The 2020 Dev Run: As Big As The Launch Run (?)

[VR Golgot]

Maybe, but we've had 4-5yrs of 100 people working on the title... So it's not entirely unfair to use that as a baseline, for the same 100 people working for another 2yrs IMHO. ie: If we have a company building a row of houses, could we not judge the potential quality of the next 2 houses, based on the past 5 they've built already?

It's definitely a sensible baseline for our expectations. I would throw these potential positives into the ring though:

• Seasonal 'flagship' deliveries clearly had a negative impact on game design & delivery.
  
  We've all seen this clearly in the fractured releases, with their lack of complementary overlap, hurried-feeling mechanics at points (Multicrewwwww ), and thin accompanying content. Informal dev chats suggest the feeling was the same inside FDev. IE these Lavecon snippets [1],[2] for example:
  
  

  The way they told me things, since Horizons was such a, let's stick with the term 'hard lesson', they decided to go with an 'everything at once' approach for the next expansion / update thing. So taking off time to actually work on the thing was necessary but in result as a whole it'll provide a more unified and refined experience that Horizons did not manage.

  
  

  On the brighter side, the fact that it would be developed as a whole thing, with every aspect in the mind, does make me kind of happy... When talking with developers it felt like every single one of them couldn't wait to tell you about it in a genuine non PR way.

  
  
  And this bit of drunken gossip from a prior Lavecon
  
  

  Horizons having the roadmap publicly laid out for the entire expansion (major features at least) meant they were locked in to specific promised feature set with no wriggle-room for deviation if they thought of better/more important things along the way, or certain features turned out to be not as fun as expected, etc.
  
  So this time they're completing the entire mega-update in advance and not telling anyone what's in it until they're absolutely sure about what is going to be delivered.
  
  EDIT: This is what I gleaned from talking to a very drunk Sandro Sammarco (nice chap) at Lavecon the other year.

• Staffing has seemingly upped slowly over that time. (See links in OP. During Horizons they were talking of '100 staff', but after various mentions of staffing increases, they started referring to '100 devs', with further ancillary staffing).

Now, it's entirely possible they've had staff changes at Frontier, but I'd say unless they've had a significant change in designers, or management have significantly changed their approach, I don't see why we can't have a gut feeling for how next year might pan out based on the past 4-5yrs. Hence me not being very optimistic. But I hope we might still get something as technically impressive and bar raising as planetary surfaces.

Ultimately, fingers crossed but not hopeful.

I see a positive here personally. Designers behind game mechanics that were particularly well received from the launch game are still at the company. They've got a chance to have a proper long, considered run at some game mechanics again. And to fill out more content to complement it this time. (The area which is traditionally part of the 'final phase' of game dev, and seemingly very pinched here in ED during Seasons).

They're still up against the proc gen monster though, on all of those fronts. Still waiting to see if they can even land a flesh wound on that beast

---

TLDR: Imagine a Horizons run where SRVs could actually be used with Multicrew, SLFs had specific missions ('destroy the fusion reactor inside the installation...'), Engineering launched with QoL like pinnable blueprints & mat trading, and all of them could be used in concert for top tier missions, as well as narrative features such as solving Guardian puzzles or shutting down invasive Thargoid bases. Both in Solo or Multiplayer.

It's not revolutionary. But it would have been a helluva lot better

 

[NeilF]

It's definitely a sensible baseline for our expectations. I would throw these potential positives into the the ring though:

• Seasonal 'flagship' deliveries clearly had a negative impact on game design & delivery.
  
  We've all seen this clearly in the fractured releases, with their lack of complementary overlap, hurried-feeling mechanics at points (Multicrewwwww ), and thin accompanying content. Informal dev chats suggest the feeling was the same inside FDev. IE these Lavecon snippets [1],[2] for example:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And this bit of drunken gossip from a prior Lavecon

• Staffing has seemingly upped slowly over that time. (See links in OP. During Horizons they were talking of '100 staff', but after various mentions of staffing increases, they started referring to '100 devs', with further ancillary staffing).

I see a positive here personally. Designers behind game mechanics that were particularly well received from the launch game are still at the company. They've got a chance to have a proper long, considered run at some game mechanics again. And to fill out more content to complement it this time. (The area which is traditionally part of the 'final phase' of game dev, and seemingly very pinched here in ED during Seasons).

They're still up against the proc gen monster though, on all of those fronts. Still waiting to see if they can even land a flesh wound on that beast

---

TLDR: Imagine a Horizons run where SRVs could actually be used with Multicrew, SLFs had specific missions ('destroy the fusion reactor inside the installation...'), Engineering launched with QoL like pinnable blueprints & mat trading, and all of them could be used in concert for top tier missions, as well as narrative features such as solving Guardian puzzles or shutting down invasive Thargoid bases. Both in Solo or Multiplayer.

It's not revolutionary. But it would have been a helluva lot better

I'm more than happy to try and look at things positively and hope that come end of next year you'll see me skipping around that we have a long overdue release that is bar raising and technically impressive.

BUT, I've been hoping for something like that since 2015 (planetary surfaces), and been dismayed at what has been greenlit to be developed, and seemingly the all too often shallow bolt on nature of what has been developed. So count me as not having high hopes...

ps: I really do struggle to pick much out of the past four years to give me hope, especially when there's so much to counter balance it IMHO!

 

[The Chairmaker]

Given the new era is not crowdfunded like vanilla was, I would be very surprised if we have a playable beta of more than a month at most (like Horizons), nevermind the 8 months we got from Premium Beta in April 2014. Would love to be wrong though.

Im not talking about playable betas or alphas as was in 2014. I expect them to be internal only.
I personally am expecting they may have a pre release vertical slice beta about a month before launch, similar to what they have done with Planet Zoo.

I am merely thinking that development of the expansion will be at an internal developmental stage somewhat similar to that of the original Elite Dangerous. Hence Alpha build will be end of this year or first quarter of next year, with private beta being end of 2nd quarter or early 3rd quarter 2020.

 

[VR SenseiMatty]

Understood, but the features mentioned (Fleet Carriers and I mentioned icy surfaces) would have been delayed already for over a year come xmas...? According to what FD are saying:-

• Fleet Carriers will now be delivered about 18 months late?
• Icy Surfaces will now be delivered about 24 months late?

^ Neither of these imply things are going smoothing, especially when the delays came just months before their release? Then add to this the bug fest of the recent release?

The point is more to understand wether they lied or not in the last public announcement.

 

[NeilF]

The point is more to understand wether they lied or not in the last public announcement.

OK... Apologies... What do you think they might have not been truthful/factual on?

 

[Stealthie]

There are more possible conclusions than the two you named and your inability to see them just highlights how you are to trying make everything suite your argument. First, make an observation, then come to a conclusion. What you are doing is having a conclusion before you are making observations which is why your argument is flawed from the start.

Your reply would have had a lot more credibility if you'd actually offered an alternative conclusion, instead of just (wrongly) stating what you think my motivations are.

Weird that you didn't suggest an alternative conclusion.

 

[Stealthie]

The point is more to understand wether they lied or not in the last public announcement.

It's a little disingenuous to talk about whether FDev "lied" about stuff.

The word "lying" has specific implications with regard to deliberately misleading people and I don't think that's important.
Pretty sure that's a deliberate straw-man being used by some people and it's probably best avoided if we intend to have an honest discussion.

The only thing that matters is that FDev have a habit of saying stuff and then not doing what they say.
They also have a habit of screwing up the stuff they actually do.

I try to form an opinion based on evidence rather than by ascribing motives to that evidence.

 

[VR SenseiMatty]

OK... Apologies... What do you think they might have not been truthful/factual on?

From their statements I understood that Fleet Carriers was most probably in the final approach to the release, but the community open letter made them realise that it is now more important to fix bugs and issues.

Now we have the 2 cases I reported above:

• If Fleet Carriers are delayed by 2/3 months I do believe them (open beta end of February).
• Instead if these are delayed by 6 months (so a beta/release in June) I really believe that they already had accumulated delays in the development so they used the excuse of the open letter to delay it furthermore.

 

[Urbanski101]

I think ED has been in a muddle in terms of its development since before its launch.

This is just the latest iteration of the confusion surrounding their development plans. FD have themselves accepted that they made mistakes during the first couple of years, hence the elongated release schedule for Horizons and the subsequent need for a year of Beyond which was to address the issues since launch.

We are now going through the same process less than a year after Beyond to address the cliff face of bugs that have been left to fester as a consequence of their development process.

IMO they have never really got on top of developing ED as a title, scheduling, release dates, quality control, content, bug fixing...it's all been a rather chaotic, puzzling and seemingly illogical series of events since launch.

That is not to say the game isn't good or they have failed...far from it, the core of the game is excellent and has held my attention on and off for 5 years. However any project that needs to derail itself every few months for a major course correction signifies that the original plans were flawed.

Considering that the 'New Era', whatever that ends up being is something of a 'hail mary - all or nothing' release, that is a very high risk strategy that has already needed to be revised after 9 months.

I'm hoping that they will learn from this but history suggests that won't be the case...we will see.

 

[VR Golgot]

ps: I really do struggle to pick much out of the past four years to give me hope, especially when there's so much to counter balance it IMHO!

Yeah I get it, I really do . But I'm suggesting that that the event you desire has happened, IE that "management have significantly changed their approach".

I think the launch title genuinely might be a better template for the PDLC than Horizons. (And way better than Beyond / this year, drab as they are thanks to resources piling into the new approach).

Caveats still remain in abundance. (The key ones for me are: They're building on a right old spaghetti mess, and they're still trying to design fun gameplay in a proc gen environment for the most part).

But I reckon you liked the launch game, for all its own flaws . That's where the hope lies

 

[Lightspeed]

So they are going to cost between 200 million and 10 billion credits. They can either do everything or nothing, can't be attacked but can be destroyed. Others can't see your fleet carrier unless they want to see it. Each system is limited to 1 fleet carrier. 100 fleet carriers can be present per system.

That's how we discussed them.

The FC forum was like a scatter gun of ideas, but among those ideas was a lot of sensible discussion about "what-ifs" and gameplay that I doubt anyone had thought about before, including FD. It became apparent as the discussion progressed that FCs were likely to be game changing and the features offered by FCs would have to be refined to fit the edge cases and exceptions that were identified. Don't ask me to give examples, I'd have to re-read the threads again, but I'm sure FD took away a lot of good ideas for "refining" the carriers and how they best interact with the game.

 

[VR SenseiMatty]

can't be attacked but can be destroyed.

I think it's the other way around, but the rest is very accurate!

 

[NeilF]

Yeah I get it, I really do . But I'm suggesting that that the event you desire has happened, IE that "management have significantly changed their approach".

I think the launch title genuinely might be a better template for the PDLC than Horizons. (And way better than Beyond / this year, drab as they are thanks to resources piling into the new approach).

Caveats still remain in abundance. (The key ones for me are: They're building on a right old spaghetti mess, and they're still trying to design fun gameplay in a proc gen environment for the most part).

But I reckon you liked the launch game, for all its own flaws . That's where the hope lies

I hope you're right... If next year's big released ultimately turns out to basically be another monstrous Multicrew, that will be bad!

 

[Viajero]

The only thing that matters is that FDev have a habit of saying stuff and then not doing what they say.
...
I try to form an opinion based on evidence rather than by ascribing motives to that evidence.

The evidence actually suggests the opposite is true with a few specific exceptions sprinkled here or there, such as FC.

Although if we posted that evidence we would probably have to go into personal interpretation of the same, or how critical or important those exceptions are for us etc.

 

[zimms]

Also depends on the personal interpretation of "a few" I guess.

 

[Stealthie]

The evidence actually suggests the opposite is true with a few specific exceptions sprinkled here or there, such as FC.

The "opposite"?

The opposite of unreliable is reliable.

Are you really going to try and claim that FDev are reliable, either in word or deed?

By all means, assert that you're happy with the level of unreliability that FDev have displayed but that's a subjective issue.
To claim that FDev are the "opposite" of unreliable is patently absurd, though.

 

[Viajero]

The "opposite"?

The opposite of unreliable is reliable.

Are you really going to try and claim that FDev are reliable, either in word or deed?

By all means, assert that you're happy with the level of unreliability that FDev have displayed but that's a subjective issue.
To claim that FDev are the "opposite" of unreliable is patently absurd, though.

I did not mentioned the terms "reliable" or "unreliable" in my note. As far as I remember you did not use them either in the note I responded to.

 

[Stealthie]

I did not use the words "reliable" or "unreliable" in my note. As far as I remember you did not use it either in the note I responded to.

No.

I was the one claiming FDev are unreliable.

You claimed the "opposite" of what I said is true.

Ergo, you are claiming they are reliable.

Which is silly.

 

[Viajero]

No.

I was the one claiming FDev are unreliable.

You claimed they are the "opposite" of what I said.

Ergo, you are claiming they are reliable.

Which is silly.

You didnt mention the terms reliable or unreliable in the note I responded to. You said:

The only thing that matters is that FDev have a habit of saying stuff and then not doing what they say.

To which I simply responded:

"The evidence actually suggests the opposite is true with a few specific exceptions sprinkled here or there, such as FC."

Bringing the terms "reliable" or "unreliable" to this equation adds an additional level of personal opinion and subjectivity to the discussion that seems to be a bit at odds with your own statement there that:

I try to form an opinion based on evidence rather than by ascribing motives to that evidence.

 

[Stealthie]

You didnt mention the terms reliable or unreliable in the note I responded to. You said:



To which I simply responded:

"The evidence actually suggests the opposite is true with a few specific exceptions sprinkled here or there, such as FC."

Bringing the terms "reliable" or "unreliable" to this equation adds an additional level of personal opinion and subjectivity to the discussion that seems to be a bit at odds with your own statement there that:

Geez, I'm sorry if I confused you by attempting to precis what I previously wrote.