Will Elite Dangerous have Atmospheric Landings, Space Legs or Procedural Cities by 2019?

[Cosmo]

I don’t understand the ‘there needs to be content to justify’ crowd when it comes to space legs.

Where is the content to justify exploration?
Mining?
Trading?
Missions?
Passenger trips?
Engineers?
Thargoids?

None of them have anything but the absolute basics behind them.
Why do space legs need some amazing content to justify their existence when nothing else does?

I want space legs to be able to float around my ship, check out the pretty views from angles other than the cockpit, go see the cargo hold and my captains quarters. I want to sit in the mess hall with my NPC crew. I’d like other players to be able to dock with my ship and come say hi and have a virtual party - after all, players are meant to create their own content in this game.
There. That’s all before we talk about leaving the ship.
I’ve just justified space legs with more ‘content’ than most game play mechanics have in the game.

Seconded. A basic iteration like this would do wonders to make the game more immersive and offer new roleplay opportunities with emergent gameplay.

The spread out player population isn't an issue, because people can use holo-me telepresence to visit other ships.

Take space legs.
**IF** FD replaced the model of an SRV with an animated humanoid model, and modified the hit box and speed, that'd be space legs.
But the problem is...what's the point?

There needs to be content behind the addition of space legs to justify the time and effort in adding them. And it needs to be content that an SRV can't fulfil. And it needs to be interesting content....not content put in just for the sake of it.

Now - there is plenty that space legs offers. A sense of immersion. Opportunities for boarding craft and wrecks, for salvage and piracy. Walking around stations and ships and EVA and so on. FPS style combat.

Thing is....most of those will be impressive the first couple of times it is done, and then largely forgotten about. That;'s not to say space legs isn't worth adding, or that it won't offer up gameplay. Just that there are a lot more thigns that are more important.

We can get additional gameplay features as you described with major updates after they launched the initial basic version. I think it'll be used a lot more and it will attract many new players to ED. Such as people who like Mass Effect.

 

[Dbrn47]

I don’t understand the ‘there needs to be content to justify’ crowd when it comes to space legs.

Where is the content to justify exploration?
Mining?
Trading?
Missions?
Passenger trips?
Engineers?
Thargoids?

None of them have anything but the absolute basics behind them.
Why do space legs need some amazing content to justify their existence when nothing else does?

I want space legs to be able to float around my ship, check out the pretty views from angles other than the cockpit, go see the cargo hold and my captains quarters. I want to sit in the mess hall with my NPC crew. I’d like other players to be able to dock with my ship and come say hi and have a virtual party - after all, players are meant to create their own content in this game.
There. That’s all before we talk about leaving the ship.
I’ve just justified space legs with more ‘content’ than most game play mechanics have in the game.

You don't understand because you don't want to, you're simply heavily biased toward a feature you want in any form. All of the things you listed have interactions and systems to either be gameplay themselves or enhance other gameplay beyond a mere visual basis. You're asking for a novelty instead of a feature. There is also the fact that we're about to have a year of improvements to all of those things you listed because we've been complaining that they can use more.

Can you look forward and see that's exactly how your base form of 'legs' implementation would go as well? We'd have perhaps a week of 'oohs and ahhs' and then the next year would be 'more content for legs when?' So why bother? Why not get some interactions and overlaps going for that system first?

On the other end, to be fair to you, I can see it from your side. I understand that something that simple on the surface can increase the immersion level of the game for you. Though, it's just something we can't agree on overall. I want more for the game. I want more for all the systems, especially exploration. I like interactions and actual things to find beyond 'neat views'. I want more tools to find things and not have a need for out of game collaboration to find treasures and data on the secrets of Elite's galaxy. There's a great opportunity to incorporate a first person experience in a way where it can interact with all systems available in the game and I think it would be a waste to just throw it in as, what I consider it would be, a gimmick in which you need to create your own imaginary scenarios to get anything from it. I'm not as willing to give them an excuse to under develop something because some are more than willing to fill in the holes with their imagination. I haven't given them a pass for leaving other parts of the game under developed and I'm not going to start for the first person experience.

 

[Dbrn47]

We can get additional gameplay features as you described with major updates after they launched the initial basic version. I think it'll be used a lot more and it will attract many new players to ED. Such as people who like Mass Effect.

The stories and choices in Mass Effect are what attract people to Mass Effect and it was all released at once. You didn't get Mass Effect without character relationships on launch, you got the full experience and the full experience was improved upon with patches, not piecemeal content. You aren't going to attract and keep new players that way. It'll keep you and the people like you that are dying to be able to move your avatar around and that is it. You overestimate the number of people willing to deal with another under developed feature release.

 

[TenakaFurey]

The players who explore and use the SRV regularly would likely also use spacelegs on a regular basis. That is a significant part of the playerbase.

And what exactly will they be doing that they could not do with an SRV? Wander around a ship or station once or twice. What else?

EVE is a completely different game.

Which is not the same as saying that lessons cannot be learned. There was a lot of time and effort put into adding space legs into EVE because the players wanted it.

And it wasn't used and ultimately added little to the game.

Why do you think ED would be any different?

Elite would benefit from space legs for essentially same reasons it benefitted from the addition of the SRV, it is an immersion-driven game (or at least it was when originally launched) and anything that increases the immersion with new gameplay features such as SRV, space legs and so on will improve the game by building on the game's strengths.

I'm sure space legs will add value to the game. Which is why FD want to add it.

With no game content in place around it, it will simply be a waste of time and effort as it will be implementing a feature lots of people want but few will use.

EDB will no doubt see more progress made towards space legs. EDH added the avatar creator and a number of animations.

But there isn't any pressing need. Just a desire and an uncertainty...at best...as to how much use such a feature will get.

Players are lazy. They won't use the feature until there is a need.

Unfortunately it looks like most of the effort is being put into simply adjusting or redesigning features than it is in adding or expanding them. Most of the Engineering rework is completely unnecessary at this point, that is time that could be better spent expanding trade, exploration or mining mechanics.

Lots of players would disagree with you. As it is, enhancements and improvements to trade, mining and exploration are slated for EDB. CandP and enginneering are simply the first to get a degree of player feedback

The only new features I'm really looking forward to are the player-owned carriers at the end of 2018 and the new ships (Type 10, Chieftan and Krait). I expect that we'll actually see minimal improvements in the rest of the game.

Maybe. Maybe not. But saying they should abandon the work because you don't believe they'll follow through is not really a productive option.

What they would need to add would be basic space legs missions, i.e., base assaults, boarding actions and some limited gameplay at stations.

In short, you agree that they need to add game content to make space legs a success.

The irony here is that it would actually be a rather lucrative investment if FD did implement it but realistically their development model would never invest the resources at this point in the game's development to actually make it happen.

I'm sure they'll monetize it quite a bit.

Unfortunately it looks like we won't really be getting either of these. Space legs is basically not happening (FD is moving on to other IPs and Elite will never get the development resources needed to do this) and improvements to the basic gameplay are also going to be very limited because they won't really have enough resources to do that properly either.

Last I checked, developers COULD work on more than one game at a time.

The fact remains that space legs was a very highly anticipated feature that many players hoped would eventually materialize. We now know that won't happen but some players still haven't processed this and are holding out for the possibility that somehow Braben will put the necessary resources into Elite to make it happen in at least a basic form.

Who says it won't happen? All FD have really said is that they can't do everything at once.

 

[TenakaFurey]

Seconded. A basic iteration like this would do wonders to make the game more immersive and offer new roleplay opportunities with emergent gameplay.

The spread out player population isn't an issue, because people can use holo-me telepresence to visit other ships.



We can get additional gameplay features as you described with major updates after they launched the initial basic version. I think it'll be used a lot more and it will attract many new players to ED. Such as people who like Mass Effect.

Which requires FD to devote several patches to one feature many won't be using until the content is available.

Improving gameplay and mechanics for aspects used by 80% of players, and for which the game has been criticised since launch, will be of more immediate value to more players.

Space legs is attractive...but an approach of get it into the game NOW will simply leave other work undone or leave space legs without the content and gameplay to support it.

Space legs requires the avatar to be fully animated. It requires ship and station layouts to be added to the game. Additional animations for the SRVs and ships. It needs new items...weapons, armour, uniforms, etc...to be added. It needs an NPC AI system
to be added. And it needs a lot of game content to be programmed in...procgen for outposts and bases and settlements and caves, suitable missions for salvage and boarding and combat.

And to work...it either needs to be added slowly or all at once.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

And what exactly will they be doing that they could not do with an SRV? Wander around a ship or station once or twice. What else?



Which is not the same as saying that lessons cannot be learned. There was a lot of time and effort put into adding space legs into EVE because the players wanted it.

And it wasn't used and ultimately added little to the game.

Why do you think ED would be any different?



I'm sure space legs will add value to the game. Which is why FD want to add it.

With no game content in place around it, it will simply be a waste of time and effort as it will be implementing a feature lots of people want but few will use.

EDB will no doubt see more progress made towards space legs. EDH added the avatar creator and a number of animations.

But there isn't any pressing need. Just a desire and an uncertainty...at best...as to how much use such a feature will get.

Players are lazy. They won't use the feature until there is a need.



Lots of players would disagree with you. As it is, enhancements and improvements to trade, mining and exploration are slated for EDB. CandP and enginneering are simply the first to get a degree of player feedback



Maybe. Maybe not. But saying they should abandon the work because you don't believe they'll follow through is not really a productive option.



In short, you agree that they need to add game content to make space legs a success.



I'm sure they'll monetize it quite a bit.



Last I checked, developers COULD work on more than one game at a time.



Who says it won't happen? All FD have really said is that they can't do everything at once.

Of course they need to add game content for space legs. Other wise there would be no point in doing it. People keep saying that there is no content for space legs. Of course there isn't as there is no reason to implement it if you can't do it. I do not understand why people say these thing.

EVE added it but provided no content to go with, maybe if they added some great content with It, it may not have died. If people want space legs without content, then they are being silly as it will kill the game mode. It needs to be released with good game content, unlike multicrew which has none and is dying a quick death, for it to succeed.

 

[Jack Schitt]

And what exactly will they be doing that they could not do with an SRV?

For some, being able to do something outside of the SRV is the "what". I've spent the last couple of days on and off exploring planetary surfaces, and if I'd had the ability to climb out of the SRV and EVA for a bit I would have done so dozens of times just because I could.

Now I'm not suggesting that there are enough players like me to make such a basic mechanic a worthwhile endeavour for FD to undertake in isolation. Nor am I suggesting that a basic "get out and WASD around" feature is what FD ought to be aiming for if and when they do take on this challenge. I think we all expect more than that, although the degree of "more" is open to interpretation and the realities of development.

What I am saying is that a hand-waving dismissal of these features on the grounds that they're nothing without layers and layers of extra game loops and interactions is subjective. I've said this before, but it bears repeating: for some players a mechanic is only viable if it leads to more content, for some value of "content". For others, the mechanic is content and anything else is a bonus. Just because you favour one viewpoint, don't dismiss those who favour the other.

Stating that "Players [...] won't use the feature until there is a need," may be true for a large number, possibly the majority, of players. But not all of them. In this case, it's also a Kickstarter FAQ feature which helped get 25,000 people to cough up a lot of investment money. I'm all for anything that occasionally reminds the community, and especially FD, of this.

 

[Kortossis]

I been testing Alpha 3.0 SC and i can tell you this, by the time those guys get anywere near being a threat to this game this game its self will have evolved or been replaced by something better if thats even possible. SC is so far out of scope for most, were talking probably 5-6 years before a possible release of the 3.0 in any playable situation to be called a live publish. Even the current live 2.6 is so full of bugs and trash and its still considered alpha, and a long ways away from polish of being classified as a beta. At least ED here got some level of playable accomplishment, and solid playable framerates for what it is at the moment. A great vision implimented onto our screens to explore, fight, and enjoy. What ever they do decide they can add they will do it well or they wont do it at all. I think we will all be playing this for years to come before any threat of SC is in the scope. But at least we will be playing something complete.

 

[Devari]

I disagree here. There has been so much negative press regarding the engineers that I think it has put a lot of people off, not only from purchasing horizons but from but g the main game. Also a number of people left the game because of engineers, so enticing them back is a good thing. Why is it a good thing, well it looks like there will be another expansion coming next year, and they will want people to buy it. Simple.

Except that they spent 6 months after Engineers launched where they were continually "balancing" and "rebalancing" everything relating to Engineers just to get to the point we're at now. Now they're planning on completely changing the Engineering system yet again which will further frustrate players who not only have to adjust to a new system but will also see their prior efforts to grind for top-end mods devalued yet again if they increase the blueprint maximums like they are planning. We already went through this once and it wasn't well received, especially since FD demonstrated that they will retroactively apply any Engineering nerfs to previously-rolled modules but for some reason don't retroactively apply Engineering buffs in the same manner. They have a terrible track record in actually making useful progress when redesigning aspects of Engineers and usually just shift the goalposts without making the system substantially better. It's a terrible idea to try to completely redesign the Engineering system yet again when there are many negatives to another rework and the time and resources can be better spent elsewhere. Players who left because of Engineers are not going to return if their prior progress was devalued and they have to learn a completely new system with yet more emphasis on grind to make incremental progress.

Trading is already being looked at for the next update and we are getting other stuff that they haven't mentioned yet.

As to the mining and exploration, these look loke they are getting much bigger and far reaching updates in the Q4 update. These look to be big updates and require time for them to be done. From what I have heard and the hints said, they will be good. It's obvious they are working on these things already.

Sure, FD can make all sorts of promises but until we actually see them deliver it doesn't mean anything. We've already seen their plans for Engineers and most of those changes are not necessarily "improvements", they've just redesigned a new system instead of refining and expanding the system we currently have. That tells me that instead of building on existing game mechanics for exploration and trading they will probably spend quite a bit of time and effort redesigning aspects that are currently working rather than actually expanding the gameplay. If they can't improve Engineers without changing the entire system again I don't have any faith in their ability to properly address the problems with exploration or trading.

There is no evidence of this, so can't really agree with or disagree with it. Personally I wouldn't even mention anything like this as there is nothing to support this.

The fact remains, that we don't know if they will be doing it or not. To say anything else is pure speculation and has no basis in fact.

It actually has a very strong basis in fact, as I've already demonstrated in detail in various threads on these forums. We have a 3 year history of FD's development decisions to look at and in particular we've seen FD neglect Elite development quite significantly over the past 2 years of Horizons development. FD has been delivering content during Horizons that is in a "minimum viable product" state with features that are incomplete, buggy and delayed. We have several sources of information from FD that describe various factors relating to this and those sources indicate that FD had been consistently neglecting Elite development so that they could put a disproportionate amount of resources into Planet Coaster development instead. We now know that FD will have two new IPs to develop over the next few years and there is already a clear pattern of FD neglecting development of the Elite franchise when there is competing financial interests. Claiming that a conclusion based on those facts is "pure speculation" is just not credible. It would only be "pure speculation" if we didn't have all of those sources of information to base our expectations on for future Elite development.

 

[CMDR Pugwash]

You're right, Engineers was poor attempt at solving several issues and has forced some of us away from the game. Or in my case, into Solo. They just didn't think it through, and probably still haven't.

 

[Devari]

And what exactly will they be doing that they could not do with an SRV? Wander around a ship or station once or twice. What else?

I already explained this in detail in my post, which you don't seem to have read for some reason. I specifically mentioned boarding actions, moving around stations and "meeting" people in person with space legs.

Since you apparently didn't read that part of my post I'm going to try another approach. I'm just going to go full Zoolander here and answer your question with a question.

What can you do with the SRV that you can't do with your ship?

If you can answer this question and understand what SRV gameplay has added to the game then you should be able to apply the same reasoning to what space legs would offer. If you can't answer this question then you're simply not going to understand why space legs would be a useful and immersive feature because you need to understand why players continue to use the SRV despite the very limited content and gameplay currently available for it.

Which is not the same as saying that lessons cannot be learned. There was a lot of time and effort put into adding space legs into EVE because the players wanted it.

And it wasn't used and ultimately added little to the game.

Why do you think ED would be any different?

I also explained this in detail in my post. Did you actually read my post? It has to do with Elite being an immersion-drive game, unlike EVE, and being based on first-person simulation gameplay, unlike EVE. And basically being a completely different game to EVE.

I'm sure space legs will add value to the game. Which is why FD want to add it.

The problem here, as I've stated in other posts, is that convincing FD's shareholders to agree with the massive investment of resources needed to properly implement space legs before seeing a return on their investment in terms of increased cosmetics store sales is not realistically happening. They have two new IPs that they will want to get out the door as soon as possible as that is a much faster way for the company to make more money.

With no game content in place around it, it will simply be a waste of time and effort as it will be implementing a feature lots of people want but few will use.

The SRV was implemented in a very basic bare-bones fashion and still remains a popular feature for various reasons so I see space legs being at least as popular as SRV use.

EDB will no doubt see more progress made towards space legs. EDH added the avatar creator and a number of animations.

Except we know that space legs and atmospheric landings are not part of Beyond. The devs have told us this very clearly.

But there isn't any pressing need. Just a desire and an uncertainty...at best...as to how much use such a feature will get.

Players are lazy. They won't use the feature until there is a need.

First, Elite players are not particularly lazy given the significant amount of repetition and grind involved in the game. Second, the feature would appeal to many players for various reason as I've described above.

Lots of players would disagree with you. As it is, enhancements and improvements to trade, mining and exploration are slated for EDB. CandP and enginneering are simply the first to get a degree of player feedback

I'd suggest exactly the opposite given that The Return has been very underwhelming and heavily criticized by the playerbase. I don't know many players on the forums who are particularly encouraged by the current state of the game or its future direction given the content we've seen from FD with 2.4.

In short, you agree that they need to add game content to make space legs a success.

Yes, they will need a minimum amount of content which is needed for any new feature. We don't even have what I would consider bare-bones content for multicrew and what little content we have frequently crashes, so if they delivered space legs to the same standard they delivered multicrew then I expect it would be underutilized. If they have at least as much content and functionality as we currently have for the SRV it will probably be used quite frequently even without having a large amount of new gameplay.

I'm sure they'll monetize it quite a bit.

I expect they will, or rather they would if they ever actually developed it.

Last I checked, developers COULD work on more than one game at a time.

Yes, they can, but they need to ensure their development priorities are balanced and that they don't leave the Elite franchise neglected when it brings in the majority of their revenue. When they take pre-order revenue from Horizons, use it to develop a completely different game and neglect Elite then we end up with what we've gotten with Horizons development over the past two years.

Who says it won't happen? All FD have really said is that they can't do everything at once.

FD has basically been telling us this during the past year when they told us that space legs and atmospheric landings are a "long way off" and that they might add these features "eventually". That is as clear an answer as you're going to get from FD on the issue. If they flat-out told us that it wasn't happening their share prices would tank as Elite is currently their main source of revenue and straight-up telling players that you're essentially abandoning any significant development in your main game franchise is usually very bad for future investment in your company.

 

[Cosmo]

The stories and choices in Mass Effect are what attract people to Mass Effect and it was all released at once. You didn't get Mass Effect without character relationships on launch, you got the full experience and the full experience was improved upon with patches, not piecemeal content. You aren't going to attract and keep new players that way. It'll keep you and the people like you that are dying to be able to move your avatar around and that is it. You overestimate the number of people willing to deal with another under developed feature release.

Iterative development is the way Frontier has been releasing content for the last two years. Mass Effect is a different type of scifi game with a linear blockbuster Hollywood story line. However, people aren't as interested in a game where you are literally the ship and stuck in a chair VS one where you're free to move around inside the ship and such. Hellion showed some of the possibilities and it was developed with a small budget.

ED is a sandbox game which means the players (we) create the adventures via emergent gameplay. There's many more possibilities for that when we can walk around and do some activities inside our ships. It would make the game a lot more appealing and immersive.

 

[TenakaFurey]

For some, being able to do something outside of the SRV is the "what". I've spent the last couple of days on and off exploring planetary surfaces, and if I'd had the ability to climb out of the SRV and EVA for a bit I would have done so dozens of times just because I could.

And would you still be doing that a week later? A month later?

There is certainly a novelty value - but designers and developers cannot usually cannot affords to develop a systems that will be used rarely or benefit few players.
Space legs, for all people want them, don't add any gameplay or game content just by existing. The game needs content that exploits that ability.

Wandering around space craft and stations is fine, but it isn't gameplay that will occupy most players more than a day or two. Therefore, it cannot justify a high priority in the development queue.

What I am saying is that a hand-waving dismissal of these features on the grounds that they're nothing without layers and layers of extra game loops and interactions is subjective. I've said this before, but it bears repeating: for some players a mechanic is only viable if it leads to more content, for some value of "content". For others, the mechanic is content and anything else is a bonus. Just because you favour one viewpoint, don't dismiss those who favour the other.

The "mechanic as content" concept doesn't really work.

Everyone wants space legs. But it CANNOT be something that FDev spends years of effort on and most players use once. Given the amount of work - it isn't technically difficult, but there is a lot of work - this would be something FDev needs to ensure is successful

FD can either add it slowly, piece by piece, and build I up over several years while developing other content that has a higher priority, or they can drop everything else and focus on Space legs and the supporting content to get it into the game quicker. Adding space legs, but then not developing the content to support it, would be a big mistake.

Stating that "Players [...] won't use the feature until there is a need," may be true for a large number, possibly the majority, of players. But not all of them. In this case, it's also a Kickstarter FAQ feature which helped get 25,000 people to cough up a lot of investment money. I'm all for anything that occasionally reminds the community, and especially FD, of this.

Space legs has value. It has advantages. People want it. And it will be added. But there is a list of more important stuff that need to be worked through as well. Updating the basic mechanics is one of those because without that, there is no game. EDs gameplay needs to become more involved, more interesting and to hide the grind better. Its an aspect of the game that people have been complaining about since launch. Looking at these systems is also going to be necessary for the development of space legs so simply because Space legs isn't an advertised feature doesn't mean it isn't being worked on.

 

[Jack Schitt]

And would you still be doing that a week later? A month later?

Yes. I've been indulging my wanderlust in various ships since launch, in SRVs since Horizons and in SLFs since The Guardians. I have no reason to believe I'd lose engagement with EVAs any quicker than I have with those.

(Caveat: I have a second account for exploration. If I spent all my time in the bubble, I might feel different. On the other hand there are plenty of places to explore without travelling thousands of light years, so maybe I wouldn't. Hard to say.)

[...]

But there is a list of more important stuff that need to be worked through as well. Updating the basic mechanics is one of those because without that, there is no game.

The issue I have with that is that we shouldn't be having to prioritise new features against things that should already have been in the game since launch. It annoys me every time I think about it, but that's an argument for another time. Suffice to say that even if FD can perform a miracle and fix all of the game's shortcomings, even bring it up to the standards that they outlined in their own DDF Proposals, I will never forgive them for launching with a half-baked product and dragging their feet for so long before addressing its issues. ED is still a great game, but compared to what we were sold on... sometimes it still feels as close to a bait and switch as makes no difference.

simply because Space legs isn't an advertised feature doesn't mean it isn't being worked on.

Maybe, but I'm not going down that particular rabbit hole. It's bad enough making predictions based on the sketchy and sometimes contradictory info we get from FD without second guessing what they might or might not be doing in secret. You weren't around for the whole "vertical slice" / "secret build" post-gamma debacle, but many of us remember. It wasn't pretty when the result failed to live up to the wishful thinking.

If basic EVA was here now, I would use it. So would a number of other players. Many more would dismiss it as useless until more gameplay were added atop it. That's all I'm saying. That we don't all fit into the same pigeonhole. Much of your analysis is right, but don't try to claim that nobody would want to walk around without further reason to do so. Because some would.

One slight but real concern here is that FD could implement limited "space legs" inside the players' ships, and a communal area on board space stations, and have technically met their Kickstarter FAQ pledge. We would get neither extra first-person gameplay, nor planetary EVAs. Nobody would win, neither the gameplay enthusiasts nor the wanderlust screen-grabbers and videographers. Maybe we need to be careful what we ask for.

 

[W4rSkuLL]

I been testing Alpha 3.0 SC and i can tell you this, by the time those guys get anywere near being a threat to this game this game its self will have evolved or been replaced by something better if thats even possible. SC is so far out of scope for most, were talking probably 5-6 years before a possible release of the 3.0 in any playable situation to be called a live publish. Even the current live 2.6 is so full of bugs and trash and its still considered alpha, and a long ways away from polish of being classified as a beta. At least ED here got some level of playable accomplishment, and solid playable framerates for what it is at the moment. A great vision implimented onto our screens to explore, fight, and enjoy. What ever they do decide they can add they will do it well or they wont do it at all. I think we will all be playing this for years to come before any threat of SC is in the scope. But at least we will be playing something complete.

SC looks impressive, although maybe Roberts swallowed over to much when he wanted to do all in one go. Although the potential is there if they can deliver a game in the end. Well, Ive bought SC to. I flew my ship, jumped out of it in flight and buzzed around in my spacesuit out in the void. Well, I never tried again. Maybe I will. Or il just play some E.D one day.

Although, space legs would be great in E.D, I think I ve mentioned it before

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Except that they spent 6 months after Engineers launched where they were continually "balancing" and "rebalancing" everything relating to Engineers just to get to the point we're at now. Now they're planning on completely changing the Engineering system yet again which will further frustrate players who not only have to adjust to a new system but will also see their prior efforts to grind for top-end mods devalued yet again if they increase the blueprint maximums like they are planning. We already went through this once and it wasn't well received, especially since FD demonstrated that they will retroactively apply any Engineering nerfs to previously-rolled modules but for some reason don't retroactively apply Engineering buffs in the same manner. They have a terrible track record in actually making useful progress when redesigning aspects of Engineers and usually just shift the goalposts without making the system substantially better. It's a terrible idea to try to completely redesign the Engineering system yet again when there are many negatives to another rework and the time and resources can be better spent elsewhere. Players who left because of Engineers are not going to return if their prior progress was devalued and they have to learn a completely new system with yet more emphasis on grind to make incremental progress.

Funny that. I see pretty much universal approval of them changing engineers. And it really isn't changing that much.

Sure, FD can make all sorts of promises but until we actually see them deliver it doesn't mean anything. We've already seen their plans for Engineers and most of those changes are not necessarily "improvements", they've just redesigned a new system instead of refining and expanding the system we currently have. That tells me that instead of building on existing game mechanics for exploration and trading they will probably spend quite a bit of time and effort redesigning aspects that are currently working rather than actually expanding the gameplay. If they can't improve Engineers without changing the entire system again I don't have any faith in their ability to properly address the problems with exploration or trading.

As stated, they are not changing the whole system of engineers so your fears are unfounded. Looks to me just as you said, an evolution of what we have and making it better. There are some aspects I not happy with though. But to be honest I wouldn't have cared if t didn't change.

Anyway, what you said didn't answer what I said. If it helps people buy and come back to the game, then that's good.

It actually has a very strong basis in fact, as I've already demonstrated in detail in various threads on these forums. We have a 3 year history of FD's development decisions to look at and in particular we've seen FD neglect Elite development quite significantly over the past 2 years of Horizons development. FD has been delivering content during Horizons that is in a "minimum viable product" state with features that are incomplete, buggy and delayed. We have several sources of information from FD that describe various factors relating to this and those sources indicate that FD had been consistently neglecting Elite development so that they could put a disproportionate amount of resources into Planet Coaster development instead. We now know that FD will have two new IPs to develop over the next few years and there is already a clear pattern of FD neglecting development of the Elite franchise when there is competing financial interests. Claiming that a conclusion based on those facts is "pure speculation" is just not credible. It would only be "pure speculation" if we didn't have all of those sources of information to base our expectations on for future Elite development.

Yes, I have seen your "facts". They are conclusions based on very little information. You already had a biased view, and you conclusions are very biased too. They are so biased they don't come over as being very rational at times.

As to neglect, well we shall have to beg to differ. FD do not have a team of 400 working ED, it's more like 100, which is a pretty small dev team. It has been like that from the beginning. So no, there is no neglect, they just have limited resources available to them. But I'm sure you could could have created miracles with a dev team like that.

Your facts are not facts, but opinions based on very little evidence to back it up. There is more evidence to go the other way, but I like to keep an open mind about these things, especially when the information is so scarce on both sides of the fence.

ED and PC have very different dev teams, as stated before, just look up the credits for both games. It isn't difficult. Hi the have about 100 staff. FDev now have around 300 staff members, oh which nicely works out at 100 each. Sounds far more plausible. Also I suspect that the team working on PC will also be working on Jurassic World as the games seem to be very similar in a lot of ways. ED is nothing like them, different code base, different tools.

 

[Devari]

Funny that. I see pretty much universal approval of them changing engineers. And it really isn't changing that much.

When you concluded that there was "universal approval of them changing Engineers" did you somehow manage to miss this thread asking FD to NOT make changes to Engineers: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...se-reconsider-making-any-changes-to-Engineers

It has been quite active for the past several days and is currently 21 pages. If FD "wasn't changing much" it wouldn't be such an active discussion topic on these forums.

As stated, they are not changing the whole system of engineers so your fears are unfounded. Looks to me just as you said, an evolution of what we have and making it better. There are some aspects I not happy with though. But to be honest I wouldn't have cared if t didn't change.

What they've described is basically completely changing Engineers to the point that our current mods would need to be "grandfathered" and might be kept in the game but couldn't be generated again going forward. That alone is going to cause balance issues as some players will have modules that may give unique gameplay advantages that won't be available to new players.

The proposed removal of secondary effects alone is a massive change, there are many grade 1 mods where you rely on the secondary effects to minimize the penalties for certain ship builds, particularly ships with power issues that also have poor heat management. There are also some unique builds that rely on secondary effects for certain weapon options to be viable. I have a full set of four medium overcharged incendiary multicannons on my stealth-build FDL that have reduced thermal load secondaries. I had to gradually collect a full set while I was engineering the weapons on my other ships and it represents a massive amount of time required to get those particular secondary rolls which are necessary to make that build viable in terms of heat management. Now I won't be able to replicate this going forward if secondary effects are removed and there might be a ship in the future where I want to use a similar build. Those are just a few of the issues that result from a single proposed change to remove secondary effects. We haven't even gotten into the specifics of what it would do to gameplay balance if they implemented all of the other changes they've discussed.

I think that you either don't do enough Engineering yourself or don't properly appreciate how wide-reaching the proposed changes are going to be. I currently have 25 fully-Engineered ships for various different roles and the proposed changes will have a major impact on the gameplay for many of them going forward.

Anyway, what you said didn't answer what I said. If it helps people buy and come back to the game, then that's good.

And if it causes experienced players to leave the game, that is worse.

Yes, I have seen your "facts". They are conclusions based on very little information. You already had a biased view, and you conclusions are very biased too. They are so biased they don't come over as being very rational at times.

So at first my conclusions were "pure speculation", now they're based on "very little information".

I suppose that's at least a bit of an improvement. I'm guessing here that since your last post you found the hyperbole dial and managed to turn it down from 11? If so then please keep going and we might get to a point where we can actually discuss the issue.

As to neglect, well we shall have to beg to differ.

I'm sorry but if you don't see how FD have neglected Elite development during Horizons then there's really no common ground here. If you don't think that FD needs to make massive changes in how they've been developing the game then you probably wouldn't understand most of the issues I'm concerned about in terms of the current state of the game.

ED and PC have very different dev teams, as stated before, just look up the credits for both games. It isn't difficult.

How do you think they paid for the Planet Coaster dev teams and the resources they needed? Oh, right, they funnelled large amounts of Elite revenue generated form pre-orders for Horizons into Planet Coaster development.

Did you actually read my posts on this topic? Because I get the sense you might have missed a few key points.

 

[M00ka]

Did you actually read my posts on this topic? Because I get the sense you might have missed a few key points.

 

[Dbrn47]

Iterative development is the way Frontier has been releasing content for the last two years. Mass Effect is a different type of scifi game with a linear blockbuster Hollywood story line. However, people aren't as interested in a game where you are literally the ship and stuck in a chair VS one where you're free to move around inside the ship and such. Hellion showed some of the possibilities and it was developed with a small budget.

ED is a sandbox game which means the players (we) create the adventures via emergent gameplay. There's many more possibilities for that when we can walk around and do some activities inside our ships. It would make the game a lot more appealing and immersive.

I'm aware of their development style and I'm a bit tired of it. As far as not being interested in a game where you're the ship, I disagree, being able to walk around in the X Universe via Rebirth, for example, did not enhance the game very much. It was a neat gimmick, but was quickly modded so that you could do everything off station just like in the previous games. You could still enter stations, but it was worked around via off station communication mods. Though, to also be fair to the design, there were at least interactions in Rebirth and not just "Imagination!™" I'm very well aware of the possibilities of first person in Elite. What I'm saying is I want it packed together as a full feature and released instead of drip fed over years. You also have to realize that releasing things in this matter hurts the game in the sense that lesser developed features aren't used long and Frontier's development seems to hinge itself on usage. Releasing it in the bare bones fashion you'd like could actually leave it dead in the water instead of having possibilities realized. There's no way to be sure, but you can look at previous patterns and I'd like to not take the risk.

 

[CMDR ANCALAGON]

There's a pattern with that guy writting thousands of words just to accuse someone of not reading his posts, incapable of understanding, and citing subjective opinions/conspiracy theories as "facts" that can't be disputed.