In defense of ED development model

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Despite lot of mistakes in communication, FD has one big advantage no other competitors have.

Their development and business plan actually work. They deliver product. There's awfully lot to add, but at the core I enjoy ED a lot. I know some of you don't, but I never expected everyone loving or even liking this game.

Reading rather damning Kotaku report on CIG internal gameplay design processes (I won't link here, find it under last posts giant SC thread in offtopic games forum) I can't praise enough hard work by designers Sandro, Mike Evans and producers to get gameplay vetted out and delivered. People will complain for FD aiming low, lacking tailoring. Hardly ever people say thank you, because when they happy they don't care, but when they find something to obsess over, they will blame you and shame you and say your game is worth nothing.

Designing games are very hard. Much harder that crunching code. Much harder than making nice PR videos and sketches of omg nice ships. People speculate how devs could do this or do that, but it is really our wishlist and nothing else. If you want to make judgement on FD delivery, you have to compare to others. Because it is not about you feeling good and justified feeling angry. It is about what in real life can make this plan work.

FD can.

 

[dynamicbob]

Frontier just need to hire some more content / programmers / background simulation development types and the game will be great

 

[Wicz]

The fact that people think the model needs defending ( in multiple threads everyday ) should be ringing alarm bells. That is of course if those bells have had chance to stop ringing after the PP release and the new "season" fundraiser announcement.

I do not enjoy the core of ED a lot, and I want to see it improved upon before I'm prepared to spend more money.

I'm also not interested in what CIG are doing when I'm talking about ED.

For me, entertainment is all about how I feel.

Just thinking aloud.

 

[noodle]

"Thank you"? Erm.... I paid for this. I didn't receive a gift.

 

[Zelos1983]

FD failed to meet kickstarter goals and deliver the single player offline mode.
It's low aiming led to the comparatively small amount of money collected through kickstarter.

Only in the last few weeks have the servers become stable enough to allow for a smooth gameplay.

So with a great game, they are just barely scraping the bottom of what I find acceptable. I truly hope they will continue to improve development in the future and make Horizons a success.

 

[Bokugo]

"They deliver a product"

So does that pizza place that doesn't understand the concept of gravities effects on pizza when it's fall on it's side. They delivered a product too, one I paid for, that wasn't what I was expecting, and would have been much more enjoyable if they actually cared. Seeing as that place "burned" me a few times already my good faith with them is up and I will either wait an extra 20 minutes for the next pizza place or just go without. Not eating pizza isn't the worst thing in the world.

Delivering a product doesn't mean much when it's a bad one.

 

[Gidio]

A lot of people understand the problem with designing a game and that it takes time to make something.
What baffles me is how they can then release something like Powerplay, which is a tacked on, unnecessarily complicated and convoluted system, instead of adding the basic mechanics that people have been asking for since day one.

Instead of spending man hours on Powerplay, they could have spent it on improving the background simulation, or adding some social aspects, or even creating more diversity in existing assets.

It's not that FD can't do it, of course they can, they have the knowledge and expertise. It's that they choose to spend all that knowledge on things that no one wanted and no one asked for.

 

[Moriarte]

FD can.

Not bad. I want to point out that most people criticise out of love for the game. Personally, I found that the "vertical slice" nonsense doesn't work for me. Yeah, yeah, it's cool to be a beta-tester once in a while, but switching on a game in 2015 and finding that basic features I used to enjoy back in 1995 (1995, CARL!) are flat out missing on release with no solid ETA is rather .. well .. laughable for the fan of the series. That's my criticism anyway - wrong choice of priority structure. (And British working hours!!!) If you take NMS guys - they seem to be nearing their release stage with all the basic stuff in and will develop upon that solid foundation. So, it can be done. Yes, I know, cartoony graphics. Neglect that, consider the structure and dedication to bring forward important pieces of the bare minimum. Making super-cool graphics on release, for example, is completely unimportant. And even futile, as we can see from the consecutive downgrade.

All in all, good job, FD! I'll be surely checking back once in a while to see what you, computer wizards, are tweaking in that massive galaxy of yours. Hope I didn't spoil all the fun of praising FD.

Peace.

 

[Hell Razor5543]

While there have been (and still are) some things that bug me (such as server errors), I keep coming back to play (well, I have yet to leave really; my Xbox is wondering what it has done to offend me, as it hasn't been turned on since Christmas!). Why? Simple really; it is (despite the problems) a VERY GOOD GAME. I haven't tried the Power Play scenarios, as I keep helping new Commanders (so I don't want to find areas off-limits to me), and I have yet to try mining or proper exploring (smuggling and piracy are currently of no interest to me), but I know there is depth there (and more to come). I am in it for the long run (so I bought the Lifetime Expansion Pass!). Thanks FD for such a good game (warts and all)

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

"Thank you"? Erm.... I paid for this. I didn't receive a gift.

I pay for meal in restaurant. Doesn't mean I won't say thank you if I am fine with service and meal delivered.

 

[Crimson Kaim]

ED is atleast having progress. Other games suffer from fix-patches after fix-patches. ED delivers something that is playable. THoug htey are a little bit too slow for my taste atm, as long as this doesn't remain in this slow speed, I am fine.

But yea, FD(ED gets things done and that isn't self-understanding today.

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

FD failed to meet kickstarter goals and deliver the single player offline mode.

Offline mode wasn't KS goal. It was something they added later. KS also carried disclaimer about posibility that some of things might failed to be produced.

It's low aiming led to the comparatively small amount of money collected through kickstarter.

They didn't aim low. They didn't promise sky because they were aware of consequences if they fail to deliver.

Only in the last few weeks have the servers become stable enough to allow for a smooth gameplay.

Never had issues with servers in last months.

 

[Moriarte]

Offline mode wasn't KS goal. It was something they added later.

And that is why we chuck it out of our heads, right?

KS also carried disclaimer about posibility that some of things might failed to be produced.

It's great that people pop up and explain to us peasants the writing underneath in small letters. So kind of you.

 

[Asrar]

ED is a great game with a massive fundament, FD did a great job, but they needed to act like they did.. such a massive game needs funds.. Power play certanly was to early as well, but increasing the fundament you can build on isnt wrong. Power Play will be great for pvp in future, you needed a part like this where players meet, because the galaxy otherwhise is to big, ppl would get lost and flaming that they never see someone.. PP is the perfect way to lead ppl to eachother, if enemy or friend, since not everyone is a clan player. FD is going the right way, setting a decent fundament, increasing it a bit and then fix what the comunity is putting in a wish list, by setting own priorities.

The game works, wings, sim, multi player pvp, factions, planetary landings coming, and they even put a pilot in the seat of a ship because ppl where asking for it, and yeah you see your paint from the cockpit now like asp, also the comunity was asking for it.
The Ships are beeing tuned, new ships added for beginners, mid players, endplayers, all pretty balanced int therms of possiblity of maneuvers and firepower.

ppl flamed why having a bigger ship when a viper can do the job as well and bigger ships dont really have an advantage.. in the same breath they flamed about shield cells, now you know why you buying a bigger ship, because you can hold more shieldbanks and you can tank way longer and have a bit more firepower.. so a bigger ship now is worth a buy, because the shield cells let you stay longer in fight, you can deliver more dps or you just have a better alrounder. this was not that good as everyone just filled every ship with multiple SCB, this now you just can do with the bigger pots and ok the courier ;-)

so all in all they do a good job, but every job needs time and funds, so before flaming (i flamed for more cockpit variety because i dont like the two seats, i like to sit in the mid ;-)

 

[Yaffle]

Moved to off topic as this is about game development, not specifically discussing Elite Dangerous.

 

[Zelos1983]

Offline mode wasn't KS goal. It was something they added later. KS also carried disclaimer about posibility that some of things might failed to be produced.

It was (as can be seen on the KS page), and the fact that KS may or may not carry a disclaimer doesn't change the fact that they didn't deliver.

They didn't aim low. They didn't promise sky because they were aware of consequences if they fail to deliver.

With a 32bit architecture that's really heavy on a single thread, lack of multi-plattform (currently) support, lack of multi-screen support (excluding Xineramaesque configurations where the driver aggregates multiple monitors to a single screen), they aimed low. Towards old machines, with virtually no significant memory usage. Just have a look at other big players in the software industry, where stuff frequently runs native on different architectures with devs really caring about optimizations and feedback from their customers.

I know, not everyone is a technical person and it might be hard to understand that.

Never had issues with servers in last months.

So you didn't play ;-).

In essence, they still have a great product, but it could have been so much more. They wanted to rush it to the market, didn't deliver on promised features, used outdated tech and the support is also lacking compared to other competitors. Now that they finally got airborne (more or less), they have to gain altitude. And I hope they will, because I like the game. I'm just not a fanboy.

Not saying "thank you" is also an issue of communication. When bug reports are ignored time and again, people are "silenced" and FD doesn't communicate at all with their customers, people will not say "thank you" even if they like the game in general. On other games that are in development I get a "thank you" when I properly report bugs and point out issues, so I include "thank you"s in my feedback as well for jobs well done.

 

[noodle]

I pay for meal in restaurant. Doesn't mean I won't say thank you if I am fine with service and meal delivered.

I think you'd say "thank you" to FD regardless of the quality of dish they delivered. Also, your personal level of satisfaction does not invalidate the concerns of others, and nor does it imply that everyone is obliged to feel grateful to a commercial company for undertaking an endeavour that is designed to make them wealthy.

 

[Patrick_68000]

Moved to off topic as this is about game development, not specifically discussing Elite Dangerous.

Then, perhaps in the forum of video games ?

 

[beelbeebub]

It was (as can be seen on the KS page), and the fact that KS may or may not carry a disclaimer doesn't change the fact that they didn't deliver.

Really? They clearly set out that sometimes in game development (or indeed any kind of development process) things that appear feasible at the start turn out to be unfeasible to deliver. That's why it's called "development", you have to develop the idea. The only way you can know 100% that you can do something is if you have already done it before (and even then there is uncertainty). If you have already done something before you are not developing, you are already manufacturing an existing product.
.
That is why kickstarter is explicit that some features may not make it into the final product. As long as good faith efforts on the part of the developer were made (i.e. they actually tried and didn't spend the money on fast cars and slow horses) then they have met their obligations.

With a 32bit architecture that's really heavy on a single thread, lack of multi-plattform (currently) support, lack of multi-screen support (excluding Xineramaesque configurations where the driver aggregates multiple monitors to a single screen), they aimed low. Towards old machines, with virtually no significant memory usage. Just have a look at other big players in the software industry, where stuff frequently runs native on different architectures with devs really caring about optimizations and feedback from their customers.

I know, not everyone is a technical person and it might be hard to understand that.

As you are a technical person you would understand:

• That 64bit is not always better than 32bit. In fact you could explain to us in what circumstances 64bit is better to use than 32bit, and what circumstances 32bit is better than 64bit.
• That "aiming low, towards older machine with virtually no significant memory usage" is far more skilful than just requiring a top end machine
• That being released on PC, Mac and Xbox means a game is multiplatform.
• That most multiplatform and many single platform games use a game engine that is ported across platforms

 

[CMDR Crustatious Cornelius Pig]

FD failed to meet kickstarter goals and deliver the single player offline mode.
It's low aiming led to the comparatively small amount of money collected through kickstarter.

Only in the last few weeks have the servers become stable enough to allow for a smooth gameplay.

So with a great game, they are just barely scraping the bottom of what I find acceptable. I truly hope they will continue to improve development in the future and make Horizons a success.

1. Ok, they didn't meet that goal. They also explained why this became a unattainable goal. It was a goal not a promise.

2. They didn't aim low they aimed at what realistically could be done.

3. I have no idea what you are talking about. My experience playing elite has been quite good. there have been some outages....just like any other game under constant development and change.

4. I agree and state I have NO doubt they will be supporting ED for years to come.