Frontier needs to decide: Game or Simulation

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Oh, there is - but it's not between "game" and "simulation" but between "multiplayer" and "Elite". Any sensible game developer would have taken one look at that combination and run away screaming.

Fortunately Frontier decided to give it a go anyway.

This. People loath FD not giving in fully to neither camp. I am actually applauding for this. There are very few games who actually try to pull this off - not only because some toxicity between PvE and PvP communities - but strong on rails assumptions how games SHOULD behave and SHOULD act.

They struggle, fail, try again, achieve some victories - that's all part of their effort. But their resolve for doing this - making massive game which gives freedom of being lonely, while giving chance of doing things together - is something I admire.

People looking for pure experience in either camps of course ain't fans. But they have many games to server their approach.

 

[Brrokk]

Oh, there is - but it's not between "game" and "simulation" but between "multiplayer" and "Elite". Any sensible game developer would have taken one look at that combination and run away screaming.

Fortunately Frontier decided to give it a go anyway.

Yes. The combination is improbable, difficult to imagine, imperfectly realised... and brilliant.

 

[Powderpanic]

Loving the fanboy defense of a badly designed game.

Some people are still backing Battlefront 2 ...

FDEV need to work out who it is designing a game for.

Solo players who like to wave at other people in super cruise and pretend what they are doing is Multiplayer.

Or

Design the game to be an actual Multiplayer with the tools to support all the things people have been asking for.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Design the game to be an actual Multiplayer with the tools to support all the things people have been asking for.

Which tools and which people?

.... because not everyone wants the same things.

 

[StiTch]

It can never be a simulation. Constructing a simulator for a setting in over a thousand years ain't gonna happen as it is, but any attempt to approach realism was discounted before the game was released when they implemented speed limits, range limits/falloff for kinetic weapons etc.

Any time you see the word "simulator" in relation to ED it should be taken with a fistful of salt.

Loving the fanboy defense of a badly designed game.

Some people are still backing Battlefront 2 ...

FDEV need to work out who it is designing a game for.

Solo players who like to wave at other people in super cruise and pretend what they are doing is Multiplayer.

Or

Design the game to be an actual Multiplayer with the tools to support all the things people have been asking for.

https://media.giphy.com/media/w1kcc1o2fRMvS/giphy.gif

A much more crucial point. No matter what side of the fence you are on ED fails to be a good multiplayer game or solo game.

 

[Frank]

All games are simulations. Space Invaders is a simulation of an alien invasion. Chess is a simulation of war.

If a simulation is completely true to the scenario it's simulating then it wouldn't be a simulation. It would be reality.

 

[StiTch]

it is very good Elite game and very good multiplayer experience I hoped for Elite 4.

I don't care about labels or whatever people want it to be.

Please explain what multiplayer content the game has - i.e. not solo content that multiple people can happen to gang up on at once - without diverting this into a PvE/PvE/Open/PG debate as a smokescreen.

I'm excited to see this. Go!

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Please explain what multiplayer content the game has - i.e. not solo content that multiple people can happen to gang up on at once - without diverting this into a PvE/PvE/Open/PG debate as a smokescreen.

I'm excited to see this. Go!

You can do things together. Things you do alone. You can do them together with others.

Multiplayer is a mechanic, feature NOT content.

 

[lysan]

They did - over five years ago.

.... and everyone either bought or backed that game.

I agree, however they are kind of not following their own vision. Or the vision communicated just was received wrong by some of the backers, me included.

I love the galaxy, it's a masterpiece, i don't like many of the "bolt, ad-hoc" solutions done in the game.
So much could be done and it would not require 1000 hours of DEV time to do it, to make it feel more like what some of us expected.

Just look at the DDF, that was made with the community, this is what those people including I expected.

Oh, there is - but it's not between "game" and "simulation" but between "multiplayer" and "Elite". Any sensible game developer would have taken one look at that combination and run away screaming.

Fortunately Frontier decided to give it a go anyway.

The whole argument between simulation and arcade is a bit misunderstood, when I say simulation I expect that some parts of the game gives you a feeling of actually doing stuff for real, and not playing a game. Like commanding your ship, of course it can never be a simulation because we don't know how to simulate something happening 1000 years out in the future.

However we can imagine. Engine start-up! why can't we have this all the time, and not only at planet surfaces? why can't we start "cold" and need to activate the powerplant and so on? why can't we shut the power plant off and drift cold as we could in the beginning? so many questions and the answers we get not really very informative.

Again, look at the DDF and you will see what was expected.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

Please explain what multiplayer content the game has - i.e. not solo content that multiple people can happen to gang up on at once - without diverting this into a PvE/PvE/Open/PG debate as a smokescreen.

I'm excited to see this. Go!

Your question is contradictory. You can't answer a question which instantly dismisses the very multiplayer content examples you just asked for. And you were quite deliberate in including that. And you know it.

 

[StiTch]

Your question is contradictory. You can't answer a question which instantly dismisses the very multiplayer content examples you just asked for. And you were quite deliberate in including that. And you know it.

I did include it quite deliberately because I know there is no multiplayer content. The only crime I committed was putting forward a rhetorical question; I know there is no viable response.

I'm sorry to say that multiplayer content is not solo content that everyone can gang up on at once. It is content that - and here's the real shocker for use of the term "multiplayer" - effectively requires multiple players!

Mind bending I know, that a multiplayer game might actually ask players to co-operate in a way that requires them to work together/work out roles between them rather than curb stomping an NPC you could have melted by yourself.

 

[kofeyh]

There is the additional option of "Some people have an outright agenda to turn ED into something more closely resembling another Space Game, and so try to play the forum meta-game thinking they're being really devious and clever, but unfortunately for them their tactic is very transparent".

It's adorable.

I’m not sure what this has to do with people not accepting that Elite was never going to be simulation alone? I mean we can keep blame shifting all week long; but Elite was always a combination of elements.

That people struggle with that, is pretty obvious. But that’s the case. It’s not one, or the other. It’s always been a combination. Not everyone is going to accept that; weirdly people still keep playing though. So maybe it’s not as drastic an issue as people want to make it out as.

Is it a vote? If so, I vote Simulation, please.

No? It’s adorable people think this is an actual issue to resolve, as though the last three years+ of development was just an illusion and surely that’s not what the developer intended. Yep, imperfect or not, that’s what they intended.

It was decided years ago.

 

[Lori Jameson]

I swear to Raxxla, if I had a thousand credits every time I've seen a 'ultimatum' thread like this one I'd be able to bribe the PF (and a few choice others) by cornering the market in Lavian Brandy.

This most definitely was decided a long while back (probably before the kickstarter even). Elite: Dangerous is a simulated galaxy with simulated politics, economies, and mysteries that shift and change with player interaction and plot advancements. It follows the 'space opera' approach to flight and battles.

The whole game seems to draw much of its inspiration from the likes of H.R. Geiger, Ridley Scott, Stanley Kubrick, Robert Holdstock, H.P. Lovecraft, etc. It feels more like a sci-fi horror RPG title than true sci-fi at times and a highly thought out survival RPG at other times. It takes the ideas of 'space is big', 'space is scary', 'space is fun' and combines it all together.

All in all, it's a highly playable space sim/RPG with a darker style to it. It is both a game and a stylised sim at the same time.

 

[Brrokk]

Please explain what multiplayer content the game has - i.e. not solo content that multiple people can happen to gang up on at once - without diverting this into a PvE/PvE/Open/PG debate as a smokescreen.

I'm excited to see this. Go!

The Thargoids I was fighting last night? First by multicrewing in a T10, then by winging in smaller ships.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

I did include it quite deliberately because I know there is no multiplayer content. The only crime I committed was putting forward a rhetorical question; I know there is no viable response.

I'm sorry to say that multiplayer content is not solo content that everyone can gang up on at once. It is content that - and here's the real shocker for use of the term "multiplayer" - effectively requires multiple players!

Mind bending I know, that a multiplayer game might actually ask players to co-operate in a way that requires them to work together/work out roles between them rather than curb stomping an NPC you could have melted by yourself.

Ah! That really depends on your definition of "multi player'.

ED is 'multi player' in that multiple players can join together online and play the content of the game. It can, in fact, claim to be 'multi player'.

There are also multiple players who can participate in the game's content, with a common, shared purpose, without even meeting each other. CG's are one example of this. The rekt stations at the Pleaides are another. Multiple players online can in fact all share in the same purpose of rescuing, for example. CG participants can do whatever the CG requires. All online, multiple players, but can be done even without actually seeing those other players. That still makes this a 'multi player' game.

Your requirements for ED to be a multi player game demand that all players see each other 24/7, even if it's with the already shared goal of a CG. In other words, for ED to qualify as a multiplayer game for you, there should only be one connectivity mode where everyone has no choice but to see everyone else, all the time.

 

[Lori Jameson]

I did include it quite deliberately because I know there is no multiplayer content. The only crime I committed was putting forward a rhetorical question; I know there is no viable response.

I'm sorry to say that multiplayer content is not solo content that everyone can gang up on at once. It is content that - and here's the real shocker for use of the term "multiplayer" - effectively requires multiple players!

Mind bending I know, that a multiplayer game might actually ask players to co-operate in a way that requires them to work together/work out roles between them rather than curb stomping an NPC you could have melted by yourself.

Well the whole Formadine Rift, the UP/UA/UL stuff, developing Colonia, CGs, and so on requires/required a large portion of active community involvement to achive. It may not be 'traditional' multiplayer content people are used to however, it still required multiple players to pull off.

 

[StiTch]

Your requirements for ED to be a multi player game demand that all players see each other 24/7, even if it's with the already shared goal of a CG. In other words, for ED to qualify as a multiplayer game for you, there should only be one connectivity mode where everyone has no choice but to see everyone else, all the time.

Please show where I said this

(^If you missed it, you'll have to forgive me; that's another rhetorical question. I'm glad to see I was right that you cannot engage in this conversation without constructing the Open/Solo strawman. Good job!)

Well the whole Formadine Rift, the UP/UA/UL stuff, developing Colonia, CGs, and so on requires/required a large portion of active community involvement to achive. It may not be 'traditional' multiplayer content people are used to however, it still required multiple players to pull off.

That's content completed by a collection of single players, which I already referenced above.

The thargoids were pointed out, and that is the closest we have - I'll agree that for all intents and purposes, most people cannot solo thargoids. However it is not true for everyone, and not very diverse - the activity itself is incredibly straightforward and repetitive - and does not ask for multiple roles. It's also important to note thargs won't likely be around forever, and not everyone is anti-thargoid.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

I’m not sure what this has to do with people not accepting that Elite was never going to be simulation alone? I mean we can keep blame shifting all week long; but Elite was always a combination of elements.

That people struggle with that, is pretty obvious. But that’s the case. It’s not one, or the other. It’s always been a combination. Not everyone is going to accept that; weirdly people still keep playing though. So maybe it’s not as drastic an issue as people want to make it out as..

My post was an indirect snipe at the few 'usual suspects' here who most definitely use threads like these to further their 'change the game into something else' agenda.

And yes I've been agreeing with you throughout your posts in this thread. Elite is a video game first and foremost, but has been combined with some elements of simulation - some of them direct (e.g. 1:1 scale galaxy/game world with 400 billion locations to go to. The galaxy creation has had a lot of science and physics involved.), and some of the simulation aspects are based on science fantasy and fiction (e.g. Frame Shift technology).

The combination of both videogame and simulation is pretty unique and although there are definite problem with ED which have been discussed and argued about to death, multiple times, I do see the whole shebang as something which definitely does work, in all its eccentric glory.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

Please show where I said this

(^If you missed it, you'll have to forgive me; that's another rhetorical question. I'm glad to see I was right that you cannot engage in this conversation without constructing the Open/Solo strawman. Good job!)

Instead, I'll ignore your pointless snipes and instead ask for your definition and list of True Multi-Player Content™

Please, go ahead. You make assertions about 'solo only content' (I'm just smiling mildly here, as I view your snipe about 'Open/Solo strawman' when you yourself mention 'solo content' - that "irony" has not escaped me )

But do go ahead and provide even just a small list or example of your idea of multiplayer content that would be good for ED. That way, we actually have something of substance to work with other than vague rhetorical questions and resultant sniping.

 

[WeavingBird1917]

Right now it's in a no man's land that is forcing Frontier to make sub optimal decisions.

If it's a game put in game elements like instantly arrIving security in appropriate systems or credit transfer (and no it won't make gold farmers magically appear like scum goblins).

If it's a simulation of being a pilot in a living universe then commit to that and let players be more intimately involved in the politics or build their own stations outside the bubble and so on.

Right now, Frontier, you're trying to please everyone and it's not working.

The good news is that you can have a 'game' and a 'simulation' at the same time by replacing Solo and Open with Game (with the pvp flag some of you want) and Simulation (Player Group could have a slider for more gamey or more simulationy).

Decide, Frontier, decide

It is definitely more of a game than a simulation. Emergency oxygen only lasts 25 min. max to create a sense of urgency, whereas even a scuba tank today can last longer.