Notice GalNet changes

[Dutchman141]

This is even a harder pill to swallow in the light of Drew Wagar's recent Lore Tour. The removal of Galnet is the abandonment of all future Lore, the abandonment of all PowerPlay characters, the abandonment of one of the core things that sets this game apart from others. The game may not be dead, but it feels a lot less "alive" now.

In Drew's stream about the lack of narrative in ED he points out how much Lore the Elite galaxy actually has and his concern about Fdev not using this treasure trove in order to make good narrative.
He hoped that maybe with the release of FCs or the next Era things would change in that perspective.

Well it seems Fdev has thrown all lore overboard and is turning ED into the shallow gamy game so many others have produced.
Imho Fdev has lost all engagement with Elite as an ongoing story, a living galaxy, not just a game.
It's like what Disney did to Star Wars, just make things up as they come along, no consistency no completion no thrill.
I'm well aware that ED isn't a full fletched rpg, it could be though, but I would almost compare it as when you degraded the Elder Scrolls series to a plain dungeon crawler.
Ugh, Elite was the best line of games I've ever come across, not just for it's gameplay but also for it's lore.

Since Michael Brooks left things only went downhill imho.

Blaze your own trail, make the story yourself, they're not inspiring phrases anymore but a cheap cop-out.
Imho, the only thing Fdev is interested in is revenue, they're killing the soul of Elite, I can't show any respect for such an attitude.

 

[drew]

I am less optimistic now than I was a few weeks ago (post last Thursday's possibly I'll advised and off the cuff comment regarding the roadplan/map). Fdev has consistently under valued the rich lore backdrop they have. It's not a case of resources, it's a case of priorities.

New paintjobs come out almost weekly and I know they are more costly to implement than a Galnet article, as I've seen the process from the inside. But... paintjobs connect directly to revenue. I fear the reason for lack of Galnet, CGs, IIs and ongoing lore is this simple - they don't provide an immediate or tangible return on investment.

New dlc does obviously.

A single full time writer worth his/her salary could easily churn out 3-4 quality Galnets a week, with accompanying CGs / IIs and multiple overlapping story elements fitting into a bigger narrative. I know... because I did it... alongside (at the time) a full time job.

Other games manage this on a weekly basis without difficulty.

It's a case of executive will, focus and priority. That's why it isn't happening. Someone in fdev has decided it's not going to. My rationale is that it doesn't contribute to short term revenue goals.

Cheers,

Drew.

 

[Rubbernuke]

I am less optimistic now than I was a few weeks ago (post last Thursday's possibly I'll advised and off the cuff comment regarding the roadplan/map). Fdev has consistently under valued the rich lore backdrop they have. It's not a case of resources, it's a case of priorities.

New paintjobs come out almost weekly and I know they are more costly to implement than a Galnet article, as I've seen the process from the inside. But... paintjobs connect directly to revenue. I fear the reason for lack of Galnet, CGs, IIs and ongoing lore is this simple - they don't provide an immediate or tangible return on investment.

New dlc does obviously.

A single full time writer worth his/her salary could easily churn out 3-4 quality Galnets a week, with accompanying CGs / IIs and multiple overlapping story elements fitting into a bigger narrative. I know... because I did it... alongside (at the time) a full time job.

Other games manage this on a weekly basis without difficulty.

It's a case of executive will, focus and priority. That's why it isn't happening. Someone in fdev has decided it's not going to. My rationale is that it doesn't contribute to short term revenue goals.

Cheers,

Drew.

I think in some ways its a lack of imagination- for example fleet carriers are full of potential, but outside of a few mechanics have no personality to them at all, and are dull and soulless.

The thing is you could have story based DLC that in game is accessed like CQC / training missions (i.e. its a simulation). In this way you could relive past, present and future ED lore in bite sized chunks and make money. Everything would be compartmentalised, and not mess up the 'real' game- it would be like having offline mode for story.

 

[Old Duck]

I am less optimistic now than I was a few weeks ago (post last Thursday's possibly I'll advised and off the cuff comment regarding the roadplan/map). Fdev has consistently under valued the rich lore backdrop they have. It's not a case of resources, it's a case of priorities.

New paintjobs come out almost weekly and I know they are more costly to implement than a Galnet article, as I've seen the process from the inside. But... paintjobs connect directly to revenue. I fear the reason for lack of Galnet, CGs, IIs and ongoing lore is this simple - they don't provide an immediate or tangible return on investment.

New dlc does obviously.

A single full time writer worth his/her salary could easily churn out 3-4 quality Galnets a week, with accompanying CGs / IIs and multiple overlapping story elements fitting into a bigger narrative. I know... because I did it... alongside (at the time) a full time job.

Other games manage this on a weekly basis without difficulty.

It's a case of executive will, focus and priority. That's why it isn't happening. Someone in fdev has decided it's not going to. My rationale is that it doesn't contribute to short term revenue goals.

Cheers,

Drew.

I wholeheartedly agree with your assessment. The problem is that this way of looking at revenue is incredibly shortsighted. Last year I had pretty much walked away from ED for good, except for this forum which is its own addiction, LOL. Then I got word about Palin fleeing his base and his megaship being stranded. "Wow, something interesting is actually happening in Elite. I need to check this out!" was my first thought. And this was on PS4 with all its bugs and butt leather.

Thanks to the Interstellar Initiatives, not only was I pulled back into the game, I invested in more cosmetics and eventually bought a new copy of ED for PC. That's money Frontier would not have gotten had they made this "abandon CGs & Galnet" decision a year earlier. And let's be clear, it wasn't the "compelling gameplay" that drew me back (pun), because let's face it, CG & II gameplay gets pretty repetitive. No, it was the chance to be part of an unfolding story happening in the Elite Dangerous galaxy, to actually influence future Lore. A really good story can be way more compelling that "ooh, pretty graphics" or "wow, that was challenging combat!" Just look at Fortnite - a graphically inferior game to PUBG, yet way more interesting because of the stories each season brings. I remember playing that game (which isn't my normal genre) when the mysterious comet appeared in the sky, because I wanted to see what that was all about.

Story, mystery, narrative, lore - these are powerful, powerful tools. Apparently whoever is in charge of Elite Dangerous these days doesn't understand this.

 

[sgurr]

Thanks to the Interstellar Initiatives, not only was I pulled back into the game, I invested in more cosmetics and eventually bought a new copy of ED for PC. That's money Frontier would not have gotten had they made this "abandon CGs & Galnet" decision a year earlier.
...
And let's be clear, it wasn't the "compelling gameplay" that drew me back (pun), because let's face it, CG & II gameplay gets pretty repetitive. No, it was the chance to be part of an unfolding story happening in the Elite Dangerous galaxy, to actually influence future Lore.

Story, mystery, narrative, lore - these are powerful, powerful tools. Apparently whoever is in charge of Elite Dangerous these days doesn't understand this.

Hope you don't mind me reformatting the quote a bit but I wanted to highlight these bits.
If your focus (hello FD) is short term financial gain you can miss the massive draw and staying power that a coherent world generates.


As for my understanding of what was happening to Galnet the last I was aware was that Galnet was going to focus on in game events/ships/etc, not that it was being axed completely so this is new information.

I think it's really, really sad that FD have given up on that, and given the direction they're heading I don't have faith it's going to fundamentally change with Odyssey.

Edit: and this

It's a case of executive will, focus and priority. That's why it isn't happening. Someone in fdev has decided it's not going to. My rationale is that it doesn't contribute to short term revenue goals.

 

[Everin Grace]

Well it got very doom and gloom here

Lets think optimistically for a while:

FDev have stated they brought in a new writer.

Obviously the focus right now is Odyssey. Space legs will absolutely bring new challenges: Missions for example. Right now I bet the writers are full-time building missions so people actually have something to do. It has long been rumoured that all those installations floating around were more than eye candy. Lets hope that they become interact-able social hubs / mission sites. That's not so far fetched to hope for.

I suspect that when players are wandering round taking in the sights FDev will have to reconsider Galnet as a tool for letting people know what they can see and who they can interact with. Basically it would become a tourism guide. And again - that's not a bad thing.

Community goals, obviously would be much more complicated to generate and balance. Now you have the opportunity to personally visit systems and places: That might involve fighting, scanning, hacking or any number of first person activities. It would be a lot of work basically so I understand that they are on pause whhile new capabilities are being thought out.

Which brings us to the last point: lore and the background story being on hold.

Well this is where I think there's an opportunity, if FDev just took a leap of faith (And yes I'm really hoping our new community manager is reading this right now).

Regarding Galnet: the community could do so much here. If we were just given a simple mandate and the ability to write fiction that comes with a big disclaimer so everyone understands its not canon then suddenly the universe would get populated again. The community could even vote on what is most popular. Then all FDev would have to do is vet and approve those pieces and let the lore continue with great pace. We could fill the universe back up cos right now apart from the carrier swarms its looking as little empty.



The problem with stories on galnet has always been tagging. There's a simple fix for that:


Galnet 2.0

Galnet should function with tags to identify which audiences articles are being released to:

[Canon] FDev Official Lore and Background. You will find references to in-game places and events. (Particularly useful to players only interested in in-game activities - for example the BGS or thargoid incursions or updates regarding points of interest). Tagged Orange.

[C-Canon] Community created content that has been accepted into FDev Canon. You will find references to in-game places and events. C-Canon is formally approved by FDev. Stuff like the Community Goals and unfolding powerplay narratives. Tagged Blue.

[Legend] FDev Official "rumours and tales" that are addendum to canon but might not have a physical basis in the universe. It might describe people or places or events that don't exist in the actual game but are there to give color and background. You will find references to places and events that might not be accessible in-game. Off-Camera lore is a good example of this. Tagged Purple.

[C-Legend] Community created content that functions as legend above. C-Legend is acknowledged by FDev as consistent with the game universe but should be considered hearsay. A lot could fall into this category, such as player created missions or just regular fan fiction that doesnt really relate to anything special. Tagged Red.

Now, with the right group of volunteers from the community Galnet could become a persistent info resource: A powerful point on information that pulls player's eyes into the unfolding universe. Of course not everyone wants to write. Not everyone CAN write - but let people give it a try. Set up little incentives and rewards for best fiction, best article. Best nugget of info or tip or trick.

FDev - we can help.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

As for my understanding of what was happening to Galnet the last I was aware was that Galnet was going to focus on in game events/ships/etc, not that it was being axed completely so this is new information.

Yes.

They changed it to only do news which had a direct and immediate in-game representation (a terrible decision in itself [1])

Then they stopped changing things in-game, so by the previous policy Galnet now has nothing to say. It still describes all in-game events in scope, which is about one a year at the moment.


[1] Taken literally, President Hudson and Emperor Lavigny-Duval could both be assassinated within days of each other, the superpowers could end up at war, and the first we'd hear of it in Galnet would be a War CG two months later with a quote from "Acting Federal President Smith". Or the Thargoids suddenly strike at the bubble and set it on fire, and only then does Galnet report that they'd been massing fleets in the Col 70 sector for years.

Even with the slightly expanded approach used for the Enclave and especially Scourge Interstellar Initiatives, it still significantly limits what they can say. (And the Interstellar Initiatives were generally good, and they should do more of them, but having that be the only content for Galnet is a problem)

 

[rootsrat]

Well it got very doom and gloom here

I used to be a dreamer like you. Then I took "Thargoid war" and "personal narrative" in the knee.

 

[Everin Grace]

I used to be a dreamer like you. Then I took "Thargoid war" and "personal narrative" in the knee.

 

[rootsrat]

Stuff in my knee still hurts, no matter how strong my faith that things will get better is (it's next to zero at this point).

 

[Everin Grace]

Stuff in my knee still hurts, no matter how strong my faith that things will get better is (it's next to zero at this point).

Fact: Interest in carriers more than doubled player activity: https://steamcharts.com/app/359320

Fact: Odyssey is going to do the same cos SO MANY elite players have been waiting for it for years.


Think about that: Odyssey will pull back in a lot of ED players that will be so curious to see what effect it has. Even the POSSIBILITY of being able to walk around your Anaconda will get 1000s of players reinstalling. With that growth of new and experienced players comes increased revenue and increased focus on the universe itself. The "mile wide and inch deep" reputation of Elite dangerous was only really negated by such things as Galnet and the lore and the CG's that effected the universe to some degree. But the community got kind of jaded with galnet after years of same same content and nothing really new or meaningful being talked about, and nothing really impactful or different (gameplay wise) happening in CGs.

However:

With that new revived player base comes the opportunity for ED to revitalize their community. They would be completely frackin MENTAL to have things like Galnet and Community goals still disabled when 1000s of players are walking round looking for things to get attached to and focused on. (Do you hear me FDev? MENTAL!).

IMMERSION is the success/fail criteria of first person in Elite dangerous. and Galnet and communtiy Goals were/are the single strongest tools that they have/had for exactly that: The ability to immerse the player IN the universe and make them feel like they could make a difference.

So yeah. I have hope - but I don't think its blind stupid hope. If they are smart they use Galnet and CG's for all they are worth to add value to the spacelegs experience.

 

[Dutchman141]

It's not only taking down Galnet, CGs and Interstellar Initiatives that is responsible for the drought of narrative in ED.
There have been many other instances where Lore was used to create good narrative.
The Thargoids kicked off pretty cool imho, probes, bases, stuff to find out and explore, then it all stopped and the whole Thargoid thing turned into a pew pew fest only.

Guardians even added some new lore and it was quite exciting to investigate the sites, read the logs, etc.
That too stopped all of a sudden and now they're only good for mats gathering and obtaining some special equipment.

Aegis appeared and new tech was being developed with a nice backstory, where are they now?

Inra, a cool narative search for information utilizing the lore from previous Elite games, gone too.

On and on and on, right now there's nothing happening in the entire galaxy besides some player initiated events, events that are pretty awesome btw.
The entire bubble came to a standstill, no news, no political developments, no alien activity, nothing.
I see galactic tumbleweed passing my cockpit from time to time.

Many articles in Galnet were indeed "fluf" but it created a living galaxy where things were happening, it created immersion.
CGs and IIs did the same, they were little stories you could get involved in, stories that colored the galaxy/bubble and made it credible.

Now we're in a galaxy where nothing happens, no one does anything and powers are at rest, aka boring.

I'm not referring to the player initiated events, those are cool and in my opinion the only factors in ED that still create immersion.
Fdev's excuse that you need to blaze your own trail, create your own story is just that, an excuse, a cheap cop-out.

 

[Skip Rockbounder]

Fact: Interest in carriers more than doubled player activity: https://steamcharts.com/app/359320

Fact: Odyssey is going to do the same cos SO MANY elite players have been waiting for it for years.


Think about that: Odyssey will pull back in a lot of ED players that will be so curious to see what effect it has. Even the POSSIBILITY of being able to walk around your Anaconda will get 1000s of players reinstalling. With that growth of new and experienced players comes increased revenue and increased focus on the universe itself. The "mile wide and inch deep" reputation of Elite dangerous was only really negated by such things as Galnet and the lore and the CG's that effected the universe to some degree. But the community got kind of jaded with galnet after years of same same content and nothing really new or meaningful being talked about, and nothing really impactful or different (gameplay wise) happening in CGs.

However:

With that new revived player base comes the opportunity for ED to revitalize their community. They would be completely frackin MENTAL to have things like Galnet and Community goals still disabled when 1000s of players are walking round looking for things to get attached to and focused on. (Do you hear me FDev? MENTAL!).

IMMERSION is the success/fail criteria of first person in Elite dangerous. and Galnet and communtiy Goals were/are the single strongest tools that they have/had for exactly that: The ability to immerse the player IN the universe and make them feel like they could make a difference.

So yeah. I have hope - but I don't think its blind stupid hope. If they are smart they use Galnet and CG's for all they are worth to add value to the spacelegs experience.

Yeah, that sounds like a mission,
but as an 'old' (2000 hours) player that lost interest because of direction decisions it's gonna be impossible for FDev to get the full price of the new 'Odssey' expansion from me, I'll check out the various known sites for video and I'll check out opinions and only if I'm satisfied will I buy it in a half price sale, you see I simply don't have the faith that the personnel driving this game forward are cut from the same cloth as they once were, so really the damage has been done, I've been shot in the knee by FDev, but as they say, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, and that's fine if you're in the right group!

Nope, I lost interest gradually... that's the worst way, because there's no quick fix.

 

[Everin Grace]

It's not only taking down Galnet, CGs and Interstellar Initiatives that is responsible for the drought of narrative in ED.
There have been many other instances where Lore was used to create good narrative.
The Thargoids kicked off pretty cool imho, probes, bases, stuff to find out and explore, then it all stopped and the whole Thargoid thing turned into a pew pew fest only.

Guardians even added some new lore and it was quite exciting to investigate the sites, read the logs, etc.
That too stopped all of a sudden and now they're only good for mats gathering and obtaining some special equipment.

Aegis appeared and new tech was being developed with a nice backstory, where are they now?

Inra, a cool narative search for information utilizing the lore from previous Elite games, gone too.

On and on and on, right now there's nothing happening in the entire galaxy besides some player initiated events, events that are pretty awesome btw.
The entire bubble came to a standstill, no news, no political developments, no alien activity, nothing.
I see galactic tumbleweed passing my cockpit from time to time.

Many articles in Galnet were indeed "fluf" but it created a living galaxy where things were happening, it created immersion.
CGs and IIs did the same, they were little stories you could get involved in, stories that colored the galaxy/bubble and made it credible.

Now we're in a galaxy where nothing happens, no one does anything and powers are at rest, aka boring.

I'm not referring to the player initiated events, those are cool and in my opinion the only factors in ED that still create immersion.
Fdev's excuse that you need to blaze your own trail, create your own story is just that, an excuse, a cheap cop-out.

Certainly a lot of players share this experience. The talk is the same on the discords and in factions. A lot of factions struggle because theres nothing to aim thier player groups at.

I don't think FDev are blind to this - I think they have just struggled at figuring out what commitment to put into it. I suspect that the second someone at FDev picks up the task it quickly becomes a full-time thing. The quality control alone must be mind boggling.

I also understand a reluctance to outsource it to amateurs. Lore is absolutely not something that they can afford to be inconsistent on. And obviously there's some form of story arc laid out by the creative leads - but its extremely confidential and possibly to leak it would impact not only this game but games further down the road.

Having said that, I think storytelling has been an under-prioritized aspect of the game for too long. The community is starting to see attrition from it. RP clans are dying. Creative types are finding other games. This is not ideal. Those players tend to form tight communities around them that build the player-base and spread the word of a game that is more than pew pew and more than gank-fest. Other persistent games actively court those communities and its a bit of a shock how FDev seems to have forgotten about them and what the potential is for an excited audience into the fiction of the universe.

I hope for the love of Dog that they remember soon: Hopefully way before Odyssey releases so there's a chance to fire up those extremely useful tools that they used to have: Galnet and Community Goals.

 

[rootsrat]

Lore is absolutely not something that they can afford to be inconsistent on.

It absolutely is and I honestly don't think they care anymore. See the link in my signature. In addition to that, there are many story lines in the game were stared and left off to die, incomplete.

No, they don't care about the lore anymore is my honest opinion.

 

[Rubbernuke]

'cause you gotta have

 

[Thatchinho]

It's not only taking down Galnet, CGs and Interstellar Initiatives that is responsible for the drought of narrative in ED.
There have been many other instances where Lore was used to create good narrative.
The Thargoids kicked off pretty cool imho, probes, bases, stuff to find out and explore, then it all stopped and the whole Thargoid thing turned into a pew pew fest only.

Guardians even added some new lore and it was quite exciting to investigate the sites, read the logs, etc.
That too stopped all of a sudden and now they're only good for mats gathering and obtaining some special equipment.

Aegis appeared and new tech was being developed with a nice backstory, where are they now?

Inra, a cool narative search for information utilizing the lore from previous Elite games, gone too.

On and on and on, right now there's nothing happening in the entire galaxy besides some player initiated events, events that are pretty awesome btw.
The entire bubble came to a standstill, no news, no political developments, no alien activity, nothing.
I see galactic tumbleweed passing my cockpit from time to time.

Many articles in Galnet were indeed "fluf" but it created a living galaxy where things were happening, it created immersion.
CGs and IIs did the same, they were little stories you could get involved in, stories that colored the galaxy/bubble and made it credible.

Now we're in a galaxy where nothing happens, no one does anything and powers are at rest, aka boring.

I'm not referring to the player initiated events, those are cool and in my opinion the only factors in ED that still create immersion.
Fdev's excuse that you need to blaze your own trail, create your own story is just that, an excuse, a cheap cop-out.

Slightly OT for the thread and most of your post, but just on the Guardians stuff, there is still stuff going on. (Edit - just for clarity I don't mean stuff that FD are currently actively pushing, I mean there's stuff still going on with regard to things that are already there.)

Anyway, for entertainment purposes for the good folks of the thread, I'll do it in a style I like to call 'Galnet articles I would have submitted if Player Submitted Galnet Articles were still a thing.'


------------------------------

Intercepted Transmission

Source: Independent research vessel 'Cobra's Shadow'
Location: Col 173 Sector HU-D C13-2 A 1

We might finally be making some progress on the Guardian written language.

It's been staring us in the face for ages and we completely missed it.

We were so busy collecting the valuable new materials that had been found that we didn't take a closer look.

The towers that we get the materials from all have a higher, middle and lower panel, which we shoot off to free the materials. Well it turns out that each level always gives the same type of material. That's one thing, not that exciting in itself. The exciting thing is that the panels have writing behind them. And each level always has the same writing. And it's in both forms of the Guardian language.

This could be the Rosetta Stone we've been looking for.

We'll be returning to base to share our findings with the team.

Cobra's Shadow out.

Transmission Ends

------------------------------


(And just in case @Arthur Tolmie , @Stephen Benedetti and co read this, like it, and want to use it or adapt it - please go ahead and do so. )

(Oh and just for clarity, I've not sorted out all the pics yet, so it's not been posted about in the usual threads as yet. Credits for inspiration need to be added for Jmanis who I think was the person that first posted about there being writing behind the panels. )

 

[Everin Grace]

It absolutely is and I honestly don't think they care anymore. See the link in my signature. In addition to that, there are many story lines in the game were stared and left off to die, incomplete.

No, they don't care about the lore anymore is my honest opinion.

Maybe we are having different views on Lore. Lore is the backbone of the universe: The storytelling that makes E : D more than a flight sim in space. The story Arc encompasses many centuries and has evolved to give us rich characters and situations that give depth to the persistent universe.
How that story unfolds is a big deal. One of the main reasons they cant simply outsource is it because the universe depends on it. If D.B ever decides to make a sequel to this game the lore there will evolve from here.

The thread you point to has a lot of legitimate points where improvements can be made (And I see some have which is awesome). Admittedly I never went further than the first 2 or 3 pages on that thread, becasue I see technical quality-of-life issues. I understand a lot of those can niggle people's boggle but personally i can forgive inconsistency in a game's design if the story is epic. Think Mass Effect 1 2 and 3.
The E : D lore has epic bits.


So I think we need to differentiate between quality of life aspects of the game and the issue of this thread - which is about actual critical features being removed.

BTW with regards that thread: I'm sensing frustration on your part and I hope you knee heals - but I think that list you point to is simply about the authenticity of the game engine to match a realism factor: The fixes are probably fine tuning within the engine itself. Better consistency for ship to ship interactions. More dialog etc.. but you know the absence of that level of quality doesn't really sum up to "game features missing" and its not really an "absence of lore dialog." Nor does it give any reason to suggest the devs don't care about lore at all. I will bet you serious beer they do and thats the reason things have ground to a halt. The design principle is probably "When in doubt don't fracking touch it."

The raison de etre of THIS thread is that features have been removed that many players consider pretty essential. Its not a discussion about improving stuff or quality fixes.
Galnet was a game feature that was removed.
So were community goals.

This is a big deal for many players and its disappointing that "being worked on" got replaced with "not on the roadmap."

However, to summarize: "Game Devs no longer give a crap about the Game Lore." is a massive disservice to FDev and I'd ask you not to say it please. There's no evidence for it and its a hugely polarizing point to make - especially for some of us that are waiting and waiting and hoping and hoping for a sign of life in that regard.

Does that make sense?

 

[Hanerib]

I think we'd need real good canon wars on lore, memes, all that crazy stuff

 

[Old Duck]

I find the part in the red box particularly laughable (or weepable, depending on one's mood). And it's been this way for a long, long time.