News From orbit down to Europa

Yes they are... They just happen to be on the other side of the planet... You may notice it's 1.58Mm from the surface to core of europa.

The nearest RES in that list is 2Ls away, or ~600,000Km. How big is Europa? :)

Edit - actually, if people are suggesting the RES are on Jupiter rather than Europa that makes sense. But I'm not sure that list proves that those RES are on the surface - just that they are in the vicinity of Jupiter.
 
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Yes they are... They just happen to be on the other side of the planet... You may notice it's 1.58Mm from the surface to core of europa.

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Looks nice, but I can't help wish the supercruise transition was between space flight and orbital cruise (like the way it is now in season1, where you approach a planet and come out of super cruise) then the approach to the surface would have been seamless.

I guess it wouldn't be feasible as you'd be travelling at much slower speeds meaning approaching the surface from orbit would take a long time!
 
Thank you for another sneak peek, it looks awesome, even if the SSS isnt working right now. The drop from supercruise doesnt hurt at all. Looking forward to next week :)
 
Yeah. With reference to the transition the problem is the stall - its a very noticable freeze because the ship stops moving. Surely there must be a way to make this less obvious and at least give the impression we are still moving or zoning in?
Agreed, that really is the only flaw in the transition/instancing and something I can overlook. Otherwise it's very nearly perfect.
 
Not 100% seamless, but good enough. Still a shame that the game in effect freezes whilst the instance loads. (Unavoidable I know)

There will be some that will say this breaks the immersion. The silly thing is without instances, it could (probably) be done totally seamlessly.

For me though that is perfectly acceptable. Roll on Monday.
 
Special transition for planets/moons would double work required to design transitions. Full stop is a bit meh, but small price to pay imho.
 
Agreed, that really is the only flaw in the transition/instancing and something I can overlook. Otherwise it's very nearly perfect.

AFAIK, it really doesn't bother me. Its a transition from warping space around you into normal space. I can happily live with it. You can always come out of orbital cruise/Supercruise and fly to the surface that way. Will likely take a good few hours though.
 
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This sneak peek is awesome, thank you! :)

Based on the visuals here is it safe to assume that the super-cruise transition to normal space has been cured off the "pop" effect everywhere? Or will this only apply to planets up close and personal?

Also, now that we know we can disembark our SRV's while on the landing pad, I'm curious what happens to our ships? Will it get stored, or hold that landing pad until we return? Something I'm desperately hoping for is the ability to store ships in a shipyard on a planetary base. Will this be possible? :)

Thank you so much for the work you've all been doing on this. Even with the imperfections it's still gloriously beautiful and will add so much to the experience of Elite. Can't wait to get into Horizon's Beta. ^_^
 
Does the screen shake play well in VR?

Is it possible to reenter Orbital SC from Glide without approaching the surface, eg by pulling up?

If we dive straight at the surface at more than 60 degrees, do we go into a 'BALLISTIC' flight program?
 
Nice peek!

Yes the transition is a problem but to me it seems less of a problem here, where the target is still a reasonable distance away, than it does in free space. Often in free space you will overshoot your target during SC drop, actually seeing the HUD element fly "past" your POV, then have the station or outpost appear in front of you once you've completed the wibbly-wobbly bit. It's very jarring, but less so in this video IMO.

Of course if you go all Adama Manoeuvre and drop out of orbital cruise right on top of the installation then it may have similar problems to the free space version. Only time will tell. Hopefully Monday time. :D
 
Not 100% seamless, but good enough. Still a shame that the game in effect freezes whilst the instance loads. (Unavoidable I know)

What's nagging me is that it isn't unavoidable...the glide mode would be the perfect way to mask that transition.

It's not the end of the world...it's more a kind of "oh so close but yet so far away" moment. ;)
 
What's nagging me is that it isn't unavoidable...the glide mode would be the perfect way to mask that transition.

It's not the end of the world...it's more a kind of "oh so close but yet so far away" moment. ;)

"Would be" is really a stretch here. We don't know how well you can do with threading model FD have now. Maybe in future...But I predict it is rather complex to begin with.
 

David Braben

CEO & Founder
Frontier
Wow, i must say... Unless you get really close to that Icy surface, the textures don't look good at all... Hope that's gonna get better before horizons launches... Even from 100 meters above the planet, the icy ridges and hills just looked like random blobs of white...

Also is the gravity in this clip modified in any way? Europa is supposed to have roundabouts 0.13G and based on the hang-times of the SRV it seems higher. It could be just a feeling though.

On the textures - looking at the clip on Youtube does look a bit more blurry to me than the original. You will see for yourselves on Monday!

On the gravity - the SRV does stick you to the surface using the thrusters on the wheels, unless you manually thrust. The gravity should be correct.
 
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