Elite Dangerous' End Goal

[sotik]

Now before I get bashed, this isn't a question about what I can do at the end of the game. I am one of those who understands what a sandbox game is, what I want to know is what is Frontier's end game plan here?

Now that again isn't me asking if they will add a "end game instance" but instead I am wondering is in 2-3-4-5 years from now, when Frontier says "Okay guys we are all done." What will the game look like?

This question comes from me watching ObsidianAnt on YouTube, who if you don't know who he is, is a guy who makes videos exploring Elite Dangerous and talking about game updates and the future of the game. Something he said stuck out to me about how Frontier plans on having multi crew ships and he went on talking about how it would be cool for players to EVA on planets and space stations. So as someone who will admit to not being here from the kick starter I have no idea what the goals of this game are.

 

[Asp Explorer]

There isn't an end to Elite.

Reaching triple Elite, owning all the ships, getting all the ranks, having more cash than you can throw a stick at, dangling system permits in front of homeless people - none of that matters. You play it for the experience. If you are bored then clear save and try getting to Elite in a stock Sidewinder, or become a PvP-Pro in a Hauler. Mind you - I'm pretty sure that something rather interesting is going to happen later on this year.

 

[Monk]

This is basically have for a long term look...NOTE: i posted this some time ago https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=221217&p=3373302&viewfull=1#post3373302


Not that it says much...but a rough roadmap (with no time or order) was provided way back on Newsletter #29

http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=dcbf6b86b4b0c7d1c21b73b1e&id=1824c0b05a

We do intend to release small, free updates after launch, but expansions that include significant new features and content will be charged for separately. For example, our current roadmap is to add (in no particular order):

• Landing/ driving / prospecting on airless rocky planets, moons & asteroids
• Walking around interiors and combative boarding of other ships
• Combat and other interactions with other players and AIs in the internal areas of star ports
• Accessing richly detailed planetary surfaces
• Availability of giant ‘executive control’ ships to players

Take that for what it is worth...though it isn't much.

 

[Legacy_LuckyLuke]

I would love to know how they intend to pull off planets with a variety of environments - such as oceans, ice floes, sand dunes, forests and so on.... How do they even figure all that out so it looks realistic. Here's hoping they add some 'basic' atmospheric planets in season two.

It would be awesome to fly over an ocean, across cliffs of ice and snow to find a small base tucked away somewhere.

I do agree though that it would be nice to have a better view of the road map, if only at a high level.

 

[Alex Brentnall]

http://elite-dangerous.wikia.com/wiki/Elite_Dangerous_FAQ

Lots of "We want to do" in the faq taken from the development forums at Kickstarter. I don't think it will ever be finished and I think it will be real life factors that determine when they say, ok it's time

I believe at the end they will give it a server life the same time since Elite has been released. Do a galaxy re-set and start the storyline off again with the same CG's, the same background story/Galnet articles etc all pre-triggered to go out on X dates. Then open the game to modding and say in X years time we will say how much we need to keep the servers running, until then fly safe
Between now and then I expect tons of development and probably 6+ years of updates.

 

[GluttonyFang]

*Proceeds to bash for asking for an explanation to the teleology of ED*

It's what we make it to be, sure devs give us toys and try to make us happy, but it's what we do with the sandbox.

 

[Faybs]

You need to remember that David Braben is a giant space nerd first and a game developer second. Once you do that, a lot of seemingly odd design decisions start making sense. Like for example why procedurally generated planets are actually evolved from first principles, simulating what geological forces would have done over billions of years instead of just having a bunch of base templates that get randomly deformed like other PG systems do. And why they did that before revamping the mission system.

 

[Marcus Tullius]

There isn't an end to Elite.

Reaching triple Elite, owning all the ships, getting all the ranks, having more cash than you can throw a stick at, dangling system permits in front of homeless people - none of that matters. You play it for the experience. If you are bored then clear save and try getting to Elite in a stock Sidewinder, or become a PvP-Pro in a Hauler. Mind you - I'm pretty sure that something rather interesting is going to happen later on this year.

...and this was a brilliant concept for single player game in 1984. I have no doubt about this, but you know it is 2016, we have the Internet, multiplayer games…

 

[xondk]

Now before I get bashed, this isn't a question about what I can do at the end of the game. I am one of those who understands what a sandbox game is, what I want to know is what is Frontier's end game plan here?

Now that again isn't me asking if they will add a "end game instance" but instead I am wondering is in 2-3-4-5 years from now, when Frontier says "Okay guys we are all done." What will the game look like?

This question comes from me watching ObsidianAnt on YouTube, who if you don't know who he is, is a guy who makes videos exploring Elite Dangerous and talking about game updates and the future of the game. Something he said stuck out to me about how Frontier plans on having multi crew ships and he went on talking about how it would be cool for players to EVA on planets and space stations. So as someone who will admit to not being here from the kick starter I have no idea what the goals of this game are.

"End game" is a term that is a big difficult when it comes to games like Elite.

If your goal is static then, you can get it and maybe find something new to do, such as Elite ranks.
But if your goal is fluid, then yeah it is a continual thing, such as background simulation and your player faction and similar.

Add that they will keep adding features, and with the graphic technology Elite is using I don't think it is really going to be able to look 'old', and it being an inhouse engine it can simply get upgraded along the way should it be missing some features.

So yeah, end game really depends on your own personal goals.

 

[Patrick_68000]

The ultimate goal of ED, is like the ultimate goal of the life, We do not know (the death here is not a goal)

 

[FiddenUK]

I would love to know how they intend to pull off planets with a variety of environments - such as oceans, ice floes, sand dunes, forests and so on.... How do they even figure all that out so it looks realistic. Here's hoping they add some 'basic' atmospheric planets in season two.

It would be awesome to fly over an ocean, across cliffs of ice and snow to find a small base tucked away somewhere.

Shoehorning elements of other procedural-generated game-engines with atmosphere into the Cobra engine!

Seriously though, it is an element that needs to be addressed sooner rather than later, or run the risk of being left behind by other offerings. I don't think you can say 'this will be the end game' of a game that is constantly evolving, but I'm sure Frontier do have a plan that they are following, even if we are not privy to that information.

 

[Raile]

The Ultimate Goal of ED is simple.
1. Make lots of money
2. Give David Braben a game to play when he needs a break from making Rollercoaster games

 

[NeilF]

It's what we make it to be, sure devs give us toys and try to make us happy, but it's what we do with the sandbox.

...but surely, more importantly, it's the tools and materials we have to use in the sandbox than define what we can achieve? If it's just sand, we can't really achieve much. Give us some water, spades and buckets, and can suddenly make the sandbox far more interesting.

We're basically at the sand stage at the moment in ED I'd suggest... The community can't really achieve much in the ED universe as most things you do have little or no consequence. ie: There's no cause and effect. Everything is too self contained and transitory. eg: As DB suggested at Kickstarter, I'd like to be able to find an area of rich deposits (eg: in an asteroid field), be able to mark it and then return to it to slowly "work it". I'd like to think if I blow up 1,000,000 ships in a RES zone, just maybe, it has even just the slightest effect outside that mini-game. etc... At the moment nothing feels connected with any depth or cause and effect.


So I agree, the community bsaically is responsible for what happens in the ED universe, but at the moment, this is highly limited to the simplistic mechanics within the game.

I would hope the ED end game involves loads of layered intelligent mechanics so you feel like you're a large connected universe instead of that you're simply hopping from mini-game to mini-game.

 

[CMDR Pugwash]

You need to remember that David Braben is a giant space nerd first and a game developer second. Once you do that, a lot of seemingly odd design decisions start making sense. Like for example why procedurally generated planets are actually evolved from first principles, simulating what geological forces would have done over billions of years instead of just having a bunch of base templates that get randomly deformed like other PG systems do. And why they did that before revamping the mission system.

and this is why I love Elite and will probably be playing it forever.

 

[Ian Skippy]

...and this was a brilliant concept for single player game in 1984. I have no doubt about this, but you know it is 2016, we have the Internet, multiplayer games…

Yes, playing a game for the experience is so 1984...

 

[NeilF]

Yes, playing a game for the experience is so 1984...

I'd suggest jumping to a "zone" and sitting there blowing up a never ending supply of ships, vapouring more metal than there is in the entire galaxy, with not a single effect outside the "zone", is so 1984.

In this day and age, I'd hope to see something slightly more intelligent such as maybe the never ending procession of suicidal Wanteds, ending... And some other (intelligent) outcomes from my actions...

And this is not a one off issue, it's true of the majority of the mechanics... eg: Every CMDR could turn up a specific asteroid field, and mine there over and over and over for years.. Yet the day after, not a single thing would have change there. The same asteroids, with the same resources... Still...

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

Now before I get bashed, this isn't a question about what I can do at the end of the game. I am one of those who understands what a sandbox game is, what I want to know is what is Frontier's end game plan here?

Now that again isn't me asking if they will add a "end game instance" but instead I am wondering is in 2-3-4-5 years from now, when Frontier says "Okay guys we are all done." What will the game look like?

This question comes from me watching ObsidianAnt on YouTube, who if you don't know who he is, is a guy who makes videos exploring Elite Dangerous and talking about game updates and the future of the game. Something he said stuck out to me about how Frontier plans on having multi crew ships and he went on talking about how it would be cool for players to EVA on planets and space stations. So as someone who will admit to not being here from the kick starter I have no idea what the goals of this game are.

Well A sandbox game should offer a lot tools to create and reahc specific things. Also offer more content within the Sandbox, so new environments.
So the hope of what Elite should be in a few years is a sandbox with a lot more tools to play within. (more ships, more possibilities to alter the universe) because currently we don't have many tools, since the univers eis rather static. Lets be honets the current Elite Sandbox is a lot grind if you want to access all the features of the sandbox, may this be playing PP, or trying to get another ship. I am not saying big change sin a sandbox should not be a big effort, they clearly should be. But they shouldn't be a low brain repeat X 300x times task. It should involve creativity within the tools of the sandbox. Bt the current Elite sandbox is: decide for the most efficient way and do it 300x, decide a lesser efficient one and ad any multiplier to these 300x. This is what I hope imporves in the Univers eof Elite, more things we can do and get (ships, wepaons, effects on economy and Powers) with added and more balanced diversity to reach these changes.

 

[Lupin]

Background simulator goal, I would suggest that they want to end of with a system that runs it's self. Then just leave server running once all expansions done.

 

[Ian Skippy]

I'd suggest jumping to a "zone" and sitting there blowing up a never ending supply of ships, vapouring more metal than there is in the entire galaxy, with not a single effect outside the "zone", is so 1984.

In this day and age, I'd hope to see something slightly more intelligent such as maybe the never ending procession of suicidal Wanteds, ending... And some other (intelligent) outcomes from my actions...

And this is not a one off issue, it's true of the majority of the mechanics... eg: Every CMDR could turn up a specific asteroid field, and mine there over and over and over for years.. Yet the day after, not a single thing would have change there. The same asteroids, with the same resources... Still...

Huh, weird. When I blow up stuff in RES things actually do change in the system. I even destabilised entire regimes to the point democracy could take over.

Which, when you think about it, is more than almost all other multiplayer games offer. But hey, let not have such petty details stop a good rant.

 

[streki]

when Frontier says "Okay guys we are all done." What will the game look like?

They'll be done when development of ED stops being a financially profitable exercise. Hopefully at that point, they'll release the entire final version as a stand-alone game, and we can play forever in our own little bubbles (1984 style).

If that's truly at the end of a ten year dev cycle, then we should have something comparable in scope to what that other space game is attempting....perhaps even larger, with all planet types realised, station interiors, 1st person combat, and who knows what else.

Maybe a Planet of Coasters to visit