A comparison of ED vs X3

[Cosmo]

That´s why multiplayer is not given much attention because only a few will play co-op at all, since there is not much point other than socializing.

I can think of many reasons to socialize:

1. playing with other people and friends can be more fun.
2. do mining operations together, each player has different tasks
3. players can escort traders. Imagine a player group that escorts traders for some credits.
4. group exploration in deep space.
5. Role-playing with other players via star system wide social chat and more.

I´m pretty sure most will play it as single player game but remain in online mode. Small groups or "squadrons" will meet up and do co-op stuff together.

The staple MMO feature of group co-op play is difficult to do in ED. Because group players are often in the wrong instance, they cannot share loot, cannot do missions together, cannot interdict together, cannot jump together.

 

[Zenicetus]

I think for me it's the lack of recognition the game gives me, and the impersonal nature of the world around me, imagine if there was an outpost/station orbiting a planet nearby, it would have an owner (randomly generated) but the AI of said character would remember me, as would any others for my actions, maybe he/she needed a certain commodity, batteries perhaps, i deliver them safely and get a rep boost with that character, their demeanour changes, they're happy to see me when i land, very much so if i drove away attacking pirates or did something else they approved of, they may give me discounts on whatever they produce there. or information, or maybe they hate me and refuse access to their docking bay whilst simultaneously calling the cops when they see me if they know me as a pirate, that AI character may never see me again if i explore outwards far enough and i don't return, but there would be other randomly generated character's to meet. it wouldn't have to be vastly complicated, maybe just a angry/neutral/happy disposition.

That's already happening, to an extent. There is an Outpost I regularly visit, owned by a corporation I've been doing missions for, in the course of doing other stuff. Over the weekend, that Outpost suddenly showed up green as a nav target. I'm apparently "allied" with this company now, and prices are improving for missions. I'm seeing a few other NPC's as green on my sensor too... my allies. I've seen green ships like that in a few neighboring systems too. I feel like waving every time I see them.

There is no real interaction with them (yet) and I don't know if they would assist if I was in combat with a non-allied ship. But this is the beginning of the faction rep system, already happening in the game. Right now it seems to be based on corporations and other entities like local "mobs" and freedom movements, but I expect this will extend to the three major factions also, and alter gameplay in different areas.

yep, going over it in my head, it's the lack of even a face to the npc's that really alienates me from the ED world, and keeps me feeling i'm in a giant empty bucket, there's no "life" other than the station announcers

God no, I hope FD never adds faces on video screens to interact with. Talk about "state of the art and what people expect".... it would take an enormous budget to do it well enough for current AAA game expectations, so it doesn't look cheesy and there would be enough different faces to interact with. If you want to see how badly this can misfire, just take a look at X: Rebirth. Talking heads would also require more voice acting, and both the video and audio data would increase the network load.

On the other hand, improvements in text interactions with NPC's would be welcome, and FD needs to drastically improve the communication between players, especially in the area of canned messages that can be sent quickly without getting into full typing mode.

 

[Foreverowned]

God no, I hope FD never adds faces on video screens to interact with.

What about static pictures? Would be easier and they don't look bad if done artistically, Civ 5 used this method for it's wonder "videos," they are just nicely drawn paintings, but no movement involved, text by itself is just so soulless.

This could be the commander of an agricultural station http://s929.photobucket.com/user/ejp791/media/2014-08-22092542_zpsa693bf28.jpg.html

 

[Gibbonici]

The staple MMO feature of group co-op play is difficult to do in ED. Because group players are often in the wrong instance, they cannot share loot, cannot do missions together, cannot interdict together, cannot jump together.

All this is yet to come, and the bolded bit is *much* better in Beta 3.03.

View attachment 789
First Great Expedition members rendezvous at training basecamp in Open Play

 

[Zieman]

1. Elite doesn't have much station variety (they're too similar).

2. Elite players can't create a business or station. The only thing players can spend their credits on is ship modules and more ships. This will get old rather quickly.

3. Elite's star systems lack unique content. They're uninteresting to explore. Why explore thousands of star systems when most have nothing special?

4. Elite doesn't have major alien factions and alien life. There's obscure Thargoids which will be rare encounters, nothing more meaningful.

5. Elite's Factions are too plain and similar. They lack personality, there's no back-story information (no Codex).

6. Elite doesn't have any significant multiplayer gameplay. Grouping is tedious. I have *Never* seen multiple groups of players working together or against each other.

7. Elite doesn't have staple social features of an MMO such as a star system wide chat and a bulletin board for player contracts. There's only a 1 vs 1 chat and voice communication. That's all.

1. Not in my opinion. And the variety will increase.

2. 1st & 2nd part provisionally true. 3rd part true if you don't embrace the old saying "It's no the destination, but the drive there".

3. 1st part: true now, at release not so. 2nd part: opinion, well my opinion differs from that. 3rd part: exploring is bound to be rewarding because most systems have nothing special - if most systems had something special, it would get old quick and nothing would be special anymore.

4. Which is a bad thing, and why?

5. Huh?

6. Beta. FDEV are working on that.

7. Did anyone mention Beta yet?

Like someone said, you're comparing Porsche that has just entered the assembly line with BMW that has been retrofitted with racing gear.

 

[Zenicetus]

What about static pictures? Would be easier and they don't look bad if done artistically, Civ 5 used this method for it's wonder "videos," they are just nicely drawn paintings, but no movement involved, text by itself is just so soulless.

This could be the commander of an agricultural station http://s929.photobucket.com/user/ejp791/media/2014-08-22092542_zpsa693bf28.jpg.html

Heh... I like that one.

This is just my personal opinion, but I prefer imagining who is behind those text messages to seeing an artist's rendition of it. I'm likely to disagree with the style of helmet, or the beard, or the lack of any faces that don't look like they're in their 20's, or a gender imbalance, or any number of things. I've seen it done badly more than I've seen it done well in previous games like this.

There is another problem with static avatars. You know players will want their own, and now we're really into the silly zone. It's fun to see all the avatars here on the forum, but I don't need that in my cockpit when I'm trying to role play a space adventurer. It would also mean extra work for FD to vett the image uploads. I know X3 and other games managed without player avatars in the comms screen, but I don't think they can get away with that in a multiplayer game.

 

[cptzipzap]

what I would like to have in ELite is a perma-death mode. When you die - you lose everything!

that would make the game very dangerous. They could make a soft- and a hardcore online modus. I would like to play the hardcore ( dayZ like) mode.

Dayz is a very boring and dull game aswell, but the case you can die and lose everything makes it so extremely exciting - because you actually "care" for your character and your stuff..

 

[Cosmo]

There is another problem with static avatars. You know players will want their own, and now we're really into the silly zone. It's fun to see all the avatars here on the forum, but I don't need that in my cockpit when I'm trying to role play a space adventurer.

Customizing the look of your character is part of role-playing imo. They can add a character creation feature which takes a profile pic that's displayed during social interaction, mission NPCs. Walking around in first person comes later.

what I would like to have in ELite is a perma-death mode. When you die - you lose everything!

There's Iron Man. During death you lose Iron Man status, but can continue playing. It's not really hardcore.

 

[Meritz]

There's Iron Man. During death you lose Iron Man status, but can continue playing. It's not really hardcore.

Well, you also cannot play in Iron Man any more, so for everyone else your character is dead and you have to make a new one if you want to play with your buddies again.

 

[RustiSwordz]

X3 is over 10 years old no longer supported.
X-Rebirth is less than a year and is possibly Ed nearest rival because Ed will be on public sale soon around the same time frame.
Star Citizen is less than a beta and is almost 2 years maybe more away from full sale. its so far away from XR and Ed in sales release as to be irrelevant.

XR is a joke, a total travesty of a game, totally poo pooed over the excellent games that went before.
Ed is the winner hands down and we haven't even seen the full game yet, i just hope that translates to sales when it goes gold/ public.

 

[bassman]

Point is they know player base will thin out extremely due to the infinite number of computer generated systems.

Not going to happen, modern gamers are social creatures and will actively seek out places where other players congregate. Yes sure there is a hard core of old elite fans who just want to oohh and aahh over endless procedural generated cookie-cutter systems but I'm betting they will make up way less that half the eventual player base (unless us social players abandon it en mass due to the poor MP mechanics of course).

 

[Rafferty]

Interesting.. I'm really only in it for the solo mode .

 

[Nomadski]

Ill give the OP a comparison that is fairer. At launch X3 was a horrendous, unplayable, buggy mess. In Beta Elite Dangerous has a few bugs but is already pretty awesome.

Whatever, I loved X3 TC, and I love Elite. For me, the true space game to end all space games would be an amalgamation of both of them...

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

you know two weeks ago I had agreed with that but with the latest update, not anymore. Now they really nailed it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBf9Ii_JOQk&lhd=1

and this is basically Elite with Flight Assist Off (Decoupled mode)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXtdSrGOtco&hd=1

really no winner or loser here imho

Really? have you tried it recently? I must admit I havent for maybe 3 weeks or so..... if it has had a radical overhaul I will fire it up again, thanks for the heads up.

I saw the fps module over the weekend. It all looked pretty enough (you would hope so given the engine they use is geared for that kind of content) but equally imo it all looked very much by the numbers, and also very wooden.

Early (very early) days yet for SC however so time will tell.

I will say though, purely subjectively I truly hate the way SC is marketed. Clearly I am in the minority, its main demographic laps it up, but all the whooping in the crowds, and the guys playing giving it all the generic military speak, and not to mention the cringeworthy wingmans hanger... Way to OTT for me.

 

[JonnyC0mbat]

I have played all the X games, bar the most recent traversty and they were not great games. X2 was good, but the learning curve was very steep, and it wasn't fun until you managed to accumulate a significant amount of credits. The story missions were terrible, the voice acting was even worse (I reference X3 terran conflict where they call a gauge a "gorge"), and you never got the impression that you were part of a huge universe due to the small sectors tagged together like an old text adventure game.


Yes they have a lot of ships, but they were all "so so". If you were flying an M3 fighter without a rear turret you wouldn't last long.


In my humble opinion the X games do not come even close to the atmosphere, or fun of Elite Dangerous. Lets face it, most of us played X games (and every other space game over the past 20 years) thinking "this is great and all, but I wish David Braben would make a new Elite game".


Just to be clear, I enjoyed playing the X games, but we all knew they were a poor mans Elite.

 

[rodneyhchef]

Interesting thread. Must admit I've drawn parallels as it's the only other space game in recent memory I've played that is on anything like the scale. (EDIT - Feel like I'm doing ED a dis-service there, it's a big game but nowhere near as big as ED)

Main issue with x3 was it it was a 2 dimensional grid of rooms with loading screens between each. ED is hardly a seemless experience at the moment but you do at least get the feeling that it is really in space

What X3 did well was the planet backdrops, maybe their scale was unrealistic, I don't know. But everything feels a bit small in ED in comparison.

It'll be interesting to see how they do the planet landings on ED - I can only think that the implementation will be similar to the interdiction evasion, with a target vector to aim for while being surrounded by flames

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

I too will be interested in the landing on planets sequence.

I am hoping for something like a (very pretty version) of the dropship landing sequence in the (UK not US) version of Aliens on the spectrum.


this is it on the C64. yes i know it is very simple, but you can hopefully see how it could be hugely expanded upon.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxhxwHD28ys

 

[rodneyhchef]

There were races in X3 like that!

 

[Combiseries]

And Loyal fanbases keep games going.

And Freelancer is a great example of this!

 

[Zieman]

I too will be interested in the landing on planets sequence.

I am hoping for something like a (very pretty version) of the dropship landing sequence in the (UK not US) version of Aliens on the spectrum.


this is it on the C64. yes i know it is very simple, but you can hopefully see how it could be hugely expanded upon.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxhxwHD28ys

Interesting. That sequence is pretty much identical to Space Rogue's version of hyperspace jump, travel between Malir Gates in different star systems. In Space Rogue it never was that long or that fluid though.