Elite Dangerous = Westerns IN SPACE

[EpicHam]

You know...
I love this game. I really do... but its making life REALLY REALLY HARD.
It's almost like stripping you of ALL modern communication tools.
No internet , no satellite , no undersea cable.
Everything has to be transmitted via the word of mouth or post.

Pre-telegraph age.
You warp to a station.
Its like walking up to a saloon in a western movie.
You fly through the gate , its like walking through the swinging doors , and you have all these people sitting at the entrance eyeballing you.

You refill on fuel , munition , and then all these posters on the wall caught your eye.

Few odd jobs here and there , most "up to date" information about local commodity prices , PSA from the sheriff... the lot.

AND THEN... you see all these WANTED posters. The Sheriff needs your help to catch some crims at large.... and sitting right under that poster... is that crim asking if you want to "make some money"

So basically... Elite : Dangerous
Is a 19th century western... in SPACE....
Without telegraph.

And it grew on me.
There's something romantic about roaming across the wild landscape and never knowing what to expect.... oh sure as someone who was born in the 90s.

Stripping me of modern comfort like.. the equivalent of the Internet and Instant Messaging can be annoying but also kinda therapeutic.


I suppose this is a game made for people in their 40s and 50s isn't it?


But seriously tho.
I NEED my phone.

 

[Commander Mad Mags]

I suppose this is a game made for people in their 40s and 50s isn't it?

Yep. We don't want none of them there new fangled gizmos you yoofs take for granted. Anything invented past 1989 is just strange and makes us feel unwell.

I agree with a lot of your points though.

 

[Joe Spivey]

You know...
I love this game. I really do... but its making life REALLY REALLY HARD.
It's almost like stripping you of ALL modern communication tools.
No internet , no satellite , no undersea cable.
Everything has to be transmitted via the word of mouth or post.

Pre-telegraph age.
You warp to a station.
Its like walking up to a saloon in a western movie.
You fly through the gate , its like walking through the swinging doors , and you have all these people sitting at the entrance eyeballing you.

You refill on fuel , munition , and then all these posters on the wall caught your eye.

Few odd jobs here and there , most "up to date" information about local commodity prices , PSA from the sheriff... the lot.

AND THEN... you see all these WANTED posters. The Sheriff needs your help to catch some crims at large.... and sitting right under that poster... is that crim asking if you want to "make some money"

So basically... Elite : Dangerous
Is a 19th century western... in SPACE....
Without telegraph.

And it grew on me.
There's something romantic about roaming across the wild landscape and never knowing what to expect.... oh sure as someone who was born in the 90s.
Stripping me of modern comfort like.. the equivalent of the Internet and Instant Messaging can be annoying but also kinda therapeutic.

I suppose this is a game made for people in their 40s and 50s isn't it?

I agree with everything.... and ain't it grand? And then, when you get out into the conflict zones, suddenly it's 1940 over southern England... quite brings a tear to the eye. The more I play the more I'm taken back to being alone in my room with my joystick in my hand.... no, wait. that sounds... wrong.

 

[EpicHam]

I agree with everything.... and ain't it grand? And then, when you get out into the conflict zones, suddenly it's 1940 over southern England... quite brings a tear to the eye.

Its rough I can tell you what .
Warping in space is like riding on horsebacks across the wild west.
You see this this dust plume rumbling across the barren landscape , turns out its a travelling merchant crossing the desert to hawk the newest wares he brought back from the "New World" .

You hail them .

They respond.

He's the first person you've seen in weeks.
You have a quick exchange , asking about where he's been and how's the "New World" ... but soon you have to part ways since he's bound for the "far coast"...

This is all.. very 18th century

 

[Jenner]

as someone who was born in the 90s.

God...I graduated high school in the 90s.

Damn kids.

 

[Commander Mad Mags]

God...I graduated high school in the 90s.

Damn kids.

How do you think I feel? I left school in the 80s! My first child was born in 1995 for flips sake! I REMEMBER when Star Wars came out the first time.

Off to the Dignitas clinic after this thread I tell ya...

 

[Pit Berensky]

God...I graduated high school in the 90s.

Damn kids.

Same here... early 90s...

 

[Adept]

Elite takes a whole lot of it's style and spirit from eighties Sci-Fi, and the old RPG game (pen & paper) Traveller.


Being a little "low tech" is a stylistic choice, and makes for a much cooler game <3

 

[Jenner]

Elite takes a whole lot of it's style and spirit from eighties Sci-Fi, and the old RPG game (pen & paper) Traveller.


Being a little "low tech" is a stylistic choice, and makes for a much cooler game <3

I agree....to a point. There's nostalgia and then there's just shoddy gameplay. There's a reason why modern games have done away with things like mapping out a dungeon on graph paper, say. Some things just don't age well.

Elite Dangerous currently needs a lot more information presented to the player all across the board. It can be faithful to the 80s/90s games, but still be modern. That's what I'd like to see, anyway.

 

[CMDR Texas Stu]

Class of '77... Was running a BBS over a 300 baud modem on a C-64 with Blitz Basic and a 1541 drive before Elite was even a flash in the pan over at Cambridge. Talk about garbage routines! (Number of files was limited to 144)
Most of y'all have no clue how technology has improved from the days of TTY, paper punch tapes, batch card files, 110 baud aucustic modems and rubbing two sticks together to make light

 

[Space]

Yep. We don't want none of them there new fangled gizmos you yoofs take for granted. Anything invented past 1989 is just strange and makes us feel unwell.

I agree with a lot of your points though.

Elite dangerous was made after 1989! GET OUT OF HERE! BEFORE YOU THROW UP!

 

[Wolf]

May I offer some handwaveium for some of the points made to make the already fun game play feel more "right" again?
Fast hyperspace travel is quite new and the "old" frame shift still took months for interstellar travel.
Maybe naked information can't be send through hyperspace.
So sending an actual ship to another system might really be necessary to transport information.

Now why can't I see the bulletin or market information immediately after entering a system?
Because the markets don't want you to. They depend on the fact you know less than them. The stations need customers. The contacts want to see you (or at least your ship) from up close.
Yes, all very old school but there could be many more reasons for doing it this way even if the technology would allow remote comms. Most reasons are political or financial.

IRL right now important agreements are always done in person, very rarely over phone let alone email or chat even if encrypted.

 

[Gimi]

May I offer some handwaveium for some of the points made to make the already fun game play feel more "right" again?
Fast hyperspace travel is quite new and the "old" frame shift still took months for interstellar travel.
Maybe naked information can't be send through hyperspace.
So sending an actual ship to another system might really be necessary to transport information.

Now why can't I see the bulletin or market information immediately after entering a system?
Because the markets don't want you to. They depend on the fact you know less than them. The stations need customers. The contacts want to see you (or at least your ship) from up close.
Yes, all very old school but there could be many more reasons for doing it this way even if the technology would allow remote comms. Most reasons are political or financial.

IRL right now important agreements are always done in person, very rarely over phone let alone email or chat even if encrypted.

To build upon that, information is valuable, so much that sharing is not necessarily the first and foremost priority in the future. While I would like to see some more information accessible in game, one has to be careful so that the element of surprise and player anticipation of the unknown is not lost.

 

[Enride]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DiWxcilWtU


You know, ever since I got into the alpha ive seen myself as a space cowboy!
And thats how ill continue to see the game, even though Im certain its not the intention of the developers

 

[Enride]

Now why can't I see the bulletin or market information immediately after entering a system?
Because the markets don't want you to. They depend on the fact you know less than them. The stations need customers. The contacts want to see you (or at least your ship) from up close.

Hell yeah!
"You gonna drink somethin pal or just sit there'n scare away my customers"

 

[Calaban]

OP: you can blame the Rogue AI for all your techno loss troubles.

I believe thats why we have Starships... but BBS's in the stations.

The information age was thrown into the Dark Ages when some Computer AI went bad somewhen in the next 120 years.

As a result, computing technology "nowadays" is purposely made "too dumb" for AI's out there to take over, or put to any sort of lethal or devastating use.

And here we are, travelling the stars, with 80's keyboards looking at us as our "interface". Its a pretty unique twist on a sci fi universe, and one that is more plausible than most.

And FYI: the only True western Sci fi was Firefly.

 

[Enride]

OP: you can blame the Rogue AI for all your techno loss troubles.

I believe thats why we have Starships... but BBS's in the stations.

The information age was thrown into the Dark Ages when some Computer AI went bad somewhen in the next 120 years.

As a result, computing technology "nowadays" is purposely made "too dumb" for AI's out there to take over, or put to any sort of lethal or devastating use.

And here we are, travelling the stars, with 80's keyboards looking at us as our "interface". Its a pretty unique twist on a sci fi universe, and one that is more plausible than most.

And FYI: the only True western Sci fi was Firefly.

Starcraft and even more Starcraft2 has alot of western vibes to it!

 

[CMDR Texas Stu]

I think Firefly has had an influence.
Of course I see the OP's humor. That said, I imagine Elite: Dangerous to be closer to a space western than other sci fi genres with each pilot being somewhat of a cowboy/girl in space. Traveling to the stars much the same way as the old west with stations dotting the way like small western towns as stanton's of civilization across the frontier. Trading posts, watering holes and places to rest between trips into the untamed wilderness of space. A wilderness you may meet friends, get ambushed by bushwhackers or highwaymen or more civilized areas with lawmen keeping a watchful eye for unruly ruffians.

 

[Commander M.O.]

I'm sorry, I had to LOL at this thread.

Take your precious modern communications to Mars and wait for my text .. it will only take about 21 minutes to get to you after I press the send button...

NO WAIT ..

How many cell towers do they have on Mars? That's right NONE. So I guess you'll be waiting a little longer.


OK, now that I have had my fun. I'll point out that radio waves are a form of electromagnetism and as such are limited to near the speed of light. So currently our modern communications would be pretty much useless between stars and very slow with in a star system. Not to mention that the star will block most communication directed towards it.

No, I think everything is just fine.

 

[Gimi]

You know, ever since I got into the alpha ive seen myself as a space cowboy!
And thats how ill continue to see the game, even though Im certain its not the intention of the developers

The comparison of Elite with the wild west and the lawless times at the end of the 19th century in the US is not new. I can't find the reference, but unless my memory is failing me I think that it was actually David Braben himself who made that comparison.

Anyone remember when/where?