal opinion, if you differ, you can, just don't attack me personally.

I'm an Beta-Player, since September 2015, and I finally bought in exactly 3 weeks after the initial first LEP was announced, for 40€. I didn't got it.
Then the Release version. Full of Bugs, less substance and gameplay.
Okay, it's a long way to make a good game, I will give you that.

The next what all these white knights saying? Help FDEV with money, they nearly bankrupt, buy additional copies and cosmetics! Because we all were in the belief, FDEV would first make the Core game complete, fleshing out etc.pp. (DDF anyone?!) before they're going into Expansions!
I bought in with 150€ in cosmetics, because I believed.

Then after one year, yes we got 4 updates, free of charge, but surely needed for Core game play, and it wasn't even enough for what the Core Game Kickstarter and Game Description would have hinted at!
Okay, development needs time, I give you that again;
but now I have to buy again. 180€ for another LEP oportunity or 50€ for Horizons only. At that Time I was already in with 250€ because I believed.

No. I've grown-up... a bit.
I only payed the 37.50€ for Horizons (Early gamers got a discount).
One Year later, everybody thought Horizons will also be only one year back then ("season"-model), we got only 2-3 updates.
Was is worth now my investment of 300€ already? No.
But we're getting at least 2 more updates, let's hope... "Winter is coming!!!!!!"

What did we get? I don't want to get into details.

BUUUT:

Now the things getting interesting.
There are so many Threads about "miles wide, inch deep", "shallow gameplay", "not worth the investment", "too expensive", "no buying into 3.0!!!" etc.
Who are defending Elite and FDEV?
Mostly LEPs.

^^ Yes. Mostly LEPs. And White knights. And especially the combination of both.
Why? Because they have already bought themselfs in, completely. They don't have to invest any more money to get better gameplay or fixing bugs. The others can pay again, that's absolutely okay, they don't need to. So let the other soak!

Funny, right?
There are so many threads, complaining Season 2 wasn't worth the money...

... and what does FDEV do now?

>> They're saying, we will add more stuff the next year to flesh this season out. <<

^^
READ AGAIN ANYBODY!
READ AGAIN!!

I'm not sure myself, if this will restore my faith into this game or FDEV, but it's a good step into the right direction!!
Again, READ IT!

And now?
Who's complaining now?! The SAME PEOPLE that defended FDEV and the Game and the price model and anything time versus money related!

Really guys. Look into your mirror and then make some head banging!

/rant mode and overaggregating OFF


For me, after Elite got a bit criticism (Steam review decreasing over time now, other re-reviews too, we don't need to go into detail), FDEV trying to make this expansion indeed WORTH the investment the player has given, even if it took now 2 year going into the third!

This is a GOOD MOVE.


peace anybody.
 
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Rudolphus

Rudolphus
I believe Sandro said on games-con 2017 they were not working already on 3.0 the next update
Juniper said:
If you insist...



Anyway...



Perhaps it wouldn't have, but they'd be perfectly within their rights to do it. 100+ team working on a product for 12 months... with potentially zero revenue... go figure.

Beyond is likely free IMO because they are using it to improve the underlying code, rework the game mechanics, add features (like the new lighting model) that is all a pre-requisite for what they have planned for 2019 and...er... beyond. You can bet your house that will be chargeable.



Possible, but highly unlikely. That's not to say they don't have a stream of developers working on 2019 content already.
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Drelthar

Drelthar
Hey, you know what they could do for LEP owners?

They could make one of the new ships (maybe that Weird looking one, chieftain I think??) exclusive to LEP holders!


:)

:)

:p
 

GraXXoR

GraXXoR
--edited for lousy voice to text recognition... --
Dan Diplo said:
If you've made a lifetime investment in a product then the one thing you'd want above all is for the product to prosper. If people stop playing the game then there will be no future releases and your investment is worth nothing. Making 3 free helps shore up the player base, keeps people happy and ultimately paves the way for the long term viability of the game. If I was an investor this is what I'd want.
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You know, I might have been looking at things wrong... I kept thinking that ED dev work was being siphoned off to JP/PC etc... and thinking it was bad for ED... But what if the fact that JP/PC being successful means that they can continue to develop ED on the side as a favour to the former majority shareholder, DB.

If they have enough income from other projects, they won't need to charge for anything other than the main game any more and could just move to a free expansion model, moving any spare dev capacity back to ED when they have time etc and relying on the frontier store for little bonuses, like the successful raider ship kit, etc... to keep the servers rolling.
 
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Sashenka

S
Novo Mundus said:
Hey, you know what they could do for LEP owners?

They could make one of the new ships (maybe that Weird looking one, chieftain I think??) exclusive to LEP holders!


:)

:)

:p
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I know you're joking but don't give them any ideas. Gating in-game content behind out-of-game time sensitive investment is beyond . It is my opinion that it is better if there are no VIP players, everyone bought the game and should have access to the content, the only difference is that LEP owners paid in advance. If they are releasing the content for free then more power to them, it is not being 'robbed', it is a good thing.
 

Juniper

Juniper
Rudolphus said:
I believe Sandro said on games-con 2017 they were not working already on 3.0 the next update
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Sandro says a lot of things. ;)

So does David Braben, and he has hinted in the past that he has had developers working on atmospheric planets, walking around, etc.

I'm sure that right now their main focus is delivering 2.4, but if they have a team of 100 (not all devs of course) working on the game, if they have a clear internal roadmap of where they want to get to, it'd be quite remarkable if they weren't at least doing some prototypes and feasibility studies in-house.
 

Kolato

Kolato
Paid 60£ for the beta base game, 100£ for the LEP. Excluding my other accounts, i've payed 160£ for Elite. Of those 100£ spent on the LEP, my rewards were... horizons access (so 20£) and a few ship skins. So i've essentially thrown out 80£. Now if frontier starts charging for season 4 and beyond, this isn't THAT big of an issue, but i still feel that i should have gotten more than 20£ back after 2 and a half years. It would be nice if we could at least get some confirmation from frontier that those 80£ didn't go to waste.
 

Space Dandy

Space Dandy
Kola2 said:
Paid 60£ for the beta base game, 100£ for the LEP. Excluding my other accounts, i've payed 160£ for Elite. Of those 100£ spent on the LEP, my rewards were... horizons access (so 20£) and a few ship skins. So i've essentially thrown out 80£. Now if frontier starts charging for season 4 and beyond, this isn't THAT big of an issue, but i still feel that i should have gotten more than 20£ back after 2 and a half years. It would be nice if we could at least get some confirmation from frontier that those 80£ didn't go to waste.
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That's the thing with lifetime passes, they are a gamble..not an investment.

You might get your monies worth and even more if the game is a success and last a long time and has lots of DLC/expansions but that all based and a long series of "IF" .....

For what it worth I always though the LEP was too expensive for what it would probably end up giving you but the game is not done yet and still has life left in it, I think it's safe to say there will be more "expansion/season/dlc you will get for free it just might take longer that you assumed it would to "make your money back".
 

Riverside

Riverside
Space Dandy said:
That's the thing with lifetime passes, they are a gamble..not an investment.

You might get your monies worth and even more if the game is a success and last a long time and has lots of DLC/expansions but that all based and a long series of "IF" .....

For what it worth I always though the LEP was too expensive for what it would probably end up giving you but the game is not done yet and still has life left in it, I think it's safe to say there will be more "expansion/season/dlc you will get for free it just might take longer that you assumed it would to "make your money back".
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I can certainly see how a lifetime pass can be considered a gamble over whether the developer will survive as a company, but I don't think that's an issue here.

I can also see an argument that an alpha or other early access game might not pick up enough sales for the Devs to justify continuing further. I have a feeling this is not the case either.

When I was deciding whether to buy the LEP or just the Horizons expansion, I was deciding whether I was likely to want to buy all future expansions, or only a few. I bought the LEP on the basis of value for money in just the same way that I might buy two of something I like to get a third free, even though I only want one. For me, it was a rational decision to save money longer term, not a punt on whether Frontier would survive as a company, or whether the game would progress at all (as would be the case with the Kickstarters - I could have done the kickstarter but waited for the game to be released). I reasonably assumed that the cost of the LEP was based on there being easily enough extra content to cover the cost (ie at least 3-4 expansion packages worth the cost of a full game).

So yes, it's taking 'a bit' longer than I expected, and that's really it. I don't begrudge anyone for receiving more free stuff than any of us though we would get, and if this turns out to be the last major set of updates, it will be a shame but I can live with that too, provided FDev accept that some players paid in advance for something that is no longer going to happen (if that is the case), and refund the difference for product not delivered.

I'm not looking for a refund, but I am looking for confirmation that the three year lifespan of Horizons will be an exception rather than the rule, and that there is a plan to produce sufficient premium content to make the LEP worthwhile.

I don't need access to super-secret plans & roadmaps (although naturally I want to know the juicy details just as much as anyone else), but I'm not donating to a just cause either. I paid in advance to receive something within a reasonable timescale, and would like some reassurance that my order has not been forgotten, that it is still on it's way.

If you ordered an Amazon delivery & it didn't show up when expected, no matter how patient you are you would eventually chase it up, hoping to either finally receive the goods you ordered, or a refund if the order cannot be completed because the product is discontinued.
 

Riverside

Riverside
Would I be right in thinking that this post suggested that there would be something relevant to LEP owners at the FX17 event? If anyone could find a more recent (or more relevant) dev post I'd appreciate it, I only really read these forums (ie not reddit, twitter etc).

Zac Antonaci said:
AndiBcool said:
So will there be a 3rd Season ? If not whats about all thouse lifetime expanson pass owners ?
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We will have more details about the "beyond" 2.4 at the special event mentioned in the post. We will be announcing details of the event a number of weeks after E3 but make sure you watch for details. It's going to be awesome. :)
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There is some ambiguity in Zacs reply that I think is only apparent with hindsight. At the time it would have been reasonable for the reader to assume there would be info on future premium content in the FX17 presentation.
 

WR3ND

WR3ND
Riverside said:
Would I be right in thinking that this post suggested that there would be something relevant to LEP owners at the FX17 event? If anyone could find a more recent (or more relevant) dev post I'd appreciate it, I only really read these forums (ie not reddit, twitter etc).

...

There is some ambiguity in Zacs reply that I think is only apparent with hindsight. At the time it would have been reasonable for the reader to assume there would be info on future premium content in the FX17 presentation.
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He probably doesn't know what an LEP is and was confusing it with the "season pass." [hehe] ;)

In all seriousness, it isn't always the easiest thing to keep track of all this stuff, and I've seen examples of confusion on the dev and community management side of things as well in the past, not just the player base.

Frontier sometime seem like they could use a more pronounced market/product ace on the inside (i.e., not a marketing agency) that keeps all this stuff sorted. The mess with Steam early on in Horizons points to that need as well. Thankfully they did sort that out eventually though. https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/202994-Elite-Dangerous-Horizons-Steam-Access

I'm not trying to assign blame or anything like that by stating this, just acknowledging that it can sometimes be a challenge. There's nothing to indicate that Frontier don't have the best intentions, and in general I think they do a great job.

...

To be clear, what he said there wasn't factually inaccurate or anything, though at the time it did seem to suggest that they would be talking about future paid-for expansions as well. Us being LEP owners get the mentioned content too though, obviously, which in regard to his post, would seem to be more relevant to the backer LEPs that got the LEPs before the ones offered at the Horizons announcement and pre-sale.

This is just speculation on my part, but if I had to guess, the next paid-for expansion will likely include some atmospheric worlds and gas giants. The 4Q '18 art goal and earlier talks with David Braben this year/last year (?) about gas giants and what sort of gameplay that might entail seem to point in that direction somewhat as well.

[video=youtube_share;ypIq3fg9nMM]https://youtu.be/ypIq3fg9nMM[/video]
 
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babelfisch

babelfisch
Jex =TE= said:
LOl maybe!

However, in defence of the forums, FDev keep punching themselves in the face. It's perfectly reasonable to ask where your LEP is going and we've all seen what's been offered by FDev which has mostly failed.

CQC
Power Play
Wings (a failure because it's so buggy and unreliable but absolutely needed but the failure compunds with no missions for winged players, not even a basic escort mission in 3 years)
MultiCrew
RNGineers (this is more mixed as a lot of people like it but it cut off none Horizon players from PVP and ruined PVP and made PVE even easier than what it already is)
Passenger Mission (an extra mission added as an expansion. I think if we didn't have delivery missions and they tried to sell those as an expansion people would complain.

Then there's Horizons, or the planets, where FDev did exactly the right thing and then stopped working on those to give us the rubbish other stuff whilst charging before it was made and cutting their staff to work on JW.

Imagine if instead of cutting staff to work on other projects and they concentrated on the planet stuff would anyone care if we didn't have MC, RNGeers and Passenger Missions?
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Problem is, they didn't cut staff. There are still over 100 people working on ED.
 
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