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So what do you think after play Elite Dangerous for just over a month?


DarkOne
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Hey Everyone

 

It's been over month since release and wondering how people are liking or not liking the game (added a poll) so be honest and maybe someone with the power to change it will make it happen. I personally have yet to buy the game and I am holding off until I see more development done to the game to get it to a place to where I think it would be something I would play for a while. I always value the feedback I get from the community on games and whether they are good or not so is the game good?


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NevilClavain
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The game was clearly designed keeping the spirit of the original games (Elite, Frontier) : very complex, very repetitive, no guide line, nobody to tell you what you have to do. So it will confuse a lot of people. (In space, no one can hear you scratching your head...)

This game is reserved to elite hardcore fan imho

 

The MMO aspect is almost non-existent.

 

Very beautiful gfx. And Hell I cant wait for the planet landing extension. I read here and there that this will take a lot of time to come, or even maybe never released...


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Cody
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I cant wait for the planet landing extension. I read here and there that this will take a lot of time to come, or even maybe never released...

 

This concerns me a little too - after Offline-gate (something which still stinks), nothing is certain anymore! <mutters something about sales weasels> As for the game itself: though I haven't put much play-time in yet, the game has not 'grabbed' me as I had hoped it would. Far too much is missing/not implemented yet/may not be implemented - rather disappointing, frankly!

Oolite Naval Attaché


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ExpandingMan
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I read here and there that this will take a lot of time to come, or even maybe never released...

 

Even though planetary transitions would be a very exciting feature, and would make the universe feel much more complete, I think this is far from the most important thing FD needs to be doing.  There are just too few viable activities right now.  I'm finding that even trading isn't a viable means to get ships that are approximately 10^6 credits or more.  That mostly seems to leave bounty hunting, but, frustratingly, that seems to involve little more than crawling through the system and stopping at USS's.  Once you get in a Cobra, the lack of productive activity to be had makes it pretty difficult to convince yourself to keep playing.  Perhaps a vastly improved missions system alone would be enough to remedy most of these problems, but it would really have to be VASTLY improved.  They really should have taken a few more months to mull over what sorts of interesting day-to-day activities should be added to make things more interesting before releasing the game.

 

If they understand what they need to do, the game will improve and they will be successful.  I'm not sure what to expect though, FD has seemed oddly obtuse and stubborn about certain things.


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XenonS
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I haven't buyed it for the moment, but it's on my list.

I would have prefered an offline mode, but to be always online should not be too much of a practical problem for a hardcore fan playing with 3 monitors at home (I'm a hardcore with only 1 monitor), else the technical specs would probably not allow to play offline, like when being underway with a laptop which I really DON'T recommend for the sake of the laptop 🙂

 

Planetary actions and more FFE / FE2 mission types would be very welcome. I remember the assassination, bombing and photography missions in FE2, they were quite interesting where you had to evade horde of ships after finishing the mission, making some interesting planet action squirmish. I think even by implementing those 1:1 into ED, but with todays grafics and maybe some walking around on planet cities and stations, this would give the magic touch of the old game series. For example, by adding good planet textures, mountains etc. the player may use the relief or the ground objects to evade or attack enemies. It would need a good upgrade to the NPC AI. That's just an idea.

I'm sort of a space romatic, so I like the scene in Star Trek Nemesis, where the ship lands on the planet and the crew immediately gets out with an off-road vehicle. I think games like Star Wars Battlefront II, or Salvation Prophecy have shown that there can be much playing fun with actions like these.

 

XenonS


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Vuzz
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At the announcement of the removal of offline mode I was pretty disappointed because I had no inttention to play other than solo.

 

But fortunately the solo online mode exists: And I have to say I'm quite satisfied, more than to expect the update for atterissages planetary and I could say that ED is the heir worthy of his lineage.

 

PS, multiplayer severe problem meeting fashion according to some french friends who play it.

 

Lags, unwanted disconnections, and even spontaneous explosion of their ships!

 

The online solo is stable and I have been ejects the server 2 times since December 16, 2014.

 

In short; I'm satisfied 90% (it'll be 100% with landings)

 

 

EDIT: I do not understand why this game was placed in MMOs so that we can play conventionally solo


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KingHaggis
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I'm still waiting for the "seamless procedural planet" feature to make ED perfect. Right now, it's very nice (especially the controls, I've never flown a spacegame with better controls than ED) but the game gets boring after a while. I think exploring different planet surfaces will expand the lifetime a lot. Especially when you'll also get the ability do to things planetbound, i.e. walking around, exploring on foot, etc. I owned a Oculus Rift DK2 for a while and being "inside" the cockpit in ED was definitely my most immersive experience ever in a game. Biggest disappointment so far is the loading screen while doing a hyperjump. Maybe it's because of technical limitations but I would prefer a universe as seamless as Space Engine, where you target a star and really go there without loading screens. I would have really wanted ED's hyperjumps like that, but I think that's only something a small percentage of gamers would complain about.

 

All in all, I think ED is awesome, but lacking content. It has the potential to become one of the best spacegames ever and thank goodness it's still being continuously worked on.


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ExpandingMan
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I'm a little concerned that with there being so much discussion over planetary landings, FD will prioritize that issue over more important core gameplay issues.


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KingHaggis
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IMO, planetary landings is the most important issue, so I will be glad if they prioritize it. It's the main reason I became a backer and it will make the game A LOT more interesting I think. Of course, I too hope the other "important core gameplay issues" won't suffer in the process. But man, planetary landings need to happen or the game won't be worthy of its title.


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NevilClavain
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IMO, planetary landings is the most important issue, so I will be glad if they prioritize it. It's the main reason I became a backer and it will make the game A LOT more interesting I think. Of course, I too hope the other "important core gameplay issues" won't suffer in the process. But man, planetary landings need to happen or the game won't be worthy of its title.

All is said here, I couldn't agree more  🙂


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ExpandingMan
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So now I just have to ask, how in the world can planetary landings be the most important issue?

 

Don't get me wrong, I very much want them to implement this.  It makes the world seem more complete, but I don't really understand the fervor about it.

 

In the grand scheme of things, if they were to add planetary landings right now and nothing else it would just be very expensive (development-wise) fluff.  It's basically equivalent to adding more stations, i.e. places to dock.  That's all very nice, but is that really what the game needs?  In and of itself, it doesn't really add more compelling activities to fill up the game, just a new fun landing procedure which will seem routine after a few dozen attempts.

 

It's hard for me to argue against, because I in some way agree that there should be planetary landings, but it seems absolutely like the wrong approach to me to prioritize something like this in a game which is lacking in core gameplay features.  It's just a novelty which would quickly grow old in a game as devoid of content as ED currently is.  I really think if FD makes this there next major goal, people will be very happy for about 5 minutes, then remember that there's nothing to do, and say most of the same negative things they are already saying about ED.


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NevilClavain
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I want it, not really for a gameplay matter, but rather for a question of a better immersion. Who can imagine an space exploration game in universe where you cannot land on planets ? This is just disturbing for me. Something is just missing, that's my feeling. FD invested a lot of time to provide to us a galaxy compliant with latest scientific knowledge in astronomy, very realistic on a lot of criteria, but you just cannot go on the planet's surface ? I know how difficult it is to implement such a feature, but I would have liked the game to be released later, but with this feature ready.


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XenonS
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If we look at FFE and FE2, basically the planetary actions are just other space stations to take missions from in a more immersive atmosphere. But I dare to say that if they were not present like in Elite, these games would not have reached their famous popularity. I agree with ExpandingMan though: If implementing planet landings, then there must be some GOOD reasons to do so, namely: specific challenging missions especially designed for planets and their landscapes.

I can envision at least the following 3 ideas:

 

- Mining activities with special vehicles that would start from the planetrary station. The spaceship should be able to carry some types of vehicles (that you must buy first of course) and would allow you to leave the ship to explore and do actions on planets.

 Maybe some defensive missions against pirates or clans that would try to occupy the mining land area to claim theier property and make profits.

 

- Pirate, clan or Alien (Thargoids ?!) bases on planets with some challenging actions involved. In FE2 and FFE this was present in form of bombing and Recon missions, but I guess with todays scripting methods it could be done much better.

 

- Some RPG type quests and Sidegames, not very exciting for everyone, but should be more easy to implement, for example some poker game in a bar, some missions taken from pirates to do weird things like chasing concurrents etc.

 

Surprisingly, there are only few good space games where you can land on planets without neglecting the pure space actions. Evochron Mercenary is one of them. But what is the thrill with planets? It's exiting not because you freely fly over the planet and land on cities, but because the atmospheric combat is well done and challenges you with different strategies and tactics than the space combat. So it really ADDS something to the game. Besides, apart some quests, there is only 1 mission type for planets, but it's enough to immerge the players: it's the Walking Robot where you get inside to do mining activities and shooting against enemies. But one must understand that the game authors have added this because it FITS to the game, and not because they wanted to add some good side-effects and atmosphere.

 

All in all, I agree: Planet actions are going to be expensive for developers, for those who think it's a walk in the park I suggest taking a look at the Star Citizen videos: they will greatly emphasize planet and 1st person actions. The problem is: We are very soon in a Precursor type game, more games in one, FPS, RPG, Space game. Adding content costs money, a lot of money. These additions must finally get more people to buy the game.

 

XenonS


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auryx
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ExpandingMan, what do you mean by "core gameplay features"? Just different ways of making money, for example?

 

I've not yet played the game, but what I'm expecting (and would be happy with) is that it never offers much more than Frontier or First Encounters did - i.e. lots of flying around, visiting faraway systems, some combat, some ship improvement, etc. I wouldn't particularly want detailed quest arcs or lots of different things to do, because to me, that makes it less of a sandbox somehow - I'd rather that most of the goals be in my own imagination. I'd certainly be inclined to prioritise planetary landings over everything else (except bug fixes) and I think that they are really an essential part of any space game.

 

But, your mileage may vary 😀

 

auryx

You look good through a crosshair.


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Cody
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The focus of the next update (1.1) will be 'community goals', it seems - I'll say no more!

Oolite Naval Attaché


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ExpandingMan
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ExpandingMan, what do you mean by "core gameplay features"? Just different ways of making money, for example?

 

Essentially yes, but also things like ship fitting (additional modules which can radically change the role of ships, etc.).  There are also other possibilities such as the more sophisticated damage model that they were hinting at much earlier in development, or that SC has now (not going to happen now, for sure, but it's just an example).  Also, a massively expanded mission system which would add a myriad of tasks to make trading and combat more interesting would go a long way to improving the game.

 

 

 

I wouldn't particularly want detailed quest arcs or lots of different things to do, because to me, that makes it less of a sandbox somehow

You wouldn't want lots of things to do?  Really?  Detailed storylines of any sort would certainly be FAR from my first choice on how to expand the game, but I always want things to do, and I can't imagine how that could subtract from the game if they are always optional.  Look at Elder Scrolls: story heavy, lots to do, very sandbox (again, story heavy not appropriate for Elite, but ES pulled it off at least until Skyrim).  Look at EVE Online: a ridiculous amount of things to do (of course you have to have the free time to coordinate doing it with other people in that game), most sandbox game ever made.


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NevilClavain
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I just started a 'mining' career. Strange that this is tedious and exciting at the same time   with patience it can bring you a lot of credits


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Geraldine
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It can Nevil but watch out for pirates and other ne'er'-do-wells sneaking up on you while you busy blasting rocks. If your attacked don't forget to raise your cargo scoop. I keep forgetting this and it puts the ship at a disadvantage while manoeuvring in combat. Mind you to the attacker it looks like your sticking your tongue out that them!


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NevilClavain
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It can Nevil but watch out for pirates and other ne'er'-do-wells sneaking up on you while you busy blasting rocks.

 

This mishap happened to me yesterday. I packed up everything and I ran away as a big coward.

 

 

If your attacked don't forget to raise your cargo scoop

 

You can also put all the power on the engines rather than sys and weapons, and begin to slalom between asteroids (it's a bit dangerous though) By putting enough distance with the opponent you'll have time to switch on hyperspace and leave him on the place.

 

BTW on mining place, there are often security forces chasing criminals. Help them to kill the rebel pilot and you'll take a lot of money with minimal risk. (between 2000 and 12000 credits)

I made a gain of 45000 credits just by doing that during 30 minutes. 


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CaptainKal
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I made a gain of 45000 credits just by doing that during 30 minutes. 

 

I made 43.000 when I brought down an Anaconda, with the help of the security forces. (First time lucky, I guess !!!!!!).

 

 

 

You can also put all the power on the engines rather than sys and weapons, and begin to slalom between asteroids (it's a bit dangerous though) By putting enough distance with the opponent you'll have time to switch on hyperspace and leave him on the place.

 

 

Just do not forget , to reset your energy allocation , when you want to fight someone. I forgot it, and my Eagle turned as slow as a truck (and got myself blown out of the sky!!!!). 


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NevilClavain
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Just do not forget , to reset your energy allocation , when you want to fight someone. I forgot it, and my Eagle turned as slow as a truck (and got myself blown out of the sky!!!!). 

Thx for the tip, I'll try to remember this


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