Let me just start off by saying that half way through doing what I wanted to get done to properly give Horizons the thorough play it deserved, my x52 pro's rudder decided to just stop working. That really took the wind out of my sails. So I have opened a RMA ticket with MadCatz (its well within warranty).
For what I was able to get in and see, here is my take.
The ability to land on planets was awesome, much wanted, just as wanted as being able to walk around on my ship and space stations/ground (hint, hint). But it still doesn't seem like it was centered around what the community wanted.
I'll just be honest here. When I logged in, my first destination was a ground station. I jumped in my conda figuring if I could land that thing, I could land anything, and headed to the nearest ground port. Critique Spoiler Alert: come to find out, this expansion would have likely been more appropriately named "Elite Dangerous: Landings" because that was about the most exciting thing that happened. Upon landing and after swapping out a cargo rack with a vehicle module I see 2 available missions -- one is a fed mission wanting me to sabotage and fed facility (umm...) and the other was a cargo mission. My exploration rank isn't that high, but my merchant rank is decent and my combat rank is Elite I should be seeing a LOT more missions (at least imo).
I was also expecting something to lead me into the basics of Horizons -- this is an expansion that is priced at the identical price of ED when it release, a full game. I was expecting another full game here, because that's what I paid for***(SEE FOOTNOTE). Instead, I see we have one ground vehicle, that shoots rocks, and gathers data from data points. What else is there to do exactly? I have no real reason except for a mission to ever use my scrab and this I find to be the most disappointing aspect of the game.
I was expecting NPC pirates that I'd have to kill in scrabs, or give my friends a reason to join me in a wing and provide air-cover while go loot a ship or raid a base -- but, nothing. I roamed around on a surface for 4 hours before the stick died and only ever came across (on a metalic world) the most common metals. But then again, what reason, exactly do I have to upgrade my scrab's weapons? So i can shoot rocks more effectively? It just makes no sense to me.
I was told that Horizons was adding crafting -- what I didn't expect is the crafting to be limited to 4 basic items -- ammo (and its variations including AMV), scrab fuel, scrab repair, and something else there. None of which can be traded, none of which can be sold, none of which can be acquired any other way than to ... shoot.... rocks... Ugh... so again, what is the point? If Horizons begins and ends on itself, what did I just buy? A $60.00 novelty? I surely hope not.
Hopefully I'm still salty from my x52's rudder taking a dump and just missed a LOT of stuff, because in the 4 hours I spent exploring, I just don't see it, I just don't see how this equates to the quality ED was when it launched and I can't see a justification for spending $60 USD on it.
FD, you guys seem, as of late to be completely ignoring the community and taking this game in your own direction ignoring the feedback you get here in the forums. Its not that you're ignoring it, its almost like you're answering community feedback with in-game sarcasm that just isn't humerus to anyone. For instance, the community was complaining about the failed promises of being able to impact the galaxy in a way that, again as promised, made it "living and breathing" -- instead of making it so a group of players could bankrupt a system, you added powerplay which has utterly nothing to do with what the players wanted. Then CQC, besides breaking the monotony for the die-hard ED fans that refuse to play any other game, this had to be the single most waste of development time I've seen in a very long time by a reputable studio.
On a closing note, FD, you need to proceed very carefully from here. Once the novelty of Horizons wears off and players realize they just paid a full game price for something most developers would likely offer at half or quarter the price there will be some very upset players -- but upset players is fine, that means they still care about your game -- how you proceed and respond to their criticism at this point will be a very critical point in the future income potential of the Elite franchise. The community did expect planetary landings, and they got that, but that was just about the extent of it. We expected crafting, and again I feel we were served sarcasm. We asked for planetary missions (you know the pew-pew kind) and we get fined for trespassing and no pew-pews, again this seems to be sarcasm to me.
But I know it has to just be poor choices or an oversight somewhere because for the life of me I can't understand why you would sabotage your own community like that. You see, the conundrum comes to this, the work you guys have put in this game, the level of detail, etc has been enough that any new player almost hits the floor (first in surprise that their PC's can run it, and second in the sheer "WOW! THE DETAIL!" factor). So it perplexes me to how a team so attentive to detail to stray this far from what the community is asking for to the point it appears to be a very bad joke, or sarcasm.
May this criticism find its way to FD's producer's desk and help improve the game.
*** EDIT: Being there is some confusion on this, I'll clarify: ED base game was $60.00 and included 1 year of updates, this is the industry price of a FINISHED AAA title with years of support, bugfixes, etc. ED: Horizons is $60.00 and includes 1 year of updates. It is not a basegame but an expansion to an already funded and established base game. ED base game consisted of 2 updates that left the community scratching their heads, one of these (Power Play) was FDev's answer to the "dynamic galaxy" complaint from the kick-starter. So before you post, keep in mind that it is the antithesis of reassuring to pipe in with "but its a year of updates!" when the last half-year of updates either fell outside the scope of the game itself (CQC) or those that attempted to answer community criticism with seemingly sarcastic development/design undertones. But what you're really telling everyone, is what I just realized, "You're paying AAA price for an incomplete game which lacks basic functionality for online play, for one year of development that makes no promise to deliver a completed title".... Really.. Not reassuring....
For what I was able to get in and see, here is my take.
The ability to land on planets was awesome, much wanted, just as wanted as being able to walk around on my ship and space stations/ground (hint, hint). But it still doesn't seem like it was centered around what the community wanted.
I'll just be honest here. When I logged in, my first destination was a ground station. I jumped in my conda figuring if I could land that thing, I could land anything, and headed to the nearest ground port. Critique Spoiler Alert: come to find out, this expansion would have likely been more appropriately named "Elite Dangerous: Landings" because that was about the most exciting thing that happened. Upon landing and after swapping out a cargo rack with a vehicle module I see 2 available missions -- one is a fed mission wanting me to sabotage and fed facility (umm...) and the other was a cargo mission. My exploration rank isn't that high, but my merchant rank is decent and my combat rank is Elite I should be seeing a LOT more missions (at least imo).
I was also expecting something to lead me into the basics of Horizons -- this is an expansion that is priced at the identical price of ED when it release, a full game. I was expecting another full game here, because that's what I paid for***(SEE FOOTNOTE). Instead, I see we have one ground vehicle, that shoots rocks, and gathers data from data points. What else is there to do exactly? I have no real reason except for a mission to ever use my scrab and this I find to be the most disappointing aspect of the game.
I was expecting NPC pirates that I'd have to kill in scrabs, or give my friends a reason to join me in a wing and provide air-cover while go loot a ship or raid a base -- but, nothing. I roamed around on a surface for 4 hours before the stick died and only ever came across (on a metalic world) the most common metals. But then again, what reason, exactly do I have to upgrade my scrab's weapons? So i can shoot rocks more effectively? It just makes no sense to me.
I was told that Horizons was adding crafting -- what I didn't expect is the crafting to be limited to 4 basic items -- ammo (and its variations including AMV), scrab fuel, scrab repair, and something else there. None of which can be traded, none of which can be sold, none of which can be acquired any other way than to ... shoot.... rocks... Ugh... so again, what is the point? If Horizons begins and ends on itself, what did I just buy? A $60.00 novelty? I surely hope not.
Hopefully I'm still salty from my x52's rudder taking a dump and just missed a LOT of stuff, because in the 4 hours I spent exploring, I just don't see it, I just don't see how this equates to the quality ED was when it launched and I can't see a justification for spending $60 USD on it.
FD, you guys seem, as of late to be completely ignoring the community and taking this game in your own direction ignoring the feedback you get here in the forums. Its not that you're ignoring it, its almost like you're answering community feedback with in-game sarcasm that just isn't humerus to anyone. For instance, the community was complaining about the failed promises of being able to impact the galaxy in a way that, again as promised, made it "living and breathing" -- instead of making it so a group of players could bankrupt a system, you added powerplay which has utterly nothing to do with what the players wanted. Then CQC, besides breaking the monotony for the die-hard ED fans that refuse to play any other game, this had to be the single most waste of development time I've seen in a very long time by a reputable studio.
On a closing note, FD, you need to proceed very carefully from here. Once the novelty of Horizons wears off and players realize they just paid a full game price for something most developers would likely offer at half or quarter the price there will be some very upset players -- but upset players is fine, that means they still care about your game -- how you proceed and respond to their criticism at this point will be a very critical point in the future income potential of the Elite franchise. The community did expect planetary landings, and they got that, but that was just about the extent of it. We expected crafting, and again I feel we were served sarcasm. We asked for planetary missions (you know the pew-pew kind) and we get fined for trespassing and no pew-pews, again this seems to be sarcasm to me.
But I know it has to just be poor choices or an oversight somewhere because for the life of me I can't understand why you would sabotage your own community like that. You see, the conundrum comes to this, the work you guys have put in this game, the level of detail, etc has been enough that any new player almost hits the floor (first in surprise that their PC's can run it, and second in the sheer "WOW! THE DETAIL!" factor). So it perplexes me to how a team so attentive to detail to stray this far from what the community is asking for to the point it appears to be a very bad joke, or sarcasm.
May this criticism find its way to FD's producer's desk and help improve the game.
*** EDIT: Being there is some confusion on this, I'll clarify: ED base game was $60.00 and included 1 year of updates, this is the industry price of a FINISHED AAA title with years of support, bugfixes, etc. ED: Horizons is $60.00 and includes 1 year of updates. It is not a basegame but an expansion to an already funded and established base game. ED base game consisted of 2 updates that left the community scratching their heads, one of these (Power Play) was FDev's answer to the "dynamic galaxy" complaint from the kick-starter. So before you post, keep in mind that it is the antithesis of reassuring to pipe in with "but its a year of updates!" when the last half-year of updates either fell outside the scope of the game itself (CQC) or those that attempted to answer community criticism with seemingly sarcastic development/design undertones. But what you're really telling everyone, is what I just realized, "You're paying AAA price for an incomplete game which lacks basic functionality for online play, for one year of development that makes no promise to deliver a completed title".... Really.. Not reassuring....
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