Things Elite Dangerous can learn from No Man's Sky
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Crafting is awful, ugh. Everything about the inventory system in NMS makes me shudder. It gets in the way of exploration and the supposed "relaxed and chill" vibe the game is supposed to have.
I'm just annoyed since I was playing it a few times through VorpX and just wanted to wander around and enjoy things in 3D without constant nagging. Still, feels like those systems could use a tweak or two to actually achieve relaxed and chill.
The marketing and PR lessons Frontier could learn from HG aren't really applicable because they haven't signed a mysterious agreement with Sony with all the doors that opens and Sony-owned marketing outlets that entails.
I'm glad Elite gave them the confidence to self publish their work so they could stay away from companies like Sony. Tho they would've been pushed to also release a stripped down MVP, I doubt Sony would've given them the longterm support and enough of a slice of the profit to continue development on such a niche audience product for years.
Murray promises updates, but I don't think they'll have the $$ to keep it up for long before switching the focus of development to new titles. It was a tough decision to make with a lot of compromises to go with the cash. Hopefully they learned a lot here and their next game will be better and nag me less in robot voices!
The only thing from NMS I wouldn't mind in Elite is 65daysofstatic doing planet ambiance for season 3 or 4! ED has some of the best sound work in modern gaming and their noodling noises would fit right in, really.
I'm just annoyed since I was playing it a few times through VorpX and just wanted to wander around and enjoy things in 3D without constant nagging. Still, feels like those systems could use a tweak or two to actually achieve relaxed and chill.
The marketing and PR lessons Frontier could learn from HG aren't really applicable because they haven't signed a mysterious agreement with Sony with all the doors that opens and Sony-owned marketing outlets that entails.
I'm glad Elite gave them the confidence to self publish their work so they could stay away from companies like Sony. Tho they would've been pushed to also release a stripped down MVP, I doubt Sony would've given them the longterm support and enough of a slice of the profit to continue development on such a niche audience product for years.
Murray promises updates, but I don't think they'll have the $$ to keep it up for long before switching the focus of development to new titles. It was a tough decision to make with a lot of compromises to go with the cash. Hopefully they learned a lot here and their next game will be better and nag me less in robot voices!
The only thing from NMS I wouldn't mind in Elite is 65daysofstatic doing planet ambiance for season 3 or 4! ED has some of the best sound work in modern gaming and their noodling noises would fit right in, really.
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Indeed.
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Another subtle difference between ED and NMS to which I wonder how FD are doing to deal with this are voxels.
NMS is based on Voxel technology which is why you dig down and make caves and things. You can also make overhangs very easily.
This to me makes the surface of the planets much more interesting and varied - ED at the moment can only do valleys.
Now, someone in the NMS thread said that the Cobra engine, or at the very least FD's devs, know how to use voxels as Planet Coaster uses them.
Question then would be if FD can utilise the technology in ED for planets to make them more interesting or not.
I haven't really noticed those aspects of the game being "better" than the features in ED. In what way do you feel crafting and exploring are better in NMS?
These are IMO of course - you may feel different - and this is a shortened list as it's 1.30am and I need sleep.
Also, both games do some things subtly different which I won't mention (like your FSD drive is different)
- Crafting:
-- Known outcomes, so you know what you will get for your time invested looking for materials
-- Less currencies (mats)*
-- Can craft on the go. No need to go to specific places
-- "upgrades" take up inventory space so you need to organise things, rather than be hidden attributes on a component
- Exploration:
-- There are no POIs giving away locations of things
-- You have beacons which, for a crafted item, can help you locate stuff
-- Landscape much more varied (see above re voxel technology)
*EG:
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It's soooo much work to do "right," isn't it. It must be one of the most terrifying features Frontier have to deal with and if I were a producer on the project I'd wake up screaming at night thinking about it. Which is why I have no doubt it's season 4 not 3 - to give them an extra 18 months, since there's a season 4 team working right now.
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Indeed it does - NMS simplifies this though by having the entire planet as 1 biome. I also like the fact that weather is changeable, and if you go off the beaten track (ie don't follow the road to the core) the systems can get very hostile. (My current world is extremely radioactive; subject to frequent storms; my suit shield constantly drains; and don't go in the water
)If ED can take this and apply to atmosphere worlds - different biomes and weather conditions that would be very nice.
Yes, they can learn that producing Earth-like worlds needs to be great and happen tomorrow!
It makes sense to do space legs and walking around/EVA for ships/stations in season 3, give us some thargoid arc to keep us occupied and a reason to EVA, maybe bring in gas giants to bring in a few of the features needed, and then have atmospheric planets cooking for season 4. Especially if they are 18 month cycles, seems almost doable... starting with lifeless then building up to the absolute production hell headache that will be populated worlds. You poor, poor pasty subterranean drones working on that.
Condolences in advance.
Condolences in advance.
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Indeed, and a true one. The "cool story" thing tends to be used when you don't believe someone... but no idea why you should doubt me on this.
Glad to hear you have 50 hours though. That's great! I hope when i get it, i will also get to play it for many hours.
Nope, not suggesting that at all. I'm more suggesting that they are such fundamentally different games that there is little they can take from each other.
You name crafting and exploring.
Ok, crafting. Not having played it, just read about it, but it seems pretty bog standard. Recipes, get stuff, combine stuff, result. You might as well point to 30 year old MUDs and say ED could learn crafting from them, or more modern, Minecraft, although NMS is a lot more limited than Minecraft. So, not sure what specifically ED can learn from NMS here. NMS is just copying what has been done before.
Exploration... did you say that with a straight faced avatar? Sorry, but i want to explore a real universe. Not a Fisher Price universe. I do like the cartoony graphics in a kind of casual way, but for real exploration, i'll take ED any day of the week. Yes, ED isn't fully fleshed out yet, still a long way to go and plenty of things to be added... but FD shouldn't be looking to NMS for inspiration. I think they can continue the way they are going already, and produce a much better exploration experience.
Of course, to each their own, but you did ask, so i'll stick to my guns on this one, and say, nope, FD can't really learn anything from NMS, at least that hasn't been done before, and probably a lot better by other games.
I know they can do it ... I appreciate it will take time ... and if they take the best from other games, blend it in FDs own way, it should be good.
Despite not enjoying ED as a whole I do really like the flight model; I like the way that the planets zoom into detail the closer you are; and the transition from space to surface is rather nice - I give FD that. (The problem is that there really isn't much of a reason to go other than for Synthesis which i have never used, and you have to use your SRV which I detest .. if they allow walking on planets so SRV is optional I will be much happier)
If you have the right controls mapped for the SRV and get on planets with reasonable gravity it is WAY more fun. I had a bad experience at first with crap controls and insane gravity that also made me detest it vehemently but I can't believe how much more fun it is now. I ignore the synthesis stuff, tho.
What they need to do on planets with expanded multicrew/ship launched fighters is really flesh out those ground combat zones mentioned for 2.3... with expanded military careers tied into to powerplay to give us better reasons and possibilities for mixed surface/air combat. Having NPC crew will let solo players do more of that and of course it'll be great with groups.
At least they've started. It'll get a lot more fun with more vehicles and assets added -- to say nothing of the space legs possibilities. Balancing all of that is going to be... interesting.
NMS can learn one related lesson from ED -- port NMS to Playstation VR and switch the FPS to a cutesy pastel SRV to cut down on sim sickness and make the planets more doable for VR. They'd really need to overhaul and optimize the engine to pump out the right framerate tho and allow more FOV. Sony's reprojection will help, but only goes so far.
What they need to do on planets with expanded multicrew/ship launched fighters is really flesh out those ground combat zones mentioned for 2.3... with expanded military careers tied into to powerplay to give us better reasons and possibilities for mixed surface/air combat. Having NPC crew will let solo players do more of that and of course it'll be great with groups.
At least they've started. It'll get a lot more fun with more vehicles and assets added -- to say nothing of the space legs possibilities. Balancing all of that is going to be... interesting.
NMS can learn one related lesson from ED -- port NMS to Playstation VR and switch the FPS to a cutesy pastel SRV to cut down on sim sickness and make the planets more doable for VR. They'd really need to overhaul and optimize the engine to pump out the right framerate tho and allow more FOV. Sony's reprojection will help, but only goes so far.
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Bad choice of words on my behalf sorry - I thought your story was interesting but hope you have a better experience. 6 hours is a reasonable stab at it I guess. It's a night out on a Friday and £40 ... bargain
"Fisher Price" universe is somewhat harsh - you're implying it's for babies which I find derogatory.
"explore a real universe" is an oxymoron considering that other than the overlain stars the rest are fake. I understand that FD have tried to take a realistic approach and incorporated some science into it, but at the end of the day the galaxy they have is fake. NMS never ever claimed to be simulating our galaxy and took a more casual approach to it
Re crafting - everything I posted had the caveat "IMO" and again I add that here : crafting in NMS is fun but in ED it is not. (See above for some reasoning - there is more but I am tired now) Yes, most games are but clones of others and it's all down to how they blend it together - FD got icrafting wrong and there are so many things they could do to improve it, but based on dev feedback they are not other than tweaking some numbers. C'est la vie.
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As an FYI I have never used synthesis ... not even to "try" it because I totally disliked the SRV handling and you can't get out (yet) .. that made me angry. Engineers I did try during Beta ... Gathering resources in NMS can be tricky to find them but when you do there's plenty ... ED is tricky to find and quite tight on resources so that just extends the search. (NMS is casual whereas ED is more "hardcore" I guess)
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There's some exploration mechanics NMS uses that ED could viably borrow, like beacons that you could hack which in turn leads on to exploration POI's, but you get to select only -one- from four possible options, and THOSE four could be drawn from a pool of say, 16 across the star system, as long as the code is set up not to give you repeats so you eventually get all of the possible exploration POI's for a given star system THAT would make for interesting exploration gameplay.
Especially if by going to those POI's there was some neat flavour text that you could brush up on.
That would be the big takeaway from NMS's exploration.
I'm also going to still state that an "offline solo" should be on the menu to go with "online solo", particularly as it looks to be the case that Coaster World -is- going to allow for network cable plug pulling. If they can do it for one, they can finally get around to it for the other, even if it needs to be put onto a seperate save and with a miniaturized galaxy.
Bad choice of words on my behalf sorry - I thought your story was interesting but hope you have a better experience. 6 hours is a reasonable stab at it I guess. It's a night out on a Friday and £40 ... bargain
"Fisher Price" universe is somewhat harsh - you're implying it's for babies which I find derogatory.
"explore a real universe" is an oxymoron considering that other than the overlain stars the rest are fake. I understand that FD have tried to take a realistic approach and incorporated some science into it, but at the end of the day the galaxy they have is fake. NMS never ever claimed to be simulating our galaxy and took a more casual approach to it
Re crafting - everything I posted had the caveat "IMO" and again I add that here : crafting in NMS is fun but in ED it is not. (See above for some reasoning - there is more but I am tired now) Yes, most games are but clones of others and it's all down to how they blend it together - FD got icrafting wrong and there are so many things they could do to improve it, but based on dev feedback they are not other than tweaking some numbers. C'est la vie.
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As an FYI I have never used synthesis ... not even to "try" it because I totally disliked the SRV handling and you can't get out (yet) .. that made me angry. Engineers I did try during Beta ... Gathering resources in NMS can be tricky to find them but when you do there's plenty ... ED is tricky to find and quite tight on resources so that just extends the search. (NMS is casual whereas ED is more "hardcore" I guess)
I just put down the controller from playing NMS, and oh dear god is there a LOT of crafting...it's a good thing you like it, Liqua, because you literally can't go more than 30-60 seconds without being forced to craft something in order to survive or progress. This is no exaggeration; you can't move, breathe, or even shoot your little mining tool without rapidly depleting some resource that you don't have. any. g. room. to. carry.
Personally, I find the crafting system shallow, even meaningless. If Fdev were to try to take much of this system and plunk it down in ED,,,I think that would be it for me.
Personally I love 'em both, but don't think I'll be endlessly playing NMS the way I do with ELITE. Might be proved wrong. But there's no reason to take sides like it's some sort of sectarian football derby.
It's all good from Frontier's POV because they have an obvious reference point/benchmark for when they start doing inhabited worlds.
One thing: I'm surprised that NMS is so basic when it comes to creature behaviour, because the lack of obvious online stuff means they don't really have the same sort of limitations something like ELITE would have when it comes to synching the experience of multiple players.
It's all good from Frontier's POV because they have an obvious reference point/benchmark for when they start doing inhabited worlds.
One thing: I'm surprised that NMS is so basic when it comes to creature behaviour, because the lack of obvious online stuff means they don't really have the same sort of limitations something like ELITE would have when it comes to synching the experience of multiple players.
Failure is the real teacher in life, not success and I think that's where the OP was coming from. I believe many in this thread have knee jerked at the mere mention of NMS and ED in the same sentence and missed that entirely.
The OP puts forward some great suggestions and is basically begging FD to be as scientifically accurate as possible, something which NMS doesn't do in any way shape or form, as the OP pointed out.
Last time I saw DB speak on the matter (today), that seems to be his primary goal so many of the things the OP suggests may very well come to fruition.
The OP puts forward some great suggestions and is basically begging FD to be as scientifically accurate as possible, something which NMS doesn't do in any way shape or form, as the OP pointed out.
Last time I saw DB speak on the matter (today), that seems to be his primary goal so many of the things the OP suggests may very well come to fruition.
I've been playing Elite since beta fairly regularly. I've played No Man's Sky for a few days, and I'm already tired of it. There's a few things No Man's Sky does that Elite should do better though. Life on planets and caves. I think it's a given they'll have rivers, oceans, lakes I hope.
