89 replies to this topic

[Riko]

Frigidman™, on 02 March 2015 - 12:09 PM, said:

EVE is a screensaver point-n-click strategy sim. Not a space flight sim (where you are in direct control of your ship ala pilots seat).

A patch ago CCP added keyboard control to move your ship up/down/etc. Was one of the first things new players struggled with: "how the frakk am I supposed to move my ship?"

Nice review Janichsan

[Frost]

I refused to ever touch EVE because it sounds like a PvP gankfest. I'm usually pretty good at PvP in most games, I'm in the top 2% of players on Destiny and usually slaughter the other players but being good at PvP doesn't mean I like lots of PvP. I'm a PvE player primarily and I like coop. So from everything I've read, unless you're part of some big corp you're not gonna have a good time. I have no desire to fly for a corp, and also want to fly my own ship, not click my ship. With all that in mind, Elite sounds far more intriguing to me.

I don't know how many hundred hours I've dumped into Escape Velocity over the years AND I'm a huge flight sim buff, so this is right up my alley. I also like the scientifically accurate (relatively speaking) direction they took with it, and the story is actually somewhat interesting to me. That being said, there seems to be a lot missing from Elite: Dangerous that I'd rather it have. The plans to add most of those things, however, intrigue me. This game is on my radar for Tuesday. You may see me drop in once the first big expansion is out.

The only thing that bothers me is I've read they limited you pretty severely in unassisted flight with 6DOF where you have really low yaw and you only maneuver at an optimal rate when flying a certain speed, in order to push people to dogfight. I don't know about that. I was over the moon for Beyond the Red Line and Diaspora with actual newtonian space combat allowing circle strafing, high speed slashing attacks, and other totally unconventional maneuvers. I want that kind of spaceflight very much. I've no idea if there's any merit to that criticism though as I haven't played it myself.

I'm disheartened to hear that exploration isn't really a viable career path. Just reading "400 billion star systems" immediately killed all of my desire to hunt down space pirates or trade and replaced it with a desire to be Magellan or Captain Cook and go out there and explore and catalog things. Hell, I liked doing that in Escape Velocity even without missions. I'd go into uncharted territory with an interstellar ramscoop or fission reactor so I would never run out of fuel, and just see how far I could explore and what cool stuff I could find. I hope they make that a viable play choice in the future, monetarily. I'd also like to know if I can do my old Escape Velocity favorite career path... turn an overpowered fighter (EV Star Clipper and EV: Nova Thunderhead FTW) into a top-flight cargo hauler that can do rapid deliveries of small but ultra-expensive mission cargo into dangerous areas and frak up much bigger ships via creative flying if they get in the way.

In the meantime I'm also watching Star Citizen anxiously. I've been playing with the pre-alpha for the first time this week with the SXSW code and I'm blown away by the level of fidelity put into every little thing so far, plus even at the pre-alpha stage the flight model is feeling really good even using a mouse and keyboard (was too lazy to hook up my HOTAS). My spaceflight skills are covered in rust, but even so I tried and accomplished some of my Viper Mk. VII maneuvers from Battlestar Galactica flying, such as playing chicken and then circle strafing downward and filling the bottom of the opposing ship with holes in a highspeed pass. So that's another one to put on the list. In its case, the only thing that bothers me is the hackneyed storyline sounds like the trite product of a B-movie grade scriptwriter at best. Seriously, they've got $75 mil from crowdfunding and can hire top-notch modelers and physics experts to build kickass starships, but can't put some of that toward a decent writer? But if they make good on only half what they're promising to do, I won't be playing for the plot anyway.

[Janichsan]

They made some concession to make the flight model more accessible and ensure dogfighting, but it's not as limited as it seems. The thing with the optimal turn rate at a certain speed for instance is only with the flight assist on. Disable flight assist, and you can turn much faster. Apart from that, circle strafing is actually possible even with enabled FA: you can always fire your directional thrusters to move your ship in every direction but forward. In fact, if you ever want to take on some of the tougher and larger ships, that's the only way how to keep out of their firing arcs. Also, the AI does this all the time.

With one of the latest minor patches, the other roles than trading got a significant income boost, making them much more viable. Exploration is still the slowest way to make money, but that's just the nature of the things: there's a lot more travelling involved than for trading or bounty hunting.

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Seriously, they've got $75 mil from crowdfunding and can hire top-notch modelers and physics experts to build kickass starships, but can't put some of that toward a decent writer?

Sounds like the game equivalent of James Cameron's Avatar…

[Frigidman™]

Interplanetary Expeditions seemed to do well for themselves ... there is untapped income from discovering ancient technologies and reverse engineering and selling them to highest bidders.

[clocknova]

Is Star Citizen going to have a Mac version?  What are the primary differences between it and Elite: Dangerous?  They sound very similar.

While I'll probably play Elite:Dangerous when the Mac version is released, the game I'm really waiting for is No Man's Sky.  That game looks like the holy grail of procedurally generated space exploration, where actual exploration is the real focus of the game.  While there's no official word on a Mac version, I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Truth be told, the game seems almost too good to be true, but we'll see.

Anyone else watching this one?

[macdude22]

I read a big piece on No Man's Sky a while back and haven't heard anything about it since. Is it still on the docket? it seemed awful ambitious.

[clocknova]

Oh, yes.  There's tons out there about this game.

For the official word:  http://www.no-mans-sky.com/about/

[macdude22]

I just wonder if it will end up being ocean wide and puddle deep like skyrim.

[Frigidman™]

I have been let down by so many space sci-fi games in recent YEARS (yes YEARS NOW!) that I honestly don't anticipate anything as it will just be yet another let down.

So... if something is up for the challenge to prove me wrong, I will be extremely happy to be proven as such.

[Frost]

clocknova, on 17 March 2015 - 09:19 AM, said:

Is Star Citizen going to have a Mac version?  What are the primary differences between it and Elite: Dangerous?  They sound very similar.

I did some looking around for the same thing, and it appears the official stance right now is "we'd like to do Mac and Linux versions but we're not committing to anything yet." While consoles are out of the running completely for being too weak. Which is a totally fair charge for this particular game; running at 1920x1200 on max detail strains my Titan. Which means a PS4/Xbone would probably burst into flames. Like I said, LOTS of attention to detail in the game... but that also means zillions of polygons.

Primary differences seem to be Elite: Dangerous is focusing on the macro and building in, Star Citizen is focusing on the micro and building out. Elite looks like it's got a massive universe, but a lot of it you can see and not touch, and they're going to bring it closer to you as time goes on. Star Citizen meanwhile seems to be trying to take a Mass Effect approach of you are your avatar and just fly your ship. You can get out, go places, do things. If you board a ship, you literally board the ship and go into FPS combat, including in zero G Ender's Game style. If you dock and do some trading, you literally disembark from your ship and go organize a trade. But at the same time, instead of 400 billion procedurally generated systems there are about 100 manually built systems, with plans to add more after launch.

Elite also seems to be online only, while Star Citizen plans to offer the ability to run private servers disconnected from the persistent universe where you go do anything up to and including full-on modding. I do like that.

Basically, from my POV it appears like Elite: Dangerous is Elite on steroids. Star Citizen is Escape Velocity on steroids.

[Frost]

Janichsan, on 17 March 2015 - 08:45 AM, said:

Sounds like the game equivalent of James Cameron's Avatar…

[Janichsan]

Frost, on 17 March 2015 - 04:02 PM, said:

I did some looking around for the same thing, and it appears the official stance right now is "we'd like to do Mac and Linux versions but we're not committing to anything yet." While consoles are out of the running completely for being too weak. Which is a totally fair charge for this particular game; running at 1920x1200 on max detail strains my Titan. Which means a PS4/Xbone would probably burst into flames. Like I said, LOTS of attention to detail in the game... but that also means zillions of polygons.

Not to forget an installation size of probably 100 GB with patches ranging from 2 to 20 GB.

I wouldn't necessarily count on a Mac version, though. Chris Roberts has expressed a strong dislike of Apple and Macs, so that might not happen.

Quote

Primary differences seem to be Elite: Dangerous is focusing on the macro and building in, Star Citizen is focusing on the micro and building out. Elite looks like it's got a massive universe, but a lot of it you can see and not touch, and they're going to bring it closer to you as time goes on. Star Citizen meanwhile seems to be trying to take a Mass Effect approach of you are your avatar and just fly your ship. You can get out, go places, do things. If you board a ship, you literally board the ship and go into FPS combat, including in zero G Ender's Game style. If you dock and do some trading, you literally disembark from your ship and go organize a trade. But at the same time, instead of 400 billion procedurally generated systems there are about 100 manually built systems, with plans to add more after launch.

Quite a lot of this will also be added to ED later in the form of (paid) expansions: you will be able to walk and/or float* around in your ship, board other ships or fight off boarding parties on yours, take a stroll in the stations and at some point even land on the planets. It's just that in ED, these are additions to be released over time (the first expansion might be coming end of this year already), while SC apparently wants to launch with already everything in place.

(* There's no artificial gravity technology in Elite, so you are in a zero G environment outside of stations and planets.)

Actually, I think there aren't that many differences between ED and SC in regard of what the developers want to achieve and which features the games will have. The differentiation will come in the implementation of these features, the overall tone of the universe and the budget spent on it.

Regarding No Man's Sky: that game definitely looks amazing, but the problem I have with it so far is that it's just not clear what the actual gameplay will be. You can explore many colourful planets with exotic lifeforms, partake in space battles between the planets – but to what ends?

[macdude22]

Janichsan, on 18 March 2015 - 08:37 AM, said:

Regarding No Man's Sky: that game definitely looks amazing, but the problem I have with it so far is that it's just not clear what the actual gameplay will be. You can explore many colourful planets with exotic lifeforms, partake in space battles between the planets – but to what ends?

Ocean wide and puddle deep

[the Battle Cat]

Frost, on 18 March 2015 - 01:14 AM, said:

Gold?  Where is all this Virginia gold mining in actual history and geology?  Virginia has no gold, no gold was found and none was mined.  I think they are confusing Jamestown colonists for Spanish Conquistadors who slaughtered thousands in the search of gold while tearing down an ancient civilization, but hey, any premise to trash America eh disney... you twats.

[Frost]

Janichsan, on 18 March 2015 - 08:37 AM, said:

Regarding No Man's Sky: that game definitely looks amazing, but the problem I have with it so far is that it's just not clear what the actual gameplay will be. You can explore many colourful planets with exotic lifeforms, partake in space battles between the planets – but to what ends?

macdude22, on 18 March 2015 - 08:42 AM, said:

Ocean wide and puddle deep

And while I'm excited for No Man's Sky, this is my main problem with it too. I can tell you that even if I don't get into them right away, I will likely spend a lot of time with both Elite: Dangerous and Star Citizen further down the road (Elite once it's more fleshed out, Star Citizen once it's actually out). They're beautiful and appealing on the surface, but they also appear to have miles of depth.

No Man's Sky looks awesome, but... what are you going to do other than wander around looking at purple dinosaurs and yellow grass with pink skies?

Granted there is no object to StarForge other than "stay alive, and do/build stuff, whatever stuff means to you" and I somehow found enough to do for about 80 hours during the Alpha and Beta stages. Including constructing a jeep and driving for miles exploring the planet, building a fortress and multiple outposts with all kinds of self-sustaining capabilities block by block, and spending 4 hours one night with my cousin summitting a procedurally-generated mountain only a little bit shorter than Everest. Which felt like we'd climbed a real mountain when we finally got to the top... we didn't have sherpas and climbing gear, but we did have environment suits and earth-moving man-portable drills. Built two basecamps, drilled our way through some impassable terrain, engineered and built a small bridge across a yawning chasm... epic.

So on second thought maybe that won't be such a big problem after all, as long as there's enough stimuli there for the budding explorer.

the Battle Cat, on 18 March 2015 - 09:08 AM, said:

Gold?  Where is all this Virginia gold mining in actual history and geology?  Virginia has no gold, no gold was found and none was mined.  I think they are confusing Jamestown colonists for Spanish Conquistadors who slaughtered thousands in the search of gold while tearing down an ancient civilization, but hey, any premise to trash America eh disney... you twats.

Hollywood 101: Never let facts get in the way when writing a story. Especially if it's one based on actual history.
Hollywood 102: Change the names and setting slightly and you can recycle a basic plot as many times as you want.

Really, the best part of Avatar was Stephen Lang playing a sci-fi tBC.

[the Battle Cat]

Frost, on 18 March 2015 - 04:36 PM, said:

Really, the best part of Avatar was Stephen Lang playing a sci-fi tBC.

I have not seen Pocahontas and was totally blind sided by the BS history hence my surprised reaction.  In the interests of full disclosure I haven't seen Avatar either.  I saw Dancing With Wolves and Avatar was supposed to be Dancing With Wolves in space so I passed.  I get pretty tired of reprocessed story lines.

[clocknova]

Janichsan, on 18 March 2015 - 08:37 AM, said:

I wouldn't necessarily count on a Mac version, though. Chris Roberts has expressed a strong dislike of Apple and Macs, so that might not happen.

But Chris Roberts is the guy doing Elite: Dangerous.  There's going to be a Mac version of that; it's already in the works.  Star Citizen has nothing official that I can find, other than the usual "we'll consider it."

[Frost]

clocknova, on 18 March 2015 - 06:06 PM, said:

But Chris Roberts is the guy doing Elite: Dangerous.  There's going to be a Mac version of that; it's already in the works.  Star Citizen has nothing official that I can find, other than the usual "we'll consider it."

David Braben is the Elite guy. Chris Roberts, the Wing Commander guy, is doing Star Citizen.

[clocknova]

Frost, on 19 March 2015 - 01:49 AM, said:

David Braben is the Elite guy. Chris Roberts, the Wing Commander guy, is doing Star Citizen.

My bad.  I saw Chris Roberts' name all over the Elite kickstarter page and assumed it was his game.  Which makes sense, I think.  Confusing.

[Janichsan]

Anyone want to take a guess on which weekday the Mac beta will be released?