Do we need Beyond 2.0?

[rootsrat]

With all due respect to FDEV and their hard work, the game is currently riddled with game-breaking and time-wasting bugs. I am not only talking about the new ones introduced with PP2.0 and further patches, but also about the ones that have been in the game forever, like inability to upgrade weapons and suits at your own FC's Pioneer store, broken material transfer between FC and ship, removed bounties not updating until a restart etc.

I personally wouldn't mind a little break in development, even if it means delaying the Colonisation even further, and FDEV doing Beyond 2.0 - a series of bigger patches focused strictly and solely on bug fixing and QOL. But this time - unlike with the Beyond - actually DO focus on bugfixing instead of new content. Keep releasing new ships, that's fine, but fix your game as well, before introducing an update of such significance, which 100% and inevitably will introduce even more bugs to the game.

To close off, I know full well FDEV are actually fixing bugs, they have (probably) less manpower available after the recent restructure and that new content is needed to keep the game alive, but there are SO MANY BUGS that have been left in the game since forever that it really is a high time for B2.0 IMO.

 

[Hanerib]

I want better FSS and more interior spaces. Not inside ships mind you. Inside space stations and installations. Oh and more taxis, a long range taxi would be nice. Very reasonable requests for a video game. How about comets maybe do something about them finally. And poke CQC a little dunno.
(edit: comets not asteroids)

 

[BDelacroix]

Where I work, we do both. We allocate some amount of backlog items (these are usually small non breaking bugs) along with a number of the requested changes.

 

[Knuttin Atoll]

I think what they should look at first is their internal processes. They also appear to keep making the same mistakes, there don't appear to be any lessons learned.

The amount of regression issues, apparent bugs completely unrelated to each other (ships can't jump system because of a cosmetic item, etc.) and most annoyingly bugs that could've been caught by play-testing for 5 minutes suggest that there are some fundamental issues around their development process, from design to roll-out.

And this isn't a recent problem, it's been systemic ever since I followed the game. I don't know if their other IP has similar issues i.e. whether it's specific to Elite or not.

I'm always surprised how forgiving the player base is - probably down to how unique Elite is with few if any direct competitors. Otherwise players would've migrated elsewhere already (I mean, I'm still here also).

On the other hand, if particularly Arx-money ("happy to support Frontier by paying for overpriced, below-quality cosmetics")* continues to roll in despite the technical issues plaguing the game, why would Frontier ever change their ways. What I would expect them to do is realise the abysmal state right now, summon all hands on deck (which would be interesting to know how many hands there really are left, that could also be the issue) and get cracking for a few weeks, not months. I don't think it's that kind of workplace though, for better (i.e. employees) or worse (i.e. us).

Don't think they can afford to park development of new content too much, they would lose the newly gained momentum of attracting new and returning players again, and the vast majority of the latest gameplay loops (Odyssey) are already almost 5 years old, the rest even older.

*edited to clarify what I meant primarily after Ian's comment below

 

[Hanerib]

Oh and make hull tanks better and add black hole accretion disks

 

[Pville_Piper]

I agree with the bug fixes, but don't delay the new content, just get more aggressive with the bug fixes.

Here's my QOL request, how about a return to current system view button. I would also like multiple filters in the galaxy map, of maybe, hover / right click on a system get visited status, powers, state, population and economy... It's clunky and slow to get all that information now.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

"Beyond" wasn't all that much about bug-fixes, though - it had major rewrites of engineering, mining, exploration, punishment and the BGS, as well as new Guardian content and (eventually) Fleet Carriers. Certainly there were plenty of bugs fixed too in that time (and one of the eight major releases did have a heavier bug-fix focus) - but other major bugs like the megaship hold bug were introduced during Beyond and persisted until the early Odyssey patches.

On the other hand, if money continues to roll in despite the technical issues plaguing the game

Well, a very substantial fraction of the money comes from new purchases, and most of the long-standing bugs aren't necessarily all that important there. They're mostly things which only start being a really big deal once you've played the game a lot.

Looking (as a rough proxy for importance to players) at the ten highest voted bugs which are still open and have been since before Update 19:

1. Flickering Shadows (63484). It's not pretty and it's a bit jarring but anyone new buying a ten-year old game in the first place probably isn't in it for graphical perfection.
2. VR Orbit Lines bug (66591). Really annoying if it affects you, most players never know it's there.
3. Broken Stellar Lighting (45769). Again, it'd look nicer if it was fixed but it's mostly a problem for people who played the game before it was introduced and can actually remember it looking nicer.
4. Anarchy BGS Balancing (52932). It'd be really difficult to explain to a beginner what this bug is, even less why they should care about it.
5. Elite NPC SLF pilots lose all skill (62586). Very bad, but obviously given how long they take to train it's going to be a while before a beginner hits it.
6. Epic/CAPI integration issues (21258). Again, tough to explain to a beginner what this bug is, most players likely aren't affected at all, and the CAPI itself has been less important since more things got put into the Journal directly.
7. AX Conflict Zones issue (58430). Affects many-player instances at busy starports. Won't be fun at Sol shortly, but probably only the second or third biggest problem for a beginner going to an AXCZ in Open even after Frontier have reduced the unlock requirements on AX builds.
8. Cargo scooping issues (67049). Now this one is certainly something a beginner might notice quite early and pretty frustrating too. But I think it's the only one on the list and it's arguably only become "beginner-noticeable" with Update 19 making S&R more mainstream.
9. CQC matchmaking issues (55380). Has been a serious problem a lot longer than that report ... but in a part of the game hardly anyone uses anyway.
10. Carrier storage issues (50569). Not many beginners owning carriers, obviously.

 

[aRJay]

While many of the recent and longer term bugs have little impact on how I play and I am as fond of new stuff as any one I support the idea of them having a bug purge.

Obviously they won’t get them all and will get abuse from the new content now crowd but an annual spring clean might work well for both FDev and us.

 

[Factabulous]

If ppl are really bothered by bugs they should be demanding fdev do fewer updates - as they mostly add the bugs when they do updates. Mostly ...

Instead the forums are full of people essentially demanding they add more bugs

 

[Knuttin Atoll]

"Beyond" wasn't all that much about bug-fixes, though - it had major rewrites of engineering, mining, exploration, punishment and the BGS, as well as new Guardian content and (eventually) Fleet Carriers. Certainly there were plenty of bugs fixed too in that time (and one of the eight major releases did have a heavier bug-fix focus) - but other major bugs like the megaship hold bug were introduced during Beyond and persisted until the early Odyssey patches.

Yes it's true, wasn't it the run up before the Beyond season that was reserved for bugfixing? Still wonder if that was a genuine "we're listening to you" moment or whether they were delayed with Beyond and needed an excuse.

Well, a very substantial fraction of the money comes from new purchases, and most of the long-standing bugs aren't necessarily all that important there. They're mostly things which only start being a really big deal once you've played the game a lot.

I've just edited my post, you're absolutely right but I had more the players in mind that throw money at Frontier via the cosmetics (and now ships) store, because they believe it'll keep them above water, and sends the wrong signal imo. When I saw the post about the borked Mandalay Midnight Black decal issues.... that's precisely what I'm talking about. Those things are so obvious they really shouldn't make it into the live game. Unless they don't use computer screens at Frontier.

Looking (as a rough proxy for importance to players) at the ten highest voted bugs which are still open and have been since before Update 19:

1. Flickering Shadows (63484). It's not pretty and it's a bit jarring but anyone new buying a ten-year old game in the first place probably isn't in it for graphical perfection.
2. VR Orbit Lines bug (66591). Really annoying if it affects you, most players never know it's there.
3. Broken Stellar Lighting (45769). Again, it'd look nicer if it was fixed but it's mostly a problem for people who played the game before it was introduced and can actually remember it looking nicer.
4. Anarchy BGS Balancing (52932). It'd be really difficult to explain to a beginner what this bug is, even less why they should care about it.
5. Elite NPC SLF pilots lose all skill (62586). Very bad, but obviously given how long they take to train it's going to be a while before a beginner hits it.
6. Epic/CAPI integration issues (21258). Again, tough to explain to a beginner what this bug is, most players likely aren't affected at all, and the CAPI itself has been less important since more things got put into the Journal directly.
7. AX Conflict Zones issue (58430). Affects many-player instances at busy starports. Won't be fun at Sol shortly, but probably only the second or third biggest problem for a beginner going to an AXCZ in Open even after Frontier have reduced the unlock requirements on AX builds.
8. Cargo scooping issues (67049). Now this one is certainly something a beginner might notice quite early and pretty frustrating too. But I think it's the only one on the list and it's arguably only become "beginner-noticeable" with Update 19 making S&R more mainstream.
9. CQC matchmaking issues (55380). Has been a serious problem a lot longer than that report ... but in a part of the game hardly anyone uses anyway.
10. Carrier storage issues (50569). Not many beginners owning carriers, obviously.

I don't really place a lot of value at player-ranked bug lists - which are easily manipulated if player groups focus on one or the other (which may have happened in the past, not sure), and skewed also by lack of participation (after the initial rollout of the issue tracker I swore never to even click on the link again, for reasons most of us should be aware of by now).

I'd really like for Frontier to publish a list of bugs that they will - with confidence - be able to fix 1) as a matter of priority and 2) within which timeframe. I'm sure they have this already internally but don't want to share it. Their perogative but more transparency wouldn't go amiss. Other devs manage this just fine, and if you treat your players as adults (by explaining why A or B isn't possible at all, or any time soon - ideally providing some high level detail such as tech limitations etc.) most would be on-board.

 

[Disemboweled Ego]

Looking (as a rough proxy for importance to players) at the ten highest voted bugs which are still open and have been since before Update 19:

I wish we could create a metrics based version of this that lists feature requests instead with things like "Super cruise assist toggle keybind" and "Filtering out those damn carriers except for my/bookmarked carriers in the left hand nav panel."

 

[rootsrat]

@rootsrat,
thanks for this nicely written roundup of the current situation. i think its anglosaxion behaviour to be polite all the times ("thanks for the hard work"....) even when the outcome is somewhat suboptimal. unfortunately i do not have this talent, maybe cultural think in the society i grew up. but i fully agree, frontier should step back in further developing this game and should concentrate on getting the current state stabilized. i really love this game and do not really play other things, but lately i get more and more frustrated and think of stopping to play this game for a while and concentrate on other stuff. its really a little sad how this game degrades.

(I'm Polish tho But I still think politeness goes a long way. And having met and talked to more than a few developers and other team members over the course of the last 10 years, I'm genuinely convinced FDEV puts a lot of hard work and passion into their game on every level.)

"Beyond" wasn't all that much about bug-fixes, though - it had major rewrites of engineering, mining, exploration, punishment and the BGS, as well as new Guardian content and (eventually) Fleet Carriers. Certainly there were plenty of bugs fixed too in that time (and one of the eight major releases did have a heavier bug-fix focus) - but other major bugs like the megaship hold bug were introduced during Beyond and persisted until the early Odyssey patches.

It was advertised as a free update focused on bug fixes and QOL improvements though. The reality was somewhat different IIRC, when it comes to bug fixing specifically.

 

[metatheurgist]

If ppl are really bothered by bugs they should be demanding fdev do fewer updates - as they mostly add the bugs when they do updates. Mostly ...

Instead the forums are full of people essentially demanding they add more bugs

They have so many bugs I'm fairly sure they have a Queen Alien nesting in the Hamster racks. I have no idea what kind of dev practices they are using over there. Nobody expects perfect code but man, they're cooking something special at Frontier.

 

[galahad2069]

"Beyond" wasn't all that much about bug-fixes, though - it had major rewrites of engineering, mining, exploration, punishment and the BGS, as well as new Guardian content and (eventually) Fleet Carriers. Certainly there were plenty of bugs fixed too in that time (and one of the eight major releases did have a heavier bug-fix focus) - but other major bugs like the megaship hold bug were introduced during Beyond and persisted until the early Odyssey patches.


Well, a very substantial fraction of the money comes from new purchases, and most of the long-standing bugs aren't necessarily all that important there. They're mostly things which only start being a really big deal once you've played the game a lot.

Looking (as a rough proxy for importance to players) at the ten highest voted bugs which are still open and have been since before Update 19:

1. Flickering Shadows (63484). It's not pretty and it's a bit jarring but anyone new buying a ten-year old game in the first place probably isn't in it for graphical perfection.
2. VR Orbit Lines bug (66591). Really annoying if it affects you, most players never know it's there.
3. Broken Stellar Lighting (45769). Again, it'd look nicer if it was fixed but it's mostly a problem for people who played the game before it was introduced and can actually remember it looking nicer.
4. Anarchy BGS Balancing (52932). It'd be really difficult to explain to a beginner what this bug is, even less why they should care about it.
5. Elite NPC SLF pilots lose all skill (62586). Very bad, but obviously given how long they take to train it's going to be a while before a beginner hits it.
6. Epic/CAPI integration issues (21258). Again, tough to explain to a beginner what this bug is, most players likely aren't affected at all, and the CAPI itself has been less important since more things got put into the Journal directly.
7. AX Conflict Zones issue (58430). Affects many-player instances at busy starports. Won't be fun at Sol shortly, but probably only the second or third biggest problem for a beginner going to an AXCZ in Open even after Frontier have reduced the unlock requirements on AX builds.
8. Cargo scooping issues (67049). Now this one is certainly something a beginner might notice quite early and pretty frustrating too. But I think it's the only one on the list and it's arguably only become "beginner-noticeable" with Update 19 making S&R more mainstream.
9. CQC matchmaking issues (55380). Has been a serious problem a lot longer than that report ... but in a part of the game hardly anyone uses anyway.
10. Carrier storage issues (50569). Not many beginners owning carriers, obviously.

Just for the record, let's not forget one of the oldest bugs, the infamous target orientation triangle (idk its actual name) that the game can randomly forget to render.

It was already a thing when I started to play in Nov 2016 and apparently 8 years was not enough for fdev to fix it.

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

I still think politeness goes a long way

Sadly that's a virtue that is getting lost more and more, in real life as well (we live in an age of Karens) and much more so on the anonymous internet. My impression is that Frontier's current developer generation is chasing the bugs they inherited, and they're losing the race between adding new stuff and maintaining old stuff. So maybe putting the brakes on new stuff might be sensible.

But then they draw the typical gamer rage on them, being called out as lazy and getting pelted with demands where the new stuff is in that dead game. It's something they can't really win.

 

[Commander Biscuit]

Agree. There's a new bug with FCs introduced yesterday, where cargo becomes greyed out and cannot be moved off the carrier. Another one today which is broken powerplay filters, displaying every system as unoccupied, requiring a restart. It's hard to do much right now without experiencing a bug, which isn't a good look considering the new or returning players weighing up spending more time or money on Elite. It's been a month, and we're collecting new bugs faster than they're being fixed.

I know asset or sound designers don't fix these things, but FD needs to allocate more guys to put out fires if they haven't already. People aren't 100% rational at times like this, and will be resentful about FD enthusiastically advertising new ships to buy, and fixing exploits, but dragging their heels on serious bugs, or failing to mention them completely.

 

[Elpapo]

It was already a thing when I started to play in Nov 2016 and apparently 8 years was not enough for fdev to fix it.

This bug is since relase of game. After 10 years, I take it as "feature" at that point.

 

[Pville_Piper]

I do agree that bug fixes need to be more aggressive, but, for the most part, I just sluff them off.

Like last night, I did my powerplay assignments and it took me 10 mega ships to get 8 scans as 2 completed but yielded neither ships logs nor merits.

The worst part is I've never done that before so I wasted time trying to figure out if I needed to scan more data points or maybe had to be within a certain range of one of my fortified and or stronghold systems... No, I ended up finding 2 megaships in one system, one scanned fine and the other didn't.

 

[the100thmonkey]

wasted time trying to figure out if I needed to scan more data points or maybe had to be within a certain range of one of my fortified and or stronghold systems... No, I ended up finding 2 megaships in one system, one scanned fine and the other didn't.

I wouldn't characterise this as a waste of time - you learned how the system works (admittedly, when it works.)

 

[Pville_Piper]

I wouldn't characterise this as a waste of time - you learned how the system works (admittedly, when it works.)

True... But no need to learn more about this if it worked as intended, key phrase "admittedly, when it works"...