not the word's i would have chosen, but the offline mode isn't going to happen. people are going to have to find a way to move on in the end.
No Single Player offline Mode then?
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not the word's i would have chosen, but the offline mode isn't going to happen. people are going to have to find a way to move on in the end.
Personally I am not effected either way, online is good, offline ok too.
But I backed Elite Dangerous, I did not buy it, ie: not a finished game.
And when I did back it, I accepted the risks, might not be even made, might be different to my expectations, but I liked the idea and bought into the idea to help make it happen.
I just fail to see where the word REFUND fits in all this. I took a chance, as did all of you, for better or for worse.
But I backed Elite Dangerous, I did not buy it, ie: not a finished game.
And when I did back it, I accepted the risks, might not be even made, might be different to my expectations, but I liked the idea and bought into the idea to help make it happen.
I just fail to see where the word REFUND fits in all this. I took a chance, as did all of you, for better or for worse.
Yeah, the pre-order is not a problem it seems. They haven't actually used anything. It's the Beta people, because they fall under a different set of laws and HAVE used the beta and didn't actually pay for a actual product. They paid for an idea, and get a product with it later. But to be able to use what they have they have to have internet... meaning they kinda fail on why they want a refund. There are some small exceptions.
I WISH there was a debate ongoing, i really do.
But instead this is rinse and repeat every single argument over and over.
There is no way to break out of this cycle except for massive refunds or the implementation of an offline mode.
(same did apply to an excuse from the CEO until yesterday)
This is not a debate, this is demands, masked as a debate.
Seriously, someone's going to have to enlighten me on this point.
Please, tell me... why would someone pay more for beta access... and then not play that beta? Wouldn't that be a pretty bloody stupid thing to do? Are we supposed to be in the business of throwing away money or something?
As said before, I'm not pushing for a refund, despite being gutted at their decision, but the notion that people who bought in to the beta aren't getting refunds because they've actually played it... what?!
Nonsensical beyond words.
Wow. So the game has already gone Free To Play.
I thought it would take at least 3 months.
Microtransactions have already been hinted at... for cosmetic items. At first.
They are really going all out with the MMO clichés.
You buy all corporate spin you run across, yes? I have some swamp land in Florida to sell you.
And actually providing the product you advertised and sold doesn't matter either, eh? I think there are several government agencies in every country who see that differently.
And you call those who want to be able to save their game locally when they feel like it and be able to return to a previous save a minority all you want. If the minority is legally right, you can't just steam-roll them, cause god forbid, developer time would be "wasted" keeping an agreement made with the people who funded you?
You are the kind of person who is enabling corporations world wide to get ever more feisty and leave consumers in the dust whenever it suits them.
They always knew that an online game and an offline game are two different animals, with one being just a client that merely renders and the other actually being a complete, self contained game.
Distributing a complete game simply doesn't fit in their new business model anymore. They're thinking of permanent cash shop income, maybe supplanting tired old EVE (which does need a replacement).
A cash shop won't be far behind. The paint jobs are just the start. (And you can't even look at your ship from the outside, except when upgrading stuff on it) They'll sell credits and whatever else the market will bear. New cash is king and old cash has already been collected. Obligations? Like every other corporate foam whipper, they can give a lukewarm fart.
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Frontier is a 20 year old, profitable and debt free company that has released over 20 games. Elite has continually exceeded expectations, and received a very positive response from audience and reviewers.
Despite these facts, you and some others behave like the company is about to fold any moment now. Do you have any idea how ridiculous it sounds? You are trying to push a narrative about how everything is now doomed because of the lack of off-line mode, and no facts seem to matter in the story.
I did and other than using more words it told us nothing beyond what the by-the-way remark in the newsletter did.
Granted, it's not a debate (I didn't call it as such, just quoted it in the reply), but whatever it is, it needs to continue, because nothing says you made a bad call like firing up your game's official forum and a thread like this is - yet again - right up there at the top.
Hanlon's razor assumes incompetence over malice, meaning that they failed to communicate despite building multiplayer in from the get go. It's been made clear that the decision is not a technical one, it's a creative one. There's nothing showstoppery that would prevent FDEV from providing an offline mode, save FDEV themselves compromising on THE VISIONᵀᴹ. So let's get that part out of the way, David's gone on record now as making it clear that it's all about curating the galaxy and making it "Dynamic" and "Ever evolving" and <insert weeble buzzwords>. That much I can get behind, and to an extent accept, as much as I disagree with it. David wants to play buzzword bingo with his creation at the expense of the oldies like me who fondly remember a galaxy on a BBC Micro, fine, his call.
However their treatment of people concerning refunds can be explained using Occam's razor, namely they're just being a bunch of corporate <BLEEP>, because there's no reason for them to act the way they are, hiding behind the T's and C's and using them as a sledgehammer to wallop everyone regardless of legitimacy of their request or complaint and only accept the most narrowly of defined of refund requests. That part is indefensible, and there's no reason whatsoever for FDEV to be acting like that, they can, and should be being the better party in that, and if they were, this thread would be over by now.
Feel free to try and defend their actions concerning refunds, but frankly you'll be defending a company who is as of now, treating their fanbase like a disposable means of income, and not like the people who cared and loved this franchise enough to come together to form this community.
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Then why do all you apologists insist on fanning the flames?
Seriously if you think FD are doing the right / moral / reasonable / fair thing here then just walk away from this topic - if it is just left with people making "demands masked as debate" then pretty soon we'd look like some bad South Park-esque characters just sitting around occasionally exclaiming the equivalent of "they took urr jerrrrrrrrrbs" and the matter would either descend into parody-farce or just die.
Or, is it really that what you are doing is making demands (that we shut up) masked as debate?
And I think you are assuming trust where trust must be earned.
You don't have to speculate or be paranoid when Braben himself has admitted they were struggling long before they made a decision and went public with it:
"As we have developed the game and released Alpha and Beta versions, the work needed to deliver a rich online nature of the game diverged from the requirements of a fully offline game," he said.
"In retrospect we should have shared the fact that we were struggling with this aspect with the community, but we were still trying to find a solution. As features were implemented, for the best results we chose to prioritise delivery of the online single and multiplayer experiences, with a view to providing the offline version later in development. We had to make a decision for the good of the game, and that is what we did.
"We have developed a multiplayer game with an unfolding story involving the players, and groups collaborating with specific objectives and taking account of all players' behaviour. This is what the game is about. Without this it would not be the rich gaming experience that we will deliver, and would be a great disappointment to all players.
"Any offline experience would be fundamentally empty. We could write a separate mission system to allow a limited series of fixed missions, but that would still not be a compelling game, and is only the first step in the mountain of work required.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...cry-over-elite-dangerous-ditched-offline-mode
Sorry, but you mistunderstand that it was also advertised in the official Store to the last minute, and FDEV answered questions about it on the forums well after Kickstarter was finished, telling that offline is in the game.
Thanks, that's good to know. You were a preorder only then, no backing?
In all honesty I didnt read all the thread, its just too big but I did read a big chunk of it. What strikes me most is I think I've read every possible argument one could possibly make on both sides of the argument but one thing that seems to be shockingly missing is that no one seems to be considering Frontier have just been honest with the reason they gave for ultimately not including offline.
I am not sure why its so hard to believe. Frontier designed Elite Dangerous to include a fluctuating market based on actual trade. Missions generated based on surrounding systems current affairs etc.. To do that at the bare minimum it needs to store for every system, price, demand and supply for every commodity. If we take an average of 1 station per each of the 4B systems and 3 bytes of data for each of the 80 or so commodities thats 894GB of data right there. But never mind that The system needs to poll each system periodically and generate missions depending on whats going on so its not just about storing those 900GB of data they need to periodically be accessed by the mission generator. With an average reading speed of 200mb/s of your typical harddisk it would take over an entire hour for the game to just read the data it needs to generate the missions. Each of these missions need to be stored of course. If we take an average of 20 missions per station with the system just storing 2 bytes for the objective and 1 byte for the reward thats another 230GB of data. Thats not all you got exploration too which needs to store which system you visited and which planets have been scanned and which not. Well I think you can see where this is going.
I dont think Frontier were misleading anyone when they said their vision of the game wouldnt easily translate offline. At least not within the vision they have of a dynamic ever evolving universe.
Like They said to do an offline mode they'd need to severely reduce that vision. Now Ironically most reasons I saw for wanting an offline mode that didnt have to do with connection issues or the game's longevity were actually because said people wanted a static universe that didnt change much if at all. So I don't know perhaps frontier's fear of compromising their games vision when delivering an offline mode might actually be unfounded in that by killing all the awesome functionality they're putting in their online version they'd be delivering exactly what that intended audience wants. Maybe thats something they can consider. I am sure it would be much easier to do an offline client if they compromised on all the dynamic elements of the game and that seems to be exactly what a lot of people are asking for. Win/Win ? Dont know just an observasion
I am not sure why its so hard to believe. Frontier designed Elite Dangerous to include a fluctuating market based on actual trade. Missions generated based on surrounding systems current affairs etc.. To do that at the bare minimum it needs to store for every system, price, demand and supply for every commodity. If we take an average of 1 station per each of the 4B systems and 3 bytes of data for each of the 80 or so commodities thats 894GB of data right there. But never mind that The system needs to poll each system periodically and generate missions depending on whats going on so its not just about storing those 900GB of data they need to periodically be accessed by the mission generator. With an average reading speed of 200mb/s of your typical harddisk it would take over an entire hour for the game to just read the data it needs to generate the missions. Each of these missions need to be stored of course. If we take an average of 20 missions per station with the system just storing 2 bytes for the objective and 1 byte for the reward thats another 230GB of data. Thats not all you got exploration too which needs to store which system you visited and which planets have been scanned and which not. Well I think you can see where this is going.
I dont think Frontier were misleading anyone when they said their vision of the game wouldnt easily translate offline. At least not within the vision they have of a dynamic ever evolving universe.
Like They said to do an offline mode they'd need to severely reduce that vision. Now Ironically most reasons I saw for wanting an offline mode that didnt have to do with connection issues or the game's longevity were actually because said people wanted a static universe that didnt change much if at all. So I don't know perhaps frontier's fear of compromising their games vision when delivering an offline mode might actually be unfounded in that by killing all the awesome functionality they're putting in their online version they'd be delivering exactly what that intended audience wants. Maybe thats something they can consider. I am sure it would be much easier to do an offline client if they compromised on all the dynamic elements of the game and that seems to be exactly what a lot of people are asking for. Win/Win ? Dont know just an observasion
47 Staff posts. You have missed it. Would you like to now retract your 'guilt or just total disregard' comment?
[Edit - that's what that Red Elite symbol stands for - staff posts.]
Currently there are 47 Staff posts in this thread, mainly from the Executive Producer.
David is, I think, approaching his 52nd birthday this coming January.
I think it's perfectly likely that within the next 10 years he will sell his controlling interest in Frontier to another investor & retire. If so, that means someone else is running the show. Who knows what they will do?
They're also going down the self-publishing route - they could invest millions in the development of a game that quite simply didn't sell. E: D might even be one of those, it's not exactly certain at this point. That could put the company in jeopardy.
In a capitalist world, and a fickle marketplace, no company is "safe" from going bankrupt. Much bigger companies than Frontier have crashed and burned in a very short space of time - Enron, Ratners (remember how quickly that one died after the CEO said something stupid that honked their customers off?), most of the banks...
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