Elite: Universe - We need a new Elite

I think the op wants ED to be accurate to reality,which would be fascinating to see but on the whole not much of a game.
The time dilation stuff just wouldn't be practical,i'd take some cargo a short trip to another system and centuries could have passed.
I'd take a trip to Sag A* and by the time i get back humanity has evolved into amorphous energy blobs who could care less about my exploration data!
 
I would love to see a more accurate game with things like accretion disks, deadly blackholes, nebulas you could fly through the gases,etc. Not sure that needs a separate game. Now that exploration has had a profit boost maybe a skill up is needed.
 
Go for Universe sandbox 1/2 maybe ? Yeah, Elite claims to try and follow some of the rules we know through science, but people at FDev also know that the game needs to be playable.
Even though some, like you, would really like more advanced science into the game, more people just enjoy flying aournd and sometime see or experience something that is scientificaly accurate.
I don't think we need an other Elite, what you want is just another type of game which already exists :p

And if I remember correctly, ED will eventually get more things to see, new bodies, accretion disks, comets, ...
 
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Suggestion taken. But why wouldn't you think there wouldn't be facilities on the ship or food in the storage? And as far as development, I'm already recommending a separate team to make the game. And who said anything about grind? Why would there be grind in a scientifically accurate game?

Granted, this game wouldn't be for everyone, but there are some who would love such a game, who would fly out to a star/system/asteroid to see for themselves scientific discovery made in the real world.

From what I read, you want pretty much a game just like elite with a survival aspect right, correct me if I got that wrong, I did go back and read the whole post but a game like elite is a grind, you have to grind to get to a certain point, want a doomaconda? grind want to visit sag a*? Grind, want anything? grind how bad the grind is, is up to you

Having to worry about food water pooping, having to use telescopes to spot planets, ship maintenance doesn't help it makes it seems like grinding simulator with only fun parts every few moments
 
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Just one thing: I recall that the kickstarter for ED didn't actually pay for the development of the game. Rather, it gauged community interest in the idea of ED becoming a thing.

Also, ED isn't a strict simulator. It was never meant to be. It isn't a space sim. It is science fiction. And it is set in 3303. Look how much tech has advances in the last 1200 years to give you an idea. What were we using in 800 AD or so? Compare that to now. Guess what? For ED, 2017 is about the same as 800. The game gets a ton of science things right, but a lot of mechanics need the fiction part. Your comment on the need for human crew? Most ship systems are automated. Why pay a human for something a computer can do? Exploration is more than just honk the system. Using the DDS is needed to really make money that way, and it only works on one object at a time. And using the DDS is the ONLY way to find a terraformable world, and those are where the big bucks are. Your light speed thing? Doesn't really apply due to how FSDs work. The ship itself isn't moving faster than light, rather space itself is what is moving. Sounds like you are talking about time distortion, but that only applies when an object is actually travelling near light speed. In ED, the object (ship) is not moving at light speed, but much much slower. You aren't changing your speed, but rather you are changing what a meter is. If that makes sense

Ship design and modules? I don't know where you are going with that. Sounds like what ED already has. Same for wear and tear. Or do you never click on that advanced maintenance button?
 
From what I read, you want pretty much a game just like elite with a survival aspect right, correct me if I got that wrong, I did go back and read the whole post but a game like elite is a grind, you have to grind to get to a certain point, want a doomaconda? grind want to visit sag a*? Grind, want anything? grind how bad the grind is, is up to you

Having to worry about food water pooping, having to use telescopes to spot planets, ship maintenance doesn't help it makes it seems like grinding simulator with only fun parts every few moments

*Scientifically accurate simulation*
 
I like physics.

But i also like pew pew.

I like it because of its physics.

ED has naff physics, and thus poo poo pew pew.

So i play FFED3D instead. It has actual, basic, physics, and thus excellent pew pew.

The OP makes some cool suggestions. I'd particularly like to see the time compression effects in supercruise, tho i guess this would be tricky to implement in a MP game (same reason we have FSD instead of "stardreamer" time acceleration). Do-able tho.

ED has all its 'realism' all in the wrong place. Classic Elite was an inter-galactic odyssey, not encumbered with an accurate Milky Way. The magic of discovery of procedurally-generated content is every bit as rich an experience as visiting more familiar locations, if not moreso, since real-life modeling is both intrinsically limited by available knowledge, as well as limiting in the dedicated resources required, effort that could be better spent refining the PG system.

For myself, i'd particularly like to see the PG system extended into the time domain - coupled with the kinds of clock drift we'd accrue from relativistic effects, it would be a natural progression of the game to depict how planets and systems evolve over longer time scales, ranging from decades to eons..
 
As much as I'd love to play that game, there's no way it's commercially viable to make at this point. Too much work for too narrow of an audience.
 
*Scientifically accurate simulation*

I already have enough grind. Grind coffee, spices, salt, and sometimes I grind in games. I prefer games to be more enjoyable than painful. This "idea" sounds as much fun as a walking simulator. Also, if you are looking for scientific realism, then say goodbye to even the vaguest notions of FSD drives, energy weapons like we see in ED, shields, and pretty much everything that makes ED fun. Hope you like taking 3 real-life days to travel to the moon. Or up to 2 real years just to reach Mars.
 
I like some of the OPs ideas as upgrades to Elite Dangerous. However, an entire game centered around minutia as finite as needing to worry about my CMDR having flaming diarrhea after eating a Chalupa at the Taco Bell on Lave Station honestly sounds like a snoozefest IMO.
 
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@OP, I'm not sure many people have the stomach for another kickstarter, especially FD. :)

Rogue System. What you're thinking about is Rogue System.
Nice knowing you, bye.

I wouldn't mind a little bit more realism in ED (esp. in SC flight), but I'm happy as things are. I had a quick look at one of the vids for Rogue System. For the majority of the 20min vid, there was a lot of staring at the ships' console, flicking switches before you even started. God forbid ED going in a similar direction! :)
 
Some really nice ideas that I think would really add to the immersion and experience of ED.
Would I want Frontier to set up an entirely new dev team for what would effectively be "Elite: Dangerous - Scientifically Accurate and Realism Focused Edition" ? No.
 

* Go work for NASA. This is a game and needs to be playable. It would be boring if too accurate

Some of us actually like things that are scientifically accurate. To us, this is game play.

CMDR's logs from Elite: Realistic

"This is Ground Control to Major Dumb. Please identify what you can see of the solar system from out there".

"Major Dumb to Ground Control. I can see gray walls, and some control panels. We did away with glass screens hundreds of years ago"

"Ground Control to Major Dumb: Oh yeah, someone fetch me some coffee or stimulant drugs or whatever you can find. Major Dumb, want to go check out another system?"

"Major Dumb to Ground Control: You wanna switch names today Son? I can't get there. Our only hope were Frame Shift Drives, which never worked, as it turns out would just fry the vessel flying in its bubble, and by the time I'd be back from the system you'd be dead"

"Ground Control to Major Dumb: Ah yeah...well this is fun. Webcam Charades?"
 
Elite: Dangerous (ED) is fine and all, but it does have its shortcomings. Specifically, the scientific aspect of it is lacking. ED if focused more on gameplay rather than scientific accuracy and discovery.

True, the gameplay aspect of it fits some of the playerbase better than it does others. But for commanders like me, I want to see the actual physics of the galaxy come into play. I want to see CME's scour nearby planets, while their darkside remains shrouded in ice. I want to see accretion disks around protostars and black holes. And yes, black holes need to be deadly. And time dilation effects need to have a profound impact on your ships, as well as your body.

The commander should not be impervious and needs to be fragile as every other human. Yes, this includes commander maintenance. You need food. You need to poop. And you need to water the flowers. The effects of zero-g should have an impact on the commander's ability to operate. Even space madness should be a factor if you're out in the black alone.

Large ships with complex parts need to have more than a one man crew. And each crewmember needs to be responsible for various tasks. There needs to be NPC crew members with various levels of training and sometimes they need to f'up which would create an emergency situation that you have to respond to. There can be human crew-members as well, but they need to be backed up by an NPC crew member if the human crewmember is away. Your ship needs to continue flying, even though you're not online. This is a simulation, and not a shoot-em-up game.

Technology is not perfect. There needs to be wear and tear on the ships and it needs constant maintenance. If you run out of materials to maintain the ship, then you need to land on planets to find said material, refine them, and shape them for use.

Speaking of material, exploration should not be a magical honk machine that discovers all planets all at once. Sure, you can have several telescopes mounted on your ship to discover bodies in that system, but to get a more detailed scan of the system you need to fly around bodies, or send probes to them to gather information.

Time needs to be a factor. Light can only travel so far, after all. As you warp space around you to travel to the system, the object you're steering towards needs to appear to speed up its orbit, and you need to adjust accordingly.

Ships should not simply be made up of modules. There should be specific ship designs, wiring, circuitry, infrastructure, etc, and each should serve a purpose and be connected. A whole module or structure can fail and you have to replace it, or part of a module or structure can fail and you can repair it.

We could start another kickstarter for this game, FD. Both Elite: Dangerous and Elite: Universe can feed into each other. ED can serve to improve the playability of EU and EU can serve to increase the scientific accuracy of ED without sacrificing playability.

What do you think? Would you like a more simulation based game that complements ED, or do you think ED is enough?

And oh yeah, it will be a new development team that is strictly focused on simulation and scientific accuracy so that pew-pew game play doesn't sneak its way in.

I'm amending this post to address some of the naysayers. The format I will use is a summary of they naysayer's response, followed by my response, a summary of my response, or a summary of another's response:

* Go work for NASA. This is a game and needs to be playable. It would be boring if too accurate

Some of us actually like things that are scientifically accurate. To us, this is game play.

* Go play another game that matches what you want

Don't try to turn me or anyone away from Frontier games. I like Elite: Dangerous and I do not want to switch. So suggesting that I or anyone go play another game is counter-intuitive to actually supporting Elite: Dangerous and Frontier Development.

* Frontier Development won't read your post, don't care about your ideas, so don't even bother.

They read more than you think! And an idea not expressed doesn't exist. At least I made my thoughts known.

* Why would FD put developers onto making a new Elite: Dangerous when this game has so many bugs/problems with it?

Again, I'm not talking about Elite: Dangerous. I'm talking about Elite: Universe with a separate set of developers dedicated to development. And I'm recommending another kickstarter to pay for it. And kickstarters aren't just for new companies. FD has been around for a long time and they started a kickstarter for ED. And Elite: Universe would be a completely new game, borrowing from ED environments and code, but focused more on the scientifically accurate side of simulation.

Wow, that colour hurts my eyes...
 
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