What is the 'endgame'?

[mossfoot]

In my case I let my adventures translate into story form. I'm a writer and editor, and so taking my experiences in Elite and turning them into a story is like my morning warmup before work

It also gives me a way to explore new elements of the game, such as the Wings and PowerPlay additions, in a narrative form. Feel free to check it out

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=103457

 

[Daemonhahn]

So I've been roving around space for a few days now. I have a Cobra Mk3 and the only upgrade I'm seeing that I want from this point is an Anaconda or a Type5 heavy, which are both several million. Up until this point, my motivation has largely been to get a fancier ship, and I've done a little bit of trading and deliveries, but most of my money has come from bounty hunting and, more recently, high conflict zones where I can net something like 200k in 20min.

I looked into power play, but a lot of it seems to basically boil down to "spend half an hour flying around for some extremely minor benefit". So far joining a Power has been more useful in terms of finding more people to blast out of space than it is for actually participating in power play.

At the point I'm at now, my Cobra 3 is pretty much fully-upgraded (its rebuy is about 150k now). I have the highest levels of all the parts and weapons I want. So now I'm realizing that all I have left to look forwards to is my next ship, which is still several million away.

Since the most cost-effective way to make money seems to be high conflict zones, I'm basically facing the reality that I might just be spending hours and hours cycling through the same big battle purely to earn cash, which I'll use for a better ship, and then... ... that's it? I 'won the game'? I can't think of anything else I'd do once I have my fully-upgraded Anaconda. It's not as if I'd need any money anymore beyond ensuring I have enough for rebuy. What is there left to do at that point? What other goals are there to shoot for once you have the biggest ship and best guns?

The end-game is when the bugs vs content finally gets to you and you stop playing.

Wait a few months, get drawn back in, get to the same point again, rinse, repeat.

 

[Sathayorn]

The only thing you should concern yourself with a game like Elite is the now. End game just means an end - This isn't supposed to be something you finish - Do what you like, try out different roles, mess with the minor factions, cause civil war - Whatever floats your space boat.

 

[Samosa]

In a sandbox, it's when you end the game - depends on you really.

It's not a sandbox, because you can't build anything. "Sandbox" may actually be a worse description than "MMO".

OP, you seem to have a good handle on what the game is. It's not difficult for anyone to get their £40/$60 out of Elite: Dangerous - dinner or a movie can cost about (or a lot more than) that, and trying out a few things in the game should take quite a few hours more.

When this question is asked, the replies are always a whole lot of talk of imagination and "metagaming", but that really is the gist; those that enjoy playing for hours and hours are getting some pleasure from messing about in a spaceship. They have a different tolerance for boredom, or require less stimulation.

Me? I've put countless hours into the game due to, no doubt, some sort of weird virtual greed related compulsive disorder.

 

[Daemonhahn]

It's not a sandbox, because you can't build anything. "Sandbox" may actually be a worse description than "MMO".

OP, you seem to have a good handle on what the game is. It's not difficult for anyone to get their £40/$60 out of Elite: Dangerous - dinner or a movie can cost about (or a lot more than) that, and trying out a few things in the game should take quite a few hours more.

When this question is asked, the replies are always a whole lot of talk of imagination and "metagaming", but that really is the gist; those that enjoy playing for hours and hours are getting some pleasure from messing about in a spaceship. They have a different tolerance for boredom, or require less stimulation.

Me? I've put countless hours into the game due to, no doubt, some sort of weird virtual greed related compulsive disorder.

Ive gotten many hours out of the game due to the constant stuttering and bugs making me have to restart all over again from losing a ship! Yay!

 

[CATPAIN KIRK]

It's not a sandbox, because you can't build anything. "Sandbox" may actually be a worse description than "MMO".

Oh - I partially agree - just tried to not get into a sermon on how lacking it is in the sandbox regard. In the 1980s style of sandbox games, it still is in regards to endgame mechanics (and I actually agree - a sandbox shouldn't have anything called an endgame).

So I'd still call it a sandbox - it's just filled with ferroconcrete you can climb around on.

 

[Daemonhahn]

Oh - I partially agree - just tried to not get into a sermon on how lacking it is in the sandbox regard. In the 1980s style of sandbox games, it still is in regards to endgame mechanics (and I actually agree - a sandbox shouldn't have anything called an endgame).

So I'd still call it a sandbox - it's just filled with ferroconcrete you can climb around on.

And the ferronconcrete is filed with bugs that will come out at the slightest attempt to climb and break your stuff

 

[Samosa]

Oh - I partially agree - just tried to not get into a sermon on how lacking it is in the sandbox regard. In the 1980s style of sandbox games, it still is in regards to endgame mechanics (and I actually agree - a sandbox shouldn't have anything called an endgame).

So I'd still call it a sandbox - it's just filled with ferroconcrete you can climb around on.

Gotcha. Then there's Minecraft, of course - probably the most well known example of something truly sandboxy. I'd say Elite Dangerous is only a sandbox or MMO in a "well, alright, if you sit me in a dark room and shine a bright light in my face and threaten me with waterboarding" sort of way. It may be on the scale, but so far at one end that it's almost falling off.

On the other hand, I just learned the word "ferroconcrete", so I'm more than thoroughly satisfied with this thread.

 

[CATPAIN KIRK]

On the other hand, I just learned the word "ferroconcrete", so I'm more than thoroughly satisfied with this thread.

Ugh - not sure if that's actually an English word (as you'll have guessed English isn't my first language, so you might want to unlearn it again).

Never played Minecraft, but having played Eve for ten years might explain why I think calling ED an MMO is more absurd than calling it a sandbox - guess that explains our discrepancies.

(But yes - both claims are absurd.)

 

[William J Smith]

Endgame.. in a cobra? yeah right.

Try for an Asp, equip it with an A5 FSD (thats about 12 million in total) then go rares running between Altair and Lave, buy an advanced scanner and a surface scanner... then head into the deep black and find something (or someone) that no one has seen before

or blat around doing anti-piracy missions off the BB.

There is no 'endgame', elite is life... do what seems best at the time and hope to hell it works out

Bill

<<will head for Sgr A* and leave his ship parked there when tired of elite

 

[Samosa]

Ugh - not sure if that's actually an English word (as you'll have guessed English isn't my first language, so you might want to unlearn it again).

It seems to be a perfectly good word:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrocement

and your English is better than my <any other language> will ever be...!

 

[mossfoot]

I don't find the sandbox claim absurd. Sandbox games as far as I know don't traditionally mean you can build anything, just that you have open ended freedom to do what you want within the game and not being forced down a linear plot path. GTA games are sandbox. Red Dead Redemption is a Sandbox.

It might not have as many toys as some sandboxes, and lacks buckets to build things like Minecraft, but in the most basic definition, it's still a sandbox.

 

[Samosa]

I don't find the sandbox claim absurd. Sandbox games as far as I know don't traditionally mean you can build anything, just that you have open ended freedom to do what you want within the game and not being forced down a linear plot path. GTA games are sandbox. Red Dead Redemption is a Sandbox.

It might not have as many toys as some sandboxes, and lacks buckets to build things like Minecraft, but in the most basic definition, it's still a sandbox.

Without "toys" with which to do things, isn't any undeveloped framework eligible to be called a sandbox by that definition?

A C# compiler is a sandbox if you really want to be tricky.

 

[Ginrikuzuma]

clearly its being the first to make contact with the thargoids and setting up trade

at least that's me

 

[mossfoot]

Without "toys" with which to do things, isn't any undeveloped framework eligible to be called a sandbox by that definition?

A C# compiler is a sandbox if you really want to be tricky.

I'm not trying to be tricky. Sandbox games might be capable of doing more now, but the term (to me) was always in reference to true "open world" gameplay. And the Elite was one of the first in that regard.

You can argue there aren't as many toys as you'd like, but you can't argue the sandbox isn't there.

 

[PiLhEaD]

My enjoyment of Elite has increased markedly since I stopped thinking about money.

I had been chasing a Python, and yet every time I looked I was many millions short, and the 'game' was starting to feel like work.

So I stopped. I stopped trying to make money. I started to take missions, but not for the profit, but simply because I liked the sound of the mission. And the more morally abhorrent the mission, the better - for I am a bad bad spaceman.

And every interdiction, I submitted, in my nasty dirty sexy Diamondback Scout with is nasty weapons. And after any pew-pew I would be on my merry way again. And for a while this was just pure fun.

Then, after a while, I parked the DbS, and got back into 'Trundle' (my T6) and went CG farming... trading trading trading... just for a 'break'... and in no way did the reward justify the time-spent... but it's not about the money.

And now the CG is done, I'm wending my way in a 'long-jump' configured Sidewinder back to my parked Exploration-tuned Asp... I'll deconstruct the Sidey and sell it when I arrive... and then I'm off sight-seeing and exploring in the Asp.

Money? Endgame? Winning? Don't bore me with such mundanities... I have a 400Bn stars starfield to play in, and play I will!

 

[Samosa]

I'm not trying to be tricky.

Apologies, I should have written "if one wants to be tricky".

 

[Cody]

No, tricky is tricky!

 

[Lanz]

I guess 'endgame' may have been a poor choice of words. What I mean is the point you get to where there isn't as much 'mechanical' growth left to undergo and you've reached the pinnacle somewhere and can now participate in the 'big stuff' that you couldn't have done at the beginning of the game because your gear/stats/whatever sucked.

I attribute getting something like an anaconda to being tantamount to hitting the 'level cap' in an MMO. The 'endgame' being what comes after you hit level cap. I would have expected that in something like ED, that would be large-scale PVP, but it doesn't seem that's realistic due to ED seeming to lack any form of large-scale in-game organization.

I don't really see the appeal in exploration. You just get to see a planet, then a slightly blue-er planet, then a slightly green-er planet, etc, etc. It feels less like an achievement and more like a novelty. That aside it's also very restrictive. If you venture outside of civilized space you're just stuck with nothing but exploration. It's not like you could go to some far-flung corner and start building your own space stations/fleets/empires.

With so little in the way of player interaction with the game, it feels like the only reason to do most of this is just to see what happens then move on. The only thing on this scale seems to be the Power Play, which has its own problems. I might have to just pick a specific power to cater to my playstyle, because the pretty blue princess seems to not be it.

 

[piugattuk]

At that point there is no point, you play because it's something to do, but the nice thing is at least we can look forward to content being added, there is no story except the story you write.