Elite Dangerous Update 7 Progress

[Deleted member 182079]

Hey Sally, your comments here are always great to read! As you appear to be asking why some in the community would be interested in knowing how many people are working on Elite, here's some thoughts. First though, I agree, I suspect most people fully realise that the answer to the question won't help improve the current situation (things are moving at the best pace they already can after all).

So, I suspect some people feel that team size is a reflection of how Frontier as a company view the Elite project internally, as it's a statement of the amount of resources being put towards the game. For example, rightly or wrongly, a team of 30 to 50 might be viewed as "maintaining and bug fixing, along with small content updates", a team of 200 might be viewed as "long term development on an ongoing project, with significant plans".

Whether or not anyone turns that into a negative will depend on a lot of things. But even if you said 500 people are working on Elite, some people would still turn it into a negative. There's always going to be negative people.

Bottom line, I guess when people hear other studios giving this type of information (Warframe = ~250, Microsoft Flight Simulator = ~500, Star Citizen / Squadron 42 = ~600), those same people just wonder where Elite stands in the scheme of things. I don't suppose it's about being negative, but rather about getting a grasp on the scale of Frontier's long term vision and commitment to Elite Dangerous. When people invest 100's and even 1000's of hours into a game, I feel that's a completely understandable question to have.

I for one will not be satisfied unless the answer is

Spoiler

 

[Pigletslastand]

Nope, doesn't work like that. The fix may take a few hours, but testing and Q&A could take days.

Then perhaps it's QA and testers they need more of..All I know is they employ a lot of people for the game to not work very well. Glad it's getting better though.

 

[Juniper]

"What one programmer can do in one month, two programmers can do in two months."
Teams needs to co-ordinate with eachother, and individuals within those teams need to co-ordinate as well. Communication and management takes time, in addition to the work of programming, debugging, etc...
Throwing more programmers at the project won't necessarily help, similar to how nine women can't make a baby in one month.

It's also sometimes a question of availability. Maybe only ONE guy knows that area of code well enough to tinker with it, and he's on holiday, or off sick, or assigned to another task somewhere else.

It's knowledge, not numbers. You can't just throw people at a technical problem and expect it to be fixed faster. If anything, the opposite is true.

Plus, as someone pointed out earlier, there's presumably a QA schedule involved as well.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

That's your opinion and you are entitled to it.

Yes it is and yes I am entitled to it. The fact that ED has a team of 100-120 makes your statement all ready ludicrous.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Then perhaps it's QA and testers they need more of..All I know is they employ a lot of people for the game to not work very well. Glad it's getting better though.

Okay, then they put the prices up of the expansions and game, as they need to pay for those extra staff. It's not that simple.

 

[Pigletslastand]

Yes it is and yes I am entitled to it. The fact that ED has a team of 100-120 makes your statement all ready ludicrous.

You like to call other peoples thoughts out in a very negative way. I hope it helps you somehow. Lack of knowledge is changed through providing the knowledge and imparting understanding. Help a person or just call their ideas and thoughts stupid. It's all up to you.

 

[EidLeWeise]

Not being a developer I wouldn't know. I'm just an invested person who's paid money. Just want my game to work. If it doesn't, I generally come here to find answers as to why it doesn't.

The whole right person for the right job though applies to pretty much everything. I'd wager I couldn't just walk in and be a Nurse, or a Teacher, or even working in the local Tesco. Everything we do takes time to get up to speed (be it 1/2 a day of Training, or 10 years worth) The same concept applies when working on different parts of the same job. For example I used to be a waiter, and it takes two very different skill sets working in a place that has fast and high turnover of meals vs somewhere where the customer is paying a premium for service, knowledge of the food and the wines, being there when needed, and being invisible when not.

You come to the forums for meaningful answers? <sniggers/> I think we all want the game to work, and I genuinely feel that Frontier are making steps in that direction. We all have to decide if those steps are enough, or if we're maybe better to take a step back for 6 months or something.

Fly Safe Cmdr o7 Eid

 

[Darth Ender]

QA timelines. That's kinda funny. we're the QA dept.

 

[zimms]

[...]
Fixing issues isn't a case of throwing more people at them (there's nothing so dangerous as someone with a little knowledge) you need to throw the RIGHT person at the issue...

Eid

Ben, for the last time, no more throwing people around. We don't want to have to call HR on you again.

 

[Pigletslastand]

The whole right person for the right job though applies to pretty much everything. I'd wager I couldn't just walk in and be a Nurse, or a Teacher, or even working in the local Tesco. Everything we do takes time to get up to speed (be it 1/2 a day of Training, or 10 years worth) The same concept applies when working on different parts of the same job. For example I used to be a waiter, and it takes two very different skill sets working in a place that has fast and high turnover of meals vs somewhere where the customer is paying a premium for service, knowledge of the food and the wines, being there when needed, and being invisible when not.

You come to the forums for meaningful answers? <sniggers/> I think we all want the game to work, and I genuinely feel that Frontier are making steps in that direction. We all have to decide if those steps are enough, or if we're maybe better to take a step back for 6 months or something.

Fly Safe Cmdr o7 Eid

Thank you. Lovely explanation! And you're right.. I hope to enjoy it working properly sooner rather than later.

 

[LeoBartlet]

QA timelines. That's kinda funny. we're the QQ dept.

FTFY

 

[LKx]

QA timelines. That's kinda funny. we're the QA dept.

Still have to go through the official one (which might have been put in a bad place after the first few updates)

 

[Rat Catcher]

I hope to enjoy it working properly sooner rather than later.

So do I...

... But there is a possibility that our perception of both differs.

I think "sooner" is likely around Christmas... (so would love it if I was pleasantly surprised to see significant performance changes before - but don't expect to) ... and "later" to be next Spring

(although it would be 'good' to know why software developed 'in house' on their own engine has turned out to be quite so broken on 'release')

 

[EidLeWeise]

Ben, for the last time, no more throwing people around. We don't want to have to call HR on you again.

It's ok... they have me on speed dial anyway (is speed dial even still a thing?)

 

[Pigletslastand]

So do I...

... But there is a possibility that our perception of both differs.

I think "sooner" is likely around Christmas... (so would love it if I was pleasantly surprised to see significant performance changes before - but don't expect to) ... and "later" to be next Spring

Which leads me to feel less confident about the future of the game as the point at which it becomes satisfactorarily playable moves further and further away with each bug discovered. Sitting here wishing for X Y and Z but knowing you have to wait about half a year for even the top voted for bugs to be squashed while another 10000 bugs wait and expire sort of messes with one's confidence that the game can actually progress from this point instead of just get good enough to play.

 

[JoeyTheMooch]

We are all mad, no?

As a hatter...

 

[millstonebarn]

IF user_abandoned_mission = TRUE THEN

Ironically, even your pseudo code is incorrect. Assignment. Right there. I see it.

 

[sallymorganmoore]

As a hatter...View attachment 262304

"TWO spoons! Yes it's two spoons. Two spoons. Thank you, yes."

I love this guy. My favourite bit is where he's talking about the white rabbit like he knows everything there is to know about him, then in the next breath appears to have no GENUINE (like not even hiding the fact, it's just...gone!) idea who the white rabbit even is or that he was even talking about him in the first place, as soon as Alice joins in the conversation.

Like, I can entirely relate to Alice in that scene sometimes, it's genius :')

 

[Globusdiablo]

FD can admit they delayed Update 7 for that Powerplay update six years in the making

#keepthedreamalive

I read that as

#keepthedramaalive

Works just as well

 

[HRDiagram]

Good news, by then I should be back after a month away, mostly on holiday, and settled in enough to properly engage in "fully outraged" mode!