Development Update 1 - June

[babelfisch]

I agree with the sentiment, but I'm a (relatively) level headed adult and I can handle reality not meeting my (at best) speculative musings about what the future might bring.

Ultimately all I really want is to continue playing one of my favourite games, to do so alongside people who currently can't play due to performance issues or bugs as well as new players, and to be given access to more content (whatever that means) thoughout my journey to keep me engaged with the world.

The world needs reasonable people like you.

 

[Sublime]

Less cartoony you say? There weren't many caves and overhands on the moon. Strangely, as they are caused by water. Oh hang on, the worlds we can land on in ED don't have liquid water on the surface, and never did. Hey, science wins!

Okay, where are the lava tubes then? For any worlds that we can visit that are volcanically active either now or have been in the past.

 

[Ian Skippy]

I really appreciate someone else discussing the grind to get involved in some fun elements of the game. I've got ~600Hours on PC and ~500-600Hours on XBOX so not coming to your levels of gameplay or experience in Elite. That's the thing though, the grind. It blocks gameplay and spoils my experience.

With those hours logged, I still haven't unlocked all the engineers and haven't fully upgraded ships etc and then another grind came with the on-foot gameplay.

I'd personally like to be able to welcome new players (which I've tried in the past but they can't get past the grind) and say "Hey lets do...."

1. Thargoid killing - Load up the game, shop for some components in some systems that stock these types of components, attach to ship, go have fun killing Thargoids. Or even trade components with people, transfer money to get started welcoming new players so they can get involved without the grind. Thargoid killing is the gameplay I've wanted to play but only managed to watch YouTube players partake in as I don't have the time to grind the materials needed to participate. If I could login to Elite, get in my ship and go meet up with people killing Thargoids what gameplay that would be. To partake I have to dedicate at least 95% of that time grinding to get started, which isn't worth it.

2. Bounties/PvP Bounties - Shop for the components, Equip, play. Have Missions for Bounties on Players. This again puts new players off as to partake in any of this gameplay there is a wall of grind that you have to unlock to even have a chance.

3. On Foot Missions - Shop for equipment, loadouts, attachments from different systems that have stock, able to transfer equipment with friends without grinding looking at terminals as they download and then re-log etc This again helps with gameplay as you can choose from the shop what loadout would be best for that particular mission without grinding again. I love the ground missions but when I was playing everything was behind a grind, which isn't gameplay in my eyes - The missions are.

4. Quicker travel times - If only nearly 2% of the systems have been explored in 7 years, this needs adjusting. x10 the jump ranges, let us see more of what's out there as in another 7 years who knows where the game will be and if 4% of the game has been explored, that would be sad. Multiplying the jump ranges by 10 would allow 40% of the game to be discovered over the next 7 years.

What it boils down to is that for my ~900hours my typical gameplay isn't actually gameplay it's probably a break down as follows:

50% Grinding
30% Travelling - There is nothing fun about leaving Elite on the other screen waiting to get somewhere
10% Fighting the Instancing
5% Gameplay
5% Googling how to grind things which is a log off and log on again usually

I'd love to see this breakdown flip to:

80% Gameplay - Log on, do anything you want as a new player, experienced player - Just pure skill and loadout sets you apart
10% Shopping for components
10% Travelling

Final Point: In my 900Hours I gained 1 Elite friend, which I persuaded to buy Odyssey myself. He gets in my ship, we try and jump to another system and the game crashes for him. We would end up doing local system missions which got boring fast so his experience is already tainted. We both haven't played since but I do still have hope that things are about to change. In a comparison, I've played Star Citizen for 2 weeks - They have global chat which I partake in. I've got 12 Friends in 2 weeks on Star Citizen and been invited to multiple discord channels, gifted credits to get started, help with loadouts, lots of multiplayer content and mainly gameplay etc. Global chat is very powerful!

So in summary, please re-consider the gameplay blocking mechanics within Elite and remove the grind and have faith that people love playing Elite for the gameplay content it has to offer without adding time wasting mechanics. Allow the players to use their skill level and loadout to set apart if they succeed or fail

Yes. If there is an un-fun wall between player and content it should go. Have a minimum skill requirement to fight Thargoids is fine, grind walls are not.

ED would be way, way more popular but aparrantly FD management sees a small number of people grind and concludes it's working. Pretty sad.

 

[LMAOCanda]

no update for like 3 weeks now.
wut r they doing?

 

[Red Anders]

I agree with the sentiment, but I'm a (relatively) level headed adult...

HE'S THE ONE!!! BURN THE WITCH!!! BURN THE WITCH!!!

 

[Red Anders]

no update for like 3 weeks now.
wut r they doing?

Working on an update maybe? Just a wild guess. Perhaps the next monthly update - clue's in the name?

 

[Ian Skippy]

Working on an update maybe? Just a wild guess. Perhaps the next monthly update - clue's in the name?

But we haven't had a monthly update for weeks.

 

[Ian Skippy]

Okay, where are the lava tubes then? For any worlds that we can visit that are volcanically active either now or have been in the past.

That doesn't undermine his point. Just because you miss A doesn't mean B is unrealistic. The discussion specifically was about B. What you are doing is called whataboutism, and it's generally frowned upon by honest people.

 

[Sublime]

That doesn't undermine his point. Just because you miss A doesn't mean B is unrealistic. The discussion specifically was about B. What you are doing is called whataboutism, and it's generally frowned upon by honest people.

My point is very much connected. Let’s not kid ourselves with implying that the reason there are no caves is because it is realistic.

I’m sure it has much less to do with intentional realism and much more to do with the game engine and/or effort involved.

If realism was such a concern, there could be other “cave-like” features such as lava tubes, or at least overhangs.

Also, the planets we land on may not currently have atmospheres but I’m sure some of them could at one time have had atmospheres and water, so there could possibly be caves there.

I’m not certain, but if memory serves me, some of Ram Tah’s notes mentions that some of the guardian sites we land in now were once atmosphere worlds.

 

[Red Anders]

But we haven't had a monthly update for weeks.

I feel sorry for the shareholders, they haven't had annual accounts for months!

 

[Lord Rak]

What it boils down to is that for my ~900hours my typical gameplay isn't actually gameplay it's probably a break down as follows:

50% Grinding
30% Travelling - There is nothing fun about leaving Elite on the other screen waiting to get somewhere
10% Fighting the Instancing
5% Gameplay
5% Googling how to grind things which is a log off and log on again usually

my gameplay is as follows:

10% grinding
30% Travelling
25% fighting (pve) I don't do PvP
34% gameplay
1% google search for information (no log, in log out)

I know and I'm sorry, it is not you, it is me, believe me I tried, I just don't want to hurt you any more.

 

[SergMx]

yeah, we both are looking for different things in a space game. When I'm playing EVE it is about the player-driven market and my market pvp niche and my activities are bound to being successful in this niche market. Elite doesn't have what makes EVE great and I wasn't interested in ED for as long as it didn't have planetary activities. This is what brought me to Elite - activities on planets - because what is out there in the galaxy?- stars, asteroid belts, planets, moons, nebulae - planets with atmospheres and life forms are interesting here, and EDO offers too little of that - well, NMS has all this and more, and I can play it NOW (not probably in a few years but NOW and that is very important) and there are many updates throughout a year as well - not just fixing stuff, but actually adding new content. NMS has some bugs as well, for example I can craft certain items without to actually know the crafting recipe - the refiner tells me that I don't have the recipe, but it still performs the crafting operation nevertheless. NMS is not a space flight simulator, it is an exploration and adventuring game in 256 galaxies, but mainly happening on planets - and this is exactly what I expect it to be and why I like it that much.

I played Elita 1 on Spectrum for a long time, and Frontier on the Amiga, so for me Elitе was always about space and ships.
They introduced horizons, and that's fine. Because it was an auxiliary element and I still played ships and space.
But what happened in Odyssey? I don't understand.

 

[LMAOCanda]

Working on an update maybe? Just a wild guess. Perhaps the next monthly update - clue's in the name?

I am referring to the weekly patch release they used to have, not this monthly forum report

 

[Franc Kaos]

more to do with the game engine

Dr Kay Ross said in her stream their planet tech was incapable of doing caves and overhangs (whether by water or lava), and if this planet tech is the big upgrade from Horizons for the forseeable future then I'm guessing liquid (water, lava, ammonia) based worlds aren't even on the long term roadmap.

 

[CMDR HollowPointPC]

Where did they say no plans for new ships or srvs?

Several times now, but the main one that stands out in my mind that most people would have/should have seen, was when Arf lead a very serious stream somewhere in the last few weeks, shortly after OA's video about them needing to be more open and they suddenly said they would be more open, the one where Arf said 'honest' something like 50 times in the stream and one of the things he said he was being honest about, was that there are no plans for new ships, or SRVs. Prior to that, it had always been 'No plans for launch' or 'no immediate plans', in that stream, it changed to and he stressed it in fact 'there are no plans', it was the same stream where he also said he was gunna be honest (again) and that there were no plans for ship interiors, which again, had changed from 'no plans at launch', or 'no immediate plans' to 'there are no plans'.

 

[StuartGT]

So if new ships and/or SRVs arrive, what would that mean regarding "no plans"?

 

[Riverside]

So if new ships and/or SRVs arrive, what would that mean regarding "no plans"?

I don't think we're expecting any new ships (or SRVs) are we? AFAIK no plans have been announced apart from an intention to 'fix' Odyssey and release it on consoles at some point and that PPOO is not off the table.

Hopefully we'll get some useful info next week (end of the month), until something firmer arrives one guess is as good as any other including the stance that FDev has no plans for anything at all and are just winging it, or that the next two decades of work have been planned meticulously and all the caginess and weasel words over the past few years have been part of a social experiment.

We just don't know.

 

[Franc Kaos]

So if new ships and/or SRVs arrive, what would that mean regarding "no plans"?

Well, there were no plans 'that day', honestly guv!

I don't think we're expecting any new ships (or SRVs) are we?

Someone found some code or something in the game showing a new ship and SRV that weren't in the game leading various YouTube influencers to guess they might be for Odyssey that then took on a life of its own as we've not had a new ship in ages and never had the 'promised' different SRV models promised when it first came out in Horizons.
Run on sentence ftw!

 

[Viajero]

10% Fighting the Instancing
…
Final Point: In my 900Hours I gained 1 Elite friend, which I persuaded to buy Odyssey myself. He gets in my ship, we try and jump to another system and the game crashes for him.

Regarding connectivity, may I suggest you and your friend give a look to the port forwarding thread?

The Port Forwarding thread: Minimizing multiplayer connection issues

Given the renewed interest in physical multicrew brought in by Odyssey, and multiplayer gameplay interest in general (player groups, co-op, pvp etc), I thought it could be useful to get a detailed thread regarding how to implement Port Forwarding effectively in our systems. A lot of the info and...

forums.frontier.co.uk

If done properly it should improve your connectivity significantly. Any questions or doubts, post in there and we ll try to help.

 

[Riverside]

Someone found some code or something in the game showing a new ship and SRV that weren't in the game leading various YouTube influencers to guess they might be for Odyssey that then took on a life of its own as we've not had a new ship in ages and never had the 'promised' different SRV models promised when it first came out in Horizons.
Run on sentence ftw!

Your post prompted the phrase 'spaghetti code' to wander through my mind

I was surprised there were no new ships at the Odd launch, but only because most major updates include them & not because of any expectation based on info FDev gave out. It probably would have been a good time to introduce a new SRV variant but again I wasn't expecting it based on FDev's info.

I think a lot of 'nice to have' stuff got left out of the Odd launch because of time constraints. The pointlessly revised ship outfitting UI is probably as good an indication as any what state anything left on the cutting room floor was in, that should have been dumped too & I sincerely hope someone in a position of authority at FDev has a moment of clarity & takes the best from both Odd & EDH rather than dumping all the Odd problems onto the rest of the game.

I think if FDev adds new ships or SRVs before the Odd console release & 'proper' launch of the PDLC on PC it will be an attempt to add value to what is otherwise a mediocre at best addition to the base game because they don't want to acknowledge that Odd content just isn't worth the money even if it worked as they intended.