I’ve been out of the loop (or should I say grind?) for a long time, before engineers. Decided to check out what FD achieved while I was asleep and honestly, I’m blown away. I’d like to share my thougts with anyone interested.. What looked like a direction-less theme park adventure at the time I was going to cryosleep, 1 inch deep, many miles wide, now begins to shape into a breathing universe, the idea people like me were infected with, when we first tried Elite 2: Frontier.
How to make the space sim people will love? That’s the question FD was answering. The question, and, therefore, the answer, is twofold - first part lies in the “realism vs arcade” realm, where realism was maintained until it didn’t start to break the immersion, meaning - until adding more realistic elements would make game a chore and clunky experience. This is where marvellous sound design comes into play: audio cues fill in the blanks, which were left on the surface of the game after developers opted out for arcadey substitutions, like speed limit an lack of proper yaw. Sound chemistry is there so that you can feel you are in a space ship, despite limitations.
The second part to the answer is even more important - the grand design. How to get people hooked, which direction to take. Is it EVE with it’s market economies? Is it merely space combat/trade/exploration game, which doesn’t aspire towards higher dimensions? As per usual, Frontier decides to squeeze in between and come up with somewhat obscure polit-economical model controlled and directed according to philosophical needs behind the closed doors in Cambridge. Which can be a blessing and a curse, as can be seen through an example of any communist country of your choosing.
Fast forward to today - the meat starts to grow on the bones. New exploration mechanics (FSS, SDS), new mining systems, the engineers, which aren’t readily available, but hide behind, let’s say, a “single player campaign” of unlocks and referrals. These mini-games within elite start to become deep. But does it all work together, for the benefit of each other? You may be of an opinion that it’s a disjointed mess, please say so if you wish, but I think different. I think Elite has finally progressed to the stage where it’s not a collection of irrelated activities under one roof, but a complex (single-multiplayer) journey, which takes you to the goal of your liking - be it the PvP olympus or owning every ship in the game engineered, or maybe leaving a mark by finding an earth-like, or perhaps just enjoying the peacefullness of the deep black in your own little way..
How to make the space sim people will love? That’s the question FD was answering. The question, and, therefore, the answer, is twofold - first part lies in the “realism vs arcade” realm, where realism was maintained until it didn’t start to break the immersion, meaning - until adding more realistic elements would make game a chore and clunky experience. This is where marvellous sound design comes into play: audio cues fill in the blanks, which were left on the surface of the game after developers opted out for arcadey substitutions, like speed limit an lack of proper yaw. Sound chemistry is there so that you can feel you are in a space ship, despite limitations.
The second part to the answer is even more important - the grand design. How to get people hooked, which direction to take. Is it EVE with it’s market economies? Is it merely space combat/trade/exploration game, which doesn’t aspire towards higher dimensions? As per usual, Frontier decides to squeeze in between and come up with somewhat obscure polit-economical model controlled and directed according to philosophical needs behind the closed doors in Cambridge. Which can be a blessing and a curse, as can be seen through an example of any communist country of your choosing.
Fast forward to today - the meat starts to grow on the bones. New exploration mechanics (FSS, SDS), new mining systems, the engineers, which aren’t readily available, but hide behind, let’s say, a “single player campaign” of unlocks and referrals. These mini-games within elite start to become deep. But does it all work together, for the benefit of each other? You may be of an opinion that it’s a disjointed mess, please say so if you wish, but I think different. I think Elite has finally progressed to the stage where it’s not a collection of irrelated activities under one roof, but a complex (single-multiplayer) journey, which takes you to the goal of your liking - be it the PvP olympus or owning every ship in the game engineered, or maybe leaving a mark by finding an earth-like, or perhaps just enjoying the peacefullness of the deep black in your own little way..
