Ship designs

CmdrBond

CmdrBond
Just had a look at some of SC's trailers.

Now I am up for some healthy competition, and good luck to them (they have the cash after all).

but there is something about their ships I don't like - I can't place what it is though.

Maybe it is just the upbringing on elite style wedges!

That is all.
 

Rashoumon

Rashoumon
Well SC design choice is based on realism. There ships are far more detailed and thought out overal and they want the materials they use on the ships to look as realistic as possible. Where ED is a compleetly different style, ED got detail no doubt about that, and i like the style so far but it's just different.
 

Adept

Adept
Rashoumon said:
Well SC design choice is based on realism. There ships are far more detailed and thought out overal and they want the materials they use on the ships to look as realistic as possible. Where ED is a compleetly different style, ED got detail no doubt about that, and i like the style so far but it's just different.
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Lol, not realism. SC went for huge poly-counts, fins and flanges. They are ahips made by artists with very little practical conciderations. Elite is the realism oriented one where they thought about armoured, re-entry capable lifting bodies and correctly tesselating cargo from the start.
 

Rashoumon

Rashoumon
Adept said:
Lol, not realism. SC went for huge poly-counts, fins and flanges. They are ahips made by artists with very little practical conciderations. Elite is the realism oriented one where they thought about armoured, re-entry capable lifting bodies and correctly tesselating cargo from the start.
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You are mistaken, there design in ships is far more realistic then ED, besides the point what really is possible in space travel my fellow ED member. I never said that parts of ED are not based on realism, i only said SC design is more about realism, with ship designs, the textures ect.
 

Asp Explorer

Asp Explorer
Rashoumon said:
You are mistaken, there design in ships is far more realistic then ED, besides the point what really is possible in space travel my fellow ED member. I never said that parts of ED are not based on realism, i only said SC design is more about realism, with ship designs, the textures ect.
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Realistic? When we get that far in the future, only then will we know what is realistic or not.

However, in the current day and age, I don't see any of the designs being realistically realistic at all.

Look at the Hornet. Air intakes, wobbly wings, projectile weapons on extremities....

SC was supposed to be airplanes in space, and I understand the design aesthetic to meet that goal - but so far they haven't quite managed it.

They do have high polygon counts, but their boundaries are rubbish (I can poke my head into my Freelancer's hull whilst standing outside) and some of the texturing is simply awful.
 

Dante80

Dante80
Rashoumon said:
You are mistaken, there design in ships is far more realistic then ED, besides the point what really is possible in space travel my fellow ED member. I never said that parts of ED are not based on realism, i only said SC design is more about realism, with ship designs, the textures ect.
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I like both games' approaches, but I really don't get the realism card when its thrown out. Either way...

For example, many of the single fighters in SC resemble 20th century airplanes. If you show the Hornet or the 300i to a guy that knows nothing about SC, he is going to ask you about futuristic air combat, not space...its not even an opinion thing, we are looking at designs with wheels, wings, winglets, fins, wing and hull mounted pylons for weapons and missiles, engine intakes (dubbed hydrogen scoops) etc etc...XD
 

Rashoumon

Rashoumon
Yeah the hornet is worst designed spaceship EVER, i do agree with that one ^^
And yeah we will never live this long to see what spaceships will actually look like in the future.

Too elaborate further, the ships are more (realisticly) thought out, because from the beginning in SC they designed everything from a first person design choice. And that choice has allot to think about
- being able to walk around in the ships
- designing the interior of the ships
- designing the ship so it can be boarded
- placement of multiple ship system operating hardpoints

When i would compare ships of both games, ED ships are just flying bricks where only the outside and the cockpit are thought out and the rest is just empty space. Now that is not a negative thing, it's simply a design choice.
 

Asp Explorer

Asp Explorer
Rashoumon said:
When i would compare ships of both games, ED ships are just flying bricks where only the outside and the cockpit are thought out and the rest is just empty space. Now that is not a negative thing, it's simply a design choice.
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The empty space is what holds your cargo and your fuel, your missile reloads, your heatsinks, your projectile ammunition, toilet paper, food for your fish, your towel, first aid kit, your spare tyre and warning triangle, and half a pack of polos.
 

Dante80

Dante80
Rashoumon said:
When i would compare ships of both games, ED ships are just flying bricks where only the outside and the cockpit are thought out and the rest is just empty space. Now that is not a negative thing, it's simply a design choice.
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Hehe, I think I understand what you mean man. You are misunderstanding something though. Here is some feedback.

Ships in ED have interiors, just like those in AC. Right now we can only view the cockpit/bridge area, but the ships have a lot more space available to the pilot than that. Here are a couple of examples:

6d6fc7d6e18b5b85634f6795e8dfacde_large.jpg

Anaconda_01_Inside.jpg

Shipinterior.png

Ships are built from the start with interiors in mind (including living quarter(s), engine room, cargo holds etc), because FD want to include first person avatar later down the line. That has been known since the start of the project btw. ;)
 

insanephoton

insanephoton
Actually I don't think they are all empty space. I'm pretty sure that the E: D ships have all been designed with first person movement in mind already. You'd have to ask the devs to be sure. In the Alpha, I did find my ship no-clipping another Sidewinder a couple of times. It wasn't exactly clear what the interior looked like, but there was certainly structure and form already in place in parts that we haven't been able to see yet.
 

Vreynn

V
It's pretty subjective.

SC's Freelancer was the first ship that made me pause, and the exploration variant of it was the first time I outright melted a ship due to looks. The fuel tanks are tacked on at odd angles. Nothing else is consistent about that ship, not even in the interesting "junk slapped on to help exploration" aesthetic that so often appears in practical KSP designs.

I haven't seen a concept for E:D I haven't liked yet, but as long as none of them are purposefully designed to be freudian nightmares, I'm not worried.

It might just be me, but the Sidewinder gives me a sort of 70's vibe, the Cobra looks like something from any given hard scifi 80's movie, and the Eagle looks like something that might have been designed as a concept somewhere in the 90's. No, I can't articulate on any of these, they're just notions.

The Lakon-9 reminds me a little of the Nostromo while looking at it during outfitting.
 

Flin

F
I like the fact that many of Elite's ships looks sturdy and meant to last for decades. Like a Humvee, a tank or one of the cars on the Dhakar desert races.

If fact the Cobra has one of the best combat profiles for avoiding direct laser or cannon fire plus the panels to protect vital equipment and hide heat signature. The above picturea of ships designed for stealth says it all.


But there are some noce looking pleasure yachts and passenger liners on the drawing board.
 

Flin

F
Vreynn said:
It might just be me, but the Sidewinder gives me a sort of 70's vibe, the Cobra looks like something from any given hard scifi 80's movie, and the Eagle looks like something that might have been designed as a concept somewhere in the 90's. No, I can't articulate on any of these, they're just notions.

The Lakon-9 reminds me a little of the Nostromo while looking at it during outfitting.
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Well, most of the iconic ship designs were limited by 80's computer limits in poly count. Neverthess, those classic shapes serve a function rational-wise.
 
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