No new lore in Elite Dangerous Odyssey?

[CMDR_Halceon]

Perhaps Jaques has moved on to a managerial position and lets his adopted cousin run the bar now instead

I assumed there was a better, cooler bar somewhere else in the station that we don't (yet) have access to. How's that for positive?

Also, I'm also appreciating that Galnet lives again. That's also positive.

 

[Darth Ender]

obviously jacques missing is the new mystery.

fdev writers are actually geniuses and left that fact for players to discover organically.

now the search begins for jacques!

where is he? when did he actually disappear? did someone take him? is he alive? is he Salvation? is he a member of the club or dark wheel?

is he your father?

 

[Tikanderoga]

I don't know, personally I stopped caring for the rewards mostly.
If I take part in CGs, I mostly do it for the story.

But that's just me after 7 years, I can absolutely understand that the rewards are a subtile steering tools to other CMDRs.

Well, the story gets influenced by the rewards.
If you look at the participating numbers, like a month ago for when billions were offered for data, you saw 12000 participants in the CG here:

INARA

The community site for Elite: Dangerous, Starfield with the game databases, information, gaming news and other handy content...

inara.cz

Yes, some people delivered for both sides, still an impressive turnout.

Look at the current CG.
No particular reward, just about 1410 participants.

The week before, 5800 participants for new star ports. And no particular reward.

I dare to say only some people are in for the story, but if you want to capture large audience, you better offer an interesting reward.

 

[Rhaazerus Orzhov]

It's good to see that Galnet was revitalized, it's really a core outlet for in-game lore and feels like a believable and needed thing to have.
But it's pretty disappointing to see no real introduction of new lore or even bolstering current game lore and history.
With this new DLC, they introduce Pilots' ability to step out of their ships, new activities, and new companies involved, but no lore about them and no reasons why this space-legs era came about.
Vista Genomics, Apex Interstellar, Frontline Solutions, Supratech, Manticore, Remlok, etc.
But in-game interactions and experiences fail to give story or backstory to any of these groups and people that show up in the galaxy.
I get half of my lore from Galnet and the other half from the Elite Dangerous fandom wiki. Being in-game doesn't explain the in-game world, and not even the Codex gives a mention of all these new companies and/or people. At least not yet.

 

[Valorin]

There's still no codex entry for the infamous so called 'Brewer Corporation' that made all these FC everyone has....

Don't forget the stations. I think they also made the Coriolis ports.
To be honest, this is one of the things I like to have mentioned as little as possible. The idea that in a civilization like Elite's there's one single company manufacturing those carriers doesn't really fly in the first place. It's nice to have an identity to these things and a name behind it, but the fact that we don't have 100 or more different carrier types is a (totally acceptable) video game restriction. The lore part just transports this to the game world, which I don't like.

 

[myothershipisacobraiv]

I'm critical about the DLC, but the "DOOM" cult around everything Tencent do is tiring. I'm not a huge fan of actual Chinese politics at all, but I try to stay realistic.

Tiring in a "we gave away the keys to the kingdom and soon our kingdom could come crashing down?" sort of way?

There's another game I want to play. I was just about to buy Odyssey instead and backburner that game, even though I want to play that one more than this. I was going to get Odyssey not because I particularly really want Odyssey so much right now (my main interest is the new ship stuff), but because of Frontier. I also got a bunch of other games recently and have barely touched any.

Now I read this thread.

One thing that came of this though is that I now know what Yamiks looks like and that he has 8 foot long pirate dreadlocks

 

[cmdr Temeleen]

i think fdev had its hands full making mvp asnalways, cause thy historically cant handle anything bigger even in slightest.

expecting anything lore wise is a bit too optimistic. i mean game runs like turd there are bugs all over and except ultea for capture planets look terrible.

in this steaming pile of beta mess lore is the least of fdev problems as they now need to be getteing the gama into something viable so it can be released on consoles (which in its current state is a realm of "you wish")

 

[Erei]

i think fdev had its hands full making mvp asnalways, cause thy historically cant handle anything bigger even in slightest.

expecting anything lore wise is a bit too optimistic. i mean game runs like turd there are bugs all over and except ultea for capture planets look terrible.

in this steaming pile of beta mess lore is the least of fdev problems as they now need to be getteing the gama into something viable so it can be released on consoles (which in its current state is a realm of "you wish")

The people who works on the lore are not the one who works on bugs. No, trust me, you don't want a writer to start rewriting your code, and you certainly don't want your coder to start writing new lore.

 

[cmdr Temeleen]

The people who works on the lore are not the one who works on bugs. No, trust me, you don't want a writer to start rewriting your code, and you certainly don't want your coder to start writing new lore.

writong lore is nice but implementing it (e.g. tionosla graveyard) isnt writers thing is it? you dont want writers to do implementation do you?

 

[Erei]

writong lore is nice but implementing it (e.g. tionosla graveyard) isnt writers thing is it? you dont want writers to do implementation do you?

Depends on the implementation. Writers are not completely incompetent people, usually. A lot of them learn enough to implement simple stuff.
If you need scripting and new models, yeah that's something else.

 

[cmdr Temeleen]

Depends on the implementation. Writers are not completely incompetent people, usually. A lot of them learn enough to implement simple stuff.
If you need scripting and new models, yeah that's something else.

point remains - i dont think any of this is high on fdev priority list. and yes i know there are multiple departments, yes i know they can work simultaneously... still apparently its not fdev priority.

 

[Awan]

point remains - i dont think any of this is high on fdev priority list. and yes i know there are multiple departments, yes i know they can work simultaneously... still apparently its not fdev priority.

I like to imagine David Braben, kicking back in his comfy recliner at home, and taking like 2 minutes to write a two paragraphs about Zorgon Peterson in a notepad file on his phone in a single evening - then having had that be added into the Codex in any random point patch back in 2019

With how long we've had the codex now missing major articles on very solidly established groups, it's very hard that we can't at least have the Codex fleshed out a bit more. Forget the new stuff, just that alone would be a plus. I can understand your points regarding adding further content which involves assets, new models, audio, etc. etc. etc.

But a notepad worth of text, a small jpeg, and a bit of code for a new entry slot is all I'm asking lol
.
Perhaps the stopgap with the Codex is that they made it voice acted for quality purposes but... for them to add new entries, they feel they shouldn't without the narrator? And that involves money. Perhaps that explains why some articles are missing.

 

[drew]

Writers are not completely incompetent people, usually.

Only occasionally.

Seriously. If you gave me a scripting tool, ability to plonk assets in particular locations and access to the PC dialogue and mission database... there'd be no end to the lore, mystery and story.

I assume Frontier never built these sort of tools into ED, so no one other than a C++ developer can mod the game. So every new 'thing' is a massive dev effort.

Cheers,

Drew.

 

[myothershipisacobraiv]

It's easier to write passable prose than it is to write passable code, but there's more distance between writing fair and writing well than there is between writing poorly and writing passably. You can ship a game on spaghetti code but you can't press a spaghetti book.

Not everything that can be spoken can be written, and penning a large body of work that reads well requires a good deal of skill. Not to mention that to write something which anyone wants to read at all is helped in no small amount by a good bit of talent and creativity. Sadly what is any of that these days? One of the ways games are great is the mix. Literature seems to have lost its place in the mix.

 

[Peter Drakon]

Only occasionally.

Seriously. If you gave me a scripting tool, ability to plonk assets in particular locations and access to the PC dialogue and mission database... there'd be no end to the lore, mystery and story.

I assume Frontier never built these sort of tools into ED, so no one other than a C++ developer can mod the game. So every new 'thing' is a massive dev effort.

Cheers,

Drew.

I'm sure they have a tool, or at least a way for this to be done by none-programmers from home. What they may not have is a way for you to actually try it and test it for your self on the fly. (It's possible you'd have to modify the source code's asset files directly and they would have to re-compile a new version of the game for you to try out.)

Still, if I'm right outsourcing this kind of work may be slow (like you writing stuff and then have to wait weeks to try out) but it would be miles better then the empty nothing we currently have.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Well, the story gets influenced by the rewards.
If you look at the participating numbers, like a month ago for when billions were offered for data, you saw 12000 participants in the CG here:

INARA

The community site for Elite: Dangerous, Starfield with the game databases, information, gaming news and other handy content...

inara.cz

Yes, some people delivered for both sides, still an impressive turnout.

Look at the current CG.
No particular reward, just about 1410 participants.

The week before, 5800 participants for new star ports. And no particular reward.

The type of CG matters as well - mining CGs (this week) are almost always less popular than trade CGs (last week) regardless of reward, plus this one is only just over half-way through and participant numbers tend to rise roughly linearly per day. (And also, people are busy doing the new Odyssey stuff, of course)

You can't add the two sides together in Winters vs Hudson, necessarily, as lots of the more mercenary people will have contributed at least something to both. Hard to say for certain but probably a little under 10,000 total participants, which still is pretty good for a CG week.

I dare to say only some people are in for the story, but if you want to capture large audience, you better offer an interesting reward.

Well, you've hit on a big topic with CGs there: should people primarily be participating for the personal reward or the story/global reward. The two sides don't necessarily get along

 

[yvesmarie]

Sadly what is any of that these days? One of the ways games are great is the mix. Literature seems to have lost its place in the mix.

I dunno... perhaps I'm misunderstanding your point, but for instance I've just recently discovered The Expanse in both its tv and novel forms, and have been quite impressed with its literary merits... as a story it engages the imagination and sense of immersion in a complete & organic universe in a way which i think very few games (if any) are capable of doing...

 

[Badmiker]

There are many talented and dedicated creators engaged with Elite; it'd be great to see their work actually in the game. This could be anything from articles in in-game newspapers to full on DM'd campaigns as Drew's Reclamation. I get that FDev want to retain control over the game (I'd hate to see the multitude of distasteful & gamebreaking mods which blight Skyrim for example) but having part of the creative team at FDev working as curators & gatekeepers to manage community input to the game would be a force multiplier; the work that FDev would invest doing this would be returned many times over in the work that they'd get from the community.

Fundamentally though; all of this is supporting immersion and when FDev doesnt even do gravity consistently then I kinda despair that they're looking further than doing an FPS right now.

 

[Quorthon]

First thing they'd have to do before introducing new lore, is putting in at least the basics of the old lore. I don't even mean big things like Tionisla, but an entry about the Pilots' Federation in the Codex would be kinda nice...
The most central and important institution for us Commanders, and the reason we actually are Commanders is not introduced at all.
They are featured in the new ship tutorial they added with Beyond, and mentioned all the time in Galnet, but if you want to find out who that mysterious organization might be and why they gave you a Sidewinder and all, you won't find it in the database.

I agree with you. I'm pretty sure there is plenty about the Pilot's Federation on the tourist beacons of Shinrarta Dezhra but not being in the Codex is silly.

 

[Bug80]

Isn't it simply like this: Frontier wants to sell Elite to a wider audience.

Lore (related to the player's imagination and immersion) = niche

Action & pew pew = wider audience

So if Frontier has to choose between hiring a writer or a pew pew developer...

(I am not saying it's a wise decision)