A message to Frontier From D2EA

[Old Duck]

Wait, weve moved on from jusst wanting interiors? now we want furniture addons? whats next a swiming pool in my Luga

You'd be surprised at how popular furnishing a home (which I just argued our large ships are, at least for some of us) is. Wait, don't you play ESO? Then you shouldn't be surprised. It's not my slice of cake, but both my wife and sister are totally obsessed with collecting, crafting, buying, and placing furniture (and paintings and cats and whatever else) in their many homes scattered throughout Tamriel. I don't understand it, but I can't argue against its popularity!

Now I need to look at the OP to see of D2EA actually asked for this, or if we've wandered off the path..

 

[angusmadmac1]

Wait, weve moved on from jusst wanting interiors? now we want furniture addons? whats next a swiming pool in my Luga

O7

I just wanted zero grav hot tubs with unicorn paint jobs with engine trails which shoot out multicoloured rainbows and stars . Nothing fancy

 

[Cmdr. Numa]

I'm wondering how many of the people crying about the games issues have at least 1,000 hours invested.

You paid 50 bucks.

When's the last time you paid 50 bucks for anything that lasted you 10 hours, let alone 1,000.

There's just no pleasing some people.

More than 4000 hours, and I paid much much more. Base game, Horizons, Lifetime Pass. cosmetics.

 

[Darrack]

You'd be surprised at how popular furnishing a home (which I just argued our large ships are, at least for some of us) is. Wait, don't you play ESO? Then you shouldn't be surprised. It's not my slice of cake, but both my wife and sister are totally obsessed with collecting, crafting, buying, and placing furniture (and paintings and cats and whatever else) in their many homes scattered throughout Tamriel. I don't understand it, but I can't argue against its popularity!

Now I need to look at the OP to see of D2EA actually asked for this, or if we've wandered off the path..

Not sure id get all my siege weapons and Volendrung trophy even in my Luga

O7

 

[DjVortex]

Wait, weve moved on from jusst wanting interiors? now we want furniture addons? whats next a swiming pool in my Luga

O7

Perhaps you should actually read what I have written about the subject?

My original point, in the context of this thread, is that there's so much that the developers could do that would benefit both the players and the developers themselves, such as for example finally implementing the long-requested feature of ship interiors. And, while doing that, they could make a pretty decent buck by supporting furnishing and decorating those ship interiors, by selling furniture and decorations in the shop for ARX. And, to make it even more interesting for the players, some furniture and decorations could be eg. mission rewards and, preferably, not trivially obtainable/unlockable (in a similar manner as Guardian modules).

This would be a win-win for everybody: The players would get long-requested interesting new content and new gameplay objectives, and the developers could get a new source of revenue.

Yet, when I suggest such a thing people don't read and just ridicule the idea based on a complete misunderstanding of what I have written. (Nowhere did I say that the ship interiors themselves should be an unlockable. I was talking about the furniture and decorations, some of which could be purchaseable in the shop, some unlockable via missions.)

 

[Northpin]

On the topic of ex-boyfriends, I'd be very interested in a study / survey / poll that breaks down, statistically-speaking, why people have "divorced" Elite over the years.

People get bored eventually and start playing other games?
I remember the old DBOBE' story regarding pitching Elite to publishers in early eighties, and publishers said "we want a game that can be played in 10 minutes, where you have 3 lives..." and DBOBE was like
Well, ED is not like that, it's a game that demands playing for months/years, but even so - it's an almost 9 years old game and not everyone is able to play the same game for 5+ years (i can, i did played DAoC for 8+ years, ED for almost 5 and i still play, and i work for the same company for the last 28 years - so yea, i can, but not everyone can)

And ED is a marvel of a game, but for a rather small demographics - it's not a nerdy niche game for nothing

 

[Darth Ender]

that's kind of glossing over the fact that over those 9 years, half we haven't seen new flyable ships, the features we do get end up being paired down from initial plans or left incomplete (cough..pp... carriers... cough...super cruise...cough) and that's been going on since year 1.

getting bored because players have been playing for 9 years is not really about the 9 years despite fdev's best efforts. it's players being bored and trying to stick around for 9 years despite fdev's off target or inadequate efforts (where it seems they invest a bunch of time in something players aren't going to really like... cough cqc....cough odyssey cough power play... cough....i swear it's not COVID)


it's a niche game not because the genre is unattractive or too complex. it's niche because so much of it lacks anything beyond basic grindy gameloops and players have other games that seem to put so much more effort into good gameplay that even the awesome potential and visuals of the abandoned vr can't overcome... so all that remains are diehards and newbies not yet disenchanted... it's niche because after you've played for a few dozen hours, everything that comes next is just repeating that.. and the only new 'content' comes at the snails pace of fdev's updates because there's really no community content... which most massively multiplayer open world games understand they need to rely on because one small group of developers can't keep up with the appetite of thousands of players playing in a persistent environment.


tldr; I'm not bored after 9 years, I've been bored for most of that time and i stick around out of spite. there's the game's niche. 'hate playing' to the point where going on the forum and arguing over hypotheticals that will never happen or defending some perceived attack on the things you do in the game or over other people discussing the game is more a part of the game that is elite dangerous than flying a ship is.

 

[Darrack]

Perhaps you should actually read what I have written about the subject?

My original point, in the context of this thread, is that there's so much that the developers could do that would benefit both the players and the developers themselves, such as for example finally implementing the long-requested feature of ship interiors. And, while doing that, they could make a pretty decent buck by supporting furnishing and decorating those ship interiors, by selling furniture and decorations in the shop for ARX. And, to make it even more interesting for the players, some furniture and decorations could be eg. mission rewards and, preferably, not trivially obtainable/unlockable (in a similar manner as Guardian modules).

This would be a win-win for everybody: The players would get long-requested interesting new content and new gameplay objectives, and the developers could get a new source of revenue.

Yet, when I suggest such a thing people don't read and just ridicule the idea based on a complete misunderstanding of what I have written. (Nowhere did I say that the ship interiors themselves should be an unlockable. I was talking about the furniture and decorations, some of which could be purchaseable in the shop, some unlockable via missions.)

Each to their own but i would much rather them spend their time on game development not fluff.
A place for the pvpers, overhaul of PP and BGS, new things to explore, continuing the Thyroids narrative.
If they need cash im happy to pay a subscription.
I spend lots of dosh in the Arx store on ship kits and paint, i would rather not see the game turn into Barbie in space.

O7

 

[DjVortex]

Each to their own but i would much rather them spend their time on game development not fluff.
A place for the pvpers, overhaul of PP and BGS, new things to explore, continuing the Thyroids narrative.
If they need cash im happy to pay a subscription.
I spend lots of dosh in the Arx store on ship kits and paint, i would rather not see the game turn into Barbie in space.

O7

I don't think any of that would be an extraordinary source of income, so what would be their motivation to do it?

They should do something that both a) gives players interesting new content and b) brings them money. That way they can then afford doing that other stuff.

 

[CMDR MRMAURICE]

Good tactics, to undermine a person's opinion, undermine their credibility.

His opinion changes depending on what the audience wants or how it will reflect his views/likes. If you seriously believe that YouTubers with these sorts of videos are doing it bc thats what they actually think, then how gullible can you be?. But doesn't he say he does YouTube for fun? Hmmm.
He says things for views. He gets in a strop when a video is no longer valid (A fix to a bug/exploit).... But he just does YouTube for fun, right?

What credibility does he have? He's a YouTuber... He may as well be a tiktoker too, for all anyone should care. He has no more credibility than you or I. And if you think bc hes a YouTuber he does, then you may as well accept the Earth is flat, bc thats on YouTube too

 

[zimms]

His opinion changes depending on what the audience wants or how it will reflect his views/likes. If you seriously believe that YouTubers with these sorts of videos are doing it bc thats what they actually think, then how gullible can you be?. But doesn't he say he does YouTube for fun? Hmmm.
He says things for views. He gets in a strop when a video is no longer valid (A fix to a bug/exploit).... But he just does YouTube for fun, right?

What credibility does he have? He's a YouTuber... He may as well be a tiktoker too, for all anyone should care. He has no more credibility than you or I. And if you think bc hes a YouTuber he does, then you may as well accept the Earth is flat, bc thats on YouTube too

I'm curios, what's your opinion on the CMs or Frontier in general?

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

Pretty sure he said he’d turned off all ads on his videos. Unless I missed a statement on the reversal of that decision, any ads that you do see on his videos are YouTube’s fault because they can go “F off, here’s ads on the video anyway even though you turned them off. And let’s add our middle finger to it as well.”… I know this because another person that turns off ads on a specific type of video had to explain this in said videos once, due to receiving complaints from people still seeing ads.

Not-so-funnily, this is exactly what they are currently serving as. A little too literally.

His opinion changes depending on what the audience wants or how it will reflect his views/likes. If you seriously believe that YouTubers with these sorts of videos are doing it bc thats what they actually think, then how gullible can you be?. But doesn't he say he does YouTube for fun? Hmmm.
He says things for views. He gets in a strop when a video is no longer valid (A fix to a bug/exploit).... But he just does YouTube for fun, right?

What credibility does he have? He's a YouTuber... He may as well be a tiktoker too, for all anyone should care. He has no more credibility than you or I. And if you think bc hes a YouTuber he does, then you may as well accept the Earth is flat, bc thats on YouTube too

So I re-checked the video page. Let's be honest, this "I turned off all ads" (if he really said it that way, I have no intention to go look for that statement) it total baloney and a smokescreen at best. I am not a youtube creator, so I may be wrong, but to my knowledge the only way to turn off ads is to turn off monetization for a video. You can do it on a per-video basis, so you have the choice to not monetize a video while keeping the channel monetized.

His channel is still monetized, as is the video in the OP. He still plasters his affiliate links all over his videos, and the video in the OP is still flagged for monetization (you can see that in the source code of the video page), and he still runs his patreon. You don't monetize your videos because you are doing it out of the goodness of your heart. You do it to profit from it in some form or another, and to profit from it you need the video to do well, and to do well you need to cater to your audience. It's a business.

And D2EA profits a lot from his videos. Maybe not even from the ad revenue, but he hasn't paid his own money for his constantly changing, evolving and upgrading very expensive Virpil setup in a long, long time. There is nothing really wrong with it, but it would be naive to assume D2EA is some kind of philanthropist. He can say "I turned off my ads", but as long as a video is monetized, it will show ads and has to be seen as a means to earn either money, influence, approval, popularity, or all of the above.

I'm not against monetization, but you as an audience have to be aware what that might mean for the content.

 

[Nekozji]

Guess I'm late to this thread Saw the vid on youtube. Have to agree that for a game about spaceships, it's had remarkably few new spaceships. Would love a modern take on the old Osprey model...

Also yes, agree with the point about understanding the sort of person each type of gameplay appeals to. Very glad that silly twitch reaction thing was removed from exploration and I think the idea of finding flora at a range of maturity would be interesting. Also pls add a shipboard bio scanner to help highlight things within a few km...

And I'd kind of like to see less combat emphasis with regards to Thargoid invasions. I enjoyed building fast refugee/supply runners and helping with the BGS via supportive actions, but I detached from the whole thing when it seemed like they were coming up with new Thargoid ships where there was no option to run away. I'm just not a combat-oriented player.

And quite honestly; more atmospheres! Clouds! Precipitation! Oceans and lakes should not be hard, just pick a sea level for each body. Don't worry over much about rivers if the terrain gen for them is a PITA. Put some new features into the core of the game that everyone will enjoy, and don't worry if it suddenly means places we previously visited look different - nobody will mind so long as they look good!

Edit: also also... maybe make some official articles on the Frontier website, twitter, or even Galnet, about how to build ships that can survive Thargoid controlled space. It's weird that all the info on this is third party.

 

[Darrack]

It's weird that all the info on this is third party.

Its all about discovery, you dont need folks to tell you how to build ships, experiment, die, rebuild, survive

O7

 

[zimms]

Its all about discovery, you dont need folks to tell you how to build ships, experiment, die, rebuild, survive

O7

Sometimes it feels like the game, especially Odyssey Engineering, tries its best to keep players from experimenting though.

 

[Darrack]

Sometimes it feels like the game, especially Odyssey Engineering, tries its best to keep players from experimenting though.

how so?

O7

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

how so?

O7

Because it takes so much effort to get a result - it discourages experimenting and promotes being happy that you managaged to just get one. You then decide to concentrate on new tasks which surely are a pain to unlock and gather as well. Better get it quickly behind you so you can finally just enjoy the game after all the menial work is done.

 

[Disemboweled Ego]

My original point, in the context of this thread, is that there's so much that the developers could do that would benefit both the players and the developers themselves, such as for example finally implementing the long-requested feature of ship interiors. And, while doing that, they could make a pretty decent buck by supporting furnishing and decorating those ship interiors, by selling furniture and decorations in the shop for ARX. And, to make it even more interesting for the players, some furniture and decorations could be eg. mission rewards and, preferably, not trivially obtainable/unlockable (in a similar manner as Guardian modules).

Based on the content in previous expansions and recent patches what they actually COULD accomplish at the current rate of development isn't that much. Maybe 1 ship interior every few months to go along with a patch with fleet carrier interior level of customization and no other content? The player number would keep going down and the number of potential buyers for the ship interior cosmetics would be small. All the "the smart thing to do is to implement what I want, but with microtransactions" suggestions would require whales to be profitable - none of the suggestions actually suggest mechanics that cater to or would attract more whales that spend 10s of thousands of € on the game.

I think ship interiors at best would see an odyssey/FC interiors like bump that sees a bunch of players return to check them out and then a quick huge dip to the old levels or below. How would they retain players? There are "add gameplay to ship interiors" suggestions but they're very vague and nothing I'd be hyped about playing.

Whenever you suggest something it'd be best to imagine a worse/minimal version of what you suggested get implemented - with FDev that's often the reality and it helps ground the suggestions in what's more low risk. A just "add more for explorers" suggestionsis probably too vague and could backfire, but The FC QoL stuff that's focused towards explorers is actually sound reasoning based on the premise (but you can still dissagree for other reasonable reasons). Most people would probably welcome even a mediocre new ship at this point. While ship interiors are often requested would people be content with laggy odyssey ship interiors only accessible when landed that are just the cockpits with no interactable components beyond being able to sit down?

 

[Taimaru]

Beluga Liner Hot Tub streams on Twitch/YouTube could be fun especially with no gravity and water going everywhere.

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

Based on the content in previous expansions and recent patches what they actually COULD accomplish at the current rate of development isn't that much. Maybe 1 ship interior every few months to go along with a patch with fleet carrier interior level of customization and no other content? The player number would keep going down and the number of potential buyers for the ship interior cosmetics would be small. All the "the smart thing to do is to implement what I want, but with microtransactions" suggestions would require whales to be profitable - none of the suggestions actually suggest mechanics that cater to or would attract more whales that spend 10s of thousands of € on the game.

I think ship interiors at best would see an odyssey/FC interiors like bump that sees a bunch of players return to check them out and then a quick huge dip to the old levels or below. How would they retain players? There are "add gameplay to ship interiors" suggestions but they're very vague and nothing I'd be hyped about playing.

Whenever you suggest something it'd be best to imagine a worse/minimal version of what you suggested get implemented - with FDev that's often the reality and it helps ground the suggestions in what's more low risk. A just "add more for explorers" suggestionsis probably too vague and could backfire, but The FC QoL stuff that's focused towards explorers is actually sound reasoning based on the premise (but you can still dissagree for other reasonable reasons). Most people would probably welcome even a mediocre new ship at this point. While ship interiors are often requested would people be content with laggy odyssey ship interiors only accessible when landed that are just the cockpits with no interactable components beyond being able to sit down?

You can't implement ship interiors like that. You need to do it right from the start. With the according gameplay laid down. Look at legs - they were able to just pull off basic shooter gameplay. And it competes with the existing gameplay like the buggy. So basically you're about to just run and gun through bases. In order to make players leave ship or buggy they had to make exoscanning pay exorbitantly high sums. That is not how you promote fun game mechanics.