What is the big deal with ship interiors???

[Boomtrooper]

Ok, so first thread post... Hi y'all o7...
At the risk of being to oblivion for my heathen views, but what are people hoping to get out of having ship interiors?!? It seems to weave into every other thread and ignite passion like no tomorrow... I mean, sure - I'm in VR, and I bloody love getting up and having a little wander round my cab in different ships, but surely once you've had a wander round your ship and gone "ooooh" a few times, there really isn't anything else to it... I struggle to see how gameplay is going to be incorporated and what the added value would be... wandering round other ships, like damaged megaships - now that would be awesome, but my own ship? Meh....

So what does everyone expect/want/hope to get out of ship interiors that would justify the enormous amount of time and effort for the devs to facilitate? What am I missing?

 

[Rat Catcher]

I don't know either - without a huge amount of gameplay attached to it I'd think the attraction of strolling around the ship admiring your biowaste would get old real quick...

 

[Iron Golem]

I would counter with what is the big deal with fps.

 

[Ted Striker]

Because the grind for my corvette and cutter was long and laborious and I want to bask.

There's no gameplay need for ship interiors but I'd still buy them if they were high quality and delivered what I want.

*Editing this on July 1st to say that I no longer think they're capable of adding ship interiors with the quality and detail I'd want, or without introducing all kinds of bugs that don't even have to do with ships or interiors.

 

[Gully Foyle]

Scrambling back to the controls after getting up and walking to the other side of the canopy during witchspace perhaps

 

[LKx]

Personally i'd like ship interiors, even without any gameplay attached, for immersion.
However i totally understand that it's not worth the massive amount of work it'd require even without any gameplay.
So, i'm totally ok to wait a future expansion to have implemented the big plans they do have about interiors and zero-g activities.

 

[PontifusRex]

I played GTAV for a long time back in the day. They have a whole ton of various interiors that all have items you can interact with.

Once the novelty wears off though, it's pretty meh.

I think if we do ever get interiors, I imagine it will be much the same here too.

 

[Welsh Wizard]

I would love to be able to conduct boarding operations against other CMDRs.

 

[Alien]

Ok, here's why ... it takes Elite Dangerous from a pew-pew game (whether that's ship pew-pew or on-foot pew-pew) to a game where you are more than just a ship. To use a certain person's catchphrase it's all about the "IMMMURRRSHUN". By being able to walk around your ship, it makes the world of Elite come alive.

I do understand that some people will be impatient and not want to walk through the ship to the station/outpost/planet so here's how I would have it work in Elite Dangerous

Long way: You get up out of the seat and walk all the way through the ship to the surface/station
Medium way: You walk to the door that is at the back of the cockpit and interact with a panel next to the door, this "teleports" you to outside
Short way: You select an option in your seat (instead of "get up") and teleport outside (this is how it's going to work in Odyssey currently)

This would also allow Frontier to implement ship interiors in stages.

 

[Cmdr Nemo]

I couldn't wait when playing NMS to get a Freighter, it only took a couple days afterwards to get tired of being mandated to go through the same process every time I wanted to do anything in my freighter. I'm also a pledger of SC and own a couple of ships in which I'm mandated to having to walk or run through the entire ship prior to taking off or after landing. I would think it will be the same if and when ED makes the interior of our ships walkable.

 

[VR Golgot]

what are people hoping to get out of having ship interiors

It would be cool if they could get to some of the gameplay they suggested for interiors & EVA back in the day:

• EVA & external ship repair (source)
• Sneaking in amongst the cargo (source)
• Fighting fires, dealing with toxic spills (source)
• Combative boarding of ships and repelling of boarders (source)
• Having hull breaches make the internal ship space contiguous with the external space. IE 'Seeing your cargo flying out into space' etc. (source)
• Potentially stealing player ships (source).

I'm not really expecting anything like that in EDO though. (Due to their old plans to do 'Legs' over 2 DLCs etc).

(I'm also kinda cynical on whether they can actually get hull breach style tech working, in terms of the interior of the ship & the exterior space being all one instance and location).

Not bothered personally if they don't do cosmetic-alone interiors in the meantime. They'd be cool to have and that, but I'd rather have locations added that have gameplay attached, not just assets alone. Adding Legs already risk being too 'game mechanic light' to stand on its own two feet, as it were . Don't think pushing the needle even further that way would be a great idea at this point.

 

[Tryst]

If it had immersion features like special consoles for things, they would have a use. However, more than the cockpit and a few special consoles is really too much, we could have a bedroom and a kitchen but that would really only appeal to RP players.

There is however the issue of leaving and boarding your ship. Having an apparently seamless transisiton, maybe loading the instance when you cycle the airlock, so you can get out of your pilot seat, walk to the airlock and walk down the steps from your ship onto the landing pad and then around the various locations in the station, (market, contacts office, outfitting, shipyard etc) , maybe speak to a tech to fix/refuel/rearm your ship and so on. Walking in the cockpit would also have allowed us to get into the SRV before launch. That would give us much more immersion to show we are actual pilots and not some robot permanently built into a seat.

Walking on planets might be a start, but I personally would have like to have seen seamless transitions rather than black screen transitions like we do with the SRV. Walking in the ship should have been the first step toward that (excuse the pun), getting into the drivers seat of the SRV, THEN walking on planets. A transition can be loaded during an animated cut scene, such as getting into or out of the drivers seat of the SRV or cycling the airlock to leave or enter the ship, even getting in or out of the pilots seat in the cockpit could load a transition, no need to have space and ship interiors in the same instance.

Another way to have space and cockpit in the same instance would be to have lore built in. ie: "Pilots federation had deemed it illegal to get out of your pilot seat while the ship is moving, or in the vicinity of a station, unless ejecting from a ship that is too badly damaged to salvage." Therefore, you have to be in normal space and at a complete standstill to do it. You are already in an instance when you go into normal space away from a station, therefore space and ship interior can both be in the same instance. The server tracks all instances so, if anyone pops in and starts shooting, you can run back to your seat.

If the game appears to be seamless, from one part to another, there is more feeling of immersion.

 

[Rat Catcher]

I couldn't wait when playing NMS to get a Freighter, it only took a couple days afterwards to get tired of being mandated to go through the same process every time I wanted to do anything in my freighter

This I found too... walking the same route each time one lands (or running, in my case) to get to the bridge or storage deck didn't take many trips before it felt like "Where's the lift?"

 

[HRDiagram]

The first thing that springs to my mind, when I think about being able to walk inside the ship is: what happens if, let's say, you walk to the bathroom and while you're unclenching someone interdicts you?

 

[Vorxian]

I think the more you can do on foot, gives a sense of being there. Being part of it. Whatever 'it' is you're doing.

I'd like to see repairs doable on foot, it would give exploration life, it would allow one to make sense of emergency landings to fix a broken cockpit window. It would add perspective on things. When thinking about it, adding legs really does open up infinite possibility.

 

[ZeeWolf]

The original plan for ED according to an ancient newsletter was 'walking around ships' followed by 'walking around stations' etc.

I can understand why the decision was later made to iterate on exterior stuff first as I imagine that will determine how lots of interior mechanics and physics work later, there can't be lots of FPS games that were developed with walking around in game vehicles before walking around general maps and stuff.

It'll be great if it happens but it's not the important immersion dissaster being made out by some as the majority of space games in the past have not included it as a feature nor do other types of simulator such as racing and flying. I would struggle to find a Twitch Star Citizen channel right now where someone was walknig around the ship looking at the toilet etc, they are all people flying, walking around outside or showing menu screens.

 

[GonzTheMalificent]

Walking around is a start - then breaking in to other cmdr's ships and stealing stuff, planting bombs, etc - whole new game of game!

 

[Qualityoflife]

Ok, so first thread post... Hi y'all o7...
At the risk of being to oblivion for my heathen views, but what are people hoping to get out of having ship interiors?!? It seems to weave into every other thread and ignite passion like no tomorrow... I mean, sure - I'm in VR, and I bloody love getting up and having a little wander round my cab in different ships, but surely once you've had a wander round your ship and gone "ooooh" a few times, there really isn't anything else to it... I struggle to see how gameplay is going to be incorporated and what the added value would be... wandering round other ships, like damaged megaships - now that would be awesome, but my own ship? Meh....

So what does everyone expect/want/hope to get out of ship interiors that would justify the enormous amount of time and effort for the devs to facilitate? What am I missing?

Imagine pizza........now imagine pizza with no bread! On top of fade to black transitions are a sin?
U need the whole experience commander, interiors or bust!

 

[zimms]

"I haven't given it a single thought and I'm all out of ideas!"

What's the big deal with space ships at all???

 

[CMDR Jayce MacLeod]

Because they make sense. There are a lot they could do with them. While those without imagination cry that there would be no gameplay involved, Tons of game play options they could add with interiors. (I made a list of like 10 things months ago off the top of my head)

Besides, there is little gameplay involved with half of the things we do in ED anyway, interiors technically wouldn't have to be much different lol.