how does ED compare to SC ?

[Allen Stroud]

Star Citizen is an Epic, Cinematic experience probably the best space opera ever....Just like all the other Wing commander games.

I enjoyed the Wing Commander games, but I'm afraid I can't agree they were this. There's some moments when you fly a little ship into a massive warzone against the odds, but, I'm afraid it never gave me the amazing tingle. The repetitive AI didn't help. Other games, Homeworld, X2 were better on these criteria.

If we agree on that then we should all be happy

Consensus on all things does not lead to nirvana...

I'm very interested in the SC process and how they do. I think there's some great stuff being produced. We can all agree to co-exist and be interested, without being fans of both or either.

 

[NeoRacer]

WC series was the space sim I played the LEAST. It just felt clunky and unrefined. Elite was always more intense and 'pure' and it looks like things are goin the same way again. Independence War was my 2nd fav. (#2 sucked ass)

I enjoyed the Wing Commander games, but I'm afraid I can't agree they were this. There's some moments when you fly a little ship into a massive warzone against the odds, but, I'm afraid it never gave me the amazing tingle. The repetitive AI didn't help. Other games, Homeworld, X2 were better on these criteria.



Consensus on all things does not lead to nirvana...

I'm very interested in the SC process and how they do. I think there's some great stuff being produced. We can all agree to co-exist and be interested, without being fans of both or either.

 

[Cody]

Consensus on all things does not lead to nirvana...

<ponders that for a moment or two - wanders away, snickering>

 

[synchromesh]

Well one things for sure.....When we start the game we wont be running around a hanger deck because we have no artificial Gravity on ours ...... There's the first big difference

 

[synchromesh]

@Allan..

It depends on how you feel about the games.....Elite was my first space sim
the landmark...The game I will never forget....and frontier etc followed..

I entered the Wing Commander series in WC3 to be honest which blew me away but it was the best of its kind for me as in a scripted multi mission Space epic..

So from my perspective they are both very different and the differences are big...No matter what SC will feel like an epic Movie but ED will feel like another life

 

[Styggron]

well one things for sure.....when we start the game we wont be running around a hanger deck because we have no artificial gravity on ours ...... There's the first big difference :d

lol

 

[Dunk]

Personally ...

Elite was huge. It was unbelievable. I played it round a friend's house and subsequently got it for my birthday back in 1984. It was truly special and way beyond anything else out there at the time.

A few years later, Frontier came out and I was shocked. The gameplay was lost. Dogfighting was awful and I stopped playing it. FFE was apparently more of the same in its Full Newtonian flight model, so I let it slide (literally and figuratively). By this point I'd already tried Wing Commander and it too didn't work for me ... at all.

Unless I am mistaken ED has gone exactly where I wanted Elite to go next. It has taken a while to get here, but it is finally back.

I look forward to seeing where Chris Roberts goes with SC in a year and a half, but I'm happy that Frontier have learned from their mistakes (regarding dogfights - which I realise and understand why pure simmers liked) and have returned with an expanded version of the original Elite. If FE and FFE were huge successes like the original Elite, then there would have been more games released with full Newtonian physics, but clearly not enough people liked that for fun game play.

 

[Elenoe]

A few years later, Frontier came out and I was shocked. The gameplay was lost. Dogfighting was awful and I stopped playing it. FFE was apparently more of the same in its Full Newtonian flight model, so I let it slide (literally and figuratively). By this point I'd already tried Wing Commander and it too didn't work for me ... at all.

one would wonder if you like space sims as genre at all I liked E2 a lot. Mostly because of planets and universe models. And since that was the best and the only right way to do it no matter flight model and since nor Chris Roberts nor Egosoft managed to create it I simply conclude they were unable to do that at all. And cannot be used for "no other games did it means it's wrong"

Unless I am mistaken ED has gone exactly where I wanted Elite to go next.

hardly. Elite is obsolete. Still unsure what you didn't like on E2/FE but E will have much more similarities with those then with old Elite.

 

[SlimExpert]

Both ED and SC are now Procedurally Generated.

Just watched latest 10 for the Chairman for Chris Roberts of SC, looks like they like the idea of Procedural Generation after all. They intend to use if for various parts of the play area, that are not fixed - like Earth and Tara.

Makes a lot of sense, who would want to build an asteroid field one rock at a time!

SlimExpert

 

[Hellhawk666]

Both ED and SC are now Procedurally Generated.

Just watched latest 10 for the Chairman for Chris Roberts of SC, looks like they like the idea of Procedural Generation after all. They intend to use if for various parts of the play area, that are not fixed - like Earth and Tara.

Makes a lot of sense, who would want to build an asteroid field one rock at a time!

SlimExpert

Yeah, CR was a bit vague about procedural generation other than that they intend to use it. I get the feeling that most of the important bits in the systems that are there at gamestart will be hand-crafted, but that procedural generation will be used to fill in repetitive areas (like asteroids, as you said).

What that will mean for the game's long-term development, who knows, but I'd think SC will always have more of a handcrafted feel and PG will be used for the "unimportant" bits. He also made passing mention of the AI so they are probably going to use PG for scripting repetitive missions.

 

[Andrew Sayers]

To me, that's kind of symptomatic of the whole project, as far as I can tell. There are loads of cool little ideas (nice looking ships, ideas about ship-boarding, FPS ideas, details about ship damage) but there's no over-arching USP.. It kind of feels like a melting pot of cool space stuff.

To be honest, I think the most useful thing the SC community can do right now is hound CIG for a clear aesthetic vision.

Frontier had this bit easy - Braben's had the same concept in his head for two or three decades, and has doubtless been getting people on board over the lunch table for a decade or more. Whereas losing the Wing Commander franchise must have set Roberts back, and having to assemble a team just for this game will have made his life even harder. If he could say for example "Star Citizen is about mighty space captains marking their name in the sky", it would give the team an organising principle to coalesce around. Like the fish tank could speak to that aesthetic if it took ridiculous amounts of in-game cash to safely transport and sustain the most beautiful creatures from the farthest worlds.

 

[Allen Stroud]

It depends on how you feel about the games...

Yes, that would be entirely my point. We can comfortably co-exist, enjoying the ride here and observing the ride over there, or enjoying both rides or waving to folks over here from over there. I'm not a fan of sniping and football scarf warfare.

I am following developments on SC, purely from a interested position as a Science Fiction fan and academic. I wish them all the luck.

 

[Jack Booted Thug]

I'm actually finding the ongoing development of Star Citizen fascinating. They are obviously hard at work and Chris Roberts most definitely has a very lofty and precise goal. He wants to make the best space sandbox game ever. I actually think things are moving along nicely over there.

Their marketing strategy of selling ship packages, limited ships, LTI and allowing a flourishing grey market is brilliant. It not only keeps the players interested in the game but encourages them to market it to their friends.

Elite Dangerous has been a lot more conservative in its approach but I do see it as having the advantage of a path that is being revisited. I am very much looking forward to the open universe of Elite and it does hold me a little more than Star Citizen (I played the original and the DDF archives has great concepts). Yet Star Citizen with its high fidelity approach and multi-crew ships will be a truly incredible experience if they can pull it off.

 

[Oss133]

I'm not a fan of sniping and football scarf warfare.

No, indeed.

Wet towel flicking is far more effective.

 

[Viking]

Frontier had this bit easy - Braben's had the same concept in his head for two or three decades, and has doubtless been getting people on board over the lunch table for a decade or more.

Chris Roberts has said he's had this vision since Wing Commander, but he had to wait until the technology was more mature. Not only graphics and processor power, but Internet too.

Whereas losing the Wing Commander franchise must have set Roberts back [...]

He didn't lose it. He sold his company Origin and the WC franchise to Electronic Arts. After that he started Digital Anvil and sold that too, to Microsoft. He's said that he doesn't want to do this again. Instead he wants to build on Star Citizen for decades to come, if people want it.

[...] and having to assemble a team just for this game will have made his life even harder.

I don't think it made his life harder. He was prepared for this. And he'd done it before.

But it's true he had to assemble a team on short notice, and even if he knew many people in the business and hired many of his old friends, it's obvious that Frontier and David Braben had an easier path regarding this. Frontier already had a large team of 200+ people when their Kickstarter project was successful. CIG had only a handful of key people. Most of the development team in CIG have been hired during the first months of 2013, but they aren't finished hiring. Right now they're around 120 people, including the short term external companies (Behavior, void alpha, Turbulent, Inca Monkey God Studios, etc.) who are helping with bits of the puzzle. So Frontier has a much larger team.

Of course, this makes the Star Citizen project take a longer time to finish than if CIG had 200+ people from the start.

 

[Geraldine]

Yes I agree Viking, it does take time to put together the team and I am sure once all the pieces are in place Chris will be progressing with the game at a much faster rate. I think this will be a great year for CIG with regards to updates and modules for players to try out. Also, great news about a bigger role for procedural generated content in the game. Adding this to the hand crafted content, should make for a richer (content wise) universe.

 

[Andrew Sayers]

I appreciate the corrections, and for what it's worth the suggestion that the SC community hound CIG for a clear aesthetic vision was intended to be helpful - I'm constantly hounding Frontier about theirs. Wing Commander was a big part of my youth, and I would like the project to succeed, but these things don't happen by magic. Clarifying the vision seems like something the community can do to improve the game.

Think about it this way - you mentioned in another thread you'd written a lot of lore for SC. That allows new backers to read up on the game and get up to speed more quickly. New devs go through a similar process, except their question isn't "which faction do I support?" but "how should this object move?" or "how aggressive should this AI be?". A clear aesthetic vision is like a rule of thumb for those guys, allowing them to be more productive sooner than they otherwise could be. CIG have an ambitious hiring process as you say. and getting those guys up to speed quickly will improve the game enormously.

 

[Viking]

Think about it this way - you mentioned in another thread you'd written a lot of lore for SC. That allows new backers to read up on the game and get up to speed more quickly. New devs go through a similar process, except their question isn't "which faction do I support?" but "how should this object move?" or "how aggressive should this AI be?". A clear aesthetic vision is like a rule of thumb for those guys, allowing them to be more productive sooner than they otherwise could be.

I have no doubt Chris Roberts and David Braben has shared their visions in detail with their developers, as needed. That's more important than letting the public/backers know, although I think we are getting a lot - much more than any developer or game studio has shared ever to their customers at such an early state. Just look at the RSI website - it's loaded with information about the game! Every day something new appears. And Frontier has also shared a lot, with their regular video updates.

BTW, I didn't say I wrote a lot of lore for SC. I collected and organized some of it into a private database. It's also more than just lore in it.

 

[CaptTamer]

Frontier had this bit easy - Braben's had the same concept in his head for two or three decades, and has doubtless been getting people on board over the lunch table for a decade or more. Whereas losing the Wing Commander franchise must have set Roberts back, and having to assemble a team just for this game will have made his life even harder.

Excellent analysis and I don't think we sometimes appreciate just how Braben has built his career around developing the expertise and technology he needs to create his true Elite vision. Even games such as Dog's Life will feature elements that were building up or testing ideas that will make their way into ED. Roberts has never had this same kind of progression and I fear this is why his project appears to be floundering when compared to the progress we have seen.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

I don't get why people are thinking SC is floundering, comments like that are IMO as biased as the ones. which are hugely biased against ED. Sure SC is not as far down the development road as ED it would seem, but Rome was not built in a day. 6 months from now I think we will be seeing far more progress from SC.