So, I've been wandering. I've seen some pretty cool things. Saw a five-star system, with three brown dwarfs in tight orbit. Saw a gas giant with twin moons orbiting so close I almost crashed flying between them. I've flown so far below the galactic plane now, the entire sky is divided neatly into blue and gold halves.
And I've seen a whole truckload of generic icy planets, rocky planets, rocks, more rocks, way more rocks, chunks of ice, and some rocks with some chunks of ice.
At this point, I'm thinking back to Freelancer's (admittedly heavily-stylised) space scenery and rather wishing Elite could pull off a bit more variety.
As such, here's my personal wish list (feel free to add your own):
* Massive, solitary asteroids. The kind you could land on (when that's eventually implemented) and start listening to Aerosmith. Maybe with cavernous holes in them, perfect for secret smuggler bases and death-defying chases.
* Massive space-icebergs for much the same reason.
* Asteroid bases in general, and large-scale mining operations - maybe with some mega-sized NPC mining ships with big chompy rock-crushing mouth bits you could accidentally fly into.
* Comets. You already have the particle effects in place, used by ships in supercruise.
* Greater asteroid/iceteroid diversity in rings (big ones, small ones), with maybe some little teeny chunks that would hit your shields and bounce off in a satisfying way.
* Major, devastating celestial events in progress. Half-destroyed planets that have collided with things, or been hit by massive asteroids. Planets passing through debris belts, whose skies are alight with meteorite showers.
* Junkyards and *artificial* debris fields. Mankind has spread across thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of systems. The implied population growth is staggering - the inevitable result would be a whole lot of wars, and a whole lot of ships lost at "sea". Some *old* shipwrecks would be nice.
* Minefields left in the wake of prior conflicts. Abandoned, derelict stations whose automated defences have gone a little crazy.
* Environmental effects beyond simple star proximity - maybe anomalous fields of radiation that would cause all ships to lose shield power, or mess with sensors, or reduce thruster power, or cause FSD interruptions.
* Full-scale accretion discs - dangerous, but full of resources.
Oh, I know. It would be a while before any of this stuff was implemented even if they were planning on it. But I can dream.
And I've seen a whole truckload of generic icy planets, rocky planets, rocks, more rocks, way more rocks, chunks of ice, and some rocks with some chunks of ice.
At this point, I'm thinking back to Freelancer's (admittedly heavily-stylised) space scenery and rather wishing Elite could pull off a bit more variety.
As such, here's my personal wish list (feel free to add your own):
* Massive, solitary asteroids. The kind you could land on (when that's eventually implemented) and start listening to Aerosmith. Maybe with cavernous holes in them, perfect for secret smuggler bases and death-defying chases.
* Massive space-icebergs for much the same reason.
* Asteroid bases in general, and large-scale mining operations - maybe with some mega-sized NPC mining ships with big chompy rock-crushing mouth bits you could accidentally fly into.
* Comets. You already have the particle effects in place, used by ships in supercruise.
* Greater asteroid/iceteroid diversity in rings (big ones, small ones), with maybe some little teeny chunks that would hit your shields and bounce off in a satisfying way.
* Major, devastating celestial events in progress. Half-destroyed planets that have collided with things, or been hit by massive asteroids. Planets passing through debris belts, whose skies are alight with meteorite showers.
* Junkyards and *artificial* debris fields. Mankind has spread across thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of systems. The implied population growth is staggering - the inevitable result would be a whole lot of wars, and a whole lot of ships lost at "sea". Some *old* shipwrecks would be nice.
* Minefields left in the wake of prior conflicts. Abandoned, derelict stations whose automated defences have gone a little crazy.
* Environmental effects beyond simple star proximity - maybe anomalous fields of radiation that would cause all ships to lose shield power, or mess with sensors, or reduce thruster power, or cause FSD interruptions.
* Full-scale accretion discs - dangerous, but full of resources.
Oh, I know. It would be a while before any of this stuff was implemented even if they were planning on it. But I can dream.
