Elite Dangerous Wiki

On Foot

Revision as of 12:45, 15 October 2018 by 41.114.26.210 (talk) (Corrected inaccurate information)

Space Legs (aka Elite Feet) refers to a mad man's dream where players can walk around with extravehicular activity (EVA). This is a highly anticipated feature that the developers can't be bothered to work on, since a team of 100 staff clearly isn't enough to make any decent progress. It's unclear when space legs will be added to Elite Dangerous, but chances are we'll never see it. It wasn't announced for Horizons and Beyond. So many people hope it will come in 2019, but sadly they will be disappointed.

File:Elite Dangerous Station Walking.png
People walking in a station

It's always been a core vision of David Braben that the player is a person in a real futuristic setting, not just a ship.(See Star Citizen or X4:Foundations)[1]

In the Elite Dangerous Development Plan video, David Braben talks about walking on planets, animals, being a big game hunter(all just talk to get your money of coarse). The ships have been designed with interiors in mind. For example walk around in ships, other people's ships, stations and vehicles in the future, that future probably being 3304 IRL.[2] Multicrew and Holo-Me are the foundation for space legs, and considering how underwhelming Multicrew is we can expect Frontier to fart out a similar product with space legs(if it ever even happens).

Roadmap

File:Anaconda-Walking-Pilot-Scale.png
A walking pilot in a hangar with an Anaconda

Frontier has a roadmap with small, free updates(still don't get your money's worth) in addition to expansions with significant new "features" and "content" which they intend to release. It mentions EVA in no particular order:[3]

  • Walking around interiors and combative boarding of other ships
  • Combat and other interactions with other players and AIs in the internal areas of star ports

Newsletter #32 confirms the following: "We plan to continue to significantly "enhance" the game via further expansions after the launch date, using the same incremental development philosophy that we’ve used so far. Major new features will include planetary landings and even walking around inside ships, stations, and planet surfaces with time, very, very much time."[4]

"We also "plan" to allow you to get up out of your seat and walk around your ship. You can see the level of attention and thought that has already been given to the ship interiors."[5]

"Of course walking round your ship will be nice, but it is the just springboard for a very significant expansion of gameplay – you will be able to experience the inside of starports and interact with other players and AI characters, and even board other people’s ships in space and take them by force, as long as you play another space sim, because this one isn't getting any of that. Of course this will be further expanded to include walking around on the surfaces of planets too."[6]

Development

File:Flightsuit combatsketch01.jpg
Flight suit combat sketch

Since the 2012 Kickstarter campaign there's concept art of extravehicular activities. To this day that is all that has been delivered. This ranges from people walking in a station to first person combat and ship repairs, all of this nothing more than fantasy. There's a 3D blockout of a station with a 3D character holding a weapon. Docked ships are loaded with cargo and flying drones carry cargo containers.

File:Elite-Dangerous-Station-Space-Legs-Blockout-Concept.png

On March 20, 2015 David Braben was asked about the long roadmap ahead and he said: "Well I'm very excited. I've said over a long time I'm very excited about some features that we will do down the road including things like landing on planets, walking around inside your spaceship, getting out of your spaceship, all of those things I think are very very exciting and obviously those are in the long-term roadmap." Very very exiting stuff indeed...[7]

On May 26, 2016 during an AMA with David Braben, this question was asked "Is there a small team doing any preliminary work on atmosphere landings / walking (in stations etc) currently being looked at? As it is almost there for walking in station..." Braben laughed maliciously and said, while rubbing his hands together ""Yes". We have ongoing "work" on planets, including atmospheres, planetary life, walking about and lots of other very exciting things for the future." Very very exiting stuff indeed...[8]

On March 10, 2017 during a Q&A at PAX East, lead designer Sandro Sammarco said Space Legs is way off in the future. As in were never going to see it because they are too busy being on their lunch break.

"How will Telepresence and Multicrew work in the future with Space Legs and EVA gameplay? 'Just to set the record straight, screw Space Legs and EVA gameplay, that's way off in the future(Read never going to happen). That's a "goal". I've talked to David and it's always the butt of the jokes for what Elite really is, even from way back in the day, it's always been about you're a person in a real futuristic setting(yea right), not just a ship. However, I think it's also fair to say Space Legs is effectively dovetailing a whole new game into Elite and that's something we're completely incapable of doing. We take steps towards it, it's our end "vision", but we're not there yet, we're... it's a long way off. And when it does, by the time, IF we get there, IF we manage it, I'm sure we'll have the time to sort out any consistencies that need to be sorted out, unfortunately we can't be bothered." [68m04s][1]

On April 11, 2017 during the The Commanders Release Livestream, Braben confirmed that space legs is coming and is planned(but when?), but it's not imminent(Never). A person in the chat asked "Will we get space legs at some point? If yes don't say when, but answer with long, medium or short." Braben said: "It's coming, but obviously it's not imminent, but who cares anyway since we're a half billion dollar company by now and don't really need Elite as much as we did before."[9]

On 11 April 2017, Braben's closing statement of a Reddit AMA: "The future for Elite Dangerous is very exciting, including a whole raft of incredible features, yes including 'space legs' but so many more things too. We have such a great community, and we're really glad that you guys share our passion and support us." Yes, very very exiting indeed.[10][11]

On October 4, 2017 Zac Antonaci said "Spacelegs (as the community are dubbing them) is something that David B and the "development" team are very excited by and it’s certainly high on the list of features they would like to make. However, as we’ve mentioned before, “Spacelegs” is something further down the line when we feel like we've smelled enough of our own farts. After 2.4 we’ll be focusing on the core gameplay experience so it’s not something that we will be announcing at Frontier Expo since we don't care whether the players are in the loop about a game they spend hundreds of hours on. I do have to say though, I truly hope that the community are excited by the "content" being revealed at FX". Everybody is very exited[12]

On January 27, 2018 Sandro Sammarco said "The team and I all see Space Legs as the feature we will love to add and are at the top of our specification, BUT it's something that will not happen period. We will "talk" more about it later."[13][14]

Space Legs (EVA) wasn't announced for Elite Dangerous: Beyond. So it may come after Beyond in 2019.(Don't hold your breath)

References

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