Will Oolite survive with the release of Elite Dangerous?

[Cmdr Wyvern]

I believe oolite will not only survive ED, but surpass it, for all the reasons stated above.
Especially since oolite isn't online play: MMOs never fail to attract internet sociopaths, and ED already has a large infestation of griefers I hear. I'm one of those ppl that don't want to have to deal with those a-holes, so I don't do MMOs.

Also, with ED being intentionally rigged to depend on an internet connection - Even in solo mode? What voidbrain thought that was a good idea? - when in the future the servers the game needs to run are no longer there, what then? Nevermind when your isp is being a derp... Oolite will still work.

[Astrobe]

You should rather be scared by a different pair of letters: LT - that is Limit Theory. This is the really "dangerous" one.

[Smivs]

Yeah, how is Limit Theory coming along? I looked at it early on and even then it looked much more promising than E:D, but I haven't been keeping up.

[Cody]

I followed LT (though I didn't back it) for the first six months or so, then lost interest - something about it turned me off.

[Smivs]

I followed LT (though I didn't back it) for the first six months or so, then lost interest - something about it turned me off.

My theory is that you found its limit

[Bugbear]

Yeah, how is Limit Theory coming along? I looked at it early on and even then it looked much more promising than E:D, but I haven't been keeping up.

Funny you should ask. Update video #21 was released today after a 2 month gestation.

It's looking quite nice; the underlying universe appears to be a lot more real that what I'm seeing with ED. Josh has also effectively exposed all aspects of the universe to a custom scripting language, meaning modifications are built in.

LT would be a threat to Oolite, if it were not for one distinction - it's not ready for release yet, and although Josh Parnell has already shown a prodigious amount of talent, the fact is that there is still much to be done, to say nothing of Beta release / testing where people will get their first look and where there will probably be much gnashing of teeth over balancing concerns.

Not sure what's happening with the core game code either. Not sure if it will be open source.

My personal position - I'm eagerly awaiting the release of LT, but having missed the kickstarter, my guess is that I'll be waiting until at least 2Q15, but my guess is more like second half of next year.

[Wildeblood]

I'm less generous about LT. Mr Parnell is burning out rather spectacularly, and I doubt the finished game will ever see the light of day. Since August he's been posting increasingly strange blog posts. The latest update video - eventually released today after several false starts - was six weeks late, unnecessarily long and a pretty bland effort compared to the previous ones. The beta was supposed to be ready this month, but he's nowhere near that stage yet.

[webbasan]

I think also that Oolite will still have its place.

If that doesn't mean anything: it shares the space on my harddrive with other "space games", like for example FreeSpaceSCP or KSP... (...and many other games which can be run decently on a Win XP VM on my Mac...)

Elite: Dangerous has got me hooked since i also got access to it, and I like it very much despite the fact that I have to restart to BootCamp to play it and i had to get a new graphics board to enjoy the "eye candy".

But don't forget: it's essentially "Frontier done right", not Elite. It's based on the heritage of Elite, but took a different approach. And this different approach let's enough room for Oolite to evolve and prosper.

Just think of the fact that you can freely roam in the system space in Oolite - Elite: Dangerous tries to convince you that you can do the same. But the different "modi" ("Super Cruise", "Normal Space") don't fit that well together. IMO a "Sandbox" game should always allow the players decision make a difference. And that's not the case when I drop out of "Super Cruise" anywhere inside a sphere with 1000km radius and I'm magically teleported at a 10km distance of the target space station.

Seeing the many very voiceful comments in the Frontier forum about the game "not being up to current gaming standards", too much "grinding" and too much "senseless flying around" I begin to feel like a fossil from a past era... and in the light of the above "issue" I see myself as a part of a smaller community which have a different opinion about how "it's done right".

At least the cancellation of the offline mode didn't hit me that hard: I also was skeptical about a multi-player approach: I feared that would also mean that you have to be online regularly, eventually become part of some faction to survive similar what I hear about Eve Online. But I played it only in Multiplayer since the start of the "Standard Beta" phase and didn't have any bad experiences despite some network lags and server issues which are to be expected in this state of the development process. All those anxious voices about "griefers" don't seem to have any real foundation. We will see if that's still the case when the doors are opened for the crowd...

[Mad Hollander]

I know that ED has been Beta tested for a while now but do you think that the official release with see people flocking away from Oolite?

I for one will be sticking with life in the Ooniverse.

Oolite will definitely live - at the border of survability. Comparing with ED - playing oolite I can't remember when I felt the trembling of the hands. With ED my hands shake like after serious hangover

There are lots of strange, clumsy things in the oolite:

it is too predictable, too safe, too synthetic

the volume, mass, hull size don't matter at all

one of the strongest ships is adder and one of the weakest is anaconda. what to do with anaconda's cargo bay ? It is too big for such small galaxy.

fuel tank size. why all ships have 7ly of fuel ? Why huge anaconda can't have bigger tank ?

weird balance - look's like nobody uses all four lasers and instead people use different oxp-uber-mega-weapons

hundreds of imbalanced oxp's

weak asteroid, planet rings and multi-planet implementation

there is actually 4 commodity, because the rest of them absolutely useless

fine system kills any fun from smuggling, piracy and etc. To cleanup the rank you need to make just couple of jumps.

Mass lock effect is too old fashioned, you can't countermeasure it.

Pixel aiming plus powerful uber-weapons :facepalm:

To me the biggest mistake that was made, was laser usage. Newcomers are difficult to learn laser, especially left and right, so the lot's of imbalanced oxp-weapons is the obvious, natural consequenc. So, the oxp's become like losing chess.

What i like in ED is
1. Docking - I'm pretty amazed. I hate docking in oolite because it is utter boredom.
2. Smuggling, police, scaners
3. Exploring. There is nothing to explore in the oolite
4. Gravitation during supercruise
5. Realistic systems, stars, planetary rings
7. Ship model - mass, size, shields and etc.

Looks like I hardly ever will spent so many time in oolite as I did in the past. Instead I started writing new Elite-like game where I will pay attention to the game play, world and etc, not pixel aiming and boring, predictable flights and 'losing chess'-style fights.

[Cody]

It seems a trifle absurd to compare the two games - but there you go! Bye!

[Smivs]

Sorry you feel that way Mad Hollander, but each to his own. I must say I don't really recognise the Oolite you refer to - it doesn't sound much like the game I know. I can't speak about E:D as I haven't played it (and probably won't).
Whatever, we'll still be here in the future should you decide to look in, and you know the welcome will be friendly.

[spud42]

i concur with the gourd...

what i have actually noticed is that the volume of posts has increased since ED came out. we seem to have acquired a few new members and a few more OXP'ers.
so i think the question of Oolites existance post ED is quite rosy!!

[ralph_hh]

I've been playing on Computers since I bought my first C64 in 1986. (maybe +/- 1 year). I played hundreds of different games. Some kept me busy for days, others went into the box after just a few minutes. Some games I keep playing again and again every now and then. Diablo II earned a very special place in this list. I spent years with it. The first to play online in multi player, played it with my wife even. It needed two kids to tear me away. Some others kept me a bit longer, Civilization II, Anno 1503. Elite was one of the first games, I am very happy with Oolite bringing back the old look and feel of that great game. Elite/Oolite don't compete with high class 3D graphics multimedia multiplayer whatsoever games. It's a game like many others. And whilst we play Oolite, there will be a million other games availiable. So what? Some play this, some play that. A game does not die when another games is realeased. Or does someone imagine, that before ED came out, all players in the world were exclusively playing Oolite? I have to disappoint you, I didn't.

[Venator Dha]

Well I'm waiting for the Mac version of E:D to be released before I get it so I'm only playing Oolite. I will play E:D when I get it so, I will be interested to see how I feel about it. I do however think Oolite provides two things that I don't ever see E:D doing:
A friendly and responsive developer community where nothing is considered too stupid.
The ability to create my own Ooniverse, that suites my tastes - No mater how good E:D is, it will always be the same universe for everyone.

[spara]

...hundreds of imbalanced oxp's...

This is, by far, my favorite.