Console Update

[Deleted member 182079]

I have both platforms for MSF and they look pretty much the same, however you are limited on the console - no add-ons (unless you buy the limited ones from the store) no third party tools or community stuff, there's a big difference in gaming between them

O7

How are add-ons and community stuff (I imagine you mean mods) relevant to this discussion though?

FDev didn't manage to optimise Odyssey well enough to run on (admittedly aging) console hardware. That's not really the fault of the consoles being consoles though.

(and I say this as a PC player who will likely never buy a console in the future)

 

[Darrack]

The problem is Odyssey is a million light years off from being optimised to run well on even top of the line PC hardware that few can afford. Right now, the current console generation are basically the only way for many to get their hands on hardware equivalent to a mid-range gaming PC at less than half the price of an equivalent PC graphics card. Even if focusing soley on PC, that needs to be your hardware target as a game developer if you ever intend to sell enough copies of your software to break even.

I agree there is a price difference, whats a PS5? 500/600 quid? it also depends on you definition of optimised and high end computer, im running an old I7-7700 with GTX 1070 and have no problems at all, admittedly a newer PC will have better graphics but performance wise i really have no issues.

O7

 

[CUTECAT]

This if we don't get odyssey unlock the permit regions cause there is no plan on console atleast to open them.

Oh and Raxxla show us the wae to it braben

 

[NoVR - What_The_X_F_Dev]

Most PC players have been good. I detest the ones that are saying "This is a good thing. because they can focus on making the game better for US."

I encountered something similar when alot of PC players seemed to be reveling in our misery when VR was nixed.

 

[Deleted member 182079]

Is there any word on whether we'll be able to continue playing Horizons content on PC?

What I mean by this is that currently, when you have Odyssey installed but choose to play Horizons from the launcher, it's running an entirely separate (non-Odyssey) installation of the game (the old codebase if you will and presumably basically the same codebase that Frontier will be continuing to maintain, tho not develop, for console). In the future, if we launch Horizons on PC will it continue to run this old software or will it essentially run Odyssey but with the Odyssey exclusive content turned off?

More importantly (for me and a certain portion of the community), when I run Horizons on PC in the future, will I see the new planet tech or the old planet tech?

It's an interesting situation now - abandoning console development for Odyssey suggests to me that performance optimisation will also be pared down if not abandoned along the way, on the other hand if you don't continue to further optimise (if that's even possible, at least for FDev) I don't think merging Horizons into the Odyssey client is a good idea, because on weaker PCs it'll still run like a dog compared to a much smoother Horizons (plus, those who prefer the old planet tech will lose out also but that's a separate topic).

 

[Deleted member 182079]

I agree there is a price difference, whats a PS5? 500/600 quid? it also depends on you definition of optimised and high end computer, im running an old I7-7700 with GTX 1070 and have no problems at all, admittedly a newer PC will have better graphics but performance wise i really have no issues.

O7

I'm on a .. mid-range? PC (i7 9700, 2060S 8GB, 16GB RAM) and Odyssey performance is adequate at best, and very janky/uneven at worst (still hitting 30 and below in specific areas, none of which justify that performance hit in terms of complexity/visuals).

The problem is some people find sub-30fps "fine", but if you play other games you will get a pretty good idea what you can expect in terms of eye-candy vs performance on your hardware, and I can tell you much prettier and much more complex games run a lot better than Odyssey does on my machine. So while it's very much playable for me, it's nowhere near what I expect given the visuals on display.

 

[Skizomeuh]

It's an interesting situation now - abandoning console development for Odyssey suggests to me that performance optimisation will also be pared down if not abandoned along the way, on the other hand if you don't continue to further optimise (if that's even possible, at least for FDev) I don't think merging Horizons into the Odyssey client is a good idea, because on weaker PCs it'll still run like a dog compared to a much smoother Horizons (plus, those who prefer the old planet tech will lose out also but that's a separate topic).

Actually Horizon content in Odyssey performs exactly the same as in Horizon.

 

[Darrack]

How are add-ons and community stuff (I imagine you mean mods) relevant to this discussion though?

FDev didn't manage to optimise Odyssey well enough to run on (admittedly aging) console hardware. That's not really the fault of the consoles being consoles though.

(and I say this as a PC player who will likely never buy a console in the future)

What i am trying to get across (probably badly) is that when it was released in 2020 it had already been developed for console release last year.
Its much easier and will run better when the game was designed for both platforms from the offset, they had what 13/14 years since the last one to build a new game from the ground up and with Microsoft's massive financial resources.
And the bit about add-ons (mods) is that consoles still cant handle that side of gaming properly.
Maybe its just me and i know cost is a consideration but i just don't see the point of consoles over PCs in gaming and as i said i have both.

O7

 

[Zieman]

Actually Horizon content in Odyssey performs exactly the same as in Horizon.

No it doesn't.

 

[Deleted member 182079]

Actually Horizon content in Odyssey performs exactly the same as in Horizon.

That's just not true. Search the forum there's been various comparison threads on this. Maybe if you lock your framerate you might not notice a difference, but there is for sure a substantial hit in Odyssey even for the spaceship stuff. Not to mention visual bugs and glitches but again, separate topic.

 

[CMDR KCalo]

Wow. Big news and I can fully understand the radio-silence that has been going on while they came to this decision.

I will share my sympathies for the console players (and hope they can get some way to move over to PC Odyssey in the future) but remind those losing their minds over this, that Horizons is still a damn fine Elite game and i certainly will be playing that on PC for a good few years while work carries on on Odyssey.

Thank you for making a difficult decision Sir David (and Frontier) and i hope this allows you to focus on getting the best out of Elite going forward.

Horizons is good and I still plan on hopping on and exploring. But active involvement is going to decrease whether it’s from console cmdrs switching over to PC or just getting bored and moving on to something else. With development stopped and only bug fixes expected, there’s not going to be a lot of life pumped into this. If there’s no life being pumped into the game, any game, it dies.

My understanding from Braben’s comment is Horizons stands as is, there will be no CG’s and no storylines as that’s all moving to Odyssey. It’ll last for a while I believe, but it’s days are numbered without some sort of nurturing.

 

[Darrack]

I'm on a .. mid-range? PC (i7 9700, 2060S 8GB, 16GB RAM) and Odyssey performance is adequate at best, and very janky/uneven at worst (still hitting 30 and below in specific areas, none of which justify that performance hit in terms of complexity/visuals).

The problem is some people find sub-30fps "fine", but if you play other games you will get a pretty good idea what you can expect in terms of eye-candy vs performance on your hardware, and I can tell you much prettier and much more complex games run a lot better than Odyssey does on my machine. So while it's very much playable for me, it's nowhere near what I expect given the visuals on display.

This is the bit that really interests me, many folks have way better rigs than me and have poor performance, even on foot im not getting much of a slow down.
Can it be due to area/region, quality of broadband? im no techy so genuinely interested.

O7

 

[CUTECAT]

Could we at least get a yes/no to if Raxxla really is in game? And can we please have access to Col70 and other restricted sectors now that there will be no more expansion or story arches on console?

This if we don't get odyssey unlock the permit regions cause there is no plan on console atleast to open them.

Oh and Raxxla show us the wae to it braben

 

[SP_Predicador]

I´m sure that this game has been in decline for some time, but now in a more pronounced way. It has been shrinking for a long time. We have left behind the best project managers of the game, the Mac players, the VR ones are struggling about, now the console ones. And whoever believes that after the commercial failure of Odyssey this is good for the PC version, start learning what the sunk cost fallacy is, and note the bursatile situation and the rumors about Frontier.

 

[Deleted member 182079]

What i am trying to get across (probably badly) is that when it was released in 2020 it had already been developed for console release last year.
Its much easier and will run better when the game was designed for both platforms from the offset, they had what 13/14 years since the last one to build a new game from the ground up and with Microsoft's massive financial resources.
And the bit about add-ons (mods) is that consoles still cant handle that side of gaming properly.
Maybe its just me and i know cost is a consideration but i just don't see the point of consoles over PCs in gaming and as i said i have both.

O7

But how long is Elite on consoles for now? 2017/2018? I'd have to google it but it's been years - we don't know whether EDO was being developed on consoles alongside the PC version, I would imagine so or at least long enough for FDev to realise it's not working.

Look at NMS. They ported it to the Switch of all things, just like that (and with apparently very little manpower). I know I know, different game yadda yadda but it shows porting games to (underpowered) consoles isn't the impossible task that some here seem to suggest.

The add-ons point really is a more philosophical topic - whether you value those things or not is one factor and consoles being walled garden environments where the platform holder has good reasons to not allow modding is another. I just think it's irrelevant to the conversation we have around whether a game can/should be ported to other systems or not.

 

[NoVR - What_The_X_F_Dev]

And yet, MSFS2020, an actual sim that's arguably much more complex than ageing Elite, runs on consoles no problem, while looking better as well.

Only a poor craftsman blames their tools.

With clouds, weather, cities and animals as well!

 

[Forsaken Chief]

What i am trying to get across (probably badly) is that when it was released in 2020 it had already been developed for console release last year.
Its much easier and will run better when the game was designed for both platforms from the offset, they had what 13/14 years since the last one to build a new game from the ground up and with Microsoft's massive financial resources.
And the bit about add-ons (mods) is that consoles still cant handle that side of gaming properly.
Maybe its just me and i know cost is a consideration but i just don't see the point of consoles over PCs in gaming and as i said i have both.

O7

There is a point to consoles over PC's. It's like the difference between a project car and a reliable new/ certified used car from a dealer. For people who don't mind tinkering, occasional issues or love to modify their equipment it's a project car (or gaming PC). For folks who just want to plug it in and play, don't care about mods/ add-ons and want a reliable experience that's easy to use, then the new &cert used cars/ consoles are the way to go.

And what doesn't fit into the car analogy is the built in social aspects of consoles. While neither xbox or playstation have a perfect solution. The fact that it is integrated and not needing a dozen or more various launchers, messengers, discord, TeamSpeak, etc etc, the list goes on, is attractive for a lot of people. Not everyone has the time, or wants to dedicate the time to pc gaming. That's okay, that's what consoles are for.

The other issue is cost, a comparably capable gpu as a series x or ps5 (ONLY GPU, not even the rest of the components in a decent gaming pc system) costs twice as much (if at msrp of course, can be much much higher in the current pc parts climate) , it's easy to see how cost comes into effect as well.

Just my 2 cents on the matter. I personally use both for different reasons, when I want to load up my dedicated ark server with 100+ mods installed, I turn on my pc, login to steam and kill some dinos.Xbox. I don't have a lot of time, just want to sit down with my friends, rubbish with them and game without needing to worry what communication apps everyone is using, I hop on my xbox.

 

[zimms]

Actually Horizon content in Odyssey performs exactly the same as in Horizon.

That's not even remotely true.

 

[The Nephilim]

Just for those acting as if they're destroying everything relating to consoles...

The console versions aren't being shut down and destroyed, they're just not going to get Odyssey and/or the 4.0 client. It sucks, yes, but you can still continue to play Horizons.

As long as Horizons is left alone, other than bug fixes, I'm happy my consoles won't be infected with the same Odyssey virus that's been plaguing my PC since last year.

Fingers crossed they can now actually concentrate on content.

 

[Tod]

This all seems very bad news for everyone, including PC players. If ED is only going to work on PC's that have a very high spec, that is not going to pay the bills as I would imagine only a small percentage of PC players have that level of technology in their PC.
Is it really too much for consoles? How on earth does No Man's Sky work so well? You only have to play this on PS5 to see the level of detail on planets on that game in comparison to the level of detail on Elite (even on one of these super PC's!) to wonder what is so difficult.
I hate to say this but is this just the start of the death of this game on all formats if it can't expand and make money?