The last year or so of Elite Dangerous has been the most dramatic since the game launched in 2014. The most recent update to Frontier Developments' epic space sim, Update 13, saw the conclusion of the story's Azimuth Saga, culminating in a disastrous attempt to stop the incursion of the Thargoids – Elite's hostile race of insectoid aliens. It's an event that has already had a major impact on Elite's universe, and Frontier are excited to discuss the studio's plans for the game and its narrative as it pushes into a new phase for the galaxy, simply known as "Aftermath".
But the drama surrounding Elite Dangerous isn't limited to the game's overarching story. As I gear up to chat with lead game designer Luke Betterton and senior producer Samantha Marsh, the Thargoid in the room is Elite Dangerous: Odyssey. Launched in May last year, Elite's second expansion was, to put it lightly, not well received by Elite's community. Complaints ranged from extensive bugs and performance issues to more fundamental criticisms about the implementation of the expansion's on-foot exploration and FPS combat. Over a year on from release, the expansion still carries a "Mostly Negative" rating on Steam, standing in stark contrast to reviews for vanilla Elite Dangerous (now bundled with its Horizons expansion), which remain firmly positive.
]]>Frontier’s gargantuan space sim Elite Dangerous will be given away for free on the Epic Games Store today. You’re getting a lot for nothing. It includes the base game, and 2015's Horizons expansion pack that fills the 400 billion star systems with landable planets. The other game is a puzzle game with visual novel elements called The World Next Door.
]]>As Frontier Developments wind up to launch the next Elite Dangerous expansion, today they rolled the first one into the base game for all to enjoy for free. The new content and features from Horizons are now available to all players, things like creating your own spaceman and landing on planets to drive spacecars. To folks who had already bought Horizons, Frontier are giving exclusive ship skins as a thank you.
]]>Frontier Developments today announced that they'll soon give the Elite Dangerous expansion Horizons free to all players, letting everyone roll around planets in spacecars before the next upcoming expansion invites us to walk on them with our own two spacefeet. The Horizons season pass has covered almost five years of new features, including character customisation, the ability to pilot ships cooperatively with a crew, and those spacecars. It has cost £20/€25/$30 (though sales often took it down to £5) so free is quite nice. People who have bought Horizons will get an exclusive paint job as thanks, mind.
]]>Fleet carriers have been officially brought over to Elite Dangerous proper, following their two beta tests over the last few months.
Judging by the announcement they'll work much as they did during the second beta, effectively giving players their own space station to dock up to 16 ships at. They can be moved around the galaxy (though not piloted) by burning expensive tritium fuel, potentially up to 500 light years at a time.
]]>Elite Dangerous finished a second beta test for its new fleet carriers this week. The giant player-owned ships are scheduled to appear in the main game sometime in June.
I've been ruminating on it for a while now, and much as I like the idea, the reality so far has been distinctly underwhelming.
]]>BEEEUUUUUHHHH. That's my impression of a battlecruiser jumping in to ruin, or make everyone's day, depending on its mood. For the next eight days, Elite Dangerous's fleet carriers are here in temporary form for its ongoing beta. I have not, frankly, been doing anything exciting, because I am like that. I've been enjoying the jumps, though.
]]>The gigantic space exploration MMO Elite Dangerous is holding a beta to test its new fleet carriers from Monday 11th May up until the 26th.
Carriers are, as you'd expect, massive capital ships (the largest available to players) capable of accommodating up to 16 smaller ships, and selectively allowing other people to dock and do business. Or, more funly, shutting them out just to be petty.
]]>Among the many player-run organizations in sandbox space sim/MMO-lite Elite: Dangerous, few have the glowing reputation of the Fuel Rats: A philanthropic alliance dedicated to rescuing stranded players that have carelessly used up the last of their hyperdrive fuel out on the far fringes of charted space.
Yesterday, it was the Rats' turn to be rescued, after one of their fueling bases of choice nearly fell under quarantine. Unsurprisingly, there were a lot of people willing to lend a hand to these humble heroes of the spacelanes.
]]>Elite Dangerous is now four years old somehow, or five if you count the various betas. In that time, it's gone from impossible promise (ah, those halcyon 2012 Kickstarter days) to absolute bedrock of modern PC gaming, what with its blend of solo noodling about, lethal PVP sandbox and slow-burn, community-driven storytelling. Whether it's quite what we expected a new Elite game to be half a decade ago is an enduring question, but by this point it's very much its own game, including embracing the 'Seasons' concept that's so hot right now (er, again for about five years). Season 3, 'Beyond' is kicking off at the end of this month, with a headline wordcount-challenging update named Elite Dangerous: Beyond - Chapter One.
It introduces a whole mess of changes, including new types of ship and traders, revisions to crime and the punishment thereof and an overhauled mission system.
]]>A photon checks into a hotel and the receptionist asks him: “Any luggage, sir?”
“No,” he says, “I’m travelling light.”
This is just one of the jokes pilots were broadcasting over the comms channel as I collected my wages in Grant Dock. There was one joke about the Higgs boson walking into a bar, or maybe it was a synagogue, I don’t remember. All I care about is getting that sweet Palladium money, which I take from the pale-faced man who runs this station. He doesn’t do much, the pale-faced man. Imagine a profile pic stuck on a postbox, with a little slot where money comes out. I prefer the people sounding off in local chat, they’re at least human beings. Not that you’d know it, listening to their jokes.
I load up my spaceship with power generators. It’s good to be back.
]]>Things have been hotting up in Elite Dangerous’ [official site] facsimile of our massive galaxy, what with that whole alien invasion problem. But if humanity can survive the Thargoids, there’s a whole lot more coming in 2018 with a new season called Elite Dangerous: Beyond. Frontier announced a roadmap at Frontier Expo, and it looks like they’re going to be cramming a lot into these free updates, including new ships, tools and large group content
]]>The pilots of Elite Dangerous: Horizons [official site] have become space sleuths in the past year, attempting to uncover more information about the mysterious aliens known as the Thargoids. Their latest discovery is the most momentous yet: a sprawling base on a world hundreds of lightyears from Earth. You can watch the first humans explore its cavernous interior below.
]]>After yonks of warning signs, hints, puzzles, and tense first encounters in Elite Dangerous: Horizons [official site], the alien Thargoids are almost ready to start preparing to properly arrive in a bit. Frontier Developments have announced that the space 'em up's Update 2.4, codenamed The Return, will kick off story events that will finally see Thargoids return to Elite as a proper part of the game. Yup, the wait continues but the end is in sight. When the Thargoids arrive, Frontier say, they'll shake the galaxy up.
]]>Space trucking sim Elite Dangerous [official site] recently held one of its public events for players. This time a special NPC would be racing back to the “bubble” (the populated core worlds of the galactic frisbee) from a mysterious place known as the Formidine Rift. Her name was Salomé and she had “vital information.” I am using the past tense to describe her because - surprise surprise - she never reached her destination. She was murdered by a player called Harry Potter, a prolific troll who had somehow infiltrated the huge coalition of players who swore to protect her.
]]>A bunch of maps and tools for space sim Elite: Dangerous [official site] were shut down today by their creators as part of a protest over what they called a “lack of consistency from Frontier in effectively fostering third-party development”. The picket line of third-party tools was set to last until Sunday and included some very useful stuff for pilots like maps, trading databases and ship designers. The main complaint these folks had is that Frontier was not communicating with them well when it comes to updates (when a patch comes out the tools are often thrown into disarray without much warning, introducing new bugs and problems for the toolfolk). But spacetalks have already been held and most of the sites will be back up tonight, leaving me in the lurch with absolutely no drama. Disgraceful.
]]>Elitists can now fly ships with their chums and create their own spaceface, thanks to the big Elite Dangerous: Horizons [official site] update today launched. The headline feature of Horizons version 2.3, nicknamed 'The Commanders', is multicrew spaceshipping, letting several players take stations on the bridge. The auxiliary roles don't sound super exciting in themselves as Elite wasn't built with them in mind but hanging with your friends is surely a lark.
Non-Horizons Elitists aren't left out. The whole game benefits today from an update adding sights like asteroid bases and roaming 'megaships'. Have a look at it all:
]]>Elite Dangerous [official site] has excellent hands. See how the fingers twitch, watch how they waggle a flightstick - just hanging around in a cockpit is oddly mesmerising. And by God I'm worried about how much inadvertent innuendo crept into those last couple of lines. Anyway: Frontier's spaceship demi-MMO is gearing up to progress far beyond hands and into bodies and faces. They've just shown off their seemingly highly configurable 'Commander' creation tool. Whole lotta faces going on here.
]]>Thargoid alien spacemen have arrived in Elite Dangerous [official site], following a string of hints and discoveries, and they look pretty flipping cool. Players can now encounter a whopping great Thargoid ship in a scripted sequence with all the mystery and threat I'd want from first contact (well, in this game) with an alien civilisation who consider me so far beneath them. Here, come watch a meeting with the spacemen.
]]>Elite Dangerous [official site] got its latest update today, bringing more galactic hi-jinks to the quite-good space sim. Murmurs of aliens and fighter bays have so far blinded us to the real highlight of the update – the space buses. The Beluga is a giant luxury space yacht for transporting wealthy VIPs on passenger missions and it is the focus of a new trailer Frontier has made to celebrate their biggest update so far, called 'Guardians'. Come watch the trailer and find out what's changed.
]]>[Update: This issue is perhaps less imminent that I'd thought - Frontier dropped us a line to stress that it may be a fair bit longer than six months, though Braben did say "the change will need to come at some point" so it seems this will happen eventually.]
Like in real life, obsolescence in PC gaming is usually a slow process. An achy knee after running becomes an achy knee after hiking then all too soon you're waking up achy, and your framerates dip lower and lower starting to stutter before you realise you simply can't play shiny new games. But sometimes there are hard cut-offs, and two are coming soon to Elite Dangerous [official site]. Developers Frontier today announced that they plan to stop supporting 32-bit systems and DirectX 10 graphics hardware. They say it'll help them make the game look prettier and run better.
]]>"f you don’t want to play Sol Trader, I’m afraid we can’t be friends any more," wrote Adam last year. Now it's your chance to make or break a friendship with our most devout strategy enthusiast, as "Elite, Asteroids & Dwarf Fortress" fusion Sol Trader is finally due for release, just a few days from now.
]]>The second Elite: Dangerous [official site] expansion, from its 'Horizons' series of add-ons, will blast off on May 26th. 'The Engineers' will bring... engineers? Obviously. Little embarrassed I had to tell you that, honestly. They, in turn, bring even more ways to customise your ships and weapons - if they like you. Also, launching alongside The Engineers but not requiring anyone to buy the expansions will be a big update with a new mission system. Though Horizons has had a wee price cut.
]]>RPS has sealed itself inside a chocolate egg for the duration of the UK's long holiday weekend, to emerge only when the reign of Mr Hops The Doom Rabbit has run its dread course. While we slumber, enjoy these fine words previously published as part of our Supporter program.
I've long inclined more towards anxiousness than ambition, and I'm becoming more so as tired bones increasingly seek to stay in known and safe places. I'm not just talking about throwing myself down mountains or entering rooms full of young people hepped up on goofballs - I'm similarly hesitant about unknown-quantity games too. Professionally, I am duty-bound to fight the instinct to shy away from something that I can't immediately equate to something else at first glance, and thank God - because most of the best gaming experiences I've had recently are those which forced me out of my comfort zone.
]]>Back in the day, I’d often get asked whether PlayStation or Xbox was best. Helpless efforts to argue "well, actually, PC is..." aside, I’d defuse their concerns about which had the superior graphics by naming which games you would or wouldn’t get on each. It’s not going to be any different for VR.
But for now, when numbers are really all we have, I'm going to list some numbers at you below. It's too early to say for sure which headset you should buy if you're planning on buying one at all, but this should help you to determine whether one virtual reality headset or the other might have better image quality or motion tracking.
]]>What will happen when humanity first meets alien life in the depths of space? We'll murder it and see if anything valuable plops out its corpse, of course. Following a trail of cryptic hints, Elite: Dangerous players have encountered alien life for the first time on a few planets. And shot it.
Luckily, the giant barnacle-looking lumps seem inert, and have not respond with hails of plasma and threats to destroy the galaxy. Not yet, anyway. However, spires which surround them (and may be part of them) are the only known source of meta-alloys so... humanity, ladies and gentlemen!
]]>Ah, that special day in any game with a colon in its name's life - when it releases its first expansion, and with it its first dash. Welcome, Frontier, to the hallowed ranks of the :- club. Now you too will be a nightmare for proof-readers and CMS tag databases the world over.
But wait just one gosh-darn cotton-pickin' minute: something strange has happened. Elite: Dangerous [official site] has quietly changed its name to Elite Dangerous, and thus the expansion is known simply as Elite Dangerous: Horizons. THOSE AREN'T THE RULES FRONTIER YOU'RE OUT OF THE :- CLUB
Elite; Dangerous #Horiz-on$ is out today, anyway.
]]>I always feel I'm making a mistake writing about Elite Dangerous: Horizons [official site]. I get that the expansion is actually a series of mini-expansions, and that the first will add planets to roam around on. It's when I reach the point in the post to explain that Horizons is being sold not as an expansion or season pass but only as a new base edition of the game with plain old E:D included that I think "Wait, that doesn't sound right." It is though. I think. I have checked. It just seems wrong. Anyway, point is: it'll all start next Tuesday, December 15th.
]]>Beta access opened tonight for the first phase of the planet-roaming Elite: Dangerous [official site] expansion Horizons, which I believe is for folks who pre-ordered.
"Aha! But Alice," you say, in a snide tone of voice that you know makes people want to twat you in the nose but makes you feel so clever, "I thought you said never to pre-order? I distinctly recall you saying that several times." Very good, clever clogs, so you get the biggest treat of all: watching Elite head honch David Braben prepare to die of asphyxiation on a lonely moon:
]]>The Elite Dangerous: Horizons expansion will introduce the ability to land on planets to the mining-trading-pirating cockpit sim. It has no fixed release date, but you'll be able to test it out later this month: a beta was announced last night during a livestreamed Q&A with David Braben and will begin on November 24th.
]]>If the last 22 second clip of planet surface searching wasn't enough to whet your whistle, Frontier Developments hosted an hour-long livestream this week that showcased the upcoming Elite: Dangerous [official site] expansion Horizons' surface recon vehicles. Surface recon vehicles - or SRVs to us inter-galactic intermediate types - are essentially dune buggies in space and look hella cool.
I can just imagine us now, tearing up the surface of an alien planetscape, one hand on the wheel, opposite elbow propped on the arm rest, the zero atmosphere not blowing through our hair. If fact, why imagine? Take a small step or giant leap inside to see it for real.
]]>Elite: Dangerous [official site] developers Frontier have already announced that the Horizons expansion would bring the ability to explore planet surfaces - along with multi-crew ships, a character creator, and more - but below is the first glimpse of what those planets look like. It's a short 23-second clip, but it looks nice.
It's just a shame that it arrives at the same time as a rough weekend for the main game, which might have resulted in some player data being permanently lost.
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