Technological Disconnect

[Eriseley]

Anything you create in 2018 will look like something created in 2018 since you cannot move into the future to compare.

Use Star Trek as an example. For some reason the weapons they used looked like guns. They could fragment into molecules and be reproduced aboard a ship with everything intact, but they had a shuttle that looked like a cargo van and big incandescent indicators that flashed (in sequence, per Shatner).

FFWD to today's verson. The Enterprise looks different inside and out. It doesn't look like the future, it looks like right now. We don't know what the future looks like.

It'll look weirder than we can imagine, probably. My guess is interstellar spaceships will have NO aerodynamic qualities for quite some time. Shipyarded in space, stay in space. Probably for millennia.

 

[Schmack]

The SRV doesn't need much improvement. It needs something to do besides shoot rocks and skimmers and access data points.

Example: Planet that has caves and you have to use an SRV to access said caves where you can access an underground base's station menu. There you would find missions to complete on that planet like finding lost people, ships or retrieving x units of certain materials.

 

[Oss133]

Tastes change. Some design decisions and fashion statements from the recent past now look awful. Who's to say that the look of the actual 3304 wouldn't be equally unpalatable?

As has already been said, the look of the future is impossible to predict. Science fiction simply reflects the era it was made in.

 

[Shiro Akai]

Interesting topic, but sadly nothing new. Literally at every step you can find examples of illogical things or permanent lack of features which today are considered trivial. Planetary navigation being such example. My 2012 old mobile phone has a feature where I put coords and app creates POI and gives me an arrow pointing me toward that POI, with distance and ETA. I'm aware it's based on satellites and maps to figure my current location, destination and what not. Fast forward 1300 years into the future - impossible feat.

One can argue you can't have proper nav tools because you lack of maps and satellites around the planet 25k LYs away. Well, quick google search and I get whole bunch of sites, with simple algorithms that calculate the heading for your POI based on your current coords. I bet it's not that big deal to add constant check which will feed the arrow showing you which way you have to go to reach your destination.

But FDEVs claim it's not necessary since there's no gameplay behind such feature...

Riiiight.

You get the mission to scan some data point in some remote outpost. You have to play that hide'n'seek game with outpost changing location. After you finally pinpoint that you can scan the data point. But when you leave the place suddenly Alzheimer strikes and you forget where it was so you have to re-play hide'n'seek game once again when you do 2nd run...

But hey - finding a place and making custom POI for future reference has no gameplay in it.

 

[Eriseley]

Tastes change. Some design decisions and fashion statements from the recent past now look awful. Who's to say that the look of the actual 3304 wouldn't be equally unpalatable?

As has already been said, the look of the future is impossible to predict. Science fiction simply reflects the era it was made in.

Just look at art relating to Jules Verne, still in a VERY weird realm of ancient past and science fiction.