Elite: Dangerous. I broke down.

[Asid]

Published on 6 Nov 2015

Here's another unedited video taken from Elite Dangerous: Horizons. Again, many things here are unfinished which I won't call out. This shows another slow zoom, but this time showing the effect of volatiles forming as a mist in a deep crater on a cold, rocky, uninhabited world.

[Jarhead0331]

^Reminds me of Pink Floyd..."There is no dark side of the moon, really. As a matter of fact, its all dark."

From a technical perspective, what FD has accomplished is nothing short of miraculous. I will always remember the awe I felt as I approached a space station for the first time...I have no doubt I am going to relive the sensation with Horizons.

[JudgeDredd]

I agree with JH - from a technical pov, the game is outstanding. I remember coming on these very forums shouting from the rooftops about the feel, sensation and immersion in the game.

I don't know what Horizons is going to bring or how it'll play out and add to the game - but the sheer scale of that moon in that video is awesome.

At 1:19 I thought it was going to transform into the Death Star!  ;D

[undercovergeek]

theres mention on the forum of prison planets and prison bases, break outs and missions to find and kill escaped convicts - the universe is certainly expanding with life

[sandman2575]

At 1:19 I thought it was going to transform into the Death Star!  ;D

As Obi Wan said, "that's no space station. It's a moon!"   ;)

[mikeck]

I agree. People don't seem to appreciate the absolute scale of this game. 4,000,000,000 stars and each one exists and can be visited. Many with planets including actual planets found to exist in real life. To cap it off, planetary landing IN SCALE. There was another game where you could land on planets but they were small. Truly is amazing

[RooksBailey]

^eve online has been around since 2003. That's 12 friggen' years of development and refinement. Do you really think it's fair to compare the state of that game with the state of Elite, that has not even been out of early access for a single year?

Yeah, I do think it is fair because both games are playable now.  Elite isn't alone in the game universe, it has to compete with other titles whether or not Game X has a ten year lead or not.  When people play a game, they want to be immersed and have fun NOW, not in ten years.  Like it or not, Elite's gameplay is already in competition with the likes of Eve Online, the X-Series, Evochron Mercenary.  And, honestly, all those games provide more content than what Elite is currently offering.  This, of course, will change as time passes - Elite's Horizon's expansion will bring it equal with Evochron's planetary landings (actually, it will surpass it), but right now Elite is lagging.  But that was not the main thrust of my argument.  I was mentioning how the existing content feels unfinished and shoehorned in at times.  That is where my frustration is coming from.

Further, in my profession, you usually lead with your strongest arguments...your first complaint is that there is no explanation for how you get back into a ship after getting destroyed? I'm sure eventually they will have this kind of fluff, but they are still working on adding more game play content to enhance the universe and add things for players to do and explore. I'd think that is a wise strategy of priority. Personally, I'd rather them focus on new content, bugs, etc., than on lore and filler for people who don't have much of an imagination.

Granted, I wasn't writing a dissertation entitled "The Structural Morphology of Elite: Dangerous" but instead just a late night, spur of the moment post, so perhaps my dialectical form could have been improved for your profession  :), but it nonetheless effectively states what I consider some increasingly annoying shortfalls that currently exist in Elite.  Nothing I wrote above hasn't already been mentioned countless times on the official forums as you probably well know.  And, no, this has nothing to do with a lack of imagination (Really?  From one old time gamer to another?  You think that is a fair defense?).  This has to do with presentation.  And Elite's presentation has been very haphazard in my opinion.   

Elite has accomplished some miraculous things. Many of which have never been accomplished before.

What precisely?  Granted, the 400 billion procedurally generated galaxy is a technological feat.  No argument there.  But gameplay-wise, Elite hasn't broken any new ground.  There is nothing in Elite that I cannot currently do in another space game.  Quite the contrary, I can actually do much more in other games.  As you point out, there is nothing wrong with this as Elite in still in Year 1.  But don't try to sell the idea that the entire game is right now revolutionary or "miraculous" when it is clearly not.  I hope it will be one day, but right now it isn't.

The game continues to improve and by the looks of it, it isn't going anywhere.

I agree.  I never argued otherwise.

But seriously, your wall of text of what to me, are extremely minor complaints, in comparison to all that the game actually does well, is exactly the reason why developers leave the business and/or get frustrated with their customers.

Three paragraphs are now considered a "wall of text"?  Okay then.  :) But I wrote "a wall of text" because I wasn't interested in writing a Twitter-esque 140 character hit along the lines of "Elite sux!  #EveOnlineForever!"   :)  I just wanted to provide some observations I had after playing the game for just short of a year.  I even acknowledged that my complaints were minor:  "None of these complaints are game breaking...."  But that is precisely why I am losing patience because it would be nice if Frontier just paused and addressed these complaints that the community has been bringing up time and again instead of constantly rushing off to new content.  This is what almost doomed Eve a few years back.  I don't want to see that happen to Elite.

Some will always want more and they will want it right away. Give credit where credit is due for a change. Elite is already a spectacular game, and I can't wait to see where it goes in the future.

Have fun playing Eve...and, LoL, X-Rebirth!

I really don't understand where the snark is coming from.  Just by perusing this very thread and the screenshots thread you can see that I have said lots of good things about the game in the past.  I am not hostile to Elite.  I, too, look forward to its future.  But to pretend that Elite is some sort of holy grail of space games in its current form is not doing the game any favors.  If anything, you should have tried to persuade me that some of the faults I listed are legitimate but not any reason to become frustrated just yet.  Instead, you accused me of lacking imagination and declared the game miraculous.  That is not doing anyone, especially the game, any favors.  Do I like Elite?  Yes!  Will I continue to play it? Yes!  Probably this afternoon if I get the chance!  But I am not going to constantly try to convince myself that the game is an absolute joy to play when it is not.  What game is, frankly?

Look, I didn't mean to rankle anyone, and I certainly didn't mean my post to seem like an unfair hit on Elite.  I was just critiquing the game like I have countless other games on this very forum.  If I offended anyone, I apologize.  But those are my opinions on the current state of Elite 1.4.1.  Hopefully, by this time next year, we are all having a blast with Horizons and all the bug fixes and new features it brings.  But right now the game is leaving me a bit annoyed in its current form. 

[JudgeDredd]

^ No offense taken here RB.

I agree with pretty much all your points. But as I said in my post - I like games with stories. Open world stuff kind of kills me. After the initial wow factor, I get burned out on trying to make my own story.

I loved the look and feel of X3-Reunion but for the life of me it took me more than two years to even scratch the surface because I was in and out of it all the time not knowing what the hell to do.

I think they've just provided a platform for people to make their own game. They've gave a very solid foundation for that imo and some gamers are getting on with it. Look at the fun UCG is having with slave trading (evil man!).

I do agree with you - every one of your points resonate with me - but I've just come to understand that unless I'm willing to go a forge my own story, it's not going to get much airtime. It's certainly not for everyone.

I haven't given up on it. I haven't played it in a long time - but I haven't given up on it. Like I said - I'd still like to see myself as a Han Solo.  :)

ps - not to step on JH's foot but I think he may have been referring to your first paragraph when he mentioned a wall of text. I did find it a little hard to read and actually skipped over it the first time

pps - also with the reference to comparing Eve:Online to Elite - perhaps the "is it fair" question was relating to nodding towards "What functionality did Eve Online have in it's first year". Certainly there's no question for a lot of people that Eve Online is much more fun than Elite just now - but that could be due to 12 years of development. Of course, just because that's the case does not mean you won't/shouldn't/can't be having more fun with Eve Online and your point about Elite having to compete with other "more fleshed out" games  for gaming time is valid. It's going to find itself slipping unless it engages people more...perhaps the Power Play and Horizons may do that...who knows?

[JudgeDredd]

Out of curiosity - is there anyone else having issues upgrading? Specifically people who may not have logged in for a while?

I saw there was a launcher update, so I clicked on that to install and it did it's thing until it got to C++ redist part and just sat there for about an hour before I decided to abort.

Next thing was to just upgrade. Unfortunately that didn't work and, from past experience, it was because I had an out of date launcher (which doesn't seem to want to complete installation).


Never mind the above - it seemed to work 4th time

What seems a bit strange is the version numbers shown in my launcher. The version I have seems to be newer than the version on the server


Any ideas?

[mikeck]

The draw of the game isn't some type of combat or the feel of the ship maneuvering or even a trade system. The amazing thing that makes this game unique is the size of it combined with the effects that occur universe wide. If you make something happen, then that occurrence exists in the universe at large for everyone. If you intervene in a civil war and make a difference, then that outcome affects everyone. That in itself is not unique but couple with a galaxy of 4,000,000,000 stars and planetary landings it's unreal. Even now, oh about 1% of the Galaxy has been explored by Elite players. I like to be part of a living universe where decisions I make affect everyone

[Jarhead0331]

Horizons beta delayed until at least 11/30...damn it. There goes my 4 day weekend.

[Panman]

Price on Steam has dropped to under $15 (on sale).  Almost a shame not to pick it up now ...

[Yskonyn]

beware that this is the base game only.
Once Horizons gets released in a few weeks you will not be able to play it without buying it seprately from Elite:Dangerous.
If you were waiting, then I suggest you wait a bit more and buy once Horizons hits.

[Pete Dero]

Price on Steam has dropped to under $15 (on sale).  Almost a shame not to pick it up now ...

Yes, but you buy the 'old' version.  What will happen to this the day Horizons is released ? You might end up in an empty universe as most people migrate to Horizons or will the 2 games share the same world ?

[Yskonyn]

The two games will share the same world.
You'll still see others as usual, but the Horizons gameplay additions are locked.