ANNOUNCEMENT Elite Dangerous: Odyssey Announcement

[NeilF]

It's a shame Frontier never utilised the keyboard in the ship for use in VR. As for lack of graphical fidelity that will soon be a thing of the past. The new HP Reverb G2 that is on pre-order (in the US) and is being released in autumn/fall is an example of that. 2160 x 2160 LCD panel per eye. 9.3 million pixels. 2.5 times that of the Oculus Quest. $599. Awesome.

True, but then the GPU to power it too needs to be taken into consideration...

ps: On the subject of the Quest, there is a hack going around at the moment to improve its resolution supposedly. It's almost as if the graphics being rendered at are a lower (non-native) resolution to the panels, and the hack helps with this... I'm not 100% sure of this, but that's my take on it!

 

[Rubbernuke]

5 years time will be the next DLC, Elite: Promised Land

A veritable Eden of fulfilled promises, pledges, unreasonable player expectations.

5 years time ED will be entering its heat death, and FD on its fifth new release (whatever that will be).

 

[Ralph Vargr]

Because it's not much fun to play a version of ED that isn't the one you'd play given an even playing field.

Frontier love even playing fields, that was the explanation offered for ARX if you recall, everyone on the same playing field.

We're ARX'd.

 

[Rubbernuke]

Or maybe there is a mechanic in the update that doesn't quite work in VR. Like forced animations for leaving the cockpit for instance.

It could be anything, and I hope we see a dev diary on why that is. It might be that ED:O will cheat on 1:1 sizing that would stick out in VR, or motion sickness.

 

[amigacooke]

No. Base. Building.

While I would have liked it, it's never been hinted at by Frontier, so can't get mifted about something that's not in the expectation canon.

 

[Dooguk]

True, but then the GPU to power it too needs to be taken into consideration...

ps: On the subject of the Quest, there is a hack going around at the moment to improve its resolution supposedly. It's almost as if the graphics being rendered at are a lower (non-native) resolution to the panels, and the hack helps with this... I'm not 100% sure of this, but that's my take on it!

I just gave an example of things changing in a short time. My DK2 was about the same price and that was like watching TV through a wicker chair.

 

[Mengy]

The only thing(s) I want to know is with the new surface tech?:-

Rain - Y/N?
Rivers/Oceans - Y/N?
Clouds - Y/N?
Fog - Y/N?
Weather - Y/N?
Storms - Y/N?
Lightening - Y/N?
Aurora - Y/N?
Procedural plant life with sensible nods to science - Y/N?

Surely it can't just be detailed deserts to walk around?

FDev won't answer of course, but my gut feeling is this:

Rain - N
Rivers/Oceans - N
Clouds - N
Fog - Y
Weather - N
Storms - N
Lightening - Y
Aurora - N
Procedural plant life with sensible nods to science - N

Both fog and lightning (in space) are already in the game so we'll likely see those on planets too. And we'll likely only be able to land on barren and icy atmospheric planets with Odyssey. No ELW's, AW's, lava worlds, no new planet types really other than the current ones with atmospheres. All of the other stuff will come with later updates. Maybe. Someday. Possibly?

Just what I'm expecting. I hope to heaven I'm very wrong.

 

[Rubbernuke]

Oculus rift s at £399 is half the price of your average phone and one sixth that of a reasonable gaming machine. Not expensive compared.

Plus a decent PC, plus a decent GPU, space to set it up and time to use it. Its why consoles will drive VR acceptance, not PCs.

 

[aRJay]

That is the thing that is bothering me, the motion sickness. I haven’t played FPS type games in ages because that bouncing up and down of the screen when you are moving which is supposed to make you think you are running makes me want to hurl after about 20 minutes. I know someone who plays the flight part of ED in VR, but comes out to use the SRV due to motion sickness. What I need is to try it and see how I get on, but at a few hundred pounds that is an expensive experiment.

Being somewhat prone to motion sickness this is a concern to me as well, I was hoping to get to try VR out but earlier this year but I didn’t make my mind to attend and then lockdown messed up the Elite meet, maybe next year.

 

[scholesey]

Or maybe there is a mechanic in the update that doesn't quite work in VR. Like forced animations for leaving the cockpit for instance.

But is the answer to remove VR altogether because getting out of a ship might not quite work? I would prefer to have a less than perfect experience in a small part of a game and let the devs fix it over time that to remove VR alltogether where the bulk of the game is awesome in VR.

 

[Dooguk]

FDev won't answer of course, but my gut feeling is this:

Rain - N
Rivers/Oceans - N
Clouds - N
Fog - Y
Weather - N
Storms - N
Lightening - Y
Aurora - N
Procedural plant life with sensible nods to science - N

Both fog and lightning (in space) are already in the game so we'll likely see those on planets too. And we'll likely only be able to land on barren and icy atmospheric planets with Odyssey. No ELW's, AW's, lava worlds, no new planet types really other than the current ones with atmospheres. All of the other stuff will come with later updates. Maybe. Someday. Possibly?

Just what I'm expecting. I hope to heaven I'm very wrong.

It looks like the planets have very thin atmospheres so I don't think there will be weather effects as such.

 

[Rubbernuke]

But is the answer to remove VR altogether because getting out of a ship might not quite work? I would prefer to have a less than perfect experience in a small part of a game and let the devs fix it over time that to remove VR alltogether where the bulk of the game is awesome in VR.

What FD need to clarify is to what extent VR is cut out- is VR legacy via Horizons, or is it excluded from foot hubs (but the space stuff benefits from the new rendering)?

In other words, to get VR you have launch Horizons via a separate option, or can you launch Odyssey but not take part in the FPS stuff.

 

[Factabulous]

But is the answer to remove VR altogether because getting out of a ship might not quite work? I would prefer to have a less than perfect experience in a small part of a game and let the devs fix it over time that to remove VR alltogether where the bulk of the game is awesome in VR.

They haven't removed VR altogether. Just from EDO. Which will be a small part of ED

 

[Ralph Vargr]

Unless the only way to get certain resources to upgrade your ship is by walking or doing something on foot. I'm a console player BTW so no VR axe to grind here.

That's it. That's how they will rope you into buying it.

 

[scholesey]

Plus a decent PC, plus a decent GPU, space to set it up and time to use it. Its why consoles will drive VR acceptance, not PCs.

You need a decent PC and GPU to play elite in the first place. No more space required in a seated game. Time to use it? No extra time required for VR.

 

[Dooguk]

But is the answer to remove VR altogether because getting out of a ship might not quite work? I would prefer to have a less than perfect experience in a small part of a game and let the devs fix it over time that to remove VR alltogether where the bulk of the game is awesome in VR.

It was just a guess. But they could introduce a fade in fade out mechanic like the SRV transition now. Probably something else though.

 

[Xenia_K]

FDev won't answer of course, but my gut feeling is this:

Rain - N
Rivers/Oceans - N
Clouds - N
Fog - Y
Weather - N
Storms - N
Lightening - Y
Aurora - N
Procedural plant life with sensible nods to science - N

Both fog and lightning (in space) are already in the game so we'll likely see those on planets too. And we'll likely only be able to land on barren and icy atmospheric planets with Odyssey. No ELW's, AW's, lava worlds, no new planet types really other than the current ones with atmospheres. All of the other stuff will come with later updates. Maybe. Someday. Possibly?

Just what I'm expecting. I hope to heaven I'm very wrong.

irony on
Procedural plant/animal life with sensible nods to science - Y
(if you upgrade ED with Planet Zoo and Jurassic Park) - same engine, modells already exist, just cross-program implementation

 

[Ralph Vargr]

Odessy isn't on sale anywhere

I'm waiting for the 70% off one.

 

[scholesey]

Being somewhat prone to motion sickness this is a concern to me as well, I was hoping to get to try VR out but earlier this year but I didn’t make my mind to attend and then lockdown messed up the Elite meet, maybe next year.

Motion sickness is odd, ever gone over a hump back bridge as a passenger and driver, it's very different. When your mind anticipates your input motion sickness for me is eradicated. I do get a "nice" feeling when I'm tumbling head over heels in an srv totally out of control, but when you are in control I don't get any problem. Stick left you expect to go left and the brain seems happy with that, for me anyway.

 

[CMDR Slee Piboi]

i agree with you that on a technical side of things, it is possible to separate DLC engine from base game engine.

It's not a matter of having a "DLC engine" and a "base game engine". It's a matter of branching the whole game client codebase with each major evolution and/or engine change, and having essentially multiple codebases that are very similar but separate and unique, and which will diverge over time except for parts which are carefully backported.

I have worked on codebases like that, and the fact that game engines are involved is completely secondary, the same applies to boring old business applications, libraries and frameworks. Staying within the gamedev context, it's easy to imagine having a branch that's still built using Unity 5 while your "latest & greatest" is on Unity 2019.3. Sure, you can port some feature code to the legacy branch, but each build is a completely separate application. You use a launcher app to make the user pick a "DLC" which essentially selects one of two standalone client builds.

So; the legacy branches get some scraps and some mandatory back end compatibility updates from the master branch, but all the good stuff is built on tech that simply isn't available in the legacy branches.

trust me, i know a thing or two about this stuff since im a game dev myself.

I built real-time 3D rendering engines used in commercial applications back when everybody used to roll their own (early 00's), and I've been working full time with UE4 and Unity since 2015. Two patents on 3D rendering tech and one on multiplayer networking. I also know a thing or two about this stuff.

But wild epeen swinging aside, I still claim the following: Odyssey could be Pac-Man from base game/Horizon perspective, we cannot assume anything as to what can be reasonably ported across. Only FDev knows for sure.

 

[Dooguk]

Being somewhat prone to motion sickness this is a concern to me as well, I was hoping to get to try VR out but earlier this year but I didn’t make my mind to attend and then lockdown messed up the Elite meet, maybe next year.

Framerate is all important in VR. That is why you need decent hardware to run it. As for the SRV problem, there is a setting that locks camera to the horizon. Works really well.