Oolite Bulletins

So here we are in 2016. We live in a time where the space game is not a rarity anymore. At this moment the situation is that there is an abundance of space games. However the quality is not alway too good. For me Elite Dangerous was a disappointment. Yes I am able to play it now on my computer but I rarely touch it.

Another thing is that it is quiet around here and I think that people are now spread more and more over many titles. Or even playing many games at the same time. And there are new titles launched everyday. The open world game seems more popular then ever.

And of course Oolite after 10 years that I play it is still going strong. Maybe this is the real cause of disappointment in other titles because Oolite offers so much.

But enough of my point of view. What do you think of the general state of space games in 2016?

Oolite is the only space genre type game I play, although I have been tempted to give Pioneer a try. Oolite ticks all the boxes for me. Not once did I ever consider backing ED.

Disembodied wrote:

Oh, my stars ... can it be that space games are making a comeback? Ladies and gentlemen, we must face facts: we are in danger of becoming "hip" ...

Yeah, right! <chortles>

Unlike Solo, I did back ED - but for various reasons, it has failed to grab me!

For a variety of reasons I have 1 game installed on my PC - Oolite. I have a Wii with some older games for the kids, and I have just purchased an XBox One for which I have 2 games (FIFA 15, cause it was cheaper than FIFA 16, and the LEGO movie game the machine came bundled with). I have been tempted by the lure of E:D on the XBox One, but I think the next game I purchase will be Forza 6.

For me Oolite meets all my needs - a challenging, robust game engine that I can customise to my hearts content with OXPs. And being a programmer (for work and for fun), there is no end to the fun I can have with the game. I can play offline, using my laptop and a cheap joystick. I can plug it into my big screen at home if I want a more immersive experience. I can't see another space game taking Oolite's place.

An important reason for Oolite remaining at the top of my game list is the issue of return on investment. I can play Oolite for 10 minutes and have a satisfying game experience. I can leave it for a month and when I come back to it I find it exactly as I left it. My impression of E:D is that if you want to get the most out of the game you need to commit a lot of time to it. But maybe that impression is false.

I can play Oolite for 10 minutes and have a satisfying game experience. I can leave it for a month and when I come back to it I find it exactly as I left it. My impression of E:D is that if you want to get the most out of the game you need to commit a lot of time to it. But maybe that impression is false.
Post Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2016 7:35 am

This exactly. I have Elite Dangerous on my HD. But to be really able to take advantage of the in game events and community goals you need to invest a lot of time into the game. I am still working on my first goal and that is the pilgrimage to Sol. So I am not far at all in the game. But this discussion is not only about ED.

I see a lot of space games trying to do it all but none of the gameplay experience seems fantastic for me. Take No Mans Sky for example. Yes it looks great graphically but the planets and transitions to space are all shrouded in fog.....The game looks great but we have to wait.
Then you got Infinity Battlescape but that is only one solar system....
Long story short all titles still have limitations and the perfect space game is not out yet. Oolite is perfect in offering a very solid experience on a modest computer and it looks still good too.

Cody wrote:

Disembodied wrote:

Oh, my stars ... can it be that space games are making a comeback? Ladies and gentlemen, we must face facts: we are in danger of becoming "hip" ...

Yeah, right! <chortles>

Unlike Solo, I did back ED - but for various reasons, it has failed to grab me!

Yes it is weird. I mean the graphics of ED are great. You've got a large universe which is also realistic. But that 'grab factor' seems non existent.

ED has rocks, but it ain't got no soul! Cue musical interlude!

To me the only space game that could replace Oolite this year is Limit Theory. But it's uncertain it will come out this year (given the history of the project) and if it will fulfil its promises.

I don't care that much about graphics - I'd say Oolite with the right OXPs is already good enough for me. But procedural generation everywhere and simulation everywhere? That's the spiritual successor of those 80's 8bits games that where squeezing everything they could from the limited hardware.

Among the current games, AFAIK only Dwarf Fortress will crush your CPU and your RAM in order to simulate a whole living and breathing world.

Mmm that Limit Theory takes indeed long then. I thought the producer had a burn out? I followed the project diaries on Youtube for a while but it seemed to me that it's very different from Oolite/elite.

pagroove wrote:

I thought the producer had a burn out?

He did, and sought professional help, and has apparently returned to full-time development, with better boundaries between life and work, but fewer development updates. So it's more difficult to gauge the current state of the game.

Just checked, and this thread on the LT forum appears to be the latest update, as of April 5.

+1 for anticipating Limit Theory. It offers all that ED offered, but without the demanding time committment. It offers all that Oolite offers, but without 25+ years of history (there is always in the back of my mind the thought that DB will do to Oolite what was done to Pioneer and demand that we stop using his intellectual property. I don't see why Pioneer had to stop using the Elite ship names and designs and planetary system names - it's not as though Pioneer was ever going to be a threat to Elite Dangerous, but that's a topic for another thread).

I'm not a Limit Theory backer so even though a 6 month release window was accidentally leaked a couple of months ago, I'm keeping my expectations in check. Josh is still reporting progress and it seems that he is making all the right noises. All the noise is academic until something concrete is released.

I'm in a bit of a limbo right now anyway. I finally got sick of Microsoft's attempts to shove Win 10 down my throat so I have abandoned Windows on my gaming laptop in favour of Linux Mint (with a Win 7 VM to handle the various Windows only bits and pieces e.g. iTunes connectivity to my iPhone and iPad, various work things that are Windows-only).

This has come at a painful cost - I've yet to be able to get my discrete graphics card up and running (AMD Radeon HD 6870M) - so I'm out of the market for now as far as graphically demanding games are concerned, although Oolite does still run nicely on the integrated graphics.

There is a light at the end of this tunnel. I'm expecting a decent tax refund in a couple of months so that will go towards building a new rig that will put me back in the game.

Bringing this post back on topic - I'll be speccing my rig to handle the following space games:
Oolite
Limit Theory
Kerbal Space Program
Elite: Dangerous - for all my expectations that this game has violated, it's still the only option if I want a graphically intense experience

Oh did I mention that I'm going to attempt to continue with running the gaming rig with Linux, and use a Windows 10 VM with direct access to the graphics card for running ED. The other three games are Linux-native. If that doesn't work, not being able to play ED is no tragic loss.

I've heard good things about space engineers. If you like your space sim a bit minecrafty.
I'm quite tempted to give it a spin.

Though it sounded interesting at first, I had my doubts about Limit Theory, which was mainly why I didn't back it.
To be honest, it was no great surprise when Josh lost his marbles. We have a Limit Theory thread, btw.

phkb wrote:

pagroove wrote:

I thought the producer had a burn out?

He did, and sought professional help, and has apparently returned to full-time development, with better boundaries between life and work, but fewer development updates. So it's more difficult to gauge the current state of the game.

Just checked, and this thread on the LT forum appears to be the latest update, as of April 5.

I use dropbox for my version control (wait, what?). Yeah, seriously, consider it: I have like 4 different machines at the moment, and I need code to be current across all of them. At the same time I need the ability to rollback

I'm still worried. At work I manage our product's software for three different targets, and a tool of mine (a small language interpreter) for half a dozen different targets. Even though I work solo on these, the obvious choice is to use Git (a very well known decentralized version control system).

Cody wrote:

We have a Limit Theory thread, btw.

There's another Limit Theory thread apart from that one. IIRC, it ends about a year ago with me predicting LT would never see the light of day, to the chagrin of ClymAngus & Bugbear.

There's been no change from or to my point of view.