Did Elite ever teach you anything?

Rafe Zetter

Banned
Rafe Zetter
Might be an odd question, but elite was a game that demanded you acquire certain skills, so here's a couple of mine I'll throw out here for starters:

Elite was the game that taught me to buy low, sell high and pack it in to burstin, even if the last few items bring only a few creds - it's all profit :) - put me in good stead for almost every spacesim after, and a few RL applications too.

Elite was the game that taught me the 5 P's long before I started work

Perfect Preparation Prevents (optional P..s) Poor Performance

Or

Write it all down, and make accurate notes.
 

deMangler

deMangler
Difficult to be sure, but I think Elite taught me really good 3d visualisation and situational awareness skills.
I think this has helped in other areas of my life for instance in coding and design. The skills are complementary.
Possibly it also taught me how to stay awake for 36 hours without realizing it.... :)
 
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JazzyTech

JazzyTech
Oh, I learned a few things...

Like you the "5 Ps" as you stated, and additionally to manage my time more wisely.. "Do what must be done before doing what you want to." (playing Frontier all night) :)
 

Johnson

J
Elite made me know all of Sol planets and moons by heart and even their Earth'sG's for most of the bodies.
Plus I know the distance in lightyears for some nearby stars like Sirius, Alpha centauri, Tau ceti and bernardstar.

Not that it did me much good. But when astrology comes up in a discussion people are like: "How do you know that stuff!?"
 

Zorbulev

Z
playing elite when I was 8 did teach some important lessons.. profit and loss and some you win and some you lose...oh and everyone in the universe is out to get you :)
 

Darren Grey

Darren Grey
I think you mean Astronomy, not Astrology :p

Frontier taught me that the galaxy is ****ing huge. And I mean really ****ing huge. Not just big huge, but proper "oh man I can never explore all this stuff even with invented technology" huge.

Frontier also got me into classical music and taught me that procedural techniques in game design can be immensely powerful.
 

Mobius

Mobius
1984 Elite taught me that games were not just a minor distraction but had the potential to destroy my entire social life.
 

sharpshifter

sharpshifter
Yeah I'd say making notes/lists and creating optimal routes is top of my chart, taking into account fuel/cargo/risk for maximum credits per hour definitely taught me some skills I still use now.

And at the same time it quenched my thirst for astronomy as I couldn't afford a worthwhile telescope back then. Mainly stardreaming and watching the orbital paths from different planets in Sol blew my little 11-year-old brain.
 

Memnoch

M
Elite and Frontier taught me that space exploration would be fun and dangerous, to buy low and sell high, that our galaxy is a huge place and aliens are not always hostile.
 

Sav112

Sav112
I was not a big reader in fact it took me into my twenties to fully read a book. Elite did teach me one thing and that was in a kids world Imagination was king! It also opened me and my friends eye’s to what when done well and thinking out the box a Computer game can mean to you. Outside the four wall of the room was space in our minds.

I still daydream today! Oh dear I got a warm fuzzy feeling thinking back either that our it’s the Pizza I’ve just eaten :D


I must be great creating something that ment so much to many!
 
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bassman

B
Elite inspired me to learn about the mathematics behind 3D graphics, I intended to write a 3D game of my own one day but never got closer than writing some C routines on my atari st to display wireframe objects.
 

ak-73

A
Yes, it did. On E2 I once physically locked the up key in place while being on the star map. I did for hours on end let star system after star sytem pass by. I did not know long it took but eventually I left the borders of the milky way on the galactic map (and of course the star kept going by but that's a different issue).

Still, it gave me an impression of how small our own solar system is and how small we truly are. That was quite a philosophical experience for me... being shown dimensions. The only time I ever had such a philosophical experience in a video game.


Alex
 
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