Do not make the game too cheap.

[Guest 161958]

I publish this post in the hopes that cmdrs who are requesting many features to speed up progress in game or godlike features in mechanics/game assets will reflect on what they are asking for.


Elite Dangerous is a unique experience in gaming. Both in bad ways and good ways.

We all have different tastes regarding games. People who want it more arcadey, people who want it more punishing, people who want it more realistic.

And yet players keep returning to it even after complaining it is not what they want, even after a break. Whoever has started playing this game must have noticed that the hours he has in steam for ED surpass other games's.
That is because the original Elite had this accomplishment mechanic built in it. You play to become the Elite. Not only by name, but forged by experience.

Be careful what you ask. Do not cheapen the experience. Don't make Elite a mcdonald lunch please.

 

[Cmdr Andrew Johnson]

Totally agree

 

[Dean Demon]

A developer should always be the only one that decides what their game should be, when that changes i'll give up gaming for good.

 

[fruitbat]

2016 is calling for its thread back, this one seems to have gotten misplaced.

This ship has sailed, docked, the hull rotted out and sunk.

 

[JesusRocks1988]

There's a lot of sentences in the OP, but nothing actually being said... why did this need to be in the beta forum?

 

[Guest 161958]

There's a lot of sentences in the OP, but nothing actually being said... why did this need to be in the beta forum?

So, for you, I actually did not say anything.

I posted it in the beta forum because it is in this forum I saw the most make it easier requests.

 

[JesusRocks1988]

So, for you, I actually did not say anything.

I posted it in the beta forum because it is in this forum I saw the most make it easier requests.

Not really, no. Need to be more specific - what is cheapening the game for you, or what suggestions are you seeing from the playerbase that are at risk of cheapening the game? What are the areas you wish FD to pull back on or focus more on? How do you envisage those changes?

The beta forum is somewhere for FD to look and gather feedback about the beta, so in order to make use of your suggestions, they will need specifics. Most of what you've said in your OP is heavily open to interpretation, so likening the game's potential direction to a "McDonald's lunch" will mean something different to you as it does to the developers.

I could say I agree with you that the game's experience shouldn't be cheapened, but are you sure that means the same thing to me as it does to you?

 

[Guest 161958]

I do not want to write a wall of text to address ALL the cheap changes that have been requested. They are on the forum.

I am just inviting people who are posting feedback in here to not be compulsive and stop asking for buffs and shortcuts.

 

[Feculator]

Meaningless busywork and pointless timesinks do not add value to a game, they just pad it out. Ideally it shouldn't just be removed of course, but also replaced with interesting stuff.

Padding also has the interesting effect that people who did spend time with it, want to be able to justify that time spent, to themselves and others, which kind of taints their objectivity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choice-supportive_bias

Like others have said though, it's better to talk about specifics.
For instance, I think the rareness of destructable asteroids is needless and done solely to keep us logged in longer i.e. pad the game out. I want them to be common, and yields to be balanced from there, so I can do the fun thing instead of the boring thing. I imagine OP would argue that the artificial scarcity is what makes asteroid explosions "special", (and the riches from mining "earned").
At the same time, I see a lot of people requesting the pulse wave scanner to basically instantly find painite rocks. In that regard I don't agree, finding valuable minerals should involve searching. HOWEVER, searching itself should be fun also (it currently isn't, and many requests are about that, rather than its effectiveness)

 

[Kenneth McGrew]

I publish this post in the hopes that cmdrs who are requesting many features to speed up progress in game or godlike features in mechanics/game assets will reflect on what they are asking for.


Elite Dangerous is a unique experience in gaming. Both in bad ways and good ways.

We all have different tastes regarding games. People who want it more arcadey, people who want it more punishing, people who want it more realistic.

And yet players keep returning to it even after complaining it is not what they want, even after a break. Whoever has started playing this game must have noticed that the hours he has in steam for ED surpass other games's.
That is because the original Elite had this accomplishment mechanic built in it. You play to become the Elite. Not only by name, but forged by experience.

Be careful what you ask. Do not cheapen the experience. Don't make Elite a mcdonald lunch please.

i understood this?

Sooo Dougals lost the ball where?

what are you feeding back on, whats useful, what should change, what bug have you encountered? or are we just looking for Dougals red ball?

 

[Guest 161958]

i understood this?



Sooo Dougals lost the ball where?

what are you feeding back on, whats useful, what should change, what bug have you encountered? or are we just looking for Dougals red ball?

I think you all understood very well what kind of propositions leading to power creep I am talking about.

But please help me getting more specific on the matter so that we can all benefit from reflecting on it.

 

[Muetdhiver]

I think you all understood very well what kind of propositions leading to power creep I am talking about.

But please help me getting more specific on the matter so that we can all benefit from reflecting on it.

TBH, no idea what you are referring to.

If you have relevant feedback for the devs, by all means explain and lay down your arguments.

 

[Sunyavadin]

Not really, no. Need to be more specific - what is cheapening the game for you, or what suggestions are you seeing from the playerbase that are at risk of cheapening the game? What are the areas you wish FD to pull back on or focus more on? How do you envisage those changes?

The beta forum is somewhere for FD to look and gather feedback about the beta, so in order to make use of your suggestions, they will need specifics. Most of what you've said in your OP is heavily open to interpretation, so likening the game's potential direction to a "McDonald's lunch" will mean something different to you as it does to the developers.

I could say I agree with you that the game's experience shouldn't be cheapened, but are you sure that means the same thing to me as it does to you?

Absolutely.

Meaningless busywork and pointless timesinks do not add value to a game, they just pad it out. Ideally it shouldn't just be removed of course, but also replaced with interesting stuff.

And it's quite the balancing act too, since one player's "easy mode" is another player's pointless busywork, and vice versa. Just look at arguments from all sides over the FSS with some complaining it "cheapens" discovery, by making it too easy, while others have an issue with it adding too much time to how they play.

Padding also has the interesting effect that people who did spend time with it, want to be able to justify that time spent, to themselves and others, which kind of taints their objectivity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choice-supportive_bias

Like others have said though, it's better to talk about specifics.
For instance, I think the rareness of destructable asteroids is needless and done solely to keep us logged in longer i.e. pad the game out. I want them to be common, and yields to be balanced from there, so I can do the fun thing instead of the boring thing. I imagine OP would argue that the artificial scarcity is what makes asteroid explosions "special", (and the riches from mining "earned").
At the same time, I see a lot of people requesting the pulse wave scanner to basically instantly find painite rocks. In that regard I don't agree, finding valuable minerals should involve searching. HOWEVER, searching itself should be fun also (it currently isn't, and many requests are about that, rather than its effectiveness)

Bold text for emphasis.

 

[Valorin]

I publish this post in the hopes that cmdrs who are requesting many features to speed up progress in game or godlike features in mechanics/game assets will reflect on what they are asking for.


Elite Dangerous is a unique experience in gaming. Both in bad ways and good ways.

We all have different tastes regarding games. People who want it more arcadey, people who want it more punishing, people who want it more realistic.

And yet players keep returning to it even after complaining it is not what they want, even after a break. Whoever has started playing this game must have noticed that the hours he has in steam for ED surpass other games's.
That is because the original Elite had this accomplishment mechanic built in it. You play to become the Elite. Not only by name, but forged by experience.

Be careful what you ask. Do not cheapen the experience. Don't make Elite a mcdonald lunch please.

Yeah. Elite is special in many ways. Quite different from most games nowadays. The realism and control is why I keep playing and why there is no substitute for me. The Galaxy simulation, the many keybinds that give us so much control about our ship. I love it to bits and it kinda stings a bit everytime a bit of these things is compromised because gamers nowadays demand their toys to be simple and arcade and rather flashy than realistic.

 

[Gun Star]

I really wish people would stop asking for in system jumps and jump gates.

I dont think they realize that mission payouts are tied to distance from entry point.

 

[ShadowWolf Kell]

OP is warning other CMDRs to be careful what they wish for, you see a lot of posts in the forums of players just wanting easy mode. Crap like in-system jumps, every ship to have no restricted slots so they're all basically the same, they want things like passive income, they want more arcade like mechanics that will just dilute the experience, all that nonsense. I even seen a request for a firing range yesterday, so we could figure out the damage of our weapons on different ship configurations down to the decimal place without even leaving the hangar[haha].

The reason people keep coming back to Elite is because it takes a lot of devotion to achieve everything you want to achieve, if everything was dumbed down and made easier then people would be done with the game in a couple hundred hours. That's the concern of the original post, and it's a rightful concern.

That happened a long time ago. You can reach Elite for everything but CQC in a week now days if you really dedicate yourself to it. The only real progression in the game is doing stuff that actually catches the attention of Frontier themselves and being immortalized in the game.

 

[CMDR Cosmic Spacehead]

I really wish people would stop asking for in system jumps and jump gates.

I dont think they realize that mission payouts are tied to distance from entry point.

I made a suggestion that compensates for the 'entry point to destination payout' with significantly increased risk of death or piracy.



No one liked it.

 

[Patrick_68000]

Yes the spirit of the Elite series, must be respected.

 

[Sunyavadin]

Yeah. Elite is special in many ways. Quite different from most games nowadays. The realism and control is why I keep playing and why there is no substitute for me. The Galaxy simulation, the many keybinds that give us so much control about our ship. I love it to bits and it kinda stings a bit everytime a bit of these things is compromised because gamers nowadays demand their toys to be simple and arcade and rather flashy than realistic.

Indeed, and I for one really hope they take the criticism of the FSS on board and integrate it into the shipboard UI as a transparent cockpit overlay, because nothing breaks that immersion like having to leave the game to play a 2D arcadey-style minigame.

 

[Valorin]

Indeed, and I for one really hope they take the criticism of the FSS on board and integrate it into the shipboard UI as a transparent cockpit overlay, because nothing breaks that immersion like having to leave the game to play a 2D arcadey-style minigame.

In makes sense though. It's nothing but a VR device interpreting the scanner's data. Also why we can look around 360° and our ship is nowhere to be seen. Virtual Reality... so futuristic!