Critics about ED development

[GIBSONJR]

These have been the best 50€ I spent the last 30 years, hands down.
I put in way more hours than in games I have for several years.
Let alone the feeling playing Elite with absolutely awesome and stunning graphics.
I cheer Frontier for the decision to come up with a new version of Elite - finally.
You can explore, trade, fight or just enjoy a whole Galaxy - if that is not enough for you I wonder what game you like.
I don´t like the idea of DLCs in general but I hope they will be priced way lower than the game and I see big things for ED in the future. I am speaking of the next 2-3 years at least.
I prefer a whole sandbox of a game over a very small and guided path through an ego shooter any day.
I expect 100s of hours playtime (which I still have I guess) out of ED.

Peace,
Robin

 

[nexxo]

Dear Frontier company,

i had buyed ED for 50.- Euros, to expensive for an downloadversion and i am a little bit disappointed. The reasons are: ED is like 50% percent finished. Only orbital docking stations.
Landing on the planets not possible like earlier Elite times. Why not? No dockingstations on the planet? But, you want buyable DLC in the soon to be able to landing on
planets! Or to walk in station with extra buyable DLC an thats cheek! The choice of spaceships in ED are very very low! But you sell on your webshop with different
paintbrushes for the ships with 10 Pounds extra! And thats very disgusting!!! Its would better these different ship are available on the station in the game with credits! What i had earned in the game!!!
You get so much millions from the backers and you screwing the customers and thats not good!!

Fret not. There's another space trading/combat game, and it is layered, complex, has tons of features and a vibrant online community. It's called Eve Online. Best thing is, it's only €10,--.
Per month.

 

[Fia]

You seem to be looking at the current game as the final product. It has been officially launched but like other online games (MWO in my personal experience, launched months ago and only introducing a major pillar of the game in a beta version now) launch does not mean complete. The core game is in place and seems to work great which is the main thing. Now FD can concentrate on fixing and improving aspects of the game and then continue to release more content. You have not been screwed you just need to be patient.

 

[Koen]

TBH the devs said right from the beginning that this would be the case at launch, so they haven't lied in that regard. A question that should be answered though is will the DLC be paid for or not? I honestly hope that it comes out as an update but I don't think they gave out those details yet

Yes, these details are out: you will have to pay for the planetary landings and walking in 1st person extensions (if you didn't already: some of us already paid for it).

 

[BLACKHOUND]

I'm having great fun in the game, well worth the £35 I paid for it. I can't wait for the DLC and I will happily pay money for it (unless it is outrageously expensive). I have already bouht paint jobs in the store for real world money as I am happy to support FD by giving them my cash so I can have that Union Flag Viper!!

This game has a very broad foundation, and whilst they are't actually all that deep in some places I trust that FD will do a good job in fleshing it out more with the updates.

FD have been quite open and honest about everything, much more so than other games I can think of (pity me I pre-ordered X-).

All in all I am happy with FD and their work so far, but they will never be able to please everybody, especially those with unrealistic expectations.

I agree with this post. (well I don't want a union flag but I don't mind he gets his )

Cheers,

 

[LaPalma75]

For the next update please: Do the game translate complete in german! 50 percent german and 50 percent english thats not professional! You want have 49 Euro? No problem but do the work final!
And external views are missing too! I mean these are standart. And the freelook mode in a cockpit.
I think the future will be: To playing computer will be luxus. The most groupies of you have no problem to pay 1000 Euros for DLCs. Are you a millionare? Congratulations.

 

[Phrygian]

I paid £35 for Shadow of Mordor. I did everything the game had to offer in 28 hours, the combat was a basic, and over simplified, derivative of Batman, the Nemesis mechanic was really actually paper thin and incredibly shallow, and the final boss fight was a quicktime event.

I demand my money back.

 

[Korenwolf]

Dear Frontier company,

i had buyed ED for 50.- Euros, to expensive for an downloadversion

Let's just take this point.

The price was slightly cheaper than the price for the latest warcrack expansion (download option), has far less bugs (have you see the number of patches since launch for WoD?), a far smoother launch and no monthly fee.

I'm also spending far more time in Elite at the moment than have in Warcrack for the past six months +

 

[LaPalma75]

At first and please do not missunderstood me: I dont want make ED bad, the grafikengine is fantastic, the sound and the atmosphere are fantastic and the animations are fantistic too.
But: ED has no docking station on a planet and landing on a planet are no possible? Thats standard for ELITE!! Why you groupies dont understand it? 20 years ago, ELITE2 has it on a
600 kilobyte disk and ED with 60 gigabyte has it not? Elite 2 has 100% freedom and ED only 50%! And David Braben want to in future with a DLC to pay for? Thats cheek! And the translation
for german mode are not complete! 50% german and 50% english?? Please make the work complete if you want 50.-! I have no problem but not so! And: What about the external view??
As DLC to pay for soon? Or cockpit view??? Thats not okey!

 

[CmdrSimonsen]

At first and please do not missunderstood me: I dont want make ED bad, the grafikengine is fantastic, the sound and the atmosphere are fantastic and the animations are fantistic too.
But: ED has no docking station on a planet and landing on a planet are no possible? Thats standard for ELITE!! Why you groupies dont understand it? 20 years ago, ELITE2 has it on a
600 kilobyte disk and ED with 60 gigabyte has it not? Elite 2 has 100% freedom and ED only 50%! And David Braben want to in future with a DLC to pay for? Thats cheek! And the translation
for german mode are not complete! 50% german and 50% english?? Please make the work complete if you want 50.-! I have no problem but not so! And: What about the external view??
As DLC to pay for soon? Or cockpit view??? Thats not okey!

Well, as others have said, planetary landings was never planned for initial release. It was planned as a DLC.
External view disucssion can be found multiple places in the forums, and while there are arguments for and against, the decision was that it wasnt put in.

None of the above have been hidden away, and you sir could have found out rather easily before spending your money.
I understand that you didnt investigate, and that you dont think it's okay. I agree, I dont think it's okay that you didnt investigate before hand.

And again, ED will evolve, some stuff will be part of the core game, some will be DLC.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Dear Frontier company,

i had buyed ED for 50.- Euros, to expensive for an downloadversion and i am a little bit disappointed. The reasons are: ED is like 50% percent finished. Only orbital docking stations.
Landing on the planets not possible like earlier Elite times. Why not? No dockingstations on the planet? But, you want buyable DLC in the soon to be able to landing on
planets! Or to walk in station with extra buyable DLC an thats cheek! The choice of spaceships in ED are very very low! But you sell on your webshop with different
paintbrushes for the ships with 10 Pounds extra! And thats very disgusting!!! Its would better these different ship are available on the station in the game with credits! What i had earned in the game!!!
You get so much millions from the backers and you screwing the customers and thats not good!!

I heard David Braben sleeps in a bed of gold and has a swimming pool filled with money that he stole from all the backers.

Or perhaps you could tone down the rhetoric by about 1000%. Cheers.

 

[Jeroll3d]

Well, as others have said, planetary landings was never planned for initial release. It was planned as a DLC.
External view disucssion can be found multiple places in the forums, and while there are arguments for and against, the decision was that it wasnt put in.

None of the above have been hidden away, and you sir could have found out rather easily before spending your money.
I understand that you didnt investigate, and that you dont think it's okay. I agree, I dont think it's okay that you didnt investigate before hand.

And again, ED will evolve, some stuff will be part of the core game, some will be DLC.

DLC? In future, yes. For now, updates, improvments, i belive.

 

[Molith]

Dear LaPalma75,

I honestly don't know where to start here.

At first and please do not missunderstood me: I dont want make ED bad, the grafikengine is fantastic, the sound and the atmosphere are fantastic and the animations are fantistic too.
But: ED has no docking station on a planet and landing on a planet are no possible? Thats standard for ELITE!!

You are wrong. planetary landings are in no way any standard for ELITE! The original version had no such landings in any way.

Why you groupies dont understand it? 20 years ago, ELITE2 has it on a
600 kilobyte disk and ED with 60 gigabyte has it not? Elite 2 has 100% freedom and ED only 50%!

You define freedom in ED by the platforms you can land on? I think you miss the real freedom of ED here. The possibility to land on a planet in the previous versions of Elite had no additional value to landing in a station.

And please note: Just repeating the same argument over and over doesn't make your arguments more correct.

And David Braben want to in future with a DLC to pay for? Thats cheek!

No, it would be, if the told us that planetary landings will be included and then they are only available via DLC. That was not the case. They always said that planetary landings will be some extension.

And the translation
for german mode are not complete! 50% german and 50% english?? Please make the work complete if you want 50.-! I have no problem but not so!

As for the translation: FD already said, that they are still working on the translation.

And: What about the external view??
As DLC to pay for soon? Or cockpit view??? Thats not okey!

FD is considering external views. Maybe you should try the search function of the forum.

What cockpit view? You mean the one that is already in game? Maybe you want to take a look at the controls page (it is called "head look")? Typically you can enable it with the middle mouse button.

 

[LaPalma75]

Dear Molith, you are very creative to make my posts in pretty parts! Would you repeat it please?

 

[DieScream]

LaPalma, do not bother engaging the FD Defense Force, they will defend the state of this shell of a game until they exhaust you. Your complaints are felt by many many people disappointed with this game, the hard-sell flyers (Newsletter) they email is just one sales pitch after another with nothing much about the game. The whole thing from the start appears to have been shady and all about profit for FD.

They sold 1/3 of a game, and want to charge DLC for the rest; it must make Electronic Arts feel proud. They refuse to honor refunds, so they will continue to hear the outrage.

 

[LaPalma75]

@Molith, Elite 2 was planned and Elite 3 was planned but Elite 4 was not planned? but planned for DLC to pay? I understand they smell the big businnes!

 

[LaPalma75]

thats business

 

[malicious1]

This game is more finished/polished than any AAA game I've encountered with in the last 4 years.

for a singleplayer id agree but the multiplayer is well under even a non AAA title

 

[MostlyClueless]

But: ED has no docking station on a planet and landing on a planet are no possible? Thats standard for ELITE!! Why you groupies dont understand it? 20 years ago, ELITE2 has it on a
600 kilobyte disk and ED with 60 gigabyte has it not?

Because implementing planetary landings in 2014 is a much, much more difficult task than it was in 1994, simply because of the level of detail that is expected. If you land on an inhabited planet you're going to expect to see not just realistic terrain (which can be procedurally generated fairly easily) but also realistic towns, cities, roads and other man-made structures. Even if they figure out how to procedurally generate those as well, an enormous amount of content will still have to be designed by hand (building styles, textures etc.), and a huge amount of work will be necessary to make sure that the cities on each planet are consistent both internally and with what would be expected to be seen on that planet based on its allegiance, economy, government type etc.

Go and look again at what planetary landings looked like in Frontier and FFE. Not a lot of detail there is there? Would you really be satisfied if you saw something similar in ED?

Don't get me wrong, I want to see them too, but it's going to take a lot of time. Time is money, so we shouldn't be surprised that they want to charge us more for it...

 

[Angine]

I heard David Braben sleeps in a bed of gold

If not, he's definitly buy one soon. That's the only reason for me to push the release of this empty shell before holidays.

This game is more finished/polished than any AAA game I've encountered with in the last 4 years.

Yes, it's more stable at release than many other games today, but polished and finished? Hhhmm.. no.
ED is only stable because there is no content to show many bugs. Nice try.