ED has a view that it should be more or less realistic, but because of that it is seriously constraint. And it repeats itself, by design. We need more cool stuff that look like SF movies, spectacular stuff to deiscover, in short we need more amazement, even if it means relaxing some of the constraints the game puts on itself, or having some stuf designed by artists and not the game engine.
Why not some SF stuff? I mean, more SF stuff
- Thread starter CMDR DUANES
- Start date
Stuff!!!
Preferably named after some sort of feline.
Somebody said stuphz.
What's the deal?
What's the deal?
Go watch The Expanse - lots of scifi stuff, like a mini-movie each week.
Just don't tell RN, he'll start frothing again....
Just don't tell RN, he'll start frothing again....
the finding and discovering of things that are interesting has more holding it back than fdev wanting elite to be realistic. They obviously dont care about realism when it conflicts with their designs.
What is probably impacting that more-so though is that the game is a shared persistent state. Investing a lot of time in implementing something that is only "discovered" once or has to be "discovered" by everyone at different times in this persistent game makes for an odd experience or an investment that has little effectiveness.
That's not to say they can't make exploration more interesting with some gameplay ...it just really should focus less on rare / unique things to discover ....and more about improving the already existing uncommon yet procedural things in the game. Like improving non-main sequence star systems not just visually but by adding hazards and other effects like radiation / magnetic hazards / dust etc. Doing the same around rings of gas giants where they would have strong magnetic fields ... With cool effects but also impacting gameplay. Then build missions and such around those hazards.
What is probably impacting that more-so though is that the game is a shared persistent state. Investing a lot of time in implementing something that is only "discovered" once or has to be "discovered" by everyone at different times in this persistent game makes for an odd experience or an investment that has little effectiveness.
That's not to say they can't make exploration more interesting with some gameplay ...it just really should focus less on rare / unique things to discover ....and more about improving the already existing uncommon yet procedural things in the game. Like improving non-main sequence star systems not just visually but by adding hazards and other effects like radiation / magnetic hazards / dust etc. Doing the same around rings of gas giants where they would have strong magnetic fields ... With cool effects but also impacting gameplay. Then build missions and such around those hazards.
he prefers Another Life
Is that the one where Longmire's #2 goes into space? I thought it was pretty good.
I'd like to find some amazing "stuff" further out into the galaxy. Maybe the remnants of an ancient civ or two? Protomolecule, anyone?
I'd believe that, he likes PP after all....
There's a sharp line between sci-fi and magic. I can easily accept ancient dead civilisations, abandoned alien ships to explore, ancient megastructures.
The restrains the game puts on itself are the same restraints that a writer of good sci-fi puts in himself, no magic. There's plenty of ideas available that don't require magic that would be nice to have in the game, letting artists design sci-fi stuff? The very essence of wrong!
The restrains the game puts on itself are the same restraints that a writer of good sci-fi puts in himself, no magic. There's plenty of ideas available that don't require magic that would be nice to have in the game, letting artists design sci-fi stuff? The very essence of wrong!
Yet, any sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from... yadda, yada yada! The Expanse novels does that well. Amos Burton forever!
Also true for any sufficiently lazy creator. or sufficiently boring environment.
edit: and space games/movies/etc happens to have overlaps of that often. Because space is booooorrrrrriiiiiiinnngggggg in real life. It's too big and too empty.
Read Leviathan Falls and then tell me it's boring. The Expanse novels are chock full of real science. AND they introduce an initially inexplicable tech that over the course of the nine novels is plausibly explained. They could do it in ED. There are tons of great SF writers out there. Just need the will.
nobody said it had to all be magic. Just like all advanced tech isn't mind boggling in how it works.
The difference between "hard" sci fi and everything else that's sci-fi though is that hard sci fi doesn't have anything not rooted in the science we know now. And everything else is just a sliding scale of how feasible or fantastic you're willing to suspend disbelief for.
When it comes to games and space, you almost always have to deal with the vastness of it in an unrealistic way. Even Expanse handwaviums away the g forces needed to accelerate so that travelling around space doesn't take realistic amounts of time that would kill any story. Not as much handwavium as star trek ...but still.
And elite is well outside of the hard sci fi realm. The only thing hard sci fi about it is what the stellar forge tries to base it's procedural generation off of ...but everything built in top of that tech demo is fantasy. The limitations therein are arbitrary and often inconsistent with any kind of hard sci fi intent. Instead, they're chosen out of gameplay design choice or they were chosen out of necessity because at the time there was no other option and changing it now is seen as disruptive.
if the thought process with an idea in elite dangerous is "But that's not realistic" - you're not judging it properly...because elite dangerous doesn't care about realistic. It only needs to be judged on whether or not it would fit the aesthetics of the game and improve gameplay. How real it is only matters in the context of fitting in with the feel of the game. Nothing more. Even fitting in with the lore is only a very soft consideration.
I shall quote Asimov's corollary to Clarke's third law;
The ignorant often confuse science and magic, which is why artists doing sci-fi is wrong, and why currently we have a great revivial in astrology, Tarot and crystal healing. Artists illustrating the ideas of sci-fi is fine, but doing sci-fi? No. There are certainly places where crystals can be used to great effect, as in a crystal radio, but by extension assigning further properties that aren't able to be demonstrated scientifically is nonsense, but that's what you get these days.
But facebook told me that if I stick crystals in every orifice that I would be protected... now your saying I will just pick up radio stations... oh no...
I used to love my crystal radio when I was a kid
