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[[File:PlanetaryLanding 2.jpg|thumb|300px|Atmospheric planetary landing]]
[[Frontier Developments|Frontier]] has ambitious plans for ED since the early access phase.<ref name=":3" /> Frontier takes an iterative approach to ''Elite Dangerous'' content, gradually building upon features to expand and improve the game.
Below is an overview of updates and expansions, both released and planned.
== Content seasons ==
=== Season 1: Post-Launch ===
[[File:Elite-Dangerous-Box-Art.png|right|thumb|250px|Elite Dangerous]]
The first season of ''Elite Dangerous'' updates added various new features and content. It commenced after ''Elite Dangerous'' launched on December 16, 2014 and continued through 2015. Notable features include:<ref>[https://www.elitedangerous.com/en/seasons/#season1 Elite Dangerous: Seasons]</ref>
* 1.1 [[Community Goals]]
* 1.2 [[Wings]]
* 1.3 [[Powerplay]]
* 1.4 [[CQC Championship|CQC]]
* 1.5 [[Ships (Update)|New Ships]]
* 1.6 [[Mission]] System
* 1.7
** New mission types
** Module storage
** Beautiful [[station]] interiors
** New navigation filters
** Ship transfer
=== Season 2: Horizons ===
[[File:Elite-Dangerous-Horizons.png|thumb|250px|Elite Dangerous: Horizons]]
''[[Elite Dangerous: Horizons]]'' was the second season of updates for ''Elite Dangerous'' and the first paid expansion. It introduced a variety of new features and gameplay content. ''Horizons'' v2.0 was released on PC on the 15th of December 2015. Subsequent major updates were released in 2016 and 2017. The most notable additions include:
* [[Planetary Landings]] on airless planets and moons
* [[Engineers]]
* [[
* [[
* [[Scarab]] [[SRV]]
* [[Ship Launched Fighters]]
* [[Passenger Carrier|Passenger transportation]]
* [[Holo-Me]]
* [[Multicrew]]
* [[Asteroid Base]]s
* [[Megaships]]
* [[Camera suite
==
[[File:Elite Dangerous Beyond logo.png|thumb|250px|Elite Dangerous: Beyond]]
''[[Elite Dangerous: Beyond]]'' was the third season of updates for ''Elite Dangerous'', and released over the course of 2018. The main focus was core gameplay, existing features, quality of life and other improvements.<ref name=":0">[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/elite-dangerous-2-4-and-beyond.354066/ Frontier Forums: Elite Dangerous - 2.4 and beyond]</ref> ''Beyond'' updates were free for all ''Horizons'' owners.<ref>[https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/9pbpvh/beyond_chapter_four_exploration_reveal_megathread/ reddit: Beyond - Chapter Four - Exploration Reveal Mega-Thread]</ref> The most notable are:
* New [[ships]]: [[Alliance Challenger]], [[Alliance Chieftain]], [[Alliance Crusader]], [[Krait MkII]], [[Krait Phantom]], [[Mamba]]
* New hybrid fighters: [[XG7 Trident]], [[XG8 Javelin]], [[XG9 Lance]]
* New weapons
* [[GalNet]] Audio: text-to-audio feature for GalNet reports
* [[Wing Missions]]
* [[Planets|Planet]] tech improvements: Planetary Visual Improvements
* Revised [[Trader|trade]] data in the Commodities Market and [[Galaxy Map]]
* [[Engineers]] improvements and 4 new Engineers in the [[Colonia Region]]
* [[Material Trader]]s
* [[Technology Broker]]s
* [[Crime & Punishment]] improvements: [[Notoriety]], [[Advanced Tactical Response]], [[Detention Centre]]s
* [[Megaship]] and [[Installation]] activities
* [[Guardian Beacon]]s, new [[Guardian Structure]] layouts, and new Guardian tech modules
* [[Pirate Activity Detected]] signal sources for challenging combat
* Improved Lighting Model with adaptive lighting, color grades, fog and god rays
* [[Scenario Missions]]
* [[Squadrons]]
* [[Miner|Mining]] gameplay improvements, including [[Hotspot]]s and new mining modules
* [[Explorer|Exploration]] gameplay improvements, including [[Notable Stellar Phenomena]], [[Galactic regions]], and new scanners
* Streamlined cockpit layout and interface with new [[Combat Mode]] and [[Analysis Mode]]
* Orrery Mode in the [[System Map]]
* [[Night Vision]]
* [[Codex]], which tracks discoveries and includes the lore-rich [[Knowledge Base]]
* [[Incursion]]s and [[AX Conflict Zone]]s
For detailed information about this season of updates see the [[Elite Dangerous: Beyond|Beyond page]].
===
[[File:April Update banner.png|thumb|220px|April Update]]
[[File:September Update banner.png|thumb|220px|September Update]]
[[File:January Update splash.png|thumb|220px|January Update]]
Over the course of 2019 and 2020, in between Season 3 and Season 4, Frontier Developments planned a series of smaller content updates with various quality of life improvements: the [[April Update]], [[September Update]], [[January Update]], and [[Fleet Carriers Update]].<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/april-update-coming-23-april-2019.508239/ Frontier Forums: April Update - Coming 23 April 2019]</ref><ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/lavecon-2019-content-reveal.516705/ Frontier Forums: Lavecon 2019 Content Reveal]</ref> Notable changes and additions include:
* The [[Pilots' Federation District]]
* [[Advanced Docking Computer]] & [[Supercruise Assist]] modules
* The [[Pilot's Handbook]]
* [[Interstellar Initiative]]s
* Revamped training and challenge tutorial missions
* New starter [[Sidewinder MkI]] tutorial mission
* Integration of the web-based Frontier Store into the game itself
* [[Livery]] can be previewed within the Store and managed from the main menu
* [[ARX]] currency introduced for Livery purchases
* Various bug fixes and minor quality of life improvements
* The [[Drake-Class Carrier]]
* The ability to queue for [[CQC]] matchmaking within the main game mode
* The merging of ''[[Elite Dangerous: Horizons]]'' into the base game<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/elite-dangerous-horizons-set-to-land-for-all-commanders.555392/ Frontier Forums: Elite Dangerous: Horizons Set to Land for All Commanders]</ref>
* Re-balancing of the [[Credits|profitability]] of [[Miner|mining]], [[Trader|trading]], [[combat]], and [[Explorer|exploration]]<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/game-balancing.558895/ Frontier Forums: Game Balancing]</ref>
{{clr}}
=== Season 4: Odyssey ===
[[File:Elite-Dangerous-Odyssey_Key-Art.png|thumb|250px|Elite Dangerous: Odyssey key art]]
''[[Elite Dangerous: Odyssey]]'' was the second paid expansion and fourth content season for ''Elite Dangerous''. It launched for PC on May 19, 2021.
Plans to release ''Odyssey'' on Xbox and PlayStation were officially cancelled on March 10, 2022, which also marked the cessation of development of new content for consoles.<ref name="Console Update">[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/console-update.600233/ Frontier Forums: Console Update]</ref>
The most notable additions of ''Odyssey'' include:
* [[On Foot]] gameplay
** The ability to disembark from ships
** [[Concourse]]s
** Pilot equipment, including [[Suits]], [[Handheld Weapon]]s, [[:Category:Consumables|Consumables]], and [[:Category:Handheld Tools|Tools]]
** New collectibles, including [[Components]], [[Goods]], and [[Data]]
** New On Foot mission types and [[Conflict Zone (On Foot)|Conflict Zones]]
** New [[Settlement]]s designed for On Foot activities
* [[Atmospheric Landings]] on planets with tenuous atmospheres (up to 0.1 atm)
* 9 new [[Engineers]]
* 2 new [[Pilots Federation]] [[Ranks|rank types]], [[Mercenary]] and [[Exobiologist]], plus 5 new post-Elite ranks for all six rank types
* Updated [[Stellar Forge]]
* Refreshed and improved visuals
* Redesigned game UI elements
* Stellar Lighting, galactic background visuals (30 June 2026)
* [[Powerplay|Powerplay 2.0]] (include 2 new powers [[Jerome Archer]] and [[Nakato Kaine]]).
* 9 new [[Engineers]], and new modifications for [[Suits]] and [[Handheld Weapon|Handheld Weapons]].
* New settlements, and over 8,000 [[Surface Port|Surface Ports]] on planets with [[Atmosphere|tenuous atmospheres]]
* 11 new ships:
** [[Anaconda Mk II]]
** [[Caspian Explorer]]
** [[Cobra Mk V]]
** [[Corsair]]
** [[Kestrel Mk II]]
** [[Lynx Highliner]]
** [[Mandalay]]
** [[Panther Clipper Mk II]]
** [[Python Mk II]]
** [[Type-8 Transporter]]
** [[Type-11 Prospector]]
*3 new capital ships:
** [[Concourse]] for the [[Drake-Class Carrier]]
** [[Colonisation Ship]]
** [[Javelin-Class Carrier]]
** [[Operation Runner]]
* 1 new vessel: [[Nomad]]
* 1 new facility: [[Dodec]]
* Thargoid ships: [[Thargoid Hunter|Hunter]], [[Thargoid Titan|Titan]]
* Thargoid drones: [[Banshee]], [[Revenant]]
* [[Thargoid Maelstrom]], [[Thargoid Spire]]
* New SRVs: [[Scorpion]], [[Rhino]]
* [[System Colonisation]]
* [[Operations]]
* Surface mining with the [[Rhino]] and [[Mining Rig]]
* Law & Disorder system rework
===
Plans for seasons or expansions after ''Odyssey'' are not yet announced.
== Roadmap ==
The expansions were planned include significant new features such as seamless freeform (manual pitch/yaw/roll) [[Elite: Dangerous FAQ#Will it be possible to manually land on planets.3F|atmospheric flight and landings]] (see [[Atmospheric Landings]]) and [[Elite: Dangerous FAQ|on-foot and out-of-ship activities]] (see [[On Foot]]) such as FPS combat, walking around and boarding ships, walking in stations and walking and driving vehicles on entire 1:1 scale populated living planets (see [[Procedural Cities]]) with [[Elite: Dangerous FAQ#Will I be able to hire crew for my ship.3F|multi-player crew]] and [[Elite: Dangerous FAQ#Can I own and control capital ships.3F|player executive controlled capital ships]].<ref name=":2" />
Frontier wrote in a newsletter, ''"We plan to follow that same incremental development philosophy that we’ve done throughout our Alpha and Beta phases, and continue to significantly enhance the game via further expansions post-launch."''<ref name=":2" />
Frontier intends to release small, free updates after launch. Expansions that include significant new features and content will have to be purchased.<ref name=":2" />
For example, the roadmap is to add these features with major updates (in no particular order): <ref name=":2">[http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=dcbf6b86b4b0c7d1c21b73b1e&id=1824c0b05a#Lifetime%20Exp Elite Dangerous Newsletter #29]
* [https://www.elitedangerous.com/en/horizons Landing / driving / prospecting on airless rocky planets, moons & asteroids]- this was added with [[Elite Dangerous: Horizons]], see [[Planetary Landings]].
* [[Elite: Dangerous FAQ#Can I walk around the ship.2C planets and space stations.3F|Walking around interiors and combative boarding of other ships]]. - see [[
* [[Elite: Dangerous FAQ#Can I walk around the ship.2C planets and space stations.3F|Combat and other interactions with other players and AIs in the internal areas of star ports]] - speculated
* [[Elite: Dangerous FAQ#Can I walk around the ship.2C planets and space stations.3F|Accessing richly detailed planetary surfaces]] - see [[Atmospheric Landings]] and [[Procedural Cities]].
* [[Elite: Dangerous FAQ#Can I own and control capital ships.3F|Availability of giant ‘executive control’ ships to players]]. - see [[Capital Ships]].
* [[Base Building]] was a rumored feature (not on the roadmap) - this was revealed as [[System Colonisation]] in Nov 2024
The [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EM0Gcl7iUM8&t=35 scope
The Development Plan video (14 Dec 2012) Braben stated: "w''e're designing all the ships with the interiors in mind, how the cargo is unloaded all that sort of thing, how damage occurs. That's because another thing that we are doing again down the line is you will be able to walk around inside your ship, you will be able to get out of your ship, walk around inside space stations, other vehicles. All of that sort of thing. We've shown the damage on the ship, the damage models. Imagine looking at that from inside the ship outwards seeing your cargo flying out into space, seeing the flames, trying to fight them. All of those things that we plan with time, they won't be at the first release because we want to do them right and want to do them well. All of these will be done as updates."''<ref name=":3" />
== 10 Year Development Plan ==
[[File:Elite Dangerous Station Walking.png|thumb|250px|People walking in a station]]
During the 2016 Elite Dangerous 24 Hour Charity Livestream! David Braben confirmed a 10 year development plan and that he hopes it will be a lot longer than that: "''Looking back at those (developer videos), you can see what we've done, we're executing on the plan. There's still a lot of things that are to come and those are very exciting. We do have a long plan. It would take us a long time to deliver all the things that we want to do. The great thing is the more things get added to the end of it. So it may well be never ending. I've said sort of 8 years, 10 years, but actually it could end up and I'm hoping it'll be a lot longer than that. The key point is we'll keep doing exciting things and we'll work out how best to do that."''<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS33cyq6Z_A&t=21m00s YouTube: 24 Hour Charity Livestream! Part 1!]</ref>
== Lifetime Expansion Pass ==
The [[Lifetime Expansion Pass]] or '''LEP''' is a content pass for [[Elite Dangerous]]'' ''that includes ownership of all current and future expansions produced for the game plus a selection of cosmetic [[Livery]] items.<ref name=":2" />
The LEP was included for Kickstarter backers who purchased the £80 "Digital Download Pack" tier in 2012. It was also available during the pre-launch beta period in 2014 and for a final time from August 6, 2015 to September 14, 2015.
== Developer Comments ==
On 12 March 2015, [[David Braben]] said, ''"We’ve said things like going down to planet surfaces, walking around inside your spaceship, getting out of your ship, all of those things would be part of paid updates. And we would phase it, we wouldn’t necessarily do them as part of one big thing, there would be multiple over time. Cause each of those, if you think of the work to do each one, it’s a major new-game-level of content. And so we’re just trying to take that seriously. We don’t want to do half-baked solutions."''<ref>[https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/03/12/david-braben-on-fan-anger-interview/ Rock Paper Shotgun: Interview: David Braben On Fan Anger And Expectations]</ref>
On 26 July 2018, Braben said, ''"We’ve continued to support and nurture the existing franchises. Elite Dangerous has continued to grow, the team size is actually getting bigger. The plan was – beyond the current season for Elite, which is mostly announced – there are a lot of things that we will be announcing that are really exciting, some of which will be free, some of which will be paid."''<ref name=":1">[https://wccftech.com/frontier-next-game-unveiled-late-2018/ Wccftech: Frontier’s Next Game To Be Unveiled in Late 2018/Early 2019; Elite Dangerous Is Getting Exciting Things]</ref>
This is a traders quote from the investment firm Liberum in 2019: ''"The company is working on a number of exciting updates for both franchies and our expectation is that we could see a big refresh release of ED in FY20, five years after launch (we expect Elite Dangerous to be closing in on £100m of life-time revenue by the end of this financial year)."''<ref>[https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/aoc8ue/liberum_our_expectation_is_that_we_could_see_a/ reddit: Liberum: "our expectation is that we could see a big refresh release of ED in FY20, five years after launch"]</ref><ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0Br0Ue1-eE YouTube: Frontier's Financial Position and the Future of Elite Dangerous]</ref>
== Development Team ==
On 26 May 2017, Frontier's Lloyd Morgan-Moore said, ''"The Elite Dangerous team is over a hundred people strong."''<ref>[http://www.redbull.com/en/games/stories/1331858657533/elite-dangerous-ps4-interview Red Bull: The tech behind Elite Dangerous’s PS4 debut]</ref>
On 31 August 2018, [[Zac Antonaci]] reaffirmed that more than 100 people are working on Elite Dangerous: ''"The Beyond season was always something that we wanted to do in order to bring even more enhancements to the core experience of Elite and being able to dedicate a full development team (over 100 people!) for a full year of free content was specifically to gear ourselves up to support our long term vision for the game."''<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/important-community-update.444800/ Frontier Forums: Important Community Update]</ref>
== Elite Dangerous Sequel ==
In an interview with PCGN at E3 2018, [[Frontier Developments|Frontier]]'s founder and CEO, [[David Braben]], said that while he would not rule out a sequel to the deep-space adventure, fans should not expect to see anything on that topic soon.<ref name=":4">[https://www.pcgamesn.com/elite-dangerous/elite-dangerous-2 PCGamesN: Elite Dangerous 2 could happen, but it’s “a long time off”]</ref>
Braben said, ''“The world has changed. We’re coming to the end of the fourth year of Elite Dangerous.”'' This advanced development is ''“a wonderful place to be in” ''but they continue support for the current game. That ''“isn’t to say there won’t be something at some point.”'' A potential sequel is a ''“long time off and there is lots to do in the Elite Dangerous world.''”<ref name=":4" />
== Related Links ==
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yd-m9AR7mY YouTube: The Future of Elite: Dangerous]
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EM0Gcl7iUM8
*[
*[https://games.yahoo.com/video/interview-elite-dangerouss-david-braben-211040547.html Yahoo!: Interview: Elite Dangerous's David Braben (in-depth)]
*[http://www.edge-online.com/features/frontier-developments-elite-dangerous-the-rebirth-of-a-legend/ In-depth Edge article with David Braben and Jonny Watts about the scope of Elite.]
== Videos ==
<gallery>
File:Elite Dangerous Development Plan
File:Elite Dangerous Dev Diary 1- Multiplayer and Ships
File:Elite Dangerous Dev Diary 2- How the Galaxy will Evolve Over Time
File:Elite Dangerous Dev Diary 3 - Player Roles
File:Elite Dangerous Trading Dev Diary
File:The Future of Elite Dangerous
File:Elite_Dangerous_-_Top_10_Future_Updates_and_Expansions
</gallery>
== Gallery ==
<gallery>
PlanetaryLanding 2.jpg|Atmospheric planetary landing art
Flightsuit_combatsketch01.jpg
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== References ==
<references />
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