I'm going to assume that the intent wasn't actually to make Private Groups (i.e. collections of players that require administration). That really wouldn't make a lot of sense from FD's point of view. That leaves separating Open Mode into Open PvE Mode and Open PvP Mode. Which is effectively the "add an Open PvE mode" argument. Even if FD did want to go down that path, it still doesn't resolve the "I can't challenge them face-to-face" issue.
Actually, private groups were the intent from the start. Open, at first, was
even described merely as a default group everyone would be a part of:
'We have the concept of “groups”. They can be private groups just of your friends or open groups (that form part of the game) based on the play styles people prefer, and the rules in each can be different. Players will begin in the group “All” but can change groups at will, though it will be possible to be banned from groups due to antisocial behaviour, and you will only meet others in that group.'
(In the FAQ, "How does multiplayer work?")
So, from that point of view, removing the Open "mode" and creating an Open "group" in its place would be merely going back to how they system was originally described.
By the way, David Braben specifically
mentioned in interviews that his game would allow PvE groups:
'Well, the discussions have come up already. We have this concept of groups where you can join a group which doesn't allow or does allow it on the user choice.'
(The "it" in that sentence is PvP. Go to 6:01 in the video.)
In any case players were never supposed to be able to force their way into another player's game. "I can't challenge them face-to-face" isn't an issue, it's a (very welcome) feature, one even deemed as essential for many players that did purchase the game. This is where I would say that the person purchased the wrong game; they got a game where being able to determine who we will play with — and, thus, being able to effortlessly avoid other players — is at the core of the game's definition of multiplayer, if that is unacceptable to the player then he clearly got the wrong game.
The instancing system will still try its best to connect players in Open.
Huh, no. Preserving the gameplay quality — for example, by not allowing players with too high mutual latency to meet — comes before connecting players. Between allowing you to defend against an opponent or keeping lag low, the game goes for keeping lag low.
Which is why it's so easy to manipulate the matchmaking into never meeting anyone else without outright blocking them. Though, of course, if the game didn't prioritize lag-free gameplay it would result in large amounts of lag and rubber-banding in lots of, perhaps even most, PvP situations, so the current arrangement is better than the game doing its best to connect players.
You miss the point. It doesn't seem to be the guarantee of a specific player being able to "get" another specific player. It is about a player affecting the BGS in a particular way facing the risk/possibility/whatever of facing a player affecting the BGS in the opposite manner (counter attack).
Which would be fine and dandy in a PvP game focused on player conflict. It's not fine at all in a game that is both supposed to be mainly about PvE and promised players they would be able to determine who they meet.
I didn't even know there was a hi-res screenshot. Alt-F10 was it? What's the deal with it not working in Open??
Yep, alt-F10.
It pauses the game for a couple of seconds, so I think it'll lag as bricks in Open.
Lag on demand + the distributed nature of the game instance "servers" = plenty of ways to annoy other players or even exploit.
Plus, it's possible to tweak things to make the screenshot saving take far more than a couple seconds. Such as, like Robert said, directing the screenshots folder to a slow device. And since it's a game function, without the use of anything external, Frontier wouldn't be able to do anything about it apart from removing the functionality.
So, they did that, removed the feature, but only for Open; lag on demand doesn't cause issues or enable exploits in Solo, after all.
