lasermink wrote:
I still don't really understand how they plan to fund the server costs down the line, though. Maybe more stuff along the lines of the paintjobs currently on offer? I guess there are more surprises waiting ahead.
Well, the server costs aren't going to be anything like what CCP would have to pay for EVE, for instance. The game relies on Peer-to-Peer networking to operate, with Frontier's server existing to more to manage backend stuff like matchmaking, player comms, dynamic stock markets and injected special events.
This is the reason there's a delay coming out of supercruise, particularly in range of space stations, as Frontier's matchmaking connects you to a player actually hosting an instance of that area of space. It sounds horrendous, but once they've got the delays sorted out, it should be fairly seamless. They've designed it so that even though entering and dropping out of supercruise is obviously intended to partially mask the loading of instances, it's not necessary to use the supercruise function to fly places (it just takes a colossal amount of time to travel large distances without supercruise). For instance, I was interdicted once on my way to a station and forced out of supercruise a few hundred km from the station - still well beyond how far you'd appear from the station by supercruising there normally. Once I'd dealt with the encounter I decided to just use conventional flight to go the rest of the way to the station to see what would happen - and sure enough, once I was close enough I could see the station far in the distance, getting closer. As I got within range, other player ships started appearing on my scanner - all completely seamless.
I saw someone from Frontier on their forum state that they'd designed the engine to allow travel between systems without hyperspace too, although they've included restrictions within the gameplay to prevent players from doing so (not only would it take too long, even under supercruise, it would burn more fuel than any of the ships can carry). I don't know how true that is though.
GazChap wrote:
No news on beta 2 though, although now there's rampant speculation that it'll be released to coincide with the 30th Anniversary.
Hopefully it'll drop around the same time I get my DK2 - whenever that may be!
You're going to love using the DK2 with it. The resolution is still not completely wonderful even on the DK2 (improving this is one of the key objectives of development for the final consumer version), and Elite Dangerous's choice of typeface makes some of the HUD readouts difficult to read, but it's such an amazing way to play the game. You do need a pretty strong GPU though - ideally you need to be able to achieve a consistent 75 FPS for Oculus to work at it's best. That said, I couldn't get that level of performance out of our test rig at work though and I thought it was perfectly playable - after posting last Wednesday, I stayed at work for another 90 mins playing it. I only stopped because I had to get home (and the bridge of my glasses was starting to dig into my nose inside the Rift). Best to play in the dark too, if you can, as light tends to get in through the nose gap in the visor.