Elite: Dangerous

[Falconeer]

The Anaconda.

*dies*


/heads to the Elite: Dangerous pledge store.

[Khaldun]

Y'all are really testing my "I have learned how to delay gratification, really I have" commitment.

[Falconeer]

The funny thing is that they are not even lying about what they are selling. You get ABSOLUTELY NOTHING by paying for beta other than... beta. No added bonus worth mentioning (other than free future, possible, potential, eventual expansions). And still, the word of mouth is getting so strong in this one that it's really starting to pick up money now.

[DraconianOne]

In fairness, the Premium beta access only costs £30 after taking away £35 for the game and £35 for future expansions.  Then again, they're not obliged to deliver on those expansions.

EDIT: I don't know why I'm defending this - I don't like the idea of paying to beta test at all and even writing that bit about the expansions actually makes me question the legality of what they're doing. More research needed.

[Ironwood]

The Anaconda.

*dies*


/heads to the Elite: Dangerous pledge store.

I just want an anaconda.  Is that too much to ask for ?

[Falconeer]

This subforum in the official website lists and discusses all the design goals and decisions taken so far. It is incredibly informative and in all honesty very, very ambitious. So ambitious that it gives me a very bad vibe. It is clear so far that the Elite team has nailed down space combat and traveling, but it's also true that not a single other element is in the game yet: mining, questing, NPCs, politics, etc. and the last time a game started with awesome combat and ended up with no meta at all it was with Mechwarrior Online, which is still stuck with nothing but arena fights.

Still, if you read to see what is the finished Elite Dangerous suposed to be, here are all the answers.


Here are some of the most interesting:

Ratings and Reputation - *Partially in the game*
Fuel in Elite: Dangerous - *Not in the game yet*
Criminality - *Partially in the game*
Trading - *Partially in the game*
Death Penalty (and Hardcore mode) - *Partially in the game*
Background Simulation - *Not in the game yet*
Persistent NPCs - *Not in the game yet*
Mining - *Not in the game yet*
Smuggling - *Partially in the game*
Hiring Wingmen - *Not in the game yet*
Exploring in Elite: Dangerous - *Partially in the game*
Bounty Hunting - *Partially in the game*
Trading Slaves (!) - *Not in the game yet*
Passengers - *Not in the game yet*
Vouchers (Real Money Purchases) - *Not in the game yet*
"Hello, Bomb. Are you with me?" (Ship Management)
War, poverty, cruelty, unnecessary violence" Factions and Causes in Elite: Dangerous - *Not in the game yet*

[Simond]

I had no idea this was so close to being playable.

As I'm too lazy to do my own research, someone tell me please which spaceship game I should take an interest in, this or Star Citizen? I'm guessing this, based on that video DraconianOne posted.

One of these has a lot of ideas thrown at a wall which may or may not eventually turn into some sort of game at an unspecified point of time in the future. The other just went into (closed and actual) beta.
Take your pick. 

The Anaconda.

*dies*


/heads to the Elite: Dangerous pledge store.

I just want an anaconda.  Is that too much to ask for ?

You can have the Anaconda as long as I can get a



 

[Ironwood]

What is that ?  A remake of the Frontier Imperial ship ?

[Falconeer]

Yeah, I think it's the Imperial Courier.








(Hahaha, "Check other side"!  )

[Ironwood]

I liked the other one better, with the 3 spikes as it looked a little like The Liberator.

In all honesty, I just want to fly the Cleopatra again, which was my Asp in Frontier.  Great wee runabout with some nice cargo space too.

[Falconeer]

We know that there will be 25 available ships at launch. Lots of them are obvious, lots aren't. Curiosity kills.

[MisterNoisy]

Yeah, I think it's the Imperial Courier.








(Hahaha, "Check other side"!   )

Oh man, I spent so much damned time in my Courier - that was literally my goal for the first part of the game after my first playthrough - trade up to a Courier.  Perfect size for smuggling, piracy, bounty hunting and light trading - it was just big enough that you could configure it for pretty much any role.

[Simond]

Why the Imperial Courier was  : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzEj4Gq7fT4

[Furiously]

All I remember is finally getting that ship and the front mount gun spot not working.

[Falconeer]

That intro movie gives me the chills. Thanks for reposting it, Simond 

I will return the favour with this updated version of our most favourite star systems ever, from the Elite: Dangerous Galaxy Map.

[Falconeer]

Ironwood mocked me into making a First Impressions video for Elite: Dangerous Premium Beta, so here it is with Engrish and all.
If anything I did my best to properly show the ship models and to get dogfights as close and personal as possible.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouohoGIDtHU

[Count Nerfedalot]

Thanks for that, very nice! 
si parla molto bene l'inglese

[Lantyssa]

You're English is fine.  Better than some people I know who are natives.

Thanks for the overview though.

[calapine]

I like your voice. 

The game looks good too, of course...

[satael]

Ironwood mocked me into making a First Impressions video for Elite: Dangerous Premium Beta, so here it is with Engrish and all.
If anything I did my best to properly show the ship models and to get dogfights as close and personal as possible.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouohoGIDtHU

Great and informative video 

[Falconeer]

Curious fact, from the official Elite: Dangerous forum. Granted, the sample size is small and Elite was developed in Europe, but this is odd.

[Ironwood]

Elite was a Monster-Fuck of a Massive Fucking Thing in the UK.

It was goddamned HUGE.  It had Benny Hill doing a TV Commercial before TV was invented.

That result doesn't surprise me much.

[Count Nerfedalot]

Elite was pretty damn expensive in the US back then.  And completely free for the vast majority of those outside the US who played it back then.  I suspect there is a correlation there.

[ajax34i]

Does it have soccer in it?

[Falconeer]

Whoa! I just tried this game, and Star Citizen, and a few others, with Voice Attack. I don't know if there are other similar softwares, if you know them please point me to them. But anyway, this is GREAT!

I usually don't like gimmicks like the WII controller or the Kinect, but this feels so damn natural. As a starship commander, it is only right to give voice commands to your ship computer, isn't it? Again, this works perfectly with both Elite Dangerous and Star Citizen, but I can see myself getting addicted to this and using it for all sorts of games. Screaming "POTION!" to heal in a MMORPG all of a sudden makes sense. Again, this is not for your most used keys, it's for the least used one, the ones you have to reach from time to time and could mess with your rhythm in games with a tight pace.

[Lantyssa]

How responsive is it?

[Falconeer]

Surprisingly very responsive. I'd say there is a 0.5 seconds delay which is perfect for the starship functions that aren't shooting or require reactions within a millisecond. For example, I am using it to:

- Divert power to shields/engines/weapons.
- Deploy/retract landing gear.
- Deploy/retract cargo scoop.
- Switch to silent running mode.
- Deploy heat sinks.
- Select/Switch targets.
- Throttle to zero.
- Activate Supercruise/Hyperjump.

All these functions work perfectly well with the 0.5 delay, it's what I would expect from a co-pilot executing my orders. I was skeptical when I first heard of it, but so far I am extremely impressed.

[Pennilenko]

Holy Shit, voice attack is fucking awesome.

[Ingmar]

Whoa! I just tried this game, and Star Citizen, and a few others, with Voice Attack. I don't know if there are other similar softwares, if you know them please point me to them. But anyway, this is GREAT!

I usually don't like gimmicks like the WII controller or the Kinect, but this feels so damn natural. As a starship commander, it is only right to give voice commands to your ship computer, isn't it? Again, this works perfectly with both Elite Dangerous and Star Citizen, but I can see myself getting addicted to this and using it for all sorts of games. Screaming "POTION!" to heal in a MMORPG all of a sudden makes sense. Again, this is not for your most used keys, it's for the least used one, the ones you have to reach from time to time and could mess with your rhythm in games with a tight pace.

Do you have potion mapped to "FOCK!"?

[Falconeer]

Heehee, that's actually the fun part.

[DraconianOne]

Demo of travel, docking and system commands with Voice Attack (also, rings of a gas giant) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxhiLpLeFhU

Combat with Voice Attack and Track-IR (also Capital Ship) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Fd5dgFJurQ

Attempting to deploy fuel scoops https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEu4Iq5KL-Q

 

[Falconeer]

This game so far is fucking incredible. As I said in my video, my only real issue is with the scope: we have all the reasons in the world to believe they won't be able to deliver half the things they promised, or at least not in any reasonable time.

List of the things that are not in the beta yet but are supposed to be ready at launch in 6 months.


Law Enforcement
Groupings
Communications
Missions
Access to some of the other 399,999,999,995 systems - Not all systems will be accessible in Beta but the number will increase.
Mining
More ships - see list of ships below
More weapons/addons - list if you know them and I'll update - Repair Systems, Shotgun type weapon, Docking computers.
Dynamic events - e.g. famines, wars etc..
Rankings
Faction alliance
New space stations
Docking on Cruisers
New trade goods (including unique trade goods)
System Map
Customization of ship interiors/exteriors
Fuel and Fuel skimming gas giants.
Wear and tear on ships /modules (outside of direct damage)
Passengers
NPC Contacts interaction
Wingmen
A more fleshed out supercruise mechanic. The ability to see, chase, interdict and avoid other players/NPCs, slingshots around planets and similar
Hyperspace stuff (i.e. analysis, following, linking, misjumps)
Improved planets
Exploration mechanics
Alliance
Empire
Damage models
Derelict ships - Salvage etc..
News system that covers events in game
Multiple character slots
Different start locations
Founder's world
Ironman mode
Deploying escape pods (rather than the automatic system we have now)
Hangars and multiple ship ownership
Improved Insurance
Single player - online/offline
Privateering and letters of Marque
Galaxy Evolution
New trade options - Seeing Market values without docking, Graphs!.
Beacons
Thargoids
Dark Systems, comets, Other Phenomena.
Probes
Player logs
Ship naming
Ship crews
Criminality

Ships to be added
1. Sidewinder (In Beta Already)
2. Cobra mk3 (In Beta Already)
3. Eagle (In Beta Already)
4. Viper mk2
5. Adder
6. ASP explorer
7. Imperial Courier
8. Anaconda (In Beta Already)
9. Panther Clipper
10. Orca
11. Daulphine
12. Beluga
13. Lakon type 6
14. Lakon type 7
15. Lakon type 9 (In Beta Already)
16. Python
17. Imperial Cutter.

more speculative :
18. Krait
19. "the hunter"
20. Fer-De-Lance

(out of 25 playable ships)

[palmer_eldritch]

Ironwood mocked me into making a First Impressions video for Elite: Dangerous Premium Beta, so here it is with Engrish and all.
If anything I did my best to properly show the ship models and to get dogfights as close and personal as possible.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouohoGIDtHU

Convinced me to splash out £100 on this, thanks.
 
The original Elite was sold (on cassette tape as I recall) for the BBC Micro and Acorn Electron, which I'm not sure were every widely available outside the UK? It was converted to other formats later, but if you had an Acorn or BBC then it was the game to buy.

[Falconeer]

I am not surprised that Elite is more popular in Europe than North America, I can think of a million reasons for such thing. I am surprised for the 78% vs 11% ratio. I understand every American kid is too busy worshipping Christ Roberts right now, but 78% vs 11% still feels really odd to me. Then again, small sample size, etc..

Happy you found the video useful, Palmer.

[Lantyssa]

I'm not surprised by it.  I had never heard of it until the Kickstarter, and was trying to figure out why so many people were going nuts over it.  I don't think it was ever promoted over here to any real degree.