Unlocking Uma Laszlo: what sort of gameplay loop was that about?

LeKeno

LeKeno
The theory:
Whether your game is two or two hundred hours long, it’s critical to think about what the player is doing on a moment-by-moment basis. That is how you begin to compartmentalize your design and nail down the core gameplay loop. One way you might approach this is to start with higher-level objectives and consider breaking them down into smaller sprints, or more specific stage-based objectives. The 3D Mario games are a great example of this. In Super Mario Odyssey, progress is defined by acquiring power moons. Players can chart their overall progress by the number of power moons they have found or by unlocking the next world in the game. Each of these power moons in turn represents a sprint — a small slice of enjoyable gameplay, where each slice interlocks to create a much larger cohesive objective or goal. In this way, players are able to enjoy satisfying moment-to-moment game mechanics while simultaneously experiencing a broader world with bigger/longer term objectives.
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In practice:

1624108794160.png


Checking the mission board every 10 minutes (notice some breaks* because it quickly got tedious), praying the RNG gods, pick and abandon missions to go from Allied to Unfriendly... 45 missions in total!

Where is the fun in that?!

There isn't even any effort to tell the backstory about why Laszlo hates Sirius Corporation, not even a nod to it on your first interaction with Laszlo.

 

Ydiss

Ydiss
To be fair, there isn't a whole ton of fun game play to be had to explicitly achieve this goal. I tried a little cheese (and gained some PRs too) and a little "doing it normally" via the CZs, fighting against Sirius Corp. The latter was too slow to consider worth it, the former was very dull. Very, very, very dull. This was not game play.

In the end, I visited a Sirius owned settlement and took to murdering their staff. This took 3 round trips of a single extraction settlement and cost me 41k in murder bounties.

So, I'd have to say that it's not a particularly well-thought out game loop and agree somewhat with the OP irrespective of their method of completion. As an objective, much like the same basic ones in Horizons engineering, it's pretty thoughtless. I keep saying this but I consider the "complete x missions of y type" unlock process the finest Fdev have concocted to date. And not utilised enough. They're still a bit basic but at least they involve fun game play.
 

Factabulous

Factabulous
Ydiss said:
So, I'd have to say that it's not a particularly well-thought out game loop and agree somewhat with the OP irrespective of their method of completion. As an objective, much like the same basic ones in Horizons engineering, it's pretty thoughtless. I keep saying this but I consider the "complete x missions of y type" unlock process the finest Fdev have concocted to date. And not utilised enough. They're still a bit basic but at least they involve fun game play.
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Dunno - those unlocks limit you to exactly doing one thing - find X, do X, repeat. At least with this unlock there are multiple paths - just that the OP chose the most boring and least rewarding (combat is slow, but you can use it to gain rank, PR farming is easy and gets you a new suit, killing Sirius got you combat against better troops (presumably)). And people (well, Jmanis) are always complaining there aren't enough reasons to do negative things.

Bit surprising the OP couldn't even work out why an engineer might have a grudge against Sirius, I guess they're new to the game. 🤷‍♀️
 

Ydiss

Ydiss
Factabulous said:
Dunno - those unlocks limit you to exactly doing one thing - find X, do X, repeat. At least with this unlock there are multiple paths - just that the OP chose the most boring and least rewarding (combat is slow, but you can use it to gain rank, PR farming is easy and gets you a new suit, killing Sirius got you combat against better troops (presumably)). And people (well, Jmanis) are always complaining there aren't enough reasons to do negative things.

Bit surprising the OP couldn't even work out why an engineer might have a grudge against Sirius, I guess they're new to the game. 🤷‍♀️
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It's better than data hunts, I'll agree.
 

CMDR Sophie Joanne

C
LeKeno said:
The theory:



In practice:

View attachment 242095

Checking the mission board every 10 minutes (notice some breaks* because it quickly got tedious), praying the RNG gods, pick and abandon missions to go from Allied to Unfriendly... 45 missions in total!

Where is the fun in that?!

There isn't even any effort to tell the backstory about why Laszlo hates Sirius Corporation, not even a nod to it on your first interaction with Laszlo.

Click to expand...
Why would you even think that is the way to do it?
I had a war in my BGS for the lasy few days - my rep with the faction I was fighting against went to Hostile within 2 days (3 or 4 GCZs a day). It isn't hard to do it without so much cheddah!
 

CMDR Sophie Joanne

C
Drelthar said:
The problem isn't that you -can- do it by cancelling missions etc.

The problem is that is the most efficient way to do it.

The design should make the most efficient way be the most fun way. Otherwise it failed as a design
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It isn't the most efficient way though - 45 abandoned missions or 5-10 GCZs..... I know what I'd be doing....
 

Fishy

Fishy
Ethaidan said:
Absolutely. Or just go attack a few settlements, kill all the scientists, steal their data and power regulator. The subtext for this unlock is... I want you to destroy this faction.
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But why not both? Pick up/abandon all Sirius power reg missions at station, then accept Sirius Staff Massacre by competing faction (and get an extra power reg). Since I was going to throw my rep in the dumpster, I wasn't going to pass on the free hoarding.
 

lysan

lysan
Ydiss said:
To be fair, there isn't a whole ton of fun game play to be had to explicitly achieve this goal. I tried a little cheese (and gained some PRs too) and a little "doing it normally" via the CZs, fighting against Sirius Corp. The latter was too slow to consider worth it, the former was very dull. Very, very, very dull. This was not game play.

In the end, I visited a Sirius owned settlement and took to murdering their staff. This took 3 round trips of a single extraction settlement and cost me 41k in murder bounties.

So, I'd have to say that it's not a particularly well-thought out game loop and agree somewhat with the OP irrespective of their method of completion. As an objective, much like the same basic ones in Horizons engineering, it's pretty thoughtless. I keep saying this but I consider the "complete x missions of y type" unlock process the finest Fdev have concocted to date. And not utilised enough. They're still a bit basic but at least they involve fun game play.
Click to expand...
Mission design is a weak point in EDO I don’t know what or how the process is, maybe it procedurally generated?
 

Ethaidan

Ethaidan
Really, all they would have had to do to make it 'good', was to have the her 'base' a bit more interesting and suitable (they're all pretty samey), and a simple introduction interactive conversation...

"So, word is you've been sticking it to Sirius... I loathe them. Ever since... Tell a bit, I want the juicy details"

1. I took missions, deliberately failed them and kept the PRs.
2. I campaigned against them in every conflict I could find.
3. I slaughtered as many scientists as I could find!

Depending on what you choose, get a discounted first mod... Faster Shield for #2, Headshot Damage for #3, and a slap in the face for #1.

Simple & relevant.
 

Bonsaipanda

Bonsaipanda
I still feel that Engineers should have skilltrees and you gain skillpoints by completing missions for the Engineers in an isolated instance, similar to the tutorials. The skills unlock blueprints that you can use to craft stuff.

oh well.
 

O'Roarke

O'Roarke
Luyten's Star had five of Sirius Corporation's Military Bases go dark a few minutes after I docked there.
Right under the noses of of their combat air patrol.

Their executes didn't like that one bit but in the setting of Elite, the lore, this is common -- some upstart company hired an Pilot's Federation member to screw them over.
And was damn successful at it.

You, on the other hand, were a paper rebel "sticking it to the man" by using text messages to tell them you weren't going to do their work because they're mean.
 
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