Anybody else get Elite Dangerous (“Version 1.0.0.0” - boy, that certainly boasts confidence in the product) yet?
Apparently, there’s some sort of “group play” / “play with friends” ability, but I’m not quite sure what that means. Does the group have its own separate “area”? Is it part of the “main community universe” (assuming this even exists), but you have the ability to communicate with each other?
I haven’t really looked up what’s new in the release build, but I think grouping is still pretty bare bones at this point.
I really don’t know why this game is coming out now. It’s a solid baseline, and stable, but I think it still needs more features baked in.
I’m waiting for my IR head tracker and HOTAS to get here before jumping, so probably after xmas.
I backed it on Kickstarter, forgot about it for a long time, then downloaded and tried it in one of the Gamma versions.
First impression was the docking tutorial. Now, I played the original Elite, and way back then, docking was the cause of the vast, vast majority of deaths.
It appears that they have made it much more difficult now. You don’t just have to fly into the rotating hole, you have to ask for docking permission (fine, but the tutorial told me I had to do it without telling me how to access communications…), then you fly through the hole, then you actually have to land on a random pad–and do so in a fairly finicky matter.
Eventually, I managed it, moved on to basic combat, and found that at least part of my problem was that the mouse/keyboard control scheme just didn’t work well for me. Possibly because I’m using a trackball, maybe there were some settings I could tweak or something, but at that point I was just frustrated. I’ve since ordered a joystick (I’ve been wanting to pick up X-Wing/TIE Fighter from GOG), but haven’t had a chance to try it out since.
I got the mercenary edition last week, and played the 1st combat demo, but haven’t done anything else
Considering a joystick (probably a T 16000)
Brian
Been playing it for some time. Imagine an Elite that came out in 1989 and add 2014 graphics and for the most part you have it.
The grouping aspects are primitive and patchy I’m afraid. But you can set up private instances of the universe. There’s a large PvE one for example.
Docking is easy once you get the hang of it and remember you have thrusters for fine movement control.
There’s a lot to like about it, especially if you’re a way-back-when Elite fan. But as seems usual these days this has been release several months too early IMHO. It’s still thin on features and maybe short of balance in some areas.
But - huge galaxy - as in the whole galaxy. A wide range of ships to own and even wider range of upgrades to customise them with. It’s very ‘simmy’ with enough keys to fill my X55. The flight model is good, the combat rewards skill, plenty of systems management. Lots of good stuff.
It says its an MMO but all it really is, is a persistent universe you need a connection to play. I’ve played for hours since release and had no interactions with other players. It’s still very much One Man and a Spaceship in a big bad galaxy.
It’s fun and will keep getting better, but I’d still give it a couple of months before buying it if you’re not an old Elite fan.
I used a t16000 for a time in beta. Fine stick. But also get Voice Attack, which has an Elite Dangerous pack to give custom voice responses to commands. I use it to automate stuff like controlling the landing gear, dropping chaff, going in and out of warp etc etc.
Much as though I don’t want to, I have to agree. I backed it on Kickstarter, but not at a high enough level to get beta access, so I got in on the gamma a few weeks ago. I wanted to love it, I grew up playing the original Acornsoft Elite and later Frontier on my Amiga. It really is Elite with prettier graphics and an unnecessarily complex way of handling the ship. I could go on at length about my issues but I’ll leave just one that I feel sums up where they went wrong in trying to make things as ‘realistic’ as possible at the expense of gameplay:
In the game they have worked out how to fly faster than light but not how to have automatically deploying landing gear. Yes, in a universe where you can traverse the Milky Way you still have to manually deploy landing gear when you dock.
Elite Dangerous mistakes such things for complexity and immersion.
Don’t get me wrong, the game has potential. But right now it is a pretty game that has hardly advanced on the game mechanic from 1984. Unfortunately the world of video games has moved on, but David Braben hasn’t.
Thanks for this. I had been considering getting into this but now I’d rather stick with Oolite.
Yeah, when playing around with the docking I got the feeling that I’d get the hang of it soon enough, but it would not ever be interesting–just a tedious, slightly finicky timesink.
Maybe they wanted to make it feel more sim-like with the more explicit landing, but sailing ports have harbormasters and tugboats and such for a reason. If I own a space station where the docking pads are on the inside, no way I’m letting some random space jockey fly around under his own power inside the place.
Isn’t there an autopilot available for docking? I thought I read that.
But anyway I think I’ll still stick with Kerbal Space Program for now.
Yes there is an autodocking module you can purchase.
I found docking super easy and fun to do… with a joystick.
I came across this fairly interesting story on Reddit, so thought I would pass it along.
Okay, now I’m interested again. 
I picked up this game, ran a few contracts, then I started writing a tool to help with commodity hauling. Now I’ve spent the last three weeks working on that, instead.
Hopefully I’ll still remember how to dock when I start playing again.
Pardon me for asking, but what are the generally accepted “standard” keys/joystick buttons for forward and reverse thrust? My setup doesn’t seem to have them defined.
I bound it to a button on my HOTAS throttle; I don’t think there’s a ‘standard’ way to do it. I’d say put it near your thruster controls since you’re primarily going to use it during docking.
I actually like all the little manual details such as landing gear and lights. It does add to my immersion.
I’m enjoying it so far. I also picked up a copy of VoiceAttack and a voice pack which allows you to talk to your ship and get voice replies.
Demo vid: http://youtu.be/8dnJ–pSjdE
Reddit writeup sold me on it. Patcher is taking so long to install that I might not actually get to play until I get back from my trip.
At least I’ll have another week before I have to get back to work.
Playing it and have managed to run 1 courier mission to a station and dock “successfully”. Well, I ground myself sideways across the bay and bounced off some structure, but that will buff right out. And the mess that I left on Pad 21 before getting yelled at…assigned parking spots? Who knew? I get the feel of it now, though, and future docking will be a breeze.
I really didn’t expect it to run so well on my 2-year old laptop, but I get great frame rates on med/high settings. Playing with a PS4 controller, works pretty well, am going to start playing with some button remapping/macroing to make things smoother.
A great tip that I saw on a forum to quickly find the docking bay entrance…the “right hand rule” tells you where the entrance is. Curl your right hand fingers in the direction to match the station rotation, your thumb then points out of where the docking entrance is.
Going to love this game 