Starting To Seriously Lose Faith

[Jex =TE=]

With respect, we've been playing this game for 3 years and others have been playing it even longer than that.

There is no game mechanic mystery that takes 3 years to figure out. They simply don't want to change things in the way the community may prefer.

It would be great if maybe the team played some other loot-based games that have more compelling gameplay loops and mechanics for inspiration. Sometimes it feels like FDev don't even play ED and I see that sentiment mentioned often, and for good reason. I refuse to believe or accept that anyone at FDev played some of these gameplay loops and grinds for an extended period of time and stamped them, "fun and good to go". Stuff like USS rng farming, grinding towards military rank, the first couple of years of Power Play (and maybe still today; I don't touch PP anymore)...all thoroughly unenjoyable due to their thinness, unpredictability, shallowness. Obvious to all who tried them.

Sorry man, I think the depth and complexity that we have now is what it's going to be. 3 years of asking with very little growth while other features get bolted on should tell everyone what they can expect going forward if they're realists. Then people will have to decide if that's good enough for them or not. But this "they'll fix it one day" thinking is well past its expiration date.

Remember when Braben thought that Piracy was spot on and didn't need changing? These people don't play games so they don't have any experience on what's good or bad gameplay - it feels like they look at it from a coding point of view and expect us to act like robots and like it. Their lack of gaming experience is ever present due to the extremely poor gaming mechanics they placed.

If you're not a gamer, how can you be expected to make a decent game?

 

[NeilF]

scanner functions while exploring planets to find the hotspots for needed materials (maybe take ideas from other games , like Mass Effect or Subnautica? its fine ).

Proposed years ago - https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...eful-resource-hot-spots?p=6054187#post6054187

And as I've said a few times recently. If something like the stateful hot spots mentioned in the above thread are no in Q4 this year, I think that will be a big mistake!

 

[Ian Skippy]

Proposed years ago - https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...eful-resource-hot-spots?p=6054187#post6054187

http://i.imgur.com/C7T6koq.gif

And as I've said a few times recently. If something like the stateful hot spots mentioned in the above thread are no in Q4 this year, I think that will be a big mistake!

Although, to be be fair, it would mean rather a lot of work to add a single keypress of gameplay. It looks fancy, but it doesnt really add depth, or challenge, or anything. It only becomes relevant when there are different atmospheric regions or some such that mean it is harder or easier to land in some places.

 

[NeilF]

Although, to be be fair, it would mean rather a lot of work to add a single keypress of gameplay. It looks fancy, but it doesnt really add depth, or challenge, or anything. It only becomes relevant when there are different atmospheric regions or some such that mean it is harder or easier to land in some places.

Huh? It adds mutliple things.
1) Simply the procedural heat map of materials (eg: arsenic) spread across a planets surface, and elements (eg: palladium) across a planetary ring, instanty gives more depth to the current mechanics. Want two materials? Then you can choose whether to go to different locations to improve chances of each individually, or go to a single location high in both. It adds value to looking around an entire planet's surface as who's to say there's not a richer area around the other side?
2) It's a potential gateway to more involved gameplay for mining. ie: A similar heat/distribution map could be applied to individual asteroids so you can choose where to mine it for improved outcomes.

3) It's a potential gateway to "stateful hot spots". ie: So the heatmap might highlight a specific (rare) hot spot of a material. Which - as explained in my post above - would reduce as mined, until gone forever. But, forget everything else, this ("stateful hot spots") suggestion alone I see as an uber uber important addition to mining/exploration.

 

[Jex =TE=]

Players love the untold, the secrets, the hidden and the unforseen.

Explorers love to silently cruise the unknown depth of infinity, listening to any signal out there that makes them surprised and intrigued.

But there's nothing out there. That's been the complaint since launch that the game is nothing but "jpeg's in space generator". There's literally nothing that will suprise you - you might be happy to find a weird configuration of planets but hardly surprising. I'd love to pick up a signal that led me somewhere - I think most people would and other stuff too, which is what we'd love to have when we go "exploring".

Me as well. I've been bopping around space just looking at the planets for the past few days, occasionally going down to drive around for fun, picking up materials along the way, and this has been the most fun I've had with Elite for over a year. Exploration feels good again to me, thanks to 3.0.

That's it?? A change in planet colour is all you need? Well thank god FDev managed to fix that bug and use it as a feature of 3.0

 

[Jex =TE=]

They need to make traveling from point A to B more interesting.

In most open world games there are dangers you have to detect and navigate around. There is loot to be found on the way. There are enemies that may attack you on the way.

If there were pirate bases on certain systems. Players could run into these pirate systems and mark the system as dangerous. Other players who are combat oriented could come in wings to clear out these pirate nests. Until they're clear players could navigate around these systems or take the risk of trying to get through by stealth undetected.

In most OW games there's interesting scenery to travel across as well. In ED it's black with white dots and lines, all the time.

 

[Marshall...]

I remember you from way back! A fellow Dropship connoisseur back in the day when sniping powerplanets equalled instant death

I kinda know what you mean tbh. There are still many plceholders (Cargo Insurance anyone?). FD do seem to be listening to the community more, so that should hopefully filter into the game in time.

 

[Jex =TE=]

I wouldn't have worded it in quite the same way -- certainly not with car comparisons! -- but it's hard not to agree with the OP to some degree.

I've already said this elsewhere, but in my opinion what's missing from this game is the feeling of David Braben's hand on the tiller. For three decades the world of Elite was Braben's world (Ian Bell's contributions to the original were vital but he himself had long since washed his hands of it) and the games were glimpses into it. Each of the different versions of Elite, then Frontier and FFE, even those programmed by different teams, seemed to offer an enticing peek into a universe much vaster than the technology could render.

Then along came the Kickstarter and here was David Braben once again, offering the opportunity to enter his world but this time with radically better technology, community input, a dedicated hand-picked team, no publisher interference. It was going to be amazing.

I won't bore everyone with a rehash of the last five years; those who've been here for the journey know the relevant details and those who joined us later probably don't care. But here we are with the product of all that effort and... am I alone in feeling kind of underwhelmed? There's a paradox to ED: it manages to somehow be a visually spectacular, unique, immersive first-person space game but at the same time give the impression of having fallen well short of its potential.

And I can't help but feel that the reason for that is at least partly down to a shortage of Braben. ED is a great game, an even more amazing technology demo, but it's definitely not "the game I want to play" that David Braben was promoting in his videos and talks in 2013/2014. Maybe it can still become that game, but I wonder whether it ever will when there's little evidence that he's still calling the shots.

FD are technical wizards at what they do, but their design choices are all over the place and I'm not sure even they know what game it is they're trying to create. Compare the focus of David Braben's Development Diaries with the on-the-fly, reactionary stuff in some of the recent FD videos. IMO, if the game is to reach its fullest potential, we need that focus back.

I don't know why Braben gets so much praise as Ian Bell did the flight dynamics and a ton more stuff for the game and was probably the brains behind the game play. You only need to look back at Braben himself on piracy a couple of years ago where he thought it was "perfect".

Check out the Ian Bell interview here http://www.iancgbell.clara.net/elite/archive/b5081501.htm

 

[Franc Kaos]

Check out the Ian Bell interview here http://www.iancgbell.clara.net/elite/archive/b5081501.htm

Holy jingle berries, I repped you too early. I particularly like this bit...

I think the reason he did this was that "F:E2" did not have the expansion potential for handling mission disks because it was rushed. I think David realised he had to effectively rewrite the game engine to give it proper expendability. <quote>

Because in the kick-starter he was talking about how modular this game engine would be and thus easy to slot new elements in down the road but from the issues I've witnessed in updates (poor networking, no SRV in multicrew, missing orrery, lack of functioning economy, missions being pulled because of <guessing here> spaghetti code, etc), and the extremely slow pace of development makes me think they made the same mistake.

@ the OP, hope you're seeing a doctor (or getting help) for the depression, but for now, do what I did, take four months off from the game and come back with fresh eyes. Wishing you al the best and a big old bear hug!

 

[Jex =TE=]

For me, there's just been too many dead end bolt ons, with little/no attempt to add mechanics with depth. Consider Thargoid Bases, Guardian Bases, CQC, Generation Ships, Multicrew etc. Consider how much development time went into these, and how much time you've spent involved in them? When's the last time you went to a Generation Ship to point and click at it?

Meanwhile, after years of build up, we're finally in the exciting time of an actual alien invasion. FD have had years to line up the gameplay ready for this event. So I find it rather concerning there's been development time available with the kind of dead-end mini-game mechanics listed above, while all we can seemingly do to interact and affect this alien invasion is to carry X to Y to repair stations after invisible Thargoid Thursday morning attacks.

I think we even know that we're not even taking part in a "game" as regards this alien invasion, but simply going along with a cut scene. ie: We can't fight against or affect a simulation of an attack. Just witness the outcomes as someone at a desk at FD flicks a switch to mark a station as damaged. eg: Why isn't the Thargoid invasion depicted as a Powerplay view within which we can undertake more involved and interesting tasks to try and effect it? ie: Like we're actually competing and taking part with a game against some mechanics?

I started giving up hope with ED about two years ago, and Season 2 did very little to address this. Planetary landings were truly impressive, but little else really made much of an impression of me.

As I've said elsewhere, Q4 of this year I see as make or break for me. With a clean slate to design and develope what FD are proclaiming improvements to the core gameplay of Exploration and Mining, along with a payable DLC (atmospheric landings?), we'll get to see if FD are changing their ethos to introduce some really interesting deeper mechanics and gameplay. Or if we're just in for more bolt on shallow mini-game designs.

Can we all stop saying ED isn't a scripted event now please because the Thargoids ARE scripted to the extreme. In fact, I'd go as far to say as the Thargoid invasion is worse than any scripted event I think I've ever seen.

Remember "winter is coming" like it was some threat and how laughable that is now (and annoying, too!) - where's the excitement, where's the 2nd voice actor for the station? You only ever thought to get one????

Now I hear the Cheiftan pitches like a buzzard - How does it do that? So it out turns a Viper? Constant boost? Engineers was nothing but a death mark on this game. It's ruined everything just like the health potions did when they introduced them 3 years ago.

 

[Jex =TE=]

Holy jingle berries, I repped you too early. I particularly like this bit...

I think the reason he did this was that "F:E2" did not have the expansion potential for handling mission disks because it was rushed. I think David realised he had to effectively rewrite the game engine to give it proper expendability. <quote>

Because in the kick-starter he was talking about how modular this game engine would be and thus easy to slot new elements in down the road but from the issues I've witnessed in updates (poor networking, no SRV in multicrew, missing orrery, lack of functioning economy, missions being pulled because of <guessing here> spaghetti code, etc), and the extremely slow pace of development makes me think they made the same mistake.

@ the OP, hope you're seeing a doctor (or getting help) for the depression, but for now, do what I did, take four months off from the game and come back with fresh eyes. Wishing you al the best and a big old bear hug!

There's nothing modular going on in ED's code - no way, not like this.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Can we all stop saying ED isn't a scripted event now please because the Thargoids ARE scripted to the extreme. In fact, I'd go as far to say as the Thargoid invasion is worse than any scripted event I think I've ever seen.

Remember "winter is coming" like it was some threat and how laughable that is now (and annoying, too!) - where's the excitement, where's the 2nd voice actor for the station? You only ever thought to get one????

Now I hear the Cheiftan pitches like a buzzard - How does it do that? So it out turns a Viper? Constant boost? Engineers was nothing but a death mark on this game. It's ruined everything just like the health potions did when they introduced them 3 years ago.

Sorry Jex, I am gonna have to put you on my ignore list for a while. I need a break from the incessant and unnecessary negativity.

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

For me, there's just been too many dead end bolt ons, with little/no attempt to add mechanics with depth. Consider Thargoid Bases, Guardian Bases, CQC, Generation Ships, Multicrew etc. Consider how much development time went into these, and how much time you've spent involved in them? When's the last time you went to a Generation Ship to point and click at it?

Meanwhile, after years of build up, we're finally in the exciting time of an actual alien invasion. FD have had years to line up the gameplay ready for this event. So I find it rather concerning there's been development time available with the kind of dead-end mini-game mechanics listed above, while all we can seemingly do to interact and affect this alien invasion is to carry X to Y to repair stations after invisible Thargoid Thursday morning attacks.

I think we even know that we're not even taking part in a "game" as regards this alien invasion, but simply going along with a cut scene. ie: We can't fight against or affect a simulation of an attack. Just witness the outcomes as someone at a desk at FD flicks a switch to mark a station as damaged. eg: Why isn't the Thargoid invasion depicted as a Powerplay view within which we can undertake more involved and interesting tasks to try and effect it? ie: Like we're actually competing and taking part with a game against some mechanics?

I started giving up hope with ED about two years ago, and Season 2 did very little to address this. Planetary landings were truly impressive, but little else really made much of an impression of me.

As I've said elsewhere, Q4 of this year I see as make or break for me. With a clean slate to design and develope what FD are proclaiming improvements to the core gameplay of Exploration and Mining, along with a payable DLC (atmospheric landings?), we'll get to see if FD are changing their ethos to introduce some really interesting deeper mechanics and gameplay. Or if we're just in for more bolt on shallow mini-game designs.

nearly everthing breaks down to bring A to B missions in the whole thargoid thing. Started with Uknown artifacts, and continued until today where ti is about delivering repair items.

But why? Why is there no "escort X to A" at least? we have those big ships now inagme, so why can a player or a wing not take a missions where they escort a T9 or as a wing a big ship to such a station and need to defend it on the way? Why do we not need to protect them while unloading their cargo? Could also have been done with the evacuation of stations.

simple,

Escort
Hold and defend
Assault
King of the hill like scenarios?

All we have is

collect and bring X to A
or shoot Y to collect and bring X to A.

And this lacks in serious variety.

So what we could get is:
Station A is burning, we need you to escort a rescue ship to gather people off the station.
Then follows a Hold the ship and defend it form pirates who who want to steal stuff from it (beacsue thargoids don't care about the stations anymore)
Then escort it back.

We could during repair of the stations get some REALLY cool other minigames, like:

Escort big ship with repair materials to the station.
Distibute the material to small repair vessels around the station. Around the stations will be alot of small vessels that then need to be cargoed up by jettisoning hull plates near them so they can fix the stations hull. Smaller nimble ships may be even in advantage here, so it adds diversity for not going "big 3" and helps involvement for newer players. Sure thats also a get A to B mission, but it is still much different form that usually ones we have which just involves docking to a station clicking on the baord.
When all materials are deleted form the big cargo vessel, then its up to return.
FD could even allow fighters to transport these materials making it a nice feature for MC. But all these tiny different and possibly entertaining facettes are not existing. We have a game composed just of shooting and transporting A to B.

There's nothing modular going on in ED's code - no way, not like this.

Well, it is very modular, the issue is, these modules are so isolated that it lacks connection to the rest of the games universe. But a univere funcations as a whole and so many features make no sense in their isolated state.

 

[Jex =TE=]

Sorry Jex, I am gonna have to put you on my ignore list for a while. I need a break from the incessant and unnecessary negativity.

beats your incessant praise of the game!

 

[Iskariot]

I know this is a somewhat pointless thread, but guess I'm just feeling like getting it off my chest: I'm starting to seriously lose faith in FDev's ability to capitalize on this game's potential. 3.0 had a lot of good changes, but every patch just makes me suspect more and more that FDev doesn't understand what makes the good parts of their game good, how people play their game, or generally how to make a fun game. It almost feels like one person / team designed the first part of the game, then handed it off to a completely different set of people- people that fail to realize what made that original stuff good. Makes me think of the Miata NC model: people loved the NA and NB models for their agility, simplicity, and fantastic road feel. When Mazda made the NC model, they made the car a good bit bigger, a good bit heavier, and a hell of a lot nicer inside. By itself it's not necessarily a bad car, but focused on entirely the wrong things. It was not terribly popular because it sacrificed the things that made a Miata a Miata. It lost its soul, and instead became a mediocre example of an already-heavily-populate "niche". And none of this is even touching on FDev's apparent difficulties with QC and testing.

I realize a lot of you are thinking, "Who the hell are you, and why on Earth should I care what you think?" I''m just another player, but I am a devout fan of the Elite series. I've played countless hours since the beta, and spent far more hours thinking about the game / experimenting with different mechanics, trying some come up with suggestions to various challenges, and generally trying to improve the game. It could be because I'm struggling with depression right now (or it honestly could be a contributing factor to said depression), it's "kind of a big deal" for someone's opinion to shift as dramatically as mine has. I don't really know what I expect as far as replies to this thread go, but... I guess I just hope to have my mind changed in the future. I want to have hope again. I want to believe FDev will make this game as great as it can be. I want my optimism back.


Edit: For the sake of having a little more idea of what I'm talking about, here are some snippets from a post of mine later in the thread:

No game will ever be completely what you want it to be.

I think the development of the game is a learning process for FDev too. In many ways FDev has to learn on the go, because the previous Elite games were build in a time when expectations were set much lower than they are now. The current game is already much more interesting than the old ones. In that sense it is a huge success.

But those of us who really love the game, this type of game, want it to endure and have a bright future for years to come.
To me it seems incredibly difficult to design a huge game universe, like ED's, with enough interesting stuff in it, even with the help of PG.
So, as far as I am concerned what is needed is a good fundament:

1. Rich game mechanics. (I understood Fdev is now working on this kind of stuff)
Just an example, as you mentioned the USS mechanic... I think we should have a more active role in discovering at most of them. A ship scanner mechanic comparable to the SRV's would be much more interesting.
We also need a much more interesting exploration mechanic. The constant honk is such an empty and boring thing. I proposed a system with launchable system exploration drones in another thread and most people seemed to like that very much.. Also the exploration information needs to be presented in a much more interesting and cool way.
I feel the orrery map should be at the heart of exploration, but sadly FDev does not seem to recognize this.

2. As much variation as humanly possible. There are a few simple things FDev could do to begin with:
a) Add recognizable Imperial and Aliance space and planetary station designs to the largest part of their territories. I think this would give us the feeling that we entered a truly different part of the galaxy. I think this simple change would do wonders for the experience. Currently every human system feel like every other human system.
b) Have other types of military capital class NPC ships (frigates, destroyers, troop transporters, military tankers etc.) patrol the systems. And put them in small fleet groups (like in the X-Wing and Tie Fighter games). Seeing these ships operate in small groups makes it feel more real.
c) Add stations that tell us their purpose just by looking at them: Mining complexes, Prison complexes, Military battle stations etc. etc.

Of course it takes time to create new assets, but they should not be too difficult to implement.

 

[Ian Skippy]

Huh? It adds mutliple things.
1) Simply the procedural heat map of materials (eg: arsenic) spread across a planets surface, and elements (eg: palladium) across a planetary ring, instanty gives more depth to the current mechanics. Want two materials? Then you can choose whether to go to different locations to improve chances of each individually, or go to a single location high in both. It adds value to looking around an entire planet's surface as who's to say there's not a richer area around the other side?
2) It's a potential gateway to more involved gameplay for mining. ie: A similar heat/distribution map could be applied to individual asteroids so you can choose where to mine it for improved outcomes.
http://i.imgur.com/5uiugni.png
3) It's a potential gateway to "stateful hot spots". ie: So the heatmap might highlight a specific (rare) hot spot of a material. Which - as explained in my post above - would reduce as mined, until gone forever. But, forget everything else, this ("stateful hot spots") suggestion alone I see as an uber uber important addition to mining/exploration.

I dont personally care much for 'potential gateways to interesting gameplay'. Bird in the hand and all that. After all, PP has tons of potential gateways to interesting stuff, but pretty much nothing happened since it was added. As for the first thing, that is kinda true, but wont really add that much if you ask me. You scan, you circle the planet in the system map, go to the 'red' bit and land. It would be an improvement, but its not the Massive Amazing Change people often make it out to be, on its own.

 

[Jimmy Joe]

nearly everthing breaks down to bring A to B missions in the whole thargoid thing. Started with Uknown artifacts, and continued until today where ti is about delivering repair items.

But why? Why is there no "excort X to A" at least? we have those big ships now inagme, so why can a player or a wing not take a missiosn where they escort a T9 or as a wing a big ship to sucha station and need to defend it ont he way? Why do we not need to protect them whiel unloading their cargo? Could also have been doen with the evacuation of stations.

simple,

Escort
Hold and defend
Assault
King of the hill like scenarios?

All we have is

collect and bring X to A or shoot Y to collect and bring X to A.

And this lacks in serious variety.

So what we could get is:
Station A is burning, we need you to escort a rescue ship to gather people to the station.
Then follows a Hold the ship and defend it form pirates who who want to steal stuff from it (beacsue thargoids don't care about the stations anymore)
Then escort it back.

We could during repair of the stations get some REALLY cool other minigames, like:

Escort big ship with repair materials to the station.
Distibute the material to small repair vessels aroudn the station. Arudn the stations will be alot of small vessels that then need to be cargoed up by jettisoning hull plates near them so they cna fix the stations hull. Maller nimble ships may be even in advantage here, so it adds diversity for not going "big 3" and helps involvement for newer players. sure thats also a get A to B mission, but it is still much different form that usually ones we have which just involves dockign to a station clicking on the baord.
When all materials are deleted form the big cargo vessel, then its up to return.
FD could even allow fighters to transport these materials making it a nice feature for MC. But all these tiny different and possibly entertaining facettes are not existing. We have a game composed just of shooting and transporting A to B.




Well, it is very modular, the issue is, these modules are so isolated that it lacks connection to the rest of the games universe. But a univere funcations as a whole and so many features make no sense in their isolated state.

+1 And this is why I don't care for Thargoids anymore, nor do I care for station repairs. There is no progression, no sense of urgency or fear of losing. In fact there is no need to care for anything at all......Oh wait, but we have some nice youtube videos..

 

[NeilF]

But there's nothing out there. That's been the complaint since launch that the game is nothing but "jpeg's in space generator". There's literally nothing that will suprise you - you might be happy to find a weird configuration of planets but hardly surprising.

For me, at least exploring to find visual treats could be enough.

There would need to be multiple layers of procedural generation with some nice visuals abilities to back it up. eg: Landing on an atmospheric world on the dark side, seeing aurora borealis to the north and lightning storms to the north lighting up the huge lake in front of you. And to the west, a huge 2km high waterfall drops in slow motion in the low gravity.

And if at least procedural vegetation can be generated too on the appropriate type of worlds?

Even just landing on a world in the rain/lightening storm?

+1 And this is why I don't care for Thargoids anymore, nor do I care for station repairs. There is no progression, no sense of urgency or fear of losing. In fact there is no need to care for anything at all......Oh wait, but we have some nice youtube videos..

Until the Thargoids add some meaningful gameplay, other than boss-ship destruction mini-games, or take X to Y to repair stations, they don't really interest me TBH.

 

[Jack Schitt]

I don't know why Braben gets so much praise [...]

Because he's the one who picked up the baton and ran with it, creating an impressive sequel and a flawed threequel, and Kickstarting a reboot. Had Ian remained in the games industry it might be him getting all the attention, but for good or bad the legacy of Elite is very much David's.

Which to me means he's the only one who has earned the right to screw up the franchise. And screw it up he yet might; he was demonstrably naive about the psychology of online gaming and he's not without form when it comes to making the occasional odd decision. But historically his vision of the game's scope and mechanics seemed more focused, certainly at odds with the flavour-of-the-month direction the game has been taking for the past couple of years.

Whether this was because he took a more hands-off approach, or was happily signing off on every flawed and inconsistent design choice, only those within FD can know. All I know is that for the first year or so of development and early release ED felt to me like a David Braben game in the same way that the first three Elite games did, and I had faith -- sometimes shaky faith but faith nonetheless -- that it was generally headed in the right direction. More recently it's felt more like a project that's merely based on an original idea by David Braben, but doing its own thing and not necessarily in a way that suggests he retains much creative oversight.

(I'm reminded a little of Star Trek: Discovery. It's doing new and interesting things with an arguably stale franchise, and is compelling viewing in its own right, but there's not much of the Roddenberry or even Berman vision shining through. At least not yet. Season 2 may change that. Anyway I digress.)

Beyond's loose roadmap looks promising but it's still unclear just how much, if any, of that might be the direct result of Braben taking the reins and how much might be realisation by FD as a whole that they can't keep piling random features on shaky foundations. Either way it's the first time in a long time that I've felt as though things are moving in the "right" direction, where "right" is clearly subjective given the massive range of gameplay variants ED can support. I just wish it felt more like a David Braben Elite game again, rather than a very slick homage. YMMV.

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

Because he's the one who picked up the baton and ran with it, creating an impressive sequel and a flawed threequel, and Kickstarting a reboot. Had Ian remained in the games industry it might be him getting all the attention, but for good or bad the legacy of Elite is very much David's.

Which to me means he's the only one who has earned the right to screw up the franchise. And screw it up he yet might; he was demonstrably naive about the psychology of online gaming and he's not without form when it comes to making the occasional odd decision. But historically his vision of the game's scope and mechanics seemed more focused, certainly at odds with the flavour-of-the-month direction the game has been taking for the past couple of years.

Whether this was because he took a more hands-off approach, or was happily signing off on every flawed and inconsistent design choice, only those within FD can know. All I know is that for the first year or so of development and early release ED felt to me like a David Braben game in the same way that the first three Elite games did, and I had faith -- sometimes shaky faith but faith nonetheless -- that it was generally headed in the right direction. More recently it's felt more like a project that's merely based on an original idea by David Braben, but doing its own thing and not necessarily in a way that suggests he retains much creative oversight.

(I'm reminded a little of Star Trek: Discovery. It's doing new and interesting things with an arguably stale franchise, and is compelling viewing in its own right, but there's not much of the Roddenberry or even Berman vision shining through. At least not yet. Season 2 may change that. Anyway I digress.)

Beyond's loose roadmap looks promising but it's still unclear just how much, if any, of that might be the direct result of Braben taking the reins and how much might be realisation by FD as a whole that they can't keep piling random features on shaky foundations. Either way it's the first time in a long time that I've felt as though things are moving in the "right" direction, where "right" is clearly subjective given the massive range of gameplay variants ED can support. I just wish it felt more like a David Braben Elite game again, rather than a very slick homage. YMMV.

What si the "David braben Elite" even?

i currently have no diea about what this is supposed to be, but when i came to Elite i came becasue of a few descriptions on the site and many gameplay aspects don't even hold up to these descriptions. So when those old ones were of the "David Braben Elite" then it would alos be important to tell him which aspects do not go along with his Vision. Not always does one with a Vision achieve it. especially when he isn't deeply involved by playing the game.