[Video] Open letter from community to Elite Dangerous

Pardon I should have been a little bit more accurate, let me try again ...

Ahem.

A roadmap for all the long lasting bugs and exploits that exist since day 1, are gamebreaking and prevent the developement of the game as a whole. For example, the instancing bug that ensures that you will always be placed into an empty instance unless you restart the game. Or the mode switching exploit(s) that let you duplicate basically anything if done right. Not to forget combat logging.
Granted, these are all network related but it is that very aprt of the game that is most borked but never gets any attention because, as Zac said himself, FD is cherry picking the easy to fix issues while ignoring the giant elephant in the room, refusing to do their homework that is long overdue.
The game is in a pretty good state if that are your best examples. Some people wouldn't even see them as issues.
 
Yes they are, they took money in exchange for goods or services. They can supply, provide updates on request to justify any delay or change of plan, or they can allow the customer to back out of the contract by reimbursing them.

Frontier are taking the path of least possible communication to satisfy this, it is disgraceful behaviour.
They really aren't. But we sure can formulate our opinions of them as a company based on it, and share those opinions, too! You could even formulate future purchasing decisions around how you've been treated as a customer, and if you wanted to be a real boyscout you could warn others away from a potentially shoddy product!
 
It isn't constructive criticism that's the issue, it's the timing of it. Right after people got caught cheating and had their credits wiped. Add the slightly cringey threats to FD into the mix, and you have a cake that tastes very much of salty tears. I amazed some of the so called influencers haven't seen straight through this.
Oh, goodness. The timing of criticism has nothing to do with whether or not it is constructive (read: useful). If it's inconvenient for FDev that this is being discussed now, that's FDev's problem, not ours.

And thank you for proving my point: using "salt" and its derivations to disparage people who are unhappy with the game and the developers is precisely the kind of derailment tactic used by the regular forum warriors. FDev themselves made certain of that when they infamously used it to minimize criticism as part of patch notes. Classy.
 
Forum PvP is the only PvP that counts. Git gud.
Yeah boi.
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I agree. Those defending FDev on this by implying the customer chasing up progress is the one who is unreasonable are fools.

They just need to offer refunds for value not redeemed, those unhappy with the protracted delay cant take it, those happy to continue to wait, can continue to wait.

It is not a difficult problem to solve :)

That's some interweb lawyerin' right there.
 
Well that was an awful response
And not surprised to see some people defending it.
Frontier have always been pretty awful with releases and they get a lot of benefit of the doubt, far more that they deserve in a lot of cases but to absolutely shirk their resposibility like this is almost an insult.
They have always been terrible at communication, its worrying they cant see that.
They get reasonable constructive criticism and they act like a spoilt brat throwing their toys out of the pram.

This isnt the first shoddy update, something is clearly wrong with their internal processes. it'd be nice if they can acknowledge that and recognise that players have suffered through this for far too long
 
That's some interweb lawyerin' right there.

There is no easy solution to some problems, The Cobra MkIV is as good an example as any. The general feeling is that it was gimped so it would not be considered Pay-to-win or similar, so while it has it's fans and it's uses, it turned out to be a disappointing 'reward' for pre-ordering Horizons. Not only that, but FDev provided a pretty iron-clad 'this will never be repeated' statement, which they quickly backtracked on for XBone customers, then didn't for PS4 customers. Already, even without taking latecomers wanting access into consideration, it is a complex situation. If they do nothing, some latecomers (including PS4 players, whose justification for getting access has merit) are unhappy, if they release it to all, some existing customers who coughed up the cash at a point where FDev needed it are unhappy. There is no win/win solution here.

This is probably the kind of thing Zac was talking about with the 'mistakes were made' bit. It is a learning opportunity. Maybe the lesson FDev learn from this will be to not take an MMO style game straight to market again, but to use a publisher as a buffer in future. Or maybe they will find some other solution.

The game is awesome, I play it a lot.
 
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So I'm a pretty casual player. I put in quite a few hours a year or so ago, then stopped, and I've just this week come back to the game.

As far as I'm concerned, I feel Frontier do communicate future updates far enough in advance. I'd rather have a good idea of what is going to be added, than just some wild ideas that may never come to fruition.

But, I do feel like the bugs are pretty much unacceptable for a studio of this size. Every update I've been around for has been plagued by bugs, and it makes you think "was this even tested?". A public beta type thing could go a long way towards helping that.
 
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