Deleted member 275835
D
I'm relatively new to ED (been at it since April), and decided on Odyssey's release - partly due to the unearned engineer invite bug, partly due to breaking my own sense of progression by doing a website driven road to riches in a Hauler to get an AspX (never found the meta game appealing) - to wipe my CMDR and start fresh.
So, sidestepping the obvious commentary on bugs/performance (of which there are billions of other threads), I thought I'd share my hopefully constructive thoughts/feedback on the new player experience:
The opening on-foot mission was fabulous. In my headcanon at least, the whole merc/soldier on "one last mission from my mysterious new benefactors in the Pilots' Fed" angle worked for me (and I was glad nobody stopped to assure me they weren't an Imperial - because I really wasn't wondering, anyway). It may not work for everyone however, and I felt it was somewhat at odds with the relative anonymity of the Horizons 'choose your own adventure' start. It'd perhaps be nice in future to see the option of choosing some shallow profession-based 'Morrowind Seyda Neen census office' style options (i.e. are you a… scientist, scavenger, merc, explorer?) which subtly alters the story of that mission - or even alters your starting location/mission a la SWTOR. Having to maverick-suit your way through a busted post Thargoid attack space station to reach an escape shuttle, for example - that would be fun. I get from a developer point of view that this could massively complicate what is essentially a tutorial/showcase for a bunch of new game features, but it's the little touches that make a difference to overall experience in my opinion, so worth mentioning for the 'nice to have' category later down the line.
The newbie game progression kind of fell off a cliff for me once I hit Chamberlain's Rest. Based on how the opening mission had gone on my previous save, I expected to be decanted straight into the 'L' plate Sidewinder at Mawson Dock after a brief black screen intermission (this transition could've been handled nicely with a 'Two Weeks Ago...' lead in to the foot mission rather than 'Present Day', I guess), but instead ended up milling about the concourse with a bunch of other (presumably new) CMDRs, feeling like the ED equivalent of being marooned in a nighttime bus station in an unfamiliar town. The P-Fed district by comparison felt a lot more sewn up in terms of progression from new pilot training and early missions, to going out into the big bad galaxy (and being incentivised to do so).
I found it quite jarring that:
The only way to get hold of a ship (not a taxi) in Chamberlain's Rest was to do the - largely hidden - 'virtual' training mission at the ship dealership. I don't know if this is a bug, but I'd have preferred to see this as an optional element so experienced CMDRs could just get on their way without the fuss and the weird disconnect of being dropped in a (to me) all too familiar yet now inaccessible location for a simulation.
On that note, being decanted to HIP 97950 without a permit for the Pilots' Federation district (and only the vaguest suggestion from our pal Dylan or Kevin or whatever his name was in the Cobra MK4 on what to do or where to go next) really wasn't really that great either. It would have been good here if I'd have been taken direct from Briscoe's Legacy straight to Dromi (that Cobra had a 60ly jump range, I checked, so totally doable in a couple of jumps), or emailed by the P-Fed upon arrival at Chamberlain's Rest with a permit and instructions to get a taxi over if I wanted to spend some time honing my skills or whatever. Again, maybe this is a bug, but it felt like a bit of a missed opportunity to tie the two halves of the game together.
These are, of course, minor things - and I think most new players are prepared for a steep learning curve given this game's reputation (and there are some pretty awesome YouTubers out there with tutorial videos for basically everything), so all in all not a big deal. I've been lucky enough to come through the update (relatively) unscathed, so looking forward to where the Odyssey progresses from here
o7 Commanders.
So, sidestepping the obvious commentary on bugs/performance (of which there are billions of other threads), I thought I'd share my hopefully constructive thoughts/feedback on the new player experience:
The opening on-foot mission was fabulous. In my headcanon at least, the whole merc/soldier on "one last mission from my mysterious new benefactors in the Pilots' Fed" angle worked for me (and I was glad nobody stopped to assure me they weren't an Imperial - because I really wasn't wondering, anyway). It may not work for everyone however, and I felt it was somewhat at odds with the relative anonymity of the Horizons 'choose your own adventure' start. It'd perhaps be nice in future to see the option of choosing some shallow profession-based 'Morrowind Seyda Neen census office' style options (i.e. are you a… scientist, scavenger, merc, explorer?) which subtly alters the story of that mission - or even alters your starting location/mission a la SWTOR. Having to maverick-suit your way through a busted post Thargoid attack space station to reach an escape shuttle, for example - that would be fun. I get from a developer point of view that this could massively complicate what is essentially a tutorial/showcase for a bunch of new game features, but it's the little touches that make a difference to overall experience in my opinion, so worth mentioning for the 'nice to have' category later down the line.
The newbie game progression kind of fell off a cliff for me once I hit Chamberlain's Rest. Based on how the opening mission had gone on my previous save, I expected to be decanted straight into the 'L' plate Sidewinder at Mawson Dock after a brief black screen intermission (this transition could've been handled nicely with a 'Two Weeks Ago...' lead in to the foot mission rather than 'Present Day', I guess), but instead ended up milling about the concourse with a bunch of other (presumably new) CMDRs, feeling like the ED equivalent of being marooned in a nighttime bus station in an unfamiliar town. The P-Fed district by comparison felt a lot more sewn up in terms of progression from new pilot training and early missions, to going out into the big bad galaxy (and being incentivised to do so).
I found it quite jarring that:
The only way to get hold of a ship (not a taxi) in Chamberlain's Rest was to do the - largely hidden - 'virtual' training mission at the ship dealership. I don't know if this is a bug, but I'd have preferred to see this as an optional element so experienced CMDRs could just get on their way without the fuss and the weird disconnect of being dropped in a (to me) all too familiar yet now inaccessible location for a simulation.
On that note, being decanted to HIP 97950 without a permit for the Pilots' Federation district (and only the vaguest suggestion from our pal Dylan or Kevin or whatever his name was in the Cobra MK4 on what to do or where to go next) really wasn't really that great either. It would have been good here if I'd have been taken direct from Briscoe's Legacy straight to Dromi (that Cobra had a 60ly jump range, I checked, so totally doable in a couple of jumps), or emailed by the P-Fed upon arrival at Chamberlain's Rest with a permit and instructions to get a taxi over if I wanted to spend some time honing my skills or whatever. Again, maybe this is a bug, but it felt like a bit of a missed opportunity to tie the two halves of the game together.
These are, of course, minor things - and I think most new players are prepared for a steep learning curve given this game's reputation (and there are some pretty awesome YouTubers out there with tutorial videos for basically everything), so all in all not a big deal. I've been lucky enough to come through the update (relatively) unscathed, so looking forward to where the Odyssey progresses from here
o7 Commanders.