Greetings from Commander Morley01 - I've been busy climbing the Trader ladder but finished that yesterday so before girding my loins for combat (for which I may be too old and slow these days) I had an hour or two playing the Beta. I used my Cobra (also have Eagle, Python and Anaconda) and did missions, traded, scanned planets and surface landed but didn't use the SRV, and looked at the Codex. My general comments are as follows, but first to say I adore the game -
- The graphics appear "starker" and more stylised. I have a Dell Inspiron 15 7000 with an NVIDIA card and a decent sized desk monitor. The game "felt" different. But it all worked OK.
- My main gripe is the gripe I had when this version of the game was released back in 2013 (I've played versions since the beginning on the BBC Micro, and Amstrad PC, and various Dell PCs over the years). When this game was first released I couldn't get it to work. I couldn't get beyond the flight controls checklist and it was some time (months) before I realised there was a controls binding interface. Like many I'd been used to firing up games and they just worked. This Elite didn't. Three joysticks later I'm on a HOTAS which is great, but, for example, once I'd done Exploration for the time being (my favourite part of the new game) and went back to Trading I configured the stick for quick repetitive trading missions and I used very few controls almost always avoiding interdiction in the lightweight Python so I never had to fight anyone. Diving into the Beta I immediately find worrying messages with exclamation marks I don't understand about control bindings, my Discovery scanner seems to have disappeared, and the scanning functions "don't work in this cockpit mode". Using the usual trial and error method, farting around with fire groups without really understanding what I'm doing, and searching in the bindings for a key I can use to toggle the display I eventually settle on "M" and can switch between three cockpit displays. It shouldn't be like this but it is so I have to suck it up and get on with it. Once the game is re-released in its final form I'll be faced with a pile of downtime fumbling around with the bindings on an "I wonder what this big red does" basis till I get resorted. Grumble over.
- I don't like the vertical blue lines in the Analysis Mode. If we're going to have multiple cockpit modes I'd prefer a distinction by colour and line type (for the colourblind) eg short dashed, full, long dashed, dotted, thick, thinner, but with the same part circle brackets. The vertical lines obscure the central viewing area and just look and feel super clunky. And does the gunsighty thing have to be so thick?
- It told me the Codex was not bound but I could get to it via panel 4 so that was fine. It looks like it will be useful and fun when I get back to exploration but of course there was nothing in it apart from a few new planets I'd scanned. All the mission/activity log stuff looks good though my experience is to pick what I'm going to do, try to configure the ship choice, outfitting and controls for the task and get on with playing. So it looks to me like a "nice to have" so thanks, but I'll probably not use it much.
- I'm looking forward to trying the new ships. I'm not at all sure what the best choice for combat would be but maybe the Krait? We'll see.
- I've followed the mining debate via Obsidian Ant but I'm not interested in mining and there's no "Mining" ladder to climb so I won't be trying to blow up asteroids.
That's it for now. If anything else strikes me I'll post it.
Best wishes
Morley01
