Too little. Too late.

[Diostar50]

to be fair, NMS, which often is used as example isnt much better tho.
Lava world is lava everywhere, paradise planet has no polar caps, and hot worlds are equally hot everywhere. Not talking about their proc gen flora and fauna, when after first few dozens hours I seen for practically whole time same 2/3 animals, just with different name.
"procgen soo good"
I could point all moaners "everything is same" to some POI catalog, like GEC, but guess that nothing is enough for them, if bacterias is bacterias, not abfaeractears, without any visible difference in path, but in other system.

Anyway, OP can just disappear and play in other game.

Trade, mining, bgs, pp, exploration.

All people which pretend that their loop is only true loop, and all other things are content for "few" other people are pathethic.

oh, and about "thousands and thousands of DW2 folks, let's use some data from edsm

Participants 4,380
- Abandonment 1,727
- Success 2,647
Far from 10k people.

Especially if you will look at success ratio.

Yes NMS takes it to the other extreme and makes discovering content a trivial matter. Its all very cartoony too. Elite is at the other extreme where the galaxy just feels empty. Its a game and there should be fun things to uncover out there other than taking screenshots of different coloured sunsets and identical plants that for some inexplicable reason can be found in one quadrant of the galaxy and also 65,000 light years away, and almost everywhere in-between, and all under the illusion of being a "different variant" lol.

One thing that shouldn't be forgotten though is the feeling of setting foot on a world and looking out across a landscape that literally no other player has set eyes on. We had that in Horizons, and it was lost with Odyssey with the whole copy and pasted biomes they in their infinite wisdom added. As small as that may seem, that was at least something unique we had to look forward to when taking a trip out into the black back in the day.

Some day someone will finally release a space game that sits in the middle of NMS's extreme trivialities of discovering weird and wonderful stuff, and Elites vast galaxy of monotonous repetition. And it'll have its own pretty sunsets too

As for your numbers on dw2, you're incorrect. Firstly not everyone who took part on those expeditions registered on EDSM, and secondly EDSM deletes accounts that have shown no activity in a while, so those numbers are way way down on what they would have been back when those events first took place. Give it long enough and it'll state no one took part on any expedition, ever! I do remember Dav Stott (frontiers server admin) having kittens when he said he monitored over 10,000 players trying to jump at the same time when that event began. They crashed the entire Elite Dangerous servers .

Edit, in fact if you look at the actual EDSM participants list, 15,409 players registered for DW2.

 

[Fizzatron]

I've been tired of tales about future ships for a little over six years now.

10 years.

That reminds me that CIG had the worst funding month in years this January and it's getting to the point where by certain estimates it isn't going to cover operating costs if it persists, a trend that has emerged over the last year and something that their last con job didn't improve. And I'm supposed to entertain the notion that getting four new ships in this game that aren't going to cost hundreds of dollars to be able to play ingame is something to complain about? I don't think so. o7

 

[LaufeusonLoki]

and it's getting to the point where by certain estimates it isn't going to cover operating costs if it persists

Oh yes, they are definitely doomed. Their profits are so small that they barely cover their losses. This is absolutely the end. Not at all like, cough, cough, one company, cough, cough, who literally had the worst year of their entire existence, during which they lost approximately 66% of their entire accumulated finances.

And I'm supposed to entertain the notion that getting four new ships in this game that aren't going to cost hundreds of dollars to be able to play ingame is something to complain about?

Yes. You are.

(Also, argument about "that aren't going to cost hundreds of dollars to be able to play ingame" is invalid, you know that).

 

[Rubbernuke]

Ehm, let's see. Other than the FSS and the DSS, you only mention new content there, although you are wrong about several of those. You even wrote building Colonia - that was building, not exploring, bubble activities in a new, smaller bubble. (Not to mention that the new content added in Beyond Chapter Four has so many severe bugs and errors that they might as well have not added them.) New content isn't reworking existing mechanics though. The only reworked things were the FSS and the DSS, and the former made things significantly worse. Meanwhile, none of the issues that most players actually had (such as JJJJJJJJ, or how exploration data has practically zero in-game effect) were touched. So, don't forget that a rework doesn't necessarily mean improvement.
In other words: Powerplay 2.0 might end up worse than 1.0. I don't think it will, but it's not guaranteed to be better for everyone. The last time Frontier tried their hands at a rework, they drove away more existing players from that activity than they drew new ones in. Hopefully they've learned some lessons from that.

There was Odyssey and its exobiology, I'll grant you that. However, that wasn't an exploration rework, but the addition of exobiology - again, new content. But the number of existing issues solved was just one: Horizons life used to be too easy to find with the DSS, putting them into the new Odyssey surface distribution mechanics fixed that. One issue solved isn't Exploration 2.0.

So, if you're hoping that PowerPlay 2.0 will solve the existing issues that PowerPlay 1.0 has and that such a rework is your turn at the table, then we explorers haven't had our turn at the table yet.

My point is, explorers have had content, tweaks and reworks. If you think all that I listed is not a turn at the table you are frankly blind. The sum updates to Powerplay from 1.3 were the introduction of consolidation, x10 fort values, changing the AI template of NPCs, removing PP pirate salvage, and ensuring the map tells the truth- that and removing a menu item. I can't remember space based life, nebulas, alien artifacts / remains, surface life, FSS scanning etc being in 1.x, can you?

You had trying to find Jaques out in the middle of nowhere, establishing bases out in the sticks, finding Thargoid junk, locating missing ships and outposts...to me thats building on exploration themes. And again, you had space borne life, things like nebula effects, surface life to find and log.

And if you don't like what the new scanner mechanics are, then thats on you- FD still updated it. You are right in that any rework might be worse than what it replaces- however considering PP was delivered incomplete, buggy and threadbare I very much doubt its going to be worse.

 

[Rubbernuke]

For that handful of remaining players, probably. After all, these are those who are not interested in exploration in general, since there is nothing to explore there, so they did not leave. For all those who left the game, it’s probably quite the opposite. And there are simply many more of them than those who remained. Just much, much more. If we include all those who have ever played ED in one list, those for whom exploration defined the game will simply be almost the same number as have played the game in general for all time.

Funny, the advertising did not say ED was Space Engine and NMS rolled into one.

Because this is the only thing they have left to do.

Really? The Mercs starting poking and then after a month or two FD released the values. From that FD then developed the BGS with player interaction in mind- otherwise....why all the influence labels? Why all the faction heads patting you on the back?

 

[SlickPBW]

See ya

 

[Ian Doncaster]

The problem with the galaxy is the same as it's been in FE2 and the same as it's been in every game since FE2 that's attempted to make a full-scale galaxy (not that there have been many!): you cannot possibly fill that with the variety of content it needs at a high level of detail. That's not a Frontier problem, that's a "computer games do not have a budget larger than a mid-sized industrial nation's GDP" problem.

Placing N million/billion stars in a galaxy-like shape? Pretty straightforward.
Placing planets in reasonably realistic orbits in those systems? Bit more work but still pretty easy. [1]
Making those planets look reasonably attractive from orbit? Sure, lots of games do that.

Making highly individualistic contents for those planets in a game which has post-2000 3D graphics? Never happening. Not in Elite Dangerous, not in any other game anyone is going to see in their lifetime either. Humans are too good at pattern recognition and artwork at the necessary level of detail is too expensive to hand-produce even for one planet.


[1] Frontier's breakthrough in Elite Dangerous isn't exactly that the Stellar Forge does it at all but that it does it really fast. Generating star positions is easy. Generating star positions fast enough that a 20,000 LY route plot completes in reasonable time is incredibly impressive.
Generating planetary heightmaps isn't too difficult. Generating detailed fully-consistent surface terrain for planet-sized objects fast enough to fly over or drive on without any apparent loading screens on the other hand... (sure, there's some ripples occasionally).
But we're still mostly in the realm of numbers rather than artwork for this.

 

[R-Irish]

Can you make an informational leaflet about this please? Thanks in advance

 

[Darrack]

Its a game and there should be fun things to uncover out there other than taking screenshots of different coloured sunsets and identical plants that for some inexplicable reason can be found in one quadrant of the galaxy and also 65,000 light years away, and almost everywhere in-between, and all under the illusion of being a "different variant" lol.

If it was possible to have Billions of WWs, ELWs etc programmed to be different (which i doubt is possible) after you have landed on one of each how many more are you going to land on?
I travel through hundreds of systems in a week im not going to land on every planet.
Unless every world had something special the uniqueness would soon ware off.

One thing that shouldn't be forgotten though is the feeling of setting foot on a world and looking out across a landscape that literally no other player has set eyes on. We had that in Horizons, and it was lost with Odyssey with the whole copy and pasted biomes they in their infinite wisdom added.

As an explorer nothing could be further from the truth, there are still plenty of screen shots i take every week that really make me smile.
That feeling of first footfall is no different in Odyssey than when i first disembarked in Horizons.

O7

 

[Fizzatron]

Oh yes, they are definitely doomed. Their profits are so small that they barely cover their losses. This is absolutely the end. Not at all like, cough, cough, one company, cough, cough, who literally had the worst year of their entire existence, during which they lost approximately 66% of their entire accumulated finances.

Frontier Developments highest market cap was $1.7Bn. As your response correctly points out, past success is no predictor of future success. All I'll say is that despite their missteps and a downturn in the games industry that's affecting every company, including CIG (not that they'd tell you), it's a good thing that Frontier doesn't have all its capital in one game, they have a portfolio of profitable games, Elite being one of them. Out of the two, I'd bet on Frontier over CIG every day. Again, they may have made some strategic missteps and been affected by COVID more than others, but even if Realms Of Ruin is a sales failure, it is still a complete game out of many other complete games. CIG have yet to release a finished game in 12 years, and you don't think that's a reason to complain but Frontier developing more features for Elite, which has been release ready since 2014 is a reason to complain?

Yes. You are.

Umm. nah.

(Also, argument about "that aren't going to cost hundreds of dollars to be able to play ingame" is invalid, you know that).

Just pointing out facts.

 

[Hellrider]

And if you don't like what the new scanner mechanics are, then thats on you- FD still updated it

Well, it's simple.
introducing FSS and DSS instead "click to discover whole system" was next time, when something raw, easy and (hehe, keyword) SHALLOW was changed.
And of course it's bad, because it's slower, so require more effort, because they cannot scan 100 bodies at once anymore.
Honestly I like fss much more, than idea "discover everything at once, then target each body for slighty more info, after it FLY to each body onl because you want to check some properties, which now you can check from fss"
If FSS tell me about something interesting- I just fly here.
Or if I like look of planet, just to make screen.
Or if it is earthlike, my rule is "screen of each discovered earthlike". I'm not gonna fly to planet only to see, that it has 2,1% of mineral, or something like that.

 

[Rubbernuke]

Well, it's simple.
introducing FSS and DSS instead "click to discover whole system" was next time, when something raw, easy and (hehe, keyword) SHALLOW was changed.
And of course it's bad, because it's slower, so require more effort, because they cannot scan 100 bodies at once anymore.
Honestly I like fss much more, than idea "discover everything at once, then target each body for slighty more info, after it FLY to each body onl because you want to check some properties, which now you can check from fss"

I should be careful- The True Explorers™ will now hunt you down and nag gank you to death for liking the Forbidden [poopy word] Scanning.

 

[Disemboweled Ego]

Making highly individualistic contents for those planets in a game which has post-2000 3D graphics? Never happening. Not in Elite Dangerous, not in any other game anyone is going to see in their lifetime either. Humans are too good at pattern recognition and artwork at the necessary level of detail is too expensive to hand-produce even for one planet.

I think it's technically possible, but I think every game dev I've seen make a cool tech demo with something like procedural city generation ended up realizing that it's not a shortcut to fun gameplay or something that's actually immersive. To get it to work better you have to simulate the whole history of the planet (computable in the more abstract solar system level for Elite with captured bodies, but not for detailed planetary features). Ultimately committing to procedural generation means accepting that sometimes areas will be boring and won't make sense.

What Elite and Starfield (and many many ubisoft games) do with repeated handcrafted outposts results in something bizarrely awful - the infinite terrain is just a backdrop and the handcrafted level is copy-pasted too many times across different places to feel unique. This only works in roguelike games where there's more variation to you being forced to attempt the same challenges with different kit and as part of a path of progression to something else.

Ironically I think Elite is one of the better games to be able to stumble on something decent here if they added more air to ground combat scenarios with spread out ground installations/vehicles to target since the formations and strategies they'd use could serve a doctrine and would have to make sense, but would still be affected by the actual terrain of the planet around the area they're defending.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Closed - as the warning to cease discussing another game has been comprehensively ignored.