No new ships conspiracy thread

[d8veh]

There’s someone, somewhere who thinks I am an idiot for branding hauler a trash ship. I am sure it brings visual pleasure and just works flawlessly for someone out there. S

The hauler is a great ship for noobs to leave the starter system. You can use it immediatelty to go on a "Road to Riches " tour, or as a taxi to get you to Ngalinn to make enough to get your fleet carrier in a week. I always get one straight away when I'm testing new fastest start methods. After that, I've never found a reason to keep one. Maybe a noob could use one to do the Guardian unlocks if they didn't have enough money for a DBX. Once you have a few million, the best thing for them is target practice (as targets).

 

[Darrack]

So why does Drew Wagar think SC is far more fun than Elite these days?

Only one star though.... oof...

Because its HIS opinion, like everyone has their own opinion.
Personally i think Elite is one of the best games ever made but that's MY opinion.
Its always good to have different opinions but whats amazing for some is rubbish for others

O7

 

[Cmdr Esteban]

See if you can duck this one. All we've had in the last 4 years are dolls to dress up and dolls houses to put them in, and you're asking for more of it. Some of us would prefer a space game to play.

Ouch. Nope, couldn’t duck that one. This forum game desperately needs better cover mechanics, like Odyssey.

 

[gorankar]

Not here for the conspiracy, just want to throw it out there that I really, really, want a Panther and Imperial Explorer.

I don't even mind if the IExplorer is a mini carrier with a small pad that can't land on a station, only the ground outside settlements, and is reliant on a small ships to ferry goods to and from space stations.

 

[varonica]

170 ships??? Wow, I definitely need to give SC a go during the next free fly. Hey, I have a question, and believe it or not it is on topic to this thread (see my last post). Does SC have NPCs flying around in those 170 ships? Like I said about Elite, I don't personally need to own even seven ships, let alone 170, but being a universe where I can encounter 170 ships (flown by NPCs) really tickles my fancy.

And when I say "flying around", I mean general air traffic like Elite models around stations.

Well you can't fly all of them, many of them are just JPG's, around 120 are flyable in game I believe.

 

[varonica]

Well you can't fly all of them, many of them are just JPG's, around 120 are flyable in game I believe.

Actually let me add, when I say flyable, you can get in them and take off, what happens then is random. Blow up? Possibly, fall through the floor, there's a good chance of that, stick your head through the canopy and die of oxygen deprivation, easily done, but there's also a chance you may be able to fly it around a bit, so at least there's that!

 

[Moriarte]

Actually let me add, when I say flyable, you can get in them and take off, what happens then is random. Blow up? Possibly, fall through the floor, there's a good chance of that, stick your head through the canopy and die of oxygen deprivation, easily done, but there's also a chance you may be able to fly it around a bit, so at least there's that!

Yeah, that’s the problem with those overly ambitious projects, like Elite and SC. They will take a lifetime to get on foot. It looked possible, 8 years ago, to populate galaxy with activity and wonder. In reality both companies, after burning heaps of cash, delivered their own brand of space demo. It became abundantly clear in later years, that with current rate of progress it might as well take another 20. Or, more likely, this isn’t endeavour for a small studio, but rather ambition should match resources. Someone like EA or Microsoft are likelier to succeed at a task of that scope.

I remember reading about squadron 42 back in 2012. 10 years flew by, people are still waiting for it. Teasing people with a carrot for 10 years straight - it’s not even funny. That’s what I mean what I say that ambition should match capabilities. ED ran into exactly the same “scale” problem. Atmospheric planets? Forget it, in this decade at least.

 

[Maolagin]

Sometimes I wonder why the flow of new ships suddenly stopped 4 years ago.

Back to the original question - my theory is Odyssey. The last new ships launched right around the time they would have been starting serious development work on Ody. In fact, Carriers are really the only significant new asset to come to Horizons at all after that point in time. The fact that Ody ships originally had a wide array of novel geometry and texture glitches and entirely reworked collision meshes suggests that they did need some individualized work to bring them to the new rendering and on-foot physics system. (Compare to Horizons surface settlements, which do not appear to have changed in Ody, and which look pretty bad up close.) So I find it quite plausible that they imposed a moratorium on introducing new ship models once that work got underway. I wouldn't be surprised if we don't get new ships again until after the client merge, because they only want to build them once for the updated engine.

Sure, we have some, but then again they’re not That hard to make

There's a neat video talking about the process. It seems like a fair bit of work!

I am sure releasing a new ship will bring back some people (and their friends) to try it out

Geez why does every post making a straightforward suggestion these days have to frame it as "this one weird trick will bring back the players"?

 

[Old Duck]

Well you can't fly all of them, many of them are just JPG's, around 120 are flyable in game I believe.

In the world of NFTs, I'm not overly surprised that people actually fall for this (dismayed, yes, but not surprised). Still 120 ships is pretty cool, assuming it's not "12 classes of 10 ships each that are basically the same except the size of the spoiler" trick that Elite uses for a couple of its ships.

But if there's no NPC traffic, then to me that negates much of the appeal of having this many ships. As I said in a different post, I don't want to own a lot of ships (I'm a minimalist), but I love the idea of encountering lots of different ships in my travels. I feel similar IRL, where I bemoan the fact that almost all cars look the same these days within there own class (all SUVs look the same, all pickup trucks look the same, etc). We need more Elon Musk Cybertrucks to break up the monopoly, LOL.

 

[HappyMoonMonkey]

Arguably it would be simpler to create lots more NPC ships of different flavours. Some of which could then be further developed into player ships if popular. For NPCs only exterior is required. Significantly less sound scheme. That would be a cool way of leading new ships in.

 

[Old Duck]

Arguably it would be simpler to create lots more NPC ships of different flavours. Some of which could then be further developed into player ships if popular. For NPCs only exterior is required. Significantly less sound scheme. That would be a cool way of leading new ships in.

Frontier could also "copy and paste" some flight models, for example, a NPC-only Gecko might have a Viper III flight model, and the average player would never notice (as an outside observer watching NPCs fly) because it's just another small fighter. I am more bothered by the fact that NPCs fly Anacondas like they are Vipers, and those should in theory have radically different flight models (and their pilots should as well), so a Gecko sharing the Viper's flight model would be no issue at all in comparison.

 

[Rat Catcher]

I wouldn't object to new ships, provided they had a role, rather than the plethora of multi-role ships we already have in game.
Tempered, naturally, by commenting that perhaps gameplay could be enhanced beforehand.

 

[Urbanski101]

Well they could even cheat abit as they've done in the past. Use variants like an Asp Military edition (sleeker, faster, lower jump range, less internal slots, better armed and armoured) as they appeared / were described in the original Elite.

There are also a bunch of other ships from previous games that haven't yet appeared in ED, Boa, Moray, Lion, Panther, Falcon etc...

My feeling is that they are wholly concentrated on fixing Odyssey which I guess is the right thing to do but if they want some positive attention for ED, a new ship or two would probably be more achievable than any further DLC.

 

[Trollymctrollerson]

I think adding compelling new ways to use the existing ships should be a higher priority. On the other hand, it would be cool to have like 5 or 6 variants of all ships.

 

[Lateralus]

So why does Drew Wagar think SC is far more fun than Elite these days?

Only one star though.... oof...

He got treated badly by Fdev as they started cutting him out of narrative decisions. Think Fdev were salty over the whole salome saga (I personally found it hilarious). I guess they drove him towards their competitor..

 

[Screemonster]

I honestly wouldn't mind ships that are literal copies of other ships in terms of stats, just with a different model and hitbox/hardpoint placements.
Especially if they're things like "this ship is broadly similar to the clipper in terms of stats - it has better hardpoint grouping, placing the large hardpoints centreline above and below like the FAS, but the engines are mounted on the ends of the wings which makes them more vulnerable from the front similar to the alliance medium ships"

You know, stuff that doesn't affect their on-paper stats but would make them a very different experience to actually fly.

 

[Chaparral]

7 year old game.

Odyssey last DLC for this iteration of ED.

Ships are a lot of work. Models, sound design, integration with every weapon animation, thermal and power profiling, balancing, etc.

Work = financial resources.

FDEV

FDEV is still fooling around trying to decide if they want to do Thargoid foot combat on an FPS that has extremely modest participation relative to the ship game*.

*Daily numbers are consistent with pre-Odyssey participation levels. This means very small numbers (at best) of new players have been recruited to EDO over the pre-EDO participation.

My conclusion: Raxxla will be found before a new ship is introduced to the game.

 

[HappyMoonMonkey]

7 year old game.

Odyssey last DLC for this iteration of ED.

Ships are a lot of work. Models, sound design, integration with every weapon animation, thermal and power profiling, balancing, etc.

Work = financial resources.

FDEV
View attachment 304807

FDEV is still fooling around trying to decide if they want to do Thargoid foot combat on an FPS that has extremely modest participation relative to the ship game*.

*Daily numbers are consistent with pre-Odyssey participation levels. This means very small numbers (at best) of new players have been recruited to EDO over the pre-EDO participation.

My conclusion: Raxxla will be found before a new ship is introduced to the game.

Well that didn't take long.... DOOOOOOMMM!

Lol.

Pretty sure I'd put money on new ships appearing in game before Raxxla is found. The appearance of the Mamba Lite and Panther LX in game recently, albeit with hacks, are proof that concepts have been worked on. We just have to wait to get to that bit of the story...

 

[Darrack]

Well that didn't take long.... DOOOOOOMMM!

Lol.

Pretty sure I'd put money on new ships appearing in game before Raxxla is found. The appearance of the Mamba Lite and Panther LX in game recently, albeit with hacks, are proof that concepts have been worked on. We just have to wait to get to that bit of the story...

I found Raxxla a month ago, was i supposed to tell someone?

O7

 

[BigBANGtheory [VR]]

I found Raxxla a month ago, was i supposed to tell someone?

Only in game