As mentioned I think the easiest reading of the above is that they were considering two PDLCs from their roadmap for a 2-3 year window, one Planding, one Legs. If we take the most likely 'first step' candidates for both Legs + Plandings, that would be:
Leaving Atmospherics and Station interiors as deeply complex elements still to be achieved. Plus the oddity of 'executive control' ships
The '10 Year Plan' itself has been spoken about in various ways, including as an aspiration that they can extend beyond that time-frame. I don't think it's a hugely robust metric in this case, given the potential flex within it (and the potential for it to include the slide into eventual maintenance etc. Who knows how long that phase could have been 'planned' for, and what PDLC cadence that would therefore imply).
If you really want to go for it though, 5 planned PDLCs at 1.5 years per PDLC, with a 2.5 year maintenance tail off, does actually fit
It is as robust as the Braben quote in your OP
Simply ballparks and very rough orders of magnitude. Also Beyond happened. Trying to assign literality to those very rough indications as you try is just a very efficient recipe for salt It is as robust at the Braben quote in your OP
Because they were sticking to their plan of primarily monetising via the roadmapped PDLCs? (Which they had somewhat pre-sold by marketing those core additions alongside the LEP).
Plus they had the financial buffer to do so, thanks to ED's decent sales across multiple platforms, and um, the decent sales of other franchises
I think a lot of it was typical early days "Yeah, no, totally, we're looking at a few years, maybe less, no promises though, but we're on it and we have big hopes!" statements that weren't rooted in deep assessments of specific deliverables. It happens often in the big, beautiful world of games. It happens in every business.
Well I'd suggest the nearer to the present the more concrete. I don't think we can draw exact parity between the two rough ballparks, as you're attempting to
There hasn't been a second dlc though, has there?The Timescale for 'Walking Around Your Spacecraft & Landing on Planets' Was Approx 2-3 Years
Planetary Landings Aimed For 'Within a Year of Release' & Hit:
'Exiting the Ship' & 'Interiors' Were Planned for the Second PDLC:
Conclusion:
Ok so clearly something went wrong. We can only guess what. The TLDR is probably: Legs difficult
Were there big technical blockers, to do with the core tech, and maybe console compatibility? Were dead-ends pursued that had to be abandoned? Were the devs overstretched due to working on Seasonal features + flagship expansions + rolling GAAS content?
Probably all of the above.
Flip Side:
As painfully slow as the shift to non-Seasonal delivery has been, and as discouraging as it was to learn that they only entered full production in 2018 (IE they hadn't managed to start + maintain a full DLC run in parallel with Horizons). I'm taking the following positives:
- They seem to be through whatever blockers they were struggling with.
- They're focused primarily on the DLC, and making it a big 'all in one' delivery.
TLDR: Game's not dead. Game's adding something chunky finally.
Cmdr Thrust from Bradford is just finishing off the beta testing now
Yeah, where's my hot redhead wife?Good question. Also, where are the things we were promissed that have nothing to do with Elite, huh?
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. I'm just kicked back on that because it's clearly a side-effect of the PDLC focus. And I want them to do something decent with that, and get a step closer to those Han Solo simulator dreams they wove at launch )
