No Single Player offline Mode then?

[Hermit]

after spending all these months putting up with clunky and stuttering code, after paying way over the odds for the dream of a game from your youth .... would you like to see it plastered all over piratebay or kickass ? i know i wouldn't

Wasn't Braben once quoted as saying that piracy in the far east did his company the world of good because it promoted his software cheaply without the need for expensive regional offices?

 

[SJT]

What are the other reasons?

I see 3.

1. Not having regular access to the internet.

2. Having a poor connection.

3. Being worried FD will shut down servers in a few years.


Reason 1 is valid and should get refunds if desired.

No excuse for 2 in 2014.

Anyone who believes in 3 shouldn't have supported anyhow.

2. I dunno, what's the net connection like in Botswana?

 

[Zephyriel]

I seriously hope the amount of discontentment on this forum will make FD reconsider their decision. It might require additional time and effort, but I won't believe them if they say it's technically impossible to make the game run totally offline. Sure, you won't have injected events, dynamic markets and other online-driven stuff, but whatever, you still get the ships, the gameplay, the missions, the whole galaxy, and you can play it just like any other single player space game.

I'm sure people who simply can't play online would be happy with that. And, again, we'll all be happy with that once the servers are no longer up. This might be very long term thinking and might seem early to some since the game isn't even released yet, but it WILL happen eventually, and I know there are some nostalgic players like myself who will still want to load the game in 20 years. I mean, isn't half of this community composed of people who still love the Elite that came out 20 years ago?

 

[MarkSC]

Just my own view, but I really do feel like this is being blown out of proportion by the vocal minority that want fully offline play. I understand it's frustrating to have that rug ripped out from underneath you, but for a lot of people misinterpreting this issue:

SOLO PLAY WILL STILL BE AVAILABLE

You'll just require an internet connection to play the game.

But only for as long as FD is around to maintain the servers. The marketplace is littered with online games that now can't be played because the developer is gone.

 

[LucyFer]

Blatantly wrong.

I stand by it.

 

[philux]

Although this is 2014, there are a lot of remote places in the US with flaky internet connection and people who are out of a constant connection for month due to their profession, such as military personnel overseas,
Hence, w/o offline mode this game becomes pointless for them.

 

[Juniper]

The online servers provide all of the data and processing for the galaxy, interactions between players and all transactions of value. Without it there isn't a game. We always intended that the way to play the game would be online. We had hoped that we could do an offline variant, but as the game progressed the online requirement superseded that. It wasn't an easy choice to make, but to stay true to the game we set out to make we had to make this choice.

Michael

In other words, you made the promise of an offline mode during the Kickstarter in order to get people's money (people did pledge big on the basis that there would be an offline mode - I myself have pledged nearly a grand all told, and that is a lot of money for me), and then once development started you decided that you were only interested in online & designed the game to be completely in that direction.

Can you see what is wrong with this picture? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?

This was simply not a choice that was available to you, difficult or not. Whatever your vision for the game, it had to meet the base requirements set out in the Kickstarter, as money changed hands on that basis. To do otherwise is simply dishonest... at best.

Whatever the legal ramifications of this move are, in terms of refunds etc, or whether "contracts" have been broken or not, this has severely damaged Frontier's reputation.

Above all, it is a serious betrayal of trust. I don't think the game, or Frontier, will recover quickly from this.

It really is that important.

 

[Completely Harmless]

Offline mode would mean. No updates at all. no planetary landings or walking around.

Not quite, is they would make only one version of the game -- in which you could go online and play, or not. Patches and expansions would not affect this at all, unless you choose to not buy an expansion, of course, in which case it would not matter if you were online or not any way.

 

[Erna Jedermann]

It's all down to actual real life piracy and the need to try and protect our / Frontier's investment ... the need to connect to the servers from time to time is more to do with DRM than downloading data from the ever evolving universe, although this matters too.

and before you all start shouting about how you've bought your copy and should be able to play it without connecting to the net, just ask yourself this one question ...

after spending all these months putting up with clunky and stuttering code, after paying way over the odds for the dream of a game from your youth .... would you like to see it plastered all over piratebay or kickass ?
i know i wouldn't

It is not the problem to be short online for a check if I have all proper license or so....I DON´T want Play ALLWAYS ONLINE.....I will play alone ....maybe with trusted RL Firends, but in General alone!!! WITH out Impact from Others in the Galaxy because they have more time or no life or anything else....

 

[SJT]

I stand by it.

You'll fall over.

 

[supersane]

You can't have a soft release with an offline mode. Because the game would be judged by a moment frozen in time, instead of the "we can fix this in 6 months" style of modern online gaming. Imagine if BF4 ppl never updated a patch from what was shipped in box.

 

[LucyFer]

2. I dunno, what's the net connection like in Botswana?

Variable.

Seems foolish to me to buy a dynamic, multiplayer game in 2014 with a poor internet connection.

Just my opinion.

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -

You'll fall over.

Guess FD ultimately agree.

 

[Skeloton]

I seriously hope the amount of discontentment on this forum will make FD reconsider their decision. It might require additional time and effort, but I won't believe them if they say it's technically impossible to make the game run totally offline. Sure, you won't have injected events, dynamic markets and other online-driven stuff, but whatever, you still get the ships, the gameplay, the missions, the whole galaxy, and you can play it just like any other single player space game.

I'm sure people who simply can't play online would be happy with that. And, again, we'll all be happy with that once the servers are no longer up. This might be very long term thinking and might seem early to some since the game isn't even released yet, but it WILL happen eventually, and I know there are some nostalgic players like myself who will still want to load the game in 20 years. I mean, isn't half of this community composed of people who still love the Elite that came out 20 years ago?

Yeah from what I understand this was not a technical decision but a design one. They didn't want to design a static version of the same game without many of the fancy doodads of the online components.

 

[FX2K]

In the UK there was a ZX Spectrum 16k or 48K computer.

if you download a PC emulator you can play the original Elite from 84. (Or try your hand at the original on a BBC emulator)

Also available here via frontier's store...
https://store.zaonce.net/elite1984.html

 

[kenny_brocklestein]

HOW LONG !!!!!!!! Its not fair for the real Multiplayer if I can cheat solo (do all with NOrisk...and than If I have enough, I try a little bit...if it too heavy back in safe solo ...)and it is Cheating to use the same Charakter in 3 Differnt Enviorments.

Bummer you can't make other people play the way you want them to. Guess you'll have to take your ball and go home?

 

[Edward Lewis]

Hello everyone,

Just a quick one to remind everyone to be good to each other on these forums. I'm all for intelligent debate, but I'm not happy with people insulting each other.

Please understand that the moderators don't have access to this information before it is released, so they can't be held accountable for any decisions that have or haven't been made by Frontier. Any abusive messages aimed their way will be dealt with accordingly.

Cheers,

Ed

 

[yibble]

I don't know about everyone else, but for me, I funded a project not a finished article. Projects change over time either due to scope change, economical constraints, time constraints, and even through discovery that the initial brief cannot be wholly delivered. I'm ok with the changes announced, because I did not expect a monolithic unchanging project, I expected an iterative approach to the project.

Again, my Kickstarter money was to assist in funding the project. If I wanted to buy a finished game that would be unchanging, I'd have purchased one that was already developed and released.

 

[LucyFer]

I don't know about everyone else, but for me, I funded a project not a finished article. Projects change over time either due to scope change, economical constraints, time constraints, and even through discovery that the initial brief cannot be wholly delivered. I'm ok with the changes announced, because I did not expect a monolithic unchanging project, I expected an iterative approach to the project.

Again, my Kickstarter money was to assist in funding the project. If I wanted to buy a finished game that would be unchanging, I'd have purchased one that was already developed and released.

Well said.

 

[reload]

But only for as long as FD is around to maintain the servers. The marketplace is littered with online games that now can't be played because the developer is gone.

And yet there are games like Dark Age of Camelot which launched in 2001 and are still perfectly playable 13 years later. Mythic Entertainment were bought out and folded in to EA, and later reformed as Broadsword. Their server architecture has gone through innumerable changes, and there is/was a community of server 'shards' which had been reverse-engineered by the community.

But I digress. As others have said: If you think FDEV are going to turn the servers off after a few years, why are you buying this game?

 

[Enride]

But they were working on it! What evidence do you have that, somehow, Frontier did not bother to *try* to implement fully offline? I'm to believe from you they said it and knew right then and there it wasn't going to work out?

Maybe there was no ill intent at all. Perhaps they worked their tails off, but it just didn't work out the way they intended.

Since when is creating an offline game more difficult then an online?

And why not be honest with the reason at least. Most of those who mainly want offline seem to also not care for dynamic universe, changing systems and so on, things we "onliners" havent seen much of so far might i add but thats an entirely dufferent discussion.

It still remains, allowing a simple offline nonupdating, non dynamic gamemode cant be much of a challenge and if it is, why and why not just keep working on it until its ready.

I know nothing of game developing, but nothing can convince me that it would be hard to make a functioning SP if you already have the functioning MP.

Its THEIR idea that the offline wont be good enough, not the disappointed players idea.