If I was Braben every time someone said “placeholders” i’d turn the whole game Amiga until they apologised.The comedy value would be priceless though.
If I was Braben every time someone said “placeholders” i’d turn the whole game Amiga until they apologised.The comedy value would be priceless though.
Still be great in VR...i’d turn the whole game Amiga
No Offense to you or your Definition.
But World of Warcraft is doing far better in the World Building as well. Its offering a far Superior World to ED.
But that doesnt make World of Warcraft into a Competition for Elite Dangerous.
I do hope. That FDev Follows Development of other Games closely. Because maybe they will learn something from it.
But thats not the Point.
Your reply got me thinking, that's why I'm replying just now. At first I wanted to take the stance that ED doesn't have any real competition even when reduced to its 2 most important attributes: a sandbox first person space sim. But... A sandbox first person space sim is not a hammer or a toothbrush, it's a computer game. When I need a hammer, a saw or a screwdriver are not competitors to hammers, because I need a bleeding hammer. But if one computer game doesn't satisfy me for whatever personal reasons, any other computer game can potentially satisfy me for whatever random personal reasons. And you're correct: any game is a potential competition to ED and this discussion is futile.No offense taken of course!
Please notice I never mentioned WoW in my post. A game is often more in competition with a certain number of related games (closer to it in theme or features etc) than with others (not so close to it). WoW competes with Elite in a few elements indeed (open world, MMO etc) but there are many other games (usually space theme related) that compete much more directly with Elite. Competition is not a binary thing, it has lots of tons of degrees in between extremes.
At one side of the extreme of potential competitors for Elite would be a game that has all the key features that make Elite, Elite. As you said before "the Niche where Elite Dangerous is Sitting". But that game does not really exist yet, or very few games can really claim to be close enough, maybe NMS. The thing with this extreme is that by definition there is going to be always close to zero competition because Elite is pretty unique. So going to this extreme is quite moot and useless.
At the other extreme of potential competitors we have... pretty much any other game that has zero, nothing, to do with space and with any kind of space game usual themes, such as Pong, Counter Strike, League of Legends... Even at this extreme, technically, any game compete with all the other games obviously. After all they are all games. But I hope you will agree with me that trying to use this as reference for competition is also quite moot and useless.
The real and actual competition for Elite worth discussing seats somewhere in between those two extremes, closer to those games that have some common denominators (themes or features etc) with Elite that players value (be it space theme in general, or space ship cockpit simulation, or ship pew-pew, space exploration, futuristic open world, etc). From the moment a group of these elements is shared there is going to be competition between those games for the time and money of those players.
And you can see players decisions about that almost every day in this forum, in reddit etc, as proof of that very real competition.
Games like EVE, NMS, Space Engineers, Kerbal, Astroneer, Evochron, Hellion. Even non game software like Space Engine or projects of games in development such as Star Citizen are already competing with Elite for some of the same players time and money (almost 300 million dollars there suggest as much).
But that is the point precisely If those games I mentioned above do not offer competition to Elite there would not really be much need in FDEV learning from them. It would be like following Pong or Candy Crush or Hearthstone or Hearts of Iron... No need at all (or very little). FDEV could just continue trodding along waiting for the real competition to appear and only then follow it to learn from it to compete.
See, when you say that you think FDEV can learn something from those games what you are implying necessarily is that there is competition already.
The competition on partial feature sets coming from those games (some more than others) is very real for Elite and FDEV.
If there a single line I would recommend you take from all this is that competition game to game, is not a binary thing, it is not a simple "yes or no". There is a multitude of degrees of grey in between the extremes just with partial feature sets in common.
And you're correct: any game is a potential competition to ED and this discussion is futile.
There are 2 groups of gamers: those that divide gamers into groups... Oh, wait... There are 2 groups of gamers: mono and multi gamers. For mono gamers it's either-or: either they find a game interesting and play only that game or move to another game. ToHehe, technically correct, but as I mentioned I think some games compete better/more with Elite than others. Again, remember not to look at this as a binary porposition. Lots of shades of grey!
Allow me to rephrase then. The revenue Elite Dangerous gets from non new players, those players that have horizons and the game already. Let's be honest here, ED doesn't have a big playerbase. This mostly due to it's niche ish style and not much marketing ( see no ads for Elite Danerous while i constantly get them for EVE, No Mans sky and the likes). Hence the most revenue they get apart from those one time purchases is the cosmetics.It isn't. Most of their revenue is from new sales. I'd say that's the main reason why are they focused so much on easing the experience for new players and probably because player retention is not so stellar.
Then please allow me to repeat myself in greater detail, backed up with numbers.Allow me to rephrase then. The revenue Elite Dangerous gets from non new players, those players that have horizons and the game already. Let's be honest here, ED doesn't have a big playerbase. This mostly due to it's niche ish style and not much marketing ( see no ads for Elite Danerous while i constantly get them for EVE, No Mans sky and the likes). Hence the most revenue they get apart from those one time purchases is the cosmetics.
As an answer to the title of this thread my personal opinion is that ED is seriously overrated instead of underrated.
I think the problem is that ED is practically the only game in it's kind, there's no competition.
Although ED has a lot of oooh and aaah stuff like it's visuals, huge galaxy to play in and very cool ships, the actual gameplay is mediocre at best.
Most things you can do are only half developed or have no impact on the game or player at all.
Then there's the multitude of very old and newer bugs, imbalances, etc.
Imho ED is definitely not underrated, it profits from the fact that there's no competition so a lot of people take it's flaws for granted and call it an underrated game, personally I think it's overrated though.
Elite does have plenty of competition though.
In the space game genre?
Personally I don't see NMS or SC as competition.
Sure there are enough games out there but afaik not that look like ED.
Alright you have a point. The revenue thing was mainly based on info given to me by players of ED so i'll keep it in mind ^^Then please allow me to repeat myself in greater detail, backed up with numbers.
ED generated £19M, £21M, £16M and £22M in each year since the release. Those numbers show sustained influx of new players.
From £22M only £4M came from their webstore sales and not only from the game extras (cosmetics as you say), but from the merchandise as well.
Also, having low playerbase means only big growth potential, which is proven by the sustained revenue generation in each year.
If you haven't seen any marketing, that doesn't mean that the marketing doesn't exist. Price promotions are an effective sales tool.
Now tell me again how cosmetics generate the most revenue.
That couldn’t happen because people have already paid for things you suggest should be given away free.Alright you have a point. The revenue thing was mainly based on info given to me by players of ED so i'll keep it in mind ^^
However the 4M from revenue then also shows a big problem in ED itself. If the cosmetics are that little of the whole picture then why is everything RL money only? It would make sense to boost sales from the cosmetics with free parts because instead of feeling 'the store is money only, how greedy' the players will think more along the lines of 'i can buy this with credits but.... these better looking skins i can buy with a quick purchase' or at least that's how i look at MTS systems myself.
You have some free stuff in the store, but maybe not many know about them.Alright you have a point. The revenue thing was mainly based on info given to me by players of ED so i'll keep it in mind ^^
However the 4M from revenue then also shows a big problem in ED itself. If the cosmetics are that little of the whole picture then why is everything RL money only? It would make sense to boost sales from the cosmetics with free parts because instead of feeling 'the store is money only, how greedy' the players will think more along the lines of 'i can buy this with credits but.... these better looking skins i can buy with a quick purchase' or at least that's how i look at MTS systems myself.