Elite Dangerous: Difference between revisions

'''''Elite Dangerous''''' is a massively multiplayer space epic and the fourth installment in the legendary [[Elite series|''Elite'' series]], the longest running space simulation series in history.<ref>https://twitter.com/gwr/status/611537566299463681?lang=en Guinness World Records, 18 June 2015</ref> It was developed and published by [[Frontier Developments]] with [[David Braben]] as the director. The Windows PC version launched on December 16, 2014. It was partially funded via a [[Kickstarter]] campaign.<ref>[http://www.pcgamer.com/elite-dangerous-crowdfunding-covered-less-than-one-quarter-of-its-total-cost-creator-says/ PC Gamer: Elite: Dangerous creator says crowdfunding covered less than one-quarter of its total cost]</ref> The Mac version was released on May 12, 2015,<ref name=":5" /> but Mac OS support was dropped on December 11, 2018 due to technical barriers.<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/important-mac-announcement.424243/ Frontier Forums: Important Mac announcement]</ref> The Xbox One version launched on October 6, 2015,<ref name=":6" /> followed by the PlayStation 4 version on June 27, 2017.<ref name=":7">[https://blog.us.playstation.com/2017/05/16/elite-dangerous-touches-down-on-ps4-june-27/ PlayStation.Blog: Elite: Dangerous Touches Down on PS4 June 27]</ref> The Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions can be played on the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 respectively via backwards compatibility,<ref>[https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/ids3nk/ps5_and_xbox_x_support_from_day1_according_to/ reddit: PS5 and Xbox X support from Day1 according to Interview with Joss Herraez]</ref><ref>[https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/johmtc/elitedangerous_we_can_confirm_that_elite/ reddit: @EliteDangerous: "We can confirm that Elite Dangerous is backwards compatible with Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5."]</ref> but no new ports optimized specifically for next-generation consoles are currently planned.<ref>[https://twinfinite.net/2020/08/elite-dangerous-odyssey-interview/ Twinfinite: Elite Dangerous Interview: Devs Detail Upcoming Odyssey Expansion]</ref>

* Star systems, celestial bodies are gradually aggregated over a very long simulated time from available matter, taking into account its chemical composition. Some [[Stellar Forge]] outcomes are ‘backed up’ by astronomical observations.<ref>Elite Dangerous Newsletter #36 http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=dcbf6b86b4b0c7d1c21b73b1e&id=76df98203b#StellarForge</ref>  

Elite Dangerous is a groundbreaking title for virtual reality gaming, because its one of the first major titles to offer full VR support with an exceptionally immersive experience in an all-encompassing universe. It was the go to game for many VR headset demos before the devices were commercially available. From a technical standpoint, Elite Dangerous is one of the PC’s most high-end VR titles, pushing even very powerful PCs to their limit. Elite Dangerous is designed from the ground up to support Virtual Reality and 4K Ultra HD display technology. It has Cutting-edge visual quality and performance enabled by Frontier's COBRA engine. It supports the latest displays at 4K resolution, and is built for the future with full 8K and 16K support. It's compatible with Oculus Rift, SteamVR and Vive headsets.<ref>https://www.elitedangerous.com/en/made-for-vr/</ref>

<nowiki> </nowiki>In March 2015, [[David Braben]] said supporting the Oculus Rift right from the start was possible, because Elite Dangerous is self-published by [[Frontier Developments]] rather than a publisher. With a publisher they'd have to make a business case for it and it would end up being pushed out into the future.<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLpX1G5I5tQ YouTube: Elite: Dangerous - David Braben Interview] with Gamereactor,

Erasmus Talbot and Jim Croft developed the dynamic music system that allows the score to ‘breathe’ and reflect gameplay. Croft managed a team of talented individuals who also worked on audio such as ship engine sound and the ship's voice. Croft said it's been an absolute honor and privilege to be involved with Elite Dangerous.<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/11961-Meet-the-Team-12-Jim-Croft-(Head-of-Audio) Frontier Forums: Meet the Team #12- Jim Croft (Head of Audio)]

Whether Elite Dangerous is the most complex project he's worked on in his career, Jim Croft answered: ''"I would say so, yes. It’s a bit like Alice. It’s a small rabbit hole initially but once you’ve started down it, one thing tends to lead to another and before you know it you are lost in labyrinthine complexity."''

Regarding the backer response to the audio, [[Jim Croft]] said: ''"The response to Alpha 1.0 has been overwhelmingly positive. We were really glad to hear that people were in general enjoying our approach, particularly with respect to ship engines. One of our biggest challenges is in attempting to make space flight feel enjoyable, dynamic and non-fatiguing, while adhering to a plausible physical flight model as much as we can. It’s very tough to keep all parties happy; some like a light touch or no sound at all, whereas others want the full ‘Hollywood’ treatment. We want to give players what they want. Our aim is making as much of the audio in the game as customisable as possible in the audio options. So players can pick and choose the elements they prefer to hear and which elements they do not."''<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/11961-Meet-the-Team-12-Jim-Croft-(Head-of-Audio) Frontier Forums: Meet the Team 12 - Jim Croft (Head of Audio)]</ref>

Senior Audio Designer [[Matthew Florianz]] held a presentation giving an in-depth look into the making of the audio for Elite Dangerous with in-game examples. Pertaining the science approach to the way Frontier creates the universe, a question they often get is: ''"Why didn't you go for no sound in space? The game has sound."'' Jim Croft answered that question: ''"In the vast and often empty blackness of space, audio fulfills the crucial role of communicating a compelling sense of speed, acceleration and mass to the player."<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiAcsrmyePs YouTube: Elite: Dangerous - Sound In Space - Control Conference 2015 (5:06)]</ref>''

The Elite Dangerous Limited Edition Box Set was part of certain Kickstarter rewards which backers received. The Limited Edition Box Set contained an Elite branded polo shirt with the correct shirt size, a limited edition game pack (copy of the game), a paperback novel of [[Elite: Legacy]], the original soundtrack, an Elite pin badge which worked as a fastener and a personalized letter written by [[David Braben]] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_British_Empire OBE] for each of the 7,000 recipients. It all fit into a bespoke shipping carton and was distributed to 7,000 individuals worldwide. It was designed so that owners felt like they received something special. This boxed set was nominated and ‘Highly Commended’ in the 2015 British Luxury Packaging Design Awards.<ref>http://www.bridgemediagroup.com/Blog/files/tag-elite-dangerous.html</ref>

Dangerous is the third best rank for members of the [[Pilots Federation]] and the galaxy is dangerous. Here's related lore: ''"Relentless, increasingly well organized piracy and the need to maintain their reputation and influence as the best of the best caused the Elite Pilots Federation to start opening its membership to candidates from the Deadly rank who were able to pass a rigorous test and then, as demand continued to soar, to those from the Dangerous rank."''<ref>http://us2.campaign-archive1.com/?u=dcbf6b86b4b0c7d1c21b73b1e&id=f72c0f91b2#Badge%20of%20Honour Elite: Dangerous Newsletter #22</ref><ref>Elite Dangerous - Digital Art Book</ref>

At the 2011 Game Developers Conference, [[David Braben]] gave the presentation [http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014628/Classic-Game-Postmortem Classic Game Postmortem - ELITE]. During the Q&A, an audience member asked: ''"Is Elite 4 still on the drawing board?"'' Braben answered: ''"Yes, it would be a tragedy for it not to be."''<ref>[http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014628/Classic-Game-Postmortem GDC Vault: Classic Game Postmortem]</ref>

In 2012, space sims were unpopular among publishers so it was difficult to attract funding for such a project. Due to the financial failure of Freelancer in the early 2000's publishers were skeptical of space games in general. Publishers would want to steer the game in a particular direction which was unacceptable for [[David Braben]]. In an interview, he said: ''"Working with publishers is great, but as part of the process, inevitably the publisher will want to steer the game in a particular direction. It happened with ‘[[Elite]]‘ – the game was rejected by Thorne-EMI because it was so different to what had gone before; to what they believed would be successful because those sort of games were successful before. They wanted three lives, a score and a ten minute play time. That was because that was the norm at the time. Today, we would be steered to make a game with cut-scenes that would appeal to an imagined audience. That is not the game I want to make."''<ref>[https://www.pcinvasion.com/credits-cobras-and-crowd-funding-david-braben-tells-us-about-elite-dangerous PC Invasion: Credits, Cobras and Crowd-Funding: David Braben tells us about Elite: Dangerous]</ref>

David Braben said: ''"When we first greenlit Elite: Dangerous, there were no other major space games since Freelancer. Now, there are dozens. So, I think we've succeeded. We've brought the genre back to life. And we've proven there's quite a lot of demand for this sort of game. Yes, it's niche, but it's quite a big niche."''<ref name=":9" />

[[Frontier Developments|Frontier]] had been working on the game as a "skunk-works" background activity for some time prior to its Kickstarter launch. Other projects were prioritized. It ''“...has been worked upon by a small team as a ‘skunk-works’ activity in the background as availability permits”''<ref name=":10" /> Elite Dangerous uses Frontier's own state-of-the-art in-house COBRA Engine tools and technology. COBRA has been carefully planned, developed and evolved since 1988.<ref>[http://www.frontier.co.uk/our_technology/ Frontier: Our Technology]</ref>

Elite Dangerous was first announced to the public on November 5, 2012.<ref>https://www.facebook.com/EliteDangerousOfficial/posts/10152235720990564?__tn__=C-R</ref> Over a quarter of a century after the original, David Braben of [[Frontier Developments]] launched a successful Kickstarter campaign in November 2012. The purpose was to test-market the concept, verify whether there's broader interest in a fourth game and to raise funds to help make the game.

Braben wrote: ''"We’re using Kickstarter both as a means of test-marketing the concept to verify there is still interest in such a game that extends beyond the individuals who regularly contact me about the game, and raising the funds to do so. There is also the fact that as long as we hit the threshold, it commits us to making the game."''<ref name=":10">[http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/06/elite_dangerous_on_kickstarter/ The Register: Classic game 'Elite' returns … on Kickstarter]</ref> By April 2014, £1.7m had been raised.<ref>http://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/DAVID-ELKS-thesentinel/story-20992380-detail/story.html</ref> This was a fraction of the total budget for developing the base-game, Elite Dangerous (1.0). At Gamescom 2014, Braben said: ''"The original budget, because we put a lot of our money towards it, was £8m, it's grown by quite a lot."''<ref name=":11">[http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-09-11-elite-dangerous-original-budget-was-8m Eurogamer: Elite: Dangerous' original budget was £8m]</ref>

The [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GxJbOMaXa0 Elite Dangerous Premiere] was held in November 2014. There were interviews, videos, speeches, reveals, prize giveaways and a detailed [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQXgcV3JMrY 1:10 scale model] of the Cobra MkIII.<ref>[http://daftworks.co.uk/eliterpg/index.php/Elite_Dangerous_Launch_Event Daftworks: Elite Dangerous Launch Event]</ref>

The Apple Mac version was released on May 12, 2015.<ref name=":5">[https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2015/05/elite-dangerous-now-available-for-macs-both-direct-and-on-steam/ Ars Technica: ''Elite: Dangerous'' now available for Macs, both direct and on Steam]</ref> It doesn't have [[Elite Dangerous: Horizons]] due to the lack of high-performance Compute Shaders in the graphics API's supported by OS X.<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=191898 Frontier Forums: Answer From The Devs 15/10/15]</ref> As of the Q4 update of Elite Dangerous: Beyond, the Mac version of Elite Dangerous will no longer be playable due to technical barriers.<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/424243-Important-Mac-announcement Frontier Forums: Important Mac announcement]</ref>

On May 26, 2017, the producer for the Elite Dangerous PS4 version Lloyd Morgan-Moore said: ''“The Elite Dangerous team is over a hundred people strong, and while we have a dedicated PS4 team to handle things like PSN infrastructure, everyone is working on content which will appear simultaneously on all platforms. We don’t regard platforms separately when it comes to content."''<ref>[http://www.redbull.com/en/games/stories/1331858657533/elite-dangerous-ps4-interview RedBull: The tech behind Elite Dangerous’s PS4 debut]</ref> The team size was confirmed by a few people who visited the Frontier offices during the week of June 9, 2017.<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/356790-My-visit-to-Frontier-Developments-and-the-Future-of-the-Game Frontier Forums: My visit to Frontier Developments and the Future of the Game]</ref>

On 1 March 2018, [[Frontier Developments|Frontier]] stated they have continued and unwavering commitment to making Elite Dangerous the most authentic, ambitious, and expansive evolving space game in the world.<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/479122-Important-Community-Update-(01-03) Frontier Forums: Important Community Update (01/03)]

During an interview at [[Lavecon]] 2015, Frontier stated to have a clear intention of a 10 year development plan.<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/165775-Lavecon-News Frontier Forums: Lavecon News]</ref> It's confirmed by [[David Braben]] during a charity livestream in December 2016.<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS33cyq6Z_A&t=21m00s YouTube: 24 Hour Charity Livestream! Part 1! 2016]</ref> In an interview with the Rolling Stone, Braben said: ''"It's down to fans engaging with it, to be honest. But I would very much like to see it still going in 10-plus years. We might change things but, we'd like to keep the same basic idea."''<ref name=":9">[http://www.rollingstone.com/glixel/features/elite-dangerous-creator-talks-sci-fi-politics-and-whats-next-w492781 Rolling Stone: Elite Dangerous creator talks sci-fi politics and what's next]</ref>

For example, the roadmap is to add these features with major updates (in no particular order): <ref>[http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=dcbf6b86b4b0c7d1c21b73b1e&id=1824c0b05a#Lifetime%20Exp Elite Dangerous Newsletter #29]</ref> <ref>[https://www.pcgamesn.com/elite-dangerous/elite-dangerous-standard-beta-begins-next-week-last-chance-grab-lifetime-expansion-pack PCGamesN: Elite: Dangerous standard beta begins next week; last chance to grab lifetime expansion pack]</ref>

''Elite Dangerous'' sold around 1.7 million franchise units by the end of May 2016. The term "franchise units" combined all sales of the ''Elite Dangerous'' base game and the ''Elite Dangerous: Horizons'' expansion.<ref>http://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-detail/FDEV/12881582.html</ref>

By December 31, 2017, cumulative sales of the game had exceeded 3.25 million franchise units.<ref>[https://www.investegate.co.uk/frontier-dev-plc/rns/interim-results/201802060700029348D/ Investegate: Frontier Dev PLC (FDEV) - 06 February 2018]</ref>

By January 15, 2019, cumulative sales of the game exceeded 4.3 million franchise units. Of these, the base game alone accounted for 3 million units.<ref>[https://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-detail/FDEV/13934373.html London Stock Exchange: Frontier Developments PLC - Notice of Results and Trading update]</ref>

By May 31, 2020, the ''Elite Dangerous'' base game had sold over 3.5 million units.<ref name=":3">[https://www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article/FDEV/annual-results/14679378 London Stock Exchange: Frontier's Annual Financial Results for FY20 - Elite Dangerous hit its highest player numbers this year, and 3.5m basegame copies sold]</ref>

By January 13, 2021, the ''Elite Dangerous'' base game had sold over 4 million units. A further 8 million base game units were claimed for free on the Epic Games Store during a giveaway week in November 2020.<ref>[https://www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article/FDEV/trading-statement/14824350 Frontier Developments PLC - Trading Statement - 13 January 2021]</ref>

The table below lists the 10 highest records for concurrent ''Elite Dangerous'' players on the Steam platform according to Steam Database.<ref>[https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/selite-dangerous-steam-just-set-a-new-4-year-record-for-concurrent-cmdrs-the-highest-since-nov-2015s-ath.541687/ Frontier Forums: Elite Dangerous (Steam) just set a new 4½ year record for concurrent CMDRs - the highest since Nov 2015's ATH]</ref>