Ship interiors is one of the main reason I went over to Star Citizen. It completely and utterly transforms the experience in too many ways to describe. Even the littlest day-to-day goings on can create the most memorable moments between friends. My buddy was messing with a fuse panel near the cockpit, and ended up fumbling said fuse because I took a sharp turn that knocked him over. Que him then scrambling to find it under the captain's seat when we were attacked by a pirate to plug it back in because we kind of needed it, lol. It even makes 'supercruise' interesting for players. We can literally go play some chess in our lounge while on long voyages. In Elite, I always felt like a 40k dreadnought, trapped in my ship, part of the ship, but in Star Citizen I am free, an actual person, living in my ship.
@@nighttrain1236 jokes on you, it's not a game "Yet", we are all professional play testers😅😂...i njoy SC in many ways, but obviously Chris won't finish it...coz selling shiny jpegs is far far more lucrative then actually finishing the "game"
My best star citizen moment was being pirated by a ship that knocked out my components (soft death) which killed my ship, but not me. The sense of dread of going to exterior view and seeing 2 people eva'ing from their ship to mine had my heart pumping. My dead in the water ship interior became a zero g FPS map. I was able to shoot the two pirates dead (almost dying myself), then eva from my wrecked ship to my aggressor's ship and flew back to safety. Ship interiors are CRUCIAL imo
I play X4, but the simplest story i can tell is that in whatever capital ship i was when i was going to sleep (irl) i went to the the captains quarters and save the game looking at the bed, it started as rp and ended up like a tradition.
My number one wish for SC is still a single-player button like ED has. I want the exploration of dangerous and uncharted space, but I don't want to deal with other gamers ruining the immersion. The game should be big enough for both types of players. I'm not sure Star Citizen can afford to shut off a (big?) portion of the player base. PvP-centric games like Warhammer Online and Age of Conan have just quickly died. There just isn't a big market for it and I want Star Citizen to do well for the PvP and the PvE crowd. As it is now I have backed to a Concierge level for SQ42 alone. It remains to be seen how the PU turns out. The times I have played have been a remarkable tech demo, but not much more. There is still too much missing, and the game is not even in alpha (the definition of which is feature- but not content complete) no matter what CIG says. Any wet dream in a game dev's eye is apparently an alpha these days just to get into the early access money.
I think the reason FDev doesn't think interiors would add any gameplay value is because that's all FDev knows how to do. We see this with station interiors. Instead of a whole new environment to explore and do missions in, it's just a glorified and more tedious menu. They'd likely do the same with ships.
I think they want them (or don't really care). Real reason is because the game was actually never developped with interior in mind. In a really surprising way (as they kept talking about it, even making some work on the anaconda interior). In essence, when you fly the ship, you are the ship. The avatar inside the cockpit is just for show (like the thrusters or whatever), it's not the part you play. When you exit, you become the dude outside. For obvious reason, you can't be both at the same time. You can solve that, but it's a lot of work, and we all know how Frontier feels about work. The excuses they came up with are utterly shallow and they don't believe them one seconds. But it was better to say "it's actually not fun" than to say "it was a lot of work".
@@erei2420 oh for sure it's a lot of work, they'd have to rework how ships function from the very basics. Entities within entities can get weird if a game isn't built with it in mind, or even a specific implementation of it. I think it's both. It's a lot of work, and they don't think it's worth the work because they don't have any ideas for what to do with it without blowing the scope up even further.
Station interiors were still cool despite being limited, though. A lot of people want the thing badly enough that FDev could indeed get away with mediocre ship interiors.
@@moon9light odyssey didn't sell well because there was little function to the interiors, as well as not being much of interest done with space legs as a whole
@@existentialselkath1264 I also believe that they have developed themselves into a dead end and the game engine can't really handle ship interiors. I mean, the whole proportions and dimensions in the game are completely off kilter. Have you ever looked at a ship in ED from the outside? For example, the Eagle has roughly the proportions you would expect from a fighter craft and it's dimensions fit it's look. But when you zoom into the cockpit, you see your little player figurine sitting in some kind of cathedral-sized glass bubble, because apparently that's the only way they could get the ego--perspective for flying the ship to work. So getting up and out of the pilot seat is not possible, because I don't see how those two discrepancies in perspective can be solved without breaking one or the other. As you said, they'd probably have to rework the whole graphics engine from scratch.
Couldn´t be more true. A spaceship interior, especially one you can interact with or even customize, makes a ship feel like home. It´s why I love Space Engineers and Star Citizen.
I hope more game developers would look more into ship interiors, there's so many gameplay loops that could be done with interiors. Excellent video as usual! Hope you're doing great
That would be cool. Although unless you build the gameplay loop(s) in, it becomes very difficult to add any after the fact, relegating the interior to window dressing and immersion.
No more Elite until ship interiors. I don't care what the white knights say, it adds a deeper level of immersion, especially walking around on moving ships (talking to you Empyrion Galactic Survival!)
Totally. I would have enough in elite if i was able to walk from the station to the hangar of my ship, open the airlock and walk trough the interior to reach the seat of my ship. I dont really need other stuff like repair or engineering like star citizen. Like x4 is more than enough. Jumship is my ideal
@@wengaiden I love the simple design of X4. It's OK if some of the bigger ships have extra rooms, but I don't need much more than the ramp/door, a corridor/ entry way/airlock and the cockpit
I think many people play space games because of immersion. Ship interiors add a lot to the immersion factor, imo. I've been enjoying Elite for years without them, but I'd enjoy it even more with them.
@@efxnews4776 man if we could just have weapons and actually go along with the marines during boarding in X4, it would make the best game ever even better. The Best best game ever! I love X4
Players just there for performance builds/PVP don't care about interiors, those players are willing to spend a lot of money for another 0.1% improvement to their build, so their voice is very loud.
So do developers. The problem is it just makes everything 10x more difficult in a space sim. On the art side, the gameplay side, performance side, tech side. Remember how long it took to develop and then mature the whole physics grid thing in general. And they had more money coming in than any of these other space games. Every single ship becomes a huge headache to develop to a high quality standard. Eg: for Elite, it will be very difficult to get all these seamless features working while maintaining the same level of quality. That's the problem with people asking E:D devs for ship interiors. It's a pretty big endeavor to bolt something like that on to an existing game. It may not be the most reasonable request.
In Star Citizen, it is important to note that ship interiors physically and simultaneously exist in the same game space as the rest of the star system, hence a "seamless" transition between interior/exterior. This is unlike games such as Starfield, where entering your ship unloads the "planet surface" zone and then loads your "ship interior" zone - two distinct instances. The former is not an easy task. In a recent interview with one of the Star Citizen ship designers, he noted the difficulty in designing ship interior spaces that must physically fit within the boundaries of a ship's hull, sometimes requiring tweaks or full redesigns to the interior and/or exterior models. The end result pays off, though, as the interior/exterior transitions really make you feel like your avatar is in fact boarding a ship, walking around inside, manning gunner stations, moving cargo, putting out fires, etc. - all while someone else is flying the ship in space or in atmosphere.
It used to be that spaceships didn't have interiors in games because it was just way too much work to model them in 3D. So the player was the ship. Now, it's becoming common: Starfield, The Expanse, Star Citizen, Starship Simulator, Star Trucker. No Man's Sky had station interiors since the beginning, but they were tiny -- just one or two small rooms. Elite Dangerous has started to model station interiors, but they have a long way to go to model interiors of all their ships.
As a Warframe player, where ship combat isn't a major focus but still having TWO ship interiors to decorate or customize or fight in (one as a hub and one as a fully pilotable multicrew space craft to fight other ships in)...it's pretty great. Hopefully more space focused games get that feature.
I've always felt that ship interiors, even if crude and simple, really add to the immersion of space games. They are by no means required, but I can totally understand why something like the lack of interiors can stunt the experience for some. They should never be required for a space game, but they are always always always a welcome addition because interiors just add sooo much to space games overall.
My problem is I recall seeing an interview/dev say that all ships were made with interiors in mind only to have the devs say that they were not even thinking about it.
One of the Frontier Devs said about the upcoming mystery features: "I always thought this feature never really brings much to the table but once I've seen it for myself I was amazed by the potential for new gameplay it brings to the table." Of course that can be applied to other features than Ship Interiors. But I just hold out hope that it was about SIs because I can think of a dozen or more gameplay features that would tie into ship interiors. Nine if you wake me up from REM sleep.
I didn't realize the importance of ships (and stations) interior importance until X4. I thought it was a "1 time" experience that was a waste of resources. But standing on a carrier deck, seeing dozens of fighters taking off at once (each of them you can fly), for a total of 200fighters launched (yes, it's that massive), or being on the top deck, watching massive turrets opening fire in a big space battle is truly something else. But instead of ship interiors we got a crappy team deathmatch mode made by a team with no experience in shooters, on an engine not made to make shooters. Because, obviously, that's what people expected and what your team can do best.
In X4 you went to zero to hero. In the Tides of Avarice dlc you can literally start the game locked in a cell. Another point is that even if its not much you can do in the ship interiors, just the immersion factor is a game changer.
Here's another example I'm surprised you didn't mention: Boarding. As much as Starfield is "meh" overall, I really enjoyed the combat when boarding other ships. Especially the zero-g combat felt pretty good to me. And even the random events, derelict ships. It adds a whole other layer to spaceships, and I've often tried to disable ships and board them rather than straight out destroy them. Often games that allow this sort of gameplay reward disabling enemy ships instead of destroying them with the ability to claim them as your own, basically making it a whole gameplay loop of it's own.
space is Huge and empty. Its Crowded and Lonely at the same Time. Having an interior space make me feel grounded and have control over my "own" Space. and for god sake, like 90% of media regarding space. series of film is happening inside the ship, it still amaze me that developer forgot the biggest aspect of space game.
Just wait until you find what the gameplay is all about and how its a mindless grind of doing a thing over and over. I tried sc after many hours of elite and i cant go back it looks sooo dated and sooo less immersive
The worst part about Odyssey isn't even that the grind wasn't changed. It's that it literally still feels like you never leave the pilots seat. It's got that same old "fade to black to teleport into a different machine," just like the scarab. Being able to walk around on my feet literally changed nothing for me, because it still feels like I never left the pilots seat, the bipedal android feels just like that a bipedal android.
@@MrRoblcopter SRVs are different. There's a fade to black, but then you experience the SRV drop. That simple thing makes a huge difference to immersion. Because it gives the "Armstrong moment". Odyssey just teleports to and from the surface. What they should have done (while not being ready to do full interiors) is teleport you to the airlock (which would be much like the elevators in stations, so not much work), and have the door open. By making people just go up and down the stairs and use an airlock it would have felt much more immersive. Yeah, you black out for the bits where you run through the ship... but you'd get your "Armstrong moment". And it'd feel more like the interiors would come some day.
Yep, space interiors are so immersive! I can not imagine elite without walking around space stations, fleet carrier and so on. Hope we will have more gameplay around this. The mentioned ship interiors, maybe more space bases etc and maybe dive even further into squadron space bases
Did you play the og trilogy? Story wise Mass Effect is the Star Wars of videogames, but the first three games are like OG trilogy, while Andromeda is like the Force Awakens from Disney.
The biggest challenge when adding an interior to your game is spacing. So I can somewhat understand why developers leave it out. It can end up in a design nightmare. However, having interiors, especially customizable ones, feels really awesome. It is certainly one of the main reasons why I played Space Engineers for hundreds of hours and still to this day to improve my ships interior with new blocks.
Fdev instances literally everything. They could do something similar at every section of the ship with animations like starfield. Cheating with space isn't hard
I prefer Starship Evo in this regard, in Sevo you can go bonkers with details. Wich lead me to think, that it's just laziness that is stoping devs to make highly detailed ships.
the game that made me realize how immersive it is to be able to walk around your ship was, of all things, Subnautica. the cyclops is by far my favorite vehicle in any game, not only for that you actually need to learn how to maneuver it as if itself were it's own entity rather than an input extension from the player, but also for how the simple ability to make it your own in a sense that's unlike any other game I've seen. you can build pretty much everything you need to survive and make it act as a mobile base, being (mostly) limited to space, but you also can decorate it with posters and plushies, or other collectibles you acquired through your explorations. I think the closest experience to it would be your home in games like Animal Crossing or Stardew Valley, for just how personal and intimate the space you inhabit gets to feel like, but it's also a vehicle! and one you can even lose lol I've seen people cry over losing a Cyclops
Cool, but you don't actually craft the submarine in Subnautica, you gather resources to spawn it, right? If you trully want to fell how is to build your own space ship then you should play games like Empyreon, Starship Evo, Space Engeneers.
I've recently discovered a game on Steam called Objects in Space that makes a very strong case for ship interior. It was so compelling, it reminded me of the wonder I felt when I first fired up Elite Dangerous.
In ED, it would be fun to have some kinds of salvage missions inside stranded ships (hauler, anacondas, etc) or most any of the current onfoot missions adapted to zero g and ships. It could be a way to test the ship interiors engine (varied -randomized?- selection of ship modules) before making it available to ship players. Also having a lab in which you could perform "researches" on exo plant samples or minerals, would make exploration more believable and immersive. We could grow baby cactoidas or fungoidas. 😅
Do we really need interiors in space games? No, but if we can have them, it’s better, because the more details, the greater the immersion. It's also a matter of the genre’s evolution and how much time a space exploration game can offer us. That being said, ever since I played Star Citizen and enjoyed the interiors, the experience is never the same when playing games that don't have them, because it feels like something is missing. If we add the possibility of interacting with those interiors, making upgrades, repairs, etc., the enjoyment is much greater. However, this is conditioned by what you, as a player, expect from the simulation. If all you want is the simulation of being at the ship's controls, then interiors aren't necessary. But if what you want is to experience being a crew member inside a spaceship, interiors become essential.
This is probably the main reason I play, I love the idea of doing a mission, flying somewhere. Parking up, going to the kitchen, crafting a meal, making a coffee, putting music on... chilling for a few mins. Then clean up, go back to fly to the next place. Means when I upgrade a ship I get new features, more space to fit out with clothes etc. When!!!
One of my all-time favorite gaming experiences was when I first acquired a ship with a navigable interior in Star Wars Galaxies. I spent so long decorating it and was able to invite friends aboard to experience it together. I can’t believe so many “space sim” games have completely overlooked it as a draw, especially for multiplayer games.
It’s likely spaceship interiors are a very big tech challenge for elite, otherwise they would have done it already. Which in turn makes it super unlikely to happen now, sadly. Tbh. I’m just happy they’re changing things for the better, even if it comes with pay to win.
I just wish a developer would create an actual space simulator, but with the explorations, battles, etc of a really fun game. Hellion was so close to that.
It's a tricky one this. Having enjoyed ship interiors in the likes of Space Engineers, Empyrion and even the Cyclops submarine in Subnautica, it really does give a sense of place and attachment to the craft. It also gives a great sense of scale to the world- if you can walk around a ship, then dock on a space station or fly past a larger vessel, then it shows you just how vast the galaxy etc is. Though if there are no real gameplay advantages to wandering around your ship, I can see why a developer might not want to invest in that aspect of the game. I also wonder how much fiddling around inside your ship can take over from the overall adventure- but that's really a gameplay choice by the player. So- I'm for ship interiors as a gamer, but can see why not everyone will provide them.
Had a friend kill us all by grabbing a drink from the fridge, (it's a long story) that could never happen in Elite. It's why we play a lot of other games, Elite feels like its missing out on the "full" experience.
Spaceship interiors are the one thing that can bring me back full time to Elite Dangerous. I am currently much more invested in Star Citizen because its Multiplayer is Stable and the Ships don't just feel like a Suit you hop in. That said, i absolutely doubt that we will ever get them in Elite. We will likely just get some prebuilt Buildings we can place side by side which look almost the same. Oh and ofc they will be locked behind a 3 month Cashwall.
One of the things I love about ED is that it just works well. One thing I hate about SC is that it is often broken. One thing I love about SC are ship interiors. One thing I hate about ED is the lack of ship interiors.
I love deep space exploration. I love the preparations and then the feeling that I am able to survive out there, while exploring. I am self sustainable unit. Adding a space interiors would add another layer to this. I would not mind to have elements like food, sleep etc. I'd require specifically equipped ship to be able to survive for a long time in the black. I'd love to grab a cup of coffee in game, sit on a couch, watching the stars.
I LOVE space games where ships have actual interiors. The exterior of the ship has been designed to look cool while actually being packaged to have a working interior to explore and feel at one with, it feels more complete and immersive. To me, it justifies why a ship is the way it looks from the exterior, being able to look out the window and see the ships wings or hull details backdropped by the environment you are currently in. Actual working features like storage, engineering and a cockpit also add to this sense of immersion. The immersion which I personally for in my scifi games. When I first started playing X-Wing vs TIE Fighter as a kid, just seeing the cockpit was a big difference from flying your ship only from a 3rd person view... now we have games with properly thought through, interactable interiors just adds to that magic👍
Space interiors just make the experience better, absolutely agree. Perspective and experience in space sims is everything imo, getting that perspective change helps you feel more like you’re there in that world just a little more
What could ship interiors bring if the implementation allowed it? Customization like a base, people love that. The ability to operate vendors on the ship while it's traveling, so if you're moving players around they could use your shops on your large merchant or cruise/touring vessel. Boarding parties, active repair, defending the ship, giving large ships the ability to be crewed more effectively. Large enough ships could have NPCs, and even mission related NPCs board them if the ship fit the right class, like if it was a luxury cruise vessel, then players might want to interact with that NPC, maybe they're wanted, I mean missions for other players being carried out on your ship would be pretty cool tbh. Imagination is the limit as to what the content could be, the only real limitation is implementation.
Haven't watched the video yet, but here are my thoughts... I'd love to see more realistic interiors of spaceships, especially those designed for longer journeys. No one would want to live in a cold, metal cave. There should be features like artificial sunlight, plants, plush beds and plenty of wooden furniture-maybe even some carpeting. If we look at how much we've improved the comfort of our homes over the past 60-70 years, the inside of spaceships should be even more comfortable and welcoming. Of course, this wouldn’t apply to fighter ships or short trips under 8 hours.
"...exceptional, high-quality and second to none..." For what they charge for them, they damn well better be. Interiors are indeed important but should be prioritized at the expense of other things.
I thought so today too, before I watched your video. I agree 100%! I imagine you'll find samples and rare objects that you can use to beautify your spaceship or equip it with useful tools. And the next step is to found your own settlements. There are endless possibilities that are not being used by Frontier Development.
Mah immersion Ship interiors are a place my friends and I can gather, away from the dangers of outside. Sure we can do it "as the ship" like in Elite, but thats just like RP'ing as a Cars character. My greatest memory was in Star Wars Galaxies and throwing parties and get togethers on my VT-49 Decimator, a POB ship (multi-passenger ships), planning raids or literally just logging in to chill out with friends.
As many issues as Starfield has, they absolutely nailed it with ship interiors. Functional, immersive, and providing a great gameplay loop when boarding enemy vessels. Clearing out a C class ship in Starfield can take several minutes, and it's full of enemies. Great fun.
The strongest argument I've seen against ship interiors is that having to leave pilot seat > walk down corridor > open door > walk down elevator > open hatch, then do all that again in reverse to return to your pilot seat, every single time, dozens of times per play session, dozens of play sessions, can get too repetitive and boring. I'm not of that oppinion, I enjoy it and I think it adds to the atmosphere and immersion, but I can see where they're coming from with that argument.
Their argument is bs... I have 5k hours playing X4, one of the things you can do once you are docked in a station far from your ship, is literally teleport yourself to the ship. I rarely used this function in my 5k hours, even if theres an in game explanation for teleport in X4. You simply get used to it, in fact you even get attached to this feature. Why this? Because the ship becomes more than a machine, it become the player home.
@@matheuskalil5680 I purposely made my walk in my Empyrion ship through a long series of corridors and elevators in my 300m long vessel. Including the part where I load and unload my Hover Vessel from the aft ramp of the vessel. I love overkill, and being able to lovingly design every nook and cranny, while tailoring a capital vessel to your liking is the best part of Empyrion and Space Engineers
Totally agree with everything you said. Would love to see Elite Dangrous with ship interiors including direct system interaction and repair, display items picked up from exploration, customize the interior and ability to hire and interact with 3D NPC crew that would enhance ship capibilities and possibly lead to related missions. Also finding creepy abandoned wrecks that can be explored and striped would be amazing. Not to mention boarding and fighting in disabled enemy ships. The list of possibilities is endless.
I've played a lot of No Man's Sky, and personally a traversable interior for the basic ships feels like it would add a lot to the experience, and seeing that clip of Star Trucker made it seem so much more feasible. A cozy little interior that you could decorate sparingly and maybe do things like material refining after you've set a course. Maybe you could even hack about in the systems, divert life-support to shields for a battle, etc. Rather than a mobile base, since NMS does have those with Freighters, it'd be more like a mobile workstation.
Being able to get out of your pilot seat and take a walk around your ship makes you feel like you are a traveller within a vast universe. It connects you more to your ship as you begin to understand its scale, its character and the quirks of its space and design. Alas, despite its beautiful and enchanting sentiment you can see why developers often leave this feature behind - The feature has so many implications of further gameplay mechanics that could just extend the scope of the game infinitely. It seems to me if you add ship interiors, or walking around you open yourself to a lot of criticism and in trying to balance reasonable scope you risk making the feature boring - sort of like what happened with X-Rebirth and the criticisms that drew. Leave ship interiors out and you've always got the "It's not that type of game, though!" crowd at your back and for bonus points don't explicitly mention that you never plan to add it and you've also got the people (like myself) who will be silently tossing my coins into the wishing well and praying it might one day come. (Like I did with Elite for years)
After a stressful day of bounty hunting it would be great to just turn around in your seat and head for the galley. Ya grab a cold one, kick your feet up on the galley table, and after my 8 years of playing, I finally get my cold beer in my own galley.
Having ship interiors is like bringing icing to the already baked cake You dont need icing to enjoy the cake but having it makes it so much nicer. After playing SC, its clear that what they are trying to achieve is something like an all encompassing experience with the game loops we all know and love. To people who appreciate immersion, this makes all the difference. I can see why casuals dont care about ship interiors much but then again casuals ruin everything.
Now with our own hangars - how about letting us decorate it as we please? How about we can have a multiple IM channel in that home hangar where we can invite friends over and talk to them - plan missions - strategize - of just hang out? How about giving us more time to make a smooth landing at a spacestation or port? How about better approach lights? How about both hangars and ships with so many components get finished - e.g., Constellation class ships still do not have a simple working table to sit at? How about fixing the Reclaimer's forward elevator? Back to Interiors - how about more personalized items - such as an uploadable graphic that could be displayed as a poster? And how about more Cargo tools such as rolling platforms that carry freight - often depicted in CIG promo's? And how about hangar chambers (or beds) that allow players to log out without loss of missions partially completed? ;-)
Ship interiors are basically the only thing SC does well at this point (when you don't fall through the floor of your ship during quantum travel). Other games get the goods with regard to all other functionality. I see this as a double-edged sword, honestly.
All other games are finished and stopped at step 3..... SC has its eyes on step 10 though. And unlike other games that block you from seeing step 1 & 2, SC has been in the open since the beginning. Thus, the criticism. But when they reach step 10... Watch all of the clowns and asshats who shat on SC come rolling out in droves with SC tramp stamps labeled 'I've been here from the beginning' lol.... Riiiight...Gamers can't handlenthe truth, and it shows..
The main reason I left ED behind was their complete disregard for VR players in Oddity. VR was the only thing that made me accept the dated graphics and game bugs being around for almost a decade. Once I got into my first ship with an interior in SC, I was utterly sold. The very act of just walking into and through your ship *never* gets old... Arthur.
Developers dont make promises, there's no legal obligation to do so, projections, expectations and planned content and features yes, but never promises.
I always appreciate space games that feature ship interiors; however, I concede that its not a strict requirement. For certain types of space games it certainaly adds to the experience, yet for others its just a 'bonus' and doesn't really affect anything. So, I think it depends on the sub-genre the game is a part of. Games that are focused on immersion (Starcitizen, Elite, SpaceBourne, etc.) should feature interiors for all the reasons you mention in this video. Games that are more focused on the action or story (Everspace, etc.) probably less so.
Interiors def connect you to the world and your ship because it feels like you actual HOME. If you’re in the black in elite having a ship interior gives me the feel that I’m at my home. I took my fleet carrier into the black for having that “home base” experience. I jumped my carrier ahead of my regular ship and then I’d fly my ship to the destination manually. Could I fly directly there without stopping from the bubble to colonia yea sure I could, but I don’t just jump jump jump, I stop, I explore the system, especially if it’s a system that is unexplored. I’ll go get those exploration points. Having the ability to get out of my ship and walk around on a planet was a really nice feature in my opinion and helped make the galaxy much larger than it was. Even star citizen does that right cuz I can go fully nomad and land my ship somewhere in the middle of no where and know that I’d be perfectly safe. The ability to repair and move modules in SC now makes it feel even more immersive. Elite loses that and it’s one of the reasons I haven’t been back at all during the entire of the thargoid war. None of it appealed to me. Starfield had that part good as well since you could customize it partially. I could modify the ship to be functionally logical as well… (or not). I am not the ship. I’ve never been a ship. I didn’t like it in Eve online either. I always felt that game was missing the station experience and people said it didn’t need it, but I think it really could expand on the game and I hope they eventually do move forward with it. A space game needs to be about the human and their ship, not just the ship. But that’s my 2 cents.
As an Elite player, I personally don't care one bit about interiors, I don't much see the point in it. If they were to introduce boarding actions and such I'd change my mind ofcourse, but unless there is some real gameplay point of it I would rather not have an extra transport distance to move through to get to and from the cockpit. I wouldn't complain if they were to add it though, it'd be nice for the players that care about it to get it. Thanks for the vid ObsidianAnt :)
Yeah, I don't trust FDev to come up with reasons to interact with interiors. Especially if they're not a core part of the game for every version and thus wouldn't be able to alter how the game already functions. Thats not to say interiors couldn't have gameplay: - Fires and repairing damage. - diffuse unexploded ordnance lodged in the hull - take care of special cargo like animals that need feeding, or creatures/smuggled drones that could get loose (possible combat encounters) - flesh out crewmates, have them linger around the ship and you can talk to them, receive missions, etc. - have bounties that must be taken alive, requiring boarding - maintain and access the rover in a garage kinda area - once there's enough things to validate it's existance, allow players to customise and decorate with items discovered on their travels, have holograms of photos taken, etc.
For me, if the game is in first person at all, it should have ship interiors. Even minimal interiors like what X4: Foundations has. It makes the ship feel more real to me and gives you a sense of the scale of the ship. It's why I got into Star Citizen with a friend of mine and it was the same reason for him. No matter how many times I walk through the ship to the cockpit, I enjoy it every time.
There’s a reason I have 500 hours in Starfield and only 200 in Elite. Elite is objectively a better space flight experience, but my heavily modified Shieldbreaker is home in a way I wish my Clipper could be
Agreed 100%. Ship exploration, customization and some interactivity would be wonderful. On the other hand I don't think is a good idea to keep adding time-consuming boring chores to pilots with more overcomplicated maintenance, constant fixes and menial tasks. Sadly, every time I mention ship interiors to the Elite Dangerous community they come with pitchforks - although they seem to react the same way with ANY changes.
100% agree with everything you said in the Video Ant. I think the biggest problem for Elite is.. it was PROMISED by Dave Braben in the Kickstarter. It was what we all wanted when get got Elite on our spectrums and BBC's but knew deep down that wasn't possible, they even started developing interiors (I believe Anaconda still has an inaccessible interior) and then.. they just gave up because I guess they found out it was going to be hard. SC on the other hand started with ships and interiors (remember we had a hanger but couldn't fly the ship), then they built the game engine around that. I seem to remember a long time back they had to virtually rewrite the entire game engine because they hadn't factored in Quantum Travel whilst walking about the ship. I mean even Flightsim 2024 looks is going to allow you to get OUT the seat into the world IE flightsim is going to be an FPS :) Id be willing to bet plane interiors will be a thing. If you get a game that you know you are rooted to the cockpit (Star wars or something) you don't expect to get out the seat because its a single seat ship and that's fair enough because you know what your getting, but if you promise big ships and interiors and don't deliver that causes annoyance.
I wonder how people would react if Elite added ship interiors but it turned out to be just hall ways and passages you could walk through and look at the "pictures" on the walls? Maybe you can see some crew models standing in rooms you can't enter, or you can but you can't interact. Basically, if you have used the camera to pan around your cockpit and really looked at the jpgs and gifs that make up the screens, coffee pots, etc, imagine that but for the whole ship. There's a bed..but you can't go to sleep in it, etc.
Frontier Dev always neglected interiors because they had no idea what to do with them. That's why they reacted with "it would be boring to run through the same interior over and over again", they were not able to imagine any interesting gameplay... as with so many other parts of Elite Dangerous.
Have you played PARKAN? A 1997 game that already had the ability to fly a spaceship, seamlessly walk around in first-person, board other ships, and land on planetary bases that you could capture and build with your drones.
Something Yamiks and others have raved about for years. Personally I'd LOVE to have such a thing to Elite... give me something more to get attached to on my ships. Let me see all the wires Delacy left that I need to fix, or all the leather everything on my Gutamaya ships that I can't see without breaking my neck... Heck it'd be a neat mechanic to be able to repair interior modules while traversing the ship, being able to walk to each hardpoint or module and repair damage to it. *clears throat* EMERRRRRRRRRSIOOOOOOOOOOOOOON
Elite should add an offline and co-op mode in wich you can have access to ship interiors without worrying not being on the helm when you get attacked, because THAT'S the reason why frontier hasn't added the feature yet....
Ship interiors is truly part of next gen gaming. I don't want to just play 1990s style scifi space games with pretty modern graphics into my elderly age.
It just baffles me they still did not fix this already. It seems so obvious! Just read through the comments here...! I am a 1985 Elite starter (when we "simulated" ship interiors in my childhood bedroom, behind my C64😂) and ship interiors were a major dream when backing the ED Kickstarter. IMMERSION!! ... the persistent lack of them was also one of the reasons for finally leaving ED in 2020. I am now just coming back ... and still no ship interiors?? 😢
The easiest way to implement ship interiors is to render a separate space from the game world and use camera objects to render exterior visuals for the cockpit and other windows. A lot of ship games do this like pulsar, warframe's railjack missions, X4's large ships, marauders, angels fall first, etc. I think maybe starfield(?) too It's extremely difficult to constantly render a detailed interactable structure like an interior constantly moving, ESPECIALLY if you have AI involved. Even just a moving platform can be a monumental challenge for AI. You have to consider how CPU/GPU calculate efficient pathfinding on a stationary object but then imagine having to accurately and timely update that for every time the object changes position in an XYZ space. Elite Dangerous does not have the infrastructure in the game engine to do this and likely does not have the resources to implement some version that could work, even the easy method. That would probably involve an effort on the scale of odyssey's dev, with full reworks on every ship, as the cockpits are all rendered within the gamespace as part of the ship.
I recently in love with X4 Foundations and picked up Elite Dangerous to get some more food for me space sim fix. I have to say I really miss the interiors and the immersion they bring. Hope they come someday.
being only a player of elite and loving it, of course adding interiors would be an awesome addition and i don't think any people are really against it, it would be cool to feel that this is a true ship and not just a cockpit while flying, exploring the inside gut mecanics and techs maybe with floors, bays, and command boards, but that said in term of pure gameplay, for elite at least, i genuinely don't see a real plus to it aside cool visuals. i don't play elite to be annoyed by the obliged gestion of modules potentialy randomly shuting down etc and is not attracted by the "being a human" side having to survive and walk kms to do a thing. i love elite mainly for its universe, its great and dark story/lore, its designs, its cool references to other SF stuff i like, and the very unique concept of the game direction like all the mysteries hidden and investigations left by the devs to uncover them, leaving players who wants to explore, investigate (the most about the thargoid, their intentions and the guardians, with small "puzzles" to resolve to collect informations) and understand things around by themself, thinking about their actions, taking side, of faction or simply money, etc and of course the beauty of its astronomicaly accurate galaxy and the feeling of complete freedom of flying from stars to stars, doing what we want in all relative "simplicity" (but keeping a complexity in its possibilities and gameplay mecanics), and the sensation of real vastness of the void. so it would be nice sure but i think elite doesn't obligatory need it because offers a very different direction for me, more focus on space itself and its beauty in which i immerse myself and less on just being someone in space, more on the adventure than the survival
I never heard anyone complaining about ship interior in a game that has them, but i seen a lot of people complaning about games who don't have ship interiors.
I think of ship interiors in space sim as analogous to being able to enter and explore many buildings in an open world game. It might not be necessary to make the game work, but it adds a level of immersion that cannot be overstated. And similarly, in the future I expect it'll become something similar where it's commonplace and we even take it for granted. I still remember playing Driver 2 and GTA 3 and wondering how long it was going to be before games would let us explore more than just city streets. Space sim games as a genre feel fragmented, where every game is missing something that other games have. To get the perfect immersive space experience you have to switch games depending on choice of activity or focus on immersive detail. Star Citizen has a lot, but no ship building. Starfield has ship building, but space flight between places barely exists. Elite Dangerous has space flight, but no interiors. X4 has limited ship interiors, but the cargo loading is handled through menu only. Star Trucker has physical cargo and loading, but you have only one truck with one interior. No Man's Sky has a lot of different ships, but planets feel infinitely interchangeable because of repetitive procgen. Some games have more than others, and some absences are even deliberate design decisions, but you're always compromising to some degree. I think with newer technology there will come a time where a game has everything I'm looking for, but I investigate nearly every space game I come into contact with. One thing I do know though is that a game with all those features is going to be janky as hell.
as a space game dev, we looked at interiors and the feasibility, but ultimately decided against it. basically it generates a tremendous amount of extra work. if the ships move while you're in them, you have to work out the physics. you have to add additional gameplay on top of the planed game to have something to do for the player once on foot. and then you have to create higher detailed interiors than the exteriors of the ships and structures because the player can now get extremely close to them. its not practical for a lot of development team sizes and experience levels.
FD are smart not wasting their time developing ship interiors. So many players bang on about wanting them, but like a child at Christmas begging for a toy they absolutely can't live without, 2 weeks later the novelty has worn off, and the thousands of hours the developer spent is wasted on something players don't even notice anymore. Same goes for the detailed cities in SC that will be totally empty a few weeks after the game launches, if it ever does.
It would be so cool having your own pad with lots of cosmetics they could charge for and maybe a little mini game or two. Hang out with buds drinking some galactic buds.
They have no argument for why they shouldn't. It takes to long to get out the ship, well just make a trapdoor and drop us from the cockpit, or launch us.
Some people just like to take offense to anything, it's what keeps them grounded, I suppose. I used to make positive videos about black women; you won't believe the crap I got for that. If you're negative, you get hit hard; if you're positive, you get hit equally (and sometimes more) hard. It's a sad state of affairs these days. Best remedy is to ignore these people.
Original Elite backer but not played since the launch of odyssey. The one feature that would bring me back is ship interiors. It's all I've wanted since the start when David Braden first talked about stowing away on other ships or hijacking them. I've tried to get excited about the new ships they added, but after so long away, a couple of new cockpit screens (which is all a new ship really is if you cant move around it) just isn't enough
It's the only thing that would bring me back, but the reality of implementing it into Elite would probably necessitate them making a whole new game with how complex it would be.
The bigger issue that is actually linked to ship interiors is the lack of competent NPC crew who are capable of navigating the ship as I walk through the interior. It all goes to a lack of immersion by the devs who don't prioritize NPC crew specifically designed to handle functions on the various ships. The idea that we would have lone explorers in spaceships is ridiculous because you need multiple specialists to assist with the functioning of the ship and be able to manually fix whatever AI can't or won't do. Ship interiors and NPC crew are a must for open world space sims/games.
Pausing to comment at the point you said to go ahead and comment. I'll edit later to give my thoughts on your thoughts. My Thoughts: I've only played Elite Dangerous for a couple of weeks now, and I've played a good bit of X4. I finished the campaign of SW Squadrons, and have played a few other SW dogfighting games. So only really two games that could qualify for ship interiors (dogfighting games utilizing single-seat fighter-craft don't really lend themselves to ship interiors). I do have an interest in Void Crew, but haven't played it. I don't miss ship interiors in Elite Dangerous. I also think it's silly to compare it to X4 as if that matters. X4 has "ship interiors". I.E. you can walk around the cockpit and maybe a couple of other rooms (on the XL ships). No where near the full interior of the ship. Sure, it would be cool to be able to walk around the cockpit in Elite Dangerous (although I haven't flown a ship yet where it would matter, I've seen videos featuring cockpits where it would be more interesting). But at the end of the day, what's the point? I can see around the cockpit with the free camera if I want, and there's nothing else to do. Are people really going to get up and pretend to use the bathroom or get a coffee from a part of the ship that doesn't exist? Unless there are actual controls that you can interact with, it's just window dressing, which I can already access with the free camera. The only benefit I can think of in Elite would be hot-swapping the pilot with a secondary multi-crew seat. Which opens up a whole can of worms about who own the ship, who has to rebuy, etc. After Watching: So, I do agree with everything that you said. I think the only difference is that while I do wish sometimes that I was a more RPG/narrative type person, I tend to a more gamey approach (outside of some soft more macro level decisions like choosing to not commit piracy or something). For Elite specifically, I think adding just a non-interactive cockpit with a door that teleports you to the SRV or the exit hatch (like how L and XL ships work in X4) wouldn't be too much to ask for the developers (since they already have all the scaffolding and the problem I mentioned above could be solved by locking out the pilot chair from all but the owner). It would make it more immersive, and would be cool. I would appreciate that immersion, but I don't miss it as much as some. It could also provide another monetization opportunity via additional cockpit customization. I think what would be too much to ask would be larger interiors for the M and L ships in Elite that had interactive stuff like a synthesis room or whatnot. I do find the idea of a ship interior like in Void Crew or Starship Simulator very interesting, but in Elite even the large ships are way smaller than the ships in those games. That sort of gameplay would make sense for fleet carriers, but probably wouldn't be financially worthwhile.
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Ship interiors is one of the main reason I went over to Star Citizen. It completely and utterly transforms the experience in too many ways to describe. Even the littlest day-to-day goings on can create the most memorable moments between friends. My buddy was messing with a fuse panel near the cockpit, and ended up fumbling said fuse because I took a sharp turn that knocked him over. Que him then scrambling to find it under the captain's seat when we were attacked by a pirate to plug it back in because we kind of needed it, lol. It even makes 'supercruise' interesting for players. We can literally go play some chess in our lounge while on long voyages.
In Elite, I always felt like a 40k dreadnought, trapped in my ship, part of the ship, but in Star Citizen I am free, an actual person, living in my ship.
hahahahaha first time seeing people using 40k dreadnought as an analogy, it's adequate indeed
Hi Chris. Still selling this 2011 game?
@@nighttrain1236 jokes on you, it's not a game "Yet", we are all professional play testers😅😂...i njoy SC in many ways, but obviously Chris won't finish it...coz selling shiny jpegs is far far more lucrative then actually finishing the "game"
In ED your just a ship with a human drone
@@nighttrain1236 SC might be continuously making shit development decisions but it still have ship interiors better than 95% of the market products.
My best star citizen moment was being pirated by a ship that knocked out my components (soft death) which killed my ship, but not me. The sense of dread of going to exterior view and seeing 2 people eva'ing from their ship to mine had my heart pumping.
My dead in the water ship interior became a zero g FPS map. I was able to shoot the two pirates dead (almost dying myself), then eva from my wrecked ship to my aggressor's ship and flew back to safety.
Ship interiors are CRUCIAL imo
this, this encapsulates it perfectly
I play X4, but the simplest story i can tell is that in whatever capital ship i was when i was going to sleep (irl) i went to the the captains quarters and save the game looking at the bed, it started as rp and ended up like a tradition.
My number one wish for SC is still a single-player button like ED has. I want the exploration of dangerous and uncharted space, but I don't want to deal with other gamers ruining the immersion. The game should be big enough for both types of players. I'm not sure Star Citizen can afford to shut off a (big?) portion of the player base. PvP-centric games like Warhammer Online and Age of Conan have just quickly died. There just isn't a big market for it and I want Star Citizen to do well for the PvP and the PvE crowd.
As it is now I have backed to a Concierge level for SQ42 alone. It remains to be seen how the PU turns out. The times I have played have been a remarkable tech demo, but not much more. There is still too much missing, and the game is not even in alpha (the definition of which is feature- but not content complete) no matter what CIG says. Any wet dream in a game dev's eye is apparently an alpha these days just to get into the early access money.
I think the reason FDev doesn't think interiors would add any gameplay value is because that's all FDev knows how to do.
We see this with station interiors. Instead of a whole new environment to explore and do missions in, it's just a glorified and more tedious menu. They'd likely do the same with ships.
I think they want them (or don't really care). Real reason is because the game was actually never developped with interior in mind. In a really surprising way (as they kept talking about it, even making some work on the anaconda interior). In essence, when you fly the ship, you are the ship. The avatar inside the cockpit is just for show (like the thrusters or whatever), it's not the part you play. When you exit, you become the dude outside. For obvious reason, you can't be both at the same time. You can solve that, but it's a lot of work, and we all know how Frontier feels about work.
The excuses they came up with are utterly shallow and they don't believe them one seconds. But it was better to say "it's actually not fun" than to say "it was a lot of work".
@@erei2420 oh for sure it's a lot of work, they'd have to rework how ships function from the very basics. Entities within entities can get weird if a game isn't built with it in mind, or even a specific implementation of it.
I think it's both. It's a lot of work, and they don't think it's worth the work because they don't have any ideas for what to do with it without blowing the scope up even further.
Station interiors were still cool despite being limited, though. A lot of people want the thing badly enough that FDev could indeed get away with mediocre ship interiors.
@@moon9light odyssey didn't sell well because there was little function to the interiors, as well as not being much of interest done with space legs as a whole
@@existentialselkath1264 I also believe that they have developed themselves into a dead end and the game engine can't really handle ship interiors. I mean, the whole proportions and dimensions in the game are completely off kilter. Have you ever looked at a ship in ED from the outside? For example, the Eagle has roughly the proportions you would expect from a fighter craft and it's dimensions fit it's look. But when you zoom into the cockpit, you see your little player figurine sitting in some kind of cathedral-sized glass bubble, because apparently that's the only way they could get the ego--perspective for flying the ship to work. So getting up and out of the pilot seat is not possible, because I don't see how those two discrepancies in perspective can be solved without breaking one or the other. As you said, they'd probably have to rework the whole graphics engine from scratch.
100%, I just want immersion. People can complain and say "we dont want them" but the best thing about ship interiors is most games it's OPTIONAL!
Couldn´t be more true.
A spaceship interior, especially one you can interact with or even customize, makes a ship feel like home.
It´s why I love Space Engineers and Star Citizen.
I hope more game developers would look more into ship interiors, there's so many gameplay loops that could be done with interiors.
Excellent video as usual! Hope you're doing great
That would be cool. Although unless you build the gameplay loop(s) in, it becomes very difficult to add any after the fact, relegating the interior to window dressing and immersion.
Developers like to slack off with code that can literally kill people so I won't count on developers bothering with doing ship interiors in games.
No more Elite until ship interiors. I don't care what the white knights say, it adds a deeper level of immersion, especially walking around on moving ships (talking to you Empyrion Galactic Survival!)
Totally. I would have enough in elite if i was able to walk from the station to the hangar of my ship, open the airlock and walk trough the interior to reach the seat of my ship. I dont really need other stuff like repair or engineering like star citizen. Like x4 is more than enough. Jumship is my ideal
@@wengaiden I love the simple design of X4. It's OK if some of the bigger ships have extra rooms, but I don't need much more than the ramp/door, a corridor/ entry way/airlock and the cockpit
@@wengaiden I am sure Frontier could easily accomplish that with the existing ship models
I think many people play space games because of immersion. Ship interiors add a lot to the immersion factor, imo. I've been enjoying Elite for years without them, but I'd enjoy it even more with them.
Exactly, I don't need any real gameplay I just want to feel like I'm actually on my ship
Ship interiors, station interiors, and planetray exploration is essential for exploration.
X4 is still great even without the planetary exploration....
But would be better if also had this feature...
@@efxnews4776 man if we could just have weapons and actually go along with the marines during boarding in X4, it would make the best game ever even better. The Best best game ever! I love X4
It's not divisive at all, except for devs and publishers. Almost all players want ship interiors.
I used to ask for sip interiors all the time, and was always told there's no value in it.
I swear most people are so short-sighted!
@fredashay and when you have walked around the ship and done nothing, what other nothingness can you do?
@@judz567 You can ponder on the nothingness of existence in your own private quarters, aka your empire of nothingness. 😉
Players just there for performance builds/PVP don't care about interiors, those players are willing to spend a lot of money for another 0.1% improvement to their build, so their voice is very loud.
So do developers. The problem is it just makes everything 10x more difficult in a space sim. On the art side, the gameplay side, performance side, tech side. Remember how long it took to develop and then mature the whole physics grid thing in general. And they had more money coming in than any of these other space games.
Every single ship becomes a huge headache to develop to a high quality standard. Eg: for Elite, it will be very difficult to get all these seamless features working while maintaining the same level of quality.
That's the problem with people asking E:D devs for ship interiors. It's a pretty big endeavor to bolt something like that on to an existing game. It may not be the most reasonable request.
The only space games I play are ones with ship interiors
Exactly lol
This is something I always hated in NMS.
Elite dangerous entered the chat☻️👁👄👁😂
Freespace 2 is good but there's no cockpit lol
In Star Citizen, it is important to note that ship interiors physically and simultaneously exist in the same game space as the rest of the star system, hence a "seamless" transition between interior/exterior. This is unlike games such as Starfield, where entering your ship unloads the "planet surface" zone and then loads your "ship interior" zone - two distinct instances.
The former is not an easy task. In a recent interview with one of the Star Citizen ship designers, he noted the difficulty in designing ship interior spaces that must physically fit within the boundaries of a ship's hull, sometimes requiring tweaks or full redesigns to the interior and/or exterior models. The end result pays off, though, as the interior/exterior transitions really make you feel like your avatar is in fact boarding a ship, walking around inside, manning gunner stations, moving cargo, putting out fires, etc. - all while someone else is flying the ship in space or in atmosphere.
It used to be that spaceships didn't have interiors in games because it was just way too much work to model them in 3D. So the player was the ship.
Now, it's becoming common: Starfield, The Expanse, Star Citizen, Starship Simulator, Star Trucker.
No Man's Sky had station interiors since the beginning, but they were tiny -- just one or two small rooms.
Elite Dangerous has started to model station interiors, but they have a long way to go to model interiors of all their ships.
You're still the ship in ED. Or so I understood.Meaning you're either Odyssey dude or the ship, can't be both.
As a Warframe player, where ship combat isn't a major focus but still having TWO ship interiors to decorate or customize or fight in (one as a hub and one as a fully pilotable multicrew space craft to fight other ships in)...it's pretty great. Hopefully more space focused games get that feature.
I've always felt that ship interiors, even if crude and simple, really add to the immersion of space games. They are by no means required, but I can totally understand why something like the lack of interiors can stunt the experience for some. They should never be required for a space game, but they are always always always a welcome addition because interiors just add sooo much to space games overall.
My problem is I recall seeing an interview/dev say that all ships were made with interiors in mind only to have the devs say that they were not even thinking about it.
One of the Frontier Devs said about the upcoming mystery features:
"I always thought this feature never really brings much to the table but once I've seen it for myself I was amazed by the potential for new gameplay it brings to the table."
Of course that can be applied to other features than Ship Interiors.
But I just hold out hope that it was about SIs because I can think of a dozen or more gameplay features that would tie into ship interiors. Nine if you wake me up from REM sleep.
I didn't realize the importance of ships (and stations) interior importance until X4. I thought it was a "1 time" experience that was a waste of resources. But standing on a carrier deck, seeing dozens of fighters taking off at once (each of them you can fly), for a total of 200fighters launched (yes, it's that massive), or being on the top deck, watching massive turrets opening fire in a big space battle is truly something else.
But instead of ship interiors we got a crappy team deathmatch mode made by a team with no experience in shooters, on an engine not made to make shooters. Because, obviously, that's what people expected and what your team can do best.
In X4 you went to zero to hero.
In the Tides of Avarice dlc you can literally start the game locked in a cell.
Another point is that even if its not much you can do in the ship interiors, just the immersion factor is a game changer.
Imagine homeworld from deck view. Or EVE. Or starpoint gemini
Here's another example I'm surprised you didn't mention: Boarding. As much as Starfield is "meh" overall, I really enjoyed the combat when boarding other ships. Especially the zero-g combat felt pretty good to me. And even the random events, derelict ships. It adds a whole other layer to spaceships, and I've often tried to disable ships and board them rather than straight out destroy them. Often games that allow this sort of gameplay reward disabling enemy ships instead of destroying them with the ability to claim them as your own, basically making it a whole gameplay loop of it's own.
So you like starfield. And i am agree
space is Huge and empty. Its Crowded and Lonely at the same Time. Having an interior space make me feel grounded and have control over my "own" Space.
and for god sake, like 90% of media regarding space. series of film is happening inside the ship, it still amaze me that developer forgot the biggest aspect of space game.
So elite is your like/dislike game?
If Elite got ship interiors, despite the game's seemingly dying state, I would actually finally reverse my refund on Odyssey and get it again.
No ship interiors is the only reason I haven’t gotten elite odyssey
Just wait until you find what the gameplay is all about and how its a mindless grind of doing a thing over and over. I tried sc after many hours of elite and i cant go back it looks sooo dated and sooo less immersive
The worst part about Odyssey isn't even that the grind wasn't changed. It's that it literally still feels like you never leave the pilots seat. It's got that same old "fade to black to teleport into a different machine," just like the scarab. Being able to walk around on my feet literally changed nothing for me, because it still feels like I never left the pilots seat, the bipedal android feels just like that a bipedal android.
Really strange reason.. it’s like I won’t buy a car because it does not have an seat heater
@@MrRoblcopter SRVs are different. There's a fade to black, but then you experience the SRV drop. That simple thing makes a huge difference to immersion. Because it gives the "Armstrong moment". Odyssey just teleports to and from the surface. What they should have done (while not being ready to do full interiors) is teleport you to the airlock (which would be much like the elevators in stations, so not much work), and have the door open. By making people just go up and down the stairs and use an airlock it would have felt much more immersive. Yeah, you black out for the bits where you run through the ship... but you'd get your "Armstrong moment". And it'd feel more like the interiors would come some day.
@@svendtang5432 after having seat heaters in my car i wouldnt buy a car without them yes.
Yep, space interiors are so immersive!
I can not imagine elite without walking around space stations, fleet carrier and so on.
Hope we will have more gameplay around this. The mentioned ship interiors, maybe more space bases etc and maybe dive even further into squadron space bases
I know Mass Effect: Andromeda is not a space sim, but i really love the Tempest and it's crew. That ship really made me feel like a home in space
Did you play the og trilogy?
Story wise Mass Effect is the Star Wars of videogames, but the first three games are like OG trilogy, while Andromeda is like the Force Awakens from Disney.
T_T are you not older enough to play in the normandy?
The biggest challenge when adding an interior to your game is spacing. So I can somewhat understand why developers leave it out. It can end up in a design nightmare. However, having interiors, especially customizable ones, feels really awesome. It is certainly one of the main reasons why I played Space Engineers for hundreds of hours and still to this day to improve my ships interior with new blocks.
Fdev instances literally everything. They could do something similar at every section of the ship with animations like starfield. Cheating with space isn't hard
I prefer Starship Evo in this regard, in Sevo you can go bonkers with details.
Wich lead me to think, that it's just laziness that is stoping devs to make highly detailed ships.
@@efxnews4776i cant deal with 3d cartoon style
the game that made me realize how immersive it is to be able to walk around your ship was, of all things, Subnautica.
the cyclops is by far my favorite vehicle in any game, not only for that you actually need to learn how to maneuver it as if itself were it's own entity rather than an input extension from the player, but also for how the simple ability to make it your own in a sense that's unlike any other game I've seen. you can build pretty much everything you need to survive and make it act as a mobile base, being (mostly) limited to space, but you also can decorate it with posters and plushies, or other collectibles you acquired through your explorations. I think the closest experience to it would be your home in games like Animal Crossing or Stardew Valley, for just how personal and intimate the space you inhabit gets to feel like, but it's also a vehicle! and one you can even lose lol I've seen people cry over losing a Cyclops
Cool, but you don't actually craft the submarine in Subnautica, you gather resources to spawn it, right?
If you trully want to fell how is to build your own space ship then you should play games like Empyreon, Starship Evo, Space Engeneers.
I've recently discovered a game on Steam called Objects in Space that makes a very strong case for ship interior. It was so compelling, it reminded me of the wonder I felt when I first fired up Elite Dangerous.
Shame that this game is abandoned, the owner should try to sell it to some other studio.
In ED, it would be fun to have some kinds of salvage missions inside stranded ships (hauler, anacondas, etc) or most any of the current onfoot missions adapted to zero g and ships. It could be a way to test the ship interiors engine (varied -randomized?- selection of ship modules) before making it available to ship players. Also having a lab in which you could perform "researches" on exo plant samples or minerals, would make exploration more believable and immersive. We could grow baby cactoidas or fungoidas. 😅
Do we really need interiors in space games? No, but if we can have them, it’s better, because the more details, the greater the immersion. It's also a matter of the genre’s evolution and how much time a space exploration game can offer us. That being said, ever since I played Star Citizen and enjoyed the interiors, the experience is never the same when playing games that don't have them, because it feels like something is missing. If we add the possibility of interacting with those interiors, making upgrades, repairs, etc., the enjoyment is much greater. However, this is conditioned by what you, as a player, expect from the simulation. If all you want is the simulation of being at the ship's controls, then interiors aren't necessary. But if what you want is to experience being a crew member inside a spaceship, interiors become essential.
What you think about the success of x4 vs x3? Yeah there is x rebirth before but meh
I don’t think Elite NEEDS ship interiors but no doubt it would be sweet.
This is probably the main reason I play, I love the idea of doing a mission, flying somewhere. Parking up, going to the kitchen, crafting a meal, making a coffee, putting music on... chilling for a few mins. Then clean up, go back to fly to the next place. Means when I upgrade a ship I get new features, more space to fit out with clothes etc. When!!!
One of my all-time favorite gaming experiences was when I first acquired a ship with a navigable interior in Star Wars Galaxies. I spent so long decorating it and was able to invite friends aboard to experience it together. I can’t believe so many “space sim” games have completely overlooked it as a draw, especially for multiplayer games.
i remember playing rodina as a kid, the fact i could leave the seat and move around made the ship felt magical, losing that loses a lot
I remember tomorrow war. I was coming from O.R.B., so be able to walk, first person cockpit view and even land on planet BLOWS MY MIND
It’s likely spaceship interiors are a very big tech challenge for elite, otherwise they would have done it already. Which in turn makes it super unlikely to happen now, sadly. Tbh. I’m just happy they’re changing things for the better, even if it comes with pay to win.
One of the major attractions that got me into Star Citizen, was the ship interiors, amongst other things.
I just wish a developer would create an actual space simulator, but with the explorations, battles, etc of a really fun game. Hellion was so close to that.
It's a tricky one this. Having enjoyed ship interiors in the likes of Space Engineers, Empyrion and even the Cyclops submarine in Subnautica, it really does give a sense of place and attachment to the craft. It also gives a great sense of scale to the world- if you can walk around a ship, then dock on a space station or fly past a larger vessel, then it shows you just how vast the galaxy etc is. Though if there are no real gameplay advantages to wandering around your ship, I can see why a developer might not want to invest in that aspect of the game. I also wonder how much fiddling around inside your ship can take over from the overall adventure- but that's really a gameplay choice by the player. So- I'm for ship interiors as a gamer, but can see why not everyone will provide them.
Had a friend kill us all by grabbing a drink from the fridge, (it's a long story) that could never happen in Elite. It's why we play a lot of other games, Elite feels like its missing out on the "full" experience.
Spaceship interiors are the one thing that can bring me back full time to Elite Dangerous. I am currently much more invested in Star Citizen because its Multiplayer is Stable and the Ships don't just feel like a Suit you hop in. That said, i absolutely doubt that we will ever get them in Elite. We will likely just get some prebuilt Buildings we can place side by side which look almost the same. Oh and ofc they will be locked behind a 3 month Cashwall.
One of the things I love about ED is that it just works well. One thing I hate about SC is that it is often broken.
One thing I love about SC are ship interiors. One thing I hate about ED is the lack of ship interiors.
I love deep space exploration. I love the preparations and then the feeling that I am able to survive out there, while exploring. I am self sustainable unit. Adding a space interiors would add another layer to this. I would not mind to have elements like food, sleep etc. I'd require specifically equipped ship to be able to survive for a long time in the black. I'd love to grab a cup of coffee in game, sit on a couch, watching the stars.
You should try Empyreon if your thing is survival in space, Empyrion is kind of a mix between Space Engeneers and No Man's Sky...
I LOVE space games where ships have actual interiors. The exterior of the ship has been designed to look cool while actually being packaged to have a working interior to explore and feel at one with, it feels more complete and immersive. To me, it justifies why a ship is the way it looks from the exterior, being able to look out the window and see the ships wings or hull details backdropped by the environment you are currently in. Actual working features like storage, engineering and a cockpit also add to this sense of immersion. The immersion which I personally for in my scifi games. When I first started playing X-Wing vs TIE Fighter as a kid, just seeing the cockpit was a big difference from flying your ship only from a 3rd person view... now we have games with properly thought through, interactable interiors just adds to that magic👍
Must be tough to deal with.
*requests RSI Polaris and watches it rise from the hangar elevator in all of its glory.*
I love ship interiors and would absolutely love to move around and even customize the inside. It adds so much more than people realize.
Space interiors just make the experience better, absolutely agree. Perspective and experience in space sims is everything imo, getting that perspective change helps you feel more like you’re there in that world just a little more
Ship interiors should be baked into the design. Even Starfield has interiors.
What could ship interiors bring if the implementation allowed it?
Customization like a base, people love that. The ability to operate vendors on the ship while it's traveling, so if you're moving players around they could use your shops on your large merchant or cruise/touring vessel. Boarding parties, active repair, defending the ship, giving large ships the ability to be crewed more effectively. Large enough ships could have NPCs, and even mission related NPCs board them if the ship fit the right class, like if it was a luxury cruise vessel, then players might want to interact with that NPC, maybe they're wanted, I mean missions for other players being carried out on your ship would be pretty cool tbh.
Imagination is the limit as to what the content could be, the only real limitation is implementation.
Haven't watched the video yet, but here are my thoughts... I'd love to see more realistic interiors of spaceships, especially those designed for longer journeys. No one would want to live in a cold, metal cave. There should be features like artificial sunlight, plants, plush beds and plenty of wooden furniture-maybe even some carpeting. If we look at how much we've improved the comfort of our homes over the past 60-70 years, the inside of spaceships should be even more comfortable and welcoming. Of course, this wouldn’t apply to fighter ships or short trips under 8 hours.
"...exceptional, high-quality and second to none..."
For what they charge for them, they damn well better be.
Interiors are indeed important but should be prioritized at the expense of other things.
I thought so today too, before I watched your video. I agree 100%!
I imagine you'll find samples and rare objects that you can use to beautify your spaceship or equip it with useful tools.
And the next step is to found your own settlements. There are endless possibilities that are not being used by Frontier Development.
100% agree!
Honestly that's why the space game I've been playing most lately is space engineers. If they won't give me an interior I'll MAKE one lmao
Mah immersion
Ship interiors are a place my friends and I can gather, away from the dangers of outside. Sure we can do it "as the ship" like in Elite, but thats just like RP'ing as a Cars character.
My greatest memory was in Star Wars Galaxies and throwing parties and get togethers on my VT-49 Decimator, a POB ship (multi-passenger ships), planning raids or literally just logging in to chill out with friends.
Btw I would like to mention that I'm a huge fan of these retro-futuristic interiors in Elite. Looks awesome. And sound engineer is a legend
As many issues as Starfield has, they absolutely nailed it with ship interiors. Functional, immersive, and providing a great gameplay loop when boarding enemy vessels. Clearing out a C class ship in Starfield can take several minutes, and it's full of enemies. Great fun.
The strongest argument I've seen against ship interiors is that having to leave pilot seat > walk down corridor > open door > walk down elevator > open hatch, then do all that again in reverse to return to your pilot seat, every single time, dozens of times per play session, dozens of play sessions, can get too repetitive and boring. I'm not of that oppinion, I enjoy it and I think it adds to the atmosphere and immersion, but I can see where they're coming from with that argument.
Their argument is bs...
I have 5k hours playing X4, one of the things you can do once you are docked in a station far from your ship, is literally teleport yourself to the ship.
I rarely used this function in my 5k hours, even if theres an in game explanation for teleport in X4.
You simply get used to it, in fact you even get attached to this feature.
Why this? Because the ship becomes more than a machine, it become the player home.
@@matheuskalil5680 I purposely made my walk in my Empyrion ship through a long series of corridors and elevators in my 300m long vessel. Including the part where I load and unload my Hover Vessel from the aft ramp of the vessel. I love overkill, and being able to lovingly design every nook and cranny, while tailoring a capital vessel to your liking is the best part of Empyrion and Space Engineers
Totally agree with everything you said. Would love to see Elite Dangrous with ship interiors including direct system interaction and repair, display items picked up from exploration, customize the interior and ability to hire and interact with 3D NPC crew that would enhance ship capibilities and possibly lead to related missions. Also finding creepy abandoned wrecks that can be explored and striped would be amazing. Not to mention boarding and fighting in disabled enemy ships. The list of possibilities is endless.
I've played a lot of No Man's Sky, and personally a traversable interior for the basic ships feels like it would add a lot to the experience, and seeing that clip of Star Trucker made it seem so much more feasible. A cozy little interior that you could decorate sparingly and maybe do things like material refining after you've set a course. Maybe you could even hack about in the systems, divert life-support to shields for a battle, etc. Rather than a mobile base, since NMS does have those with Freighters, it'd be more like a mobile workstation.
Being able to get out of your pilot seat and take a walk around your ship makes you feel like you are a traveller within a vast universe. It connects you more to your ship as you begin to understand its scale, its character and the quirks of its space and design.
Alas, despite its beautiful and enchanting sentiment you can see why developers often leave this feature behind - The feature has so many implications of further gameplay mechanics that could just extend the scope of the game infinitely. It seems to me if you add ship interiors, or walking around you open yourself to a lot of criticism and in trying to balance reasonable scope you risk making the feature boring - sort of like what happened with X-Rebirth and the criticisms that drew.
Leave ship interiors out and you've always got the "It's not that type of game, though!" crowd at your back and for bonus points don't explicitly mention that you never plan to add it and you've also got the people (like myself) who will be silently tossing my coins into the wishing well and praying it might one day come. (Like I did with Elite for years)
After a stressful day of bounty hunting it would be great to just turn around in your seat and head for the galley. Ya grab a cold one, kick your feet up on the galley table, and after my 8 years of playing, I finally get my cold beer in my own galley.
Having ship interiors is like bringing icing to the already baked cake
You dont need icing to enjoy the cake but having it makes it so much nicer.
After playing SC, its clear that what they are trying to achieve is something like an all encompassing experience with the game loops we all know and love.
To people who appreciate immersion, this makes all the difference.
I can see why casuals dont care about ship interiors much but then again casuals ruin everything.
Star Trucker made the interior a core part of the gameplay loop and it really elevates the game.
That is a good point, walking around your ship in Star Trucker adds a ton to that game. It would feel totally different it that was absent.
Now with our own hangars - how about letting us decorate it as we please? How about we can have a multiple IM channel in that home hangar where we can invite friends over and talk to them - plan missions - strategize - of just hang out? How about giving us more time to make a smooth landing at a spacestation or port? How about better approach lights? How about both hangars and ships with so many components get finished - e.g., Constellation class ships still do not have a simple working table to sit at? How about fixing the Reclaimer's forward elevator? Back to Interiors - how about more personalized items - such as an uploadable graphic that could be displayed as a poster? And how about more Cargo tools such as rolling platforms that carry freight - often depicted in CIG promo's? And how about hangar chambers (or beds) that allow players to log out without loss of missions partially completed? ;-)
Im glad im not the only one whos been needing this kind of experience for my space games
Ship interiors and the sandbox gameplay were originally what got me interested in Star Citizen. Been playing ever since.
Ship interiors are basically the only thing SC does well at this point (when you don't fall through the floor of your ship during quantum travel). Other games get the goods with regard to all other functionality. I see this as a double-edged sword, honestly.
All other games are finished and stopped at step 3..... SC has its eyes on step 10 though. And unlike other games that block you from seeing step 1 & 2, SC has been in the open since the beginning. Thus, the criticism. But when they reach step 10... Watch all of the clowns and asshats who shat on SC come rolling out in droves with SC tramp stamps labeled 'I've been here from the beginning' lol.... Riiiight...Gamers can't handlenthe truth, and it shows..
The main reason I left ED behind was their complete disregard for VR players in Oddity. VR was the only thing that made me accept the dated graphics and game bugs being around for almost a decade. Once I got into my first ship with an interior in SC, I was utterly sold. The very act of just walking into and through your ship *never* gets old... Arthur.
Lol. Elite Dangerous completely backed out of their old promise for ship interiors and gave us crap instead. Ody- crap.
I still remember when they said the ships were designed with interiors in mind
Developers dont make promises, there's no legal obligation to do so, projections, expectations and planned content and features yes, but never promises.
And atmo planets etc
"Built for VR !" , remember ...^^
I always appreciate space games that feature ship interiors; however, I concede that its not a strict requirement. For certain types of space games it certainaly adds to the experience, yet for others its just a 'bonus' and doesn't really affect anything. So, I think it depends on the sub-genre the game is a part of. Games that are focused on immersion (Starcitizen, Elite, SpaceBourne, etc.) should feature interiors for all the reasons you mention in this video. Games that are more focused on the action or story (Everspace, etc.) probably less so.
Interiors def connect you to the world and your ship because it feels like you actual HOME. If you’re in the black in elite having a ship interior gives me the feel that I’m at my home. I took my fleet carrier into the black for having that “home base” experience. I jumped my carrier ahead of my regular ship and then I’d fly my ship to the destination manually. Could I fly directly there without stopping from the bubble to colonia yea sure I could, but I don’t just jump jump jump, I stop, I explore the system, especially if it’s a system that is unexplored. I’ll go get those exploration points. Having the ability to get out of my ship and walk around on a planet was a really nice feature in my opinion and helped make the galaxy much larger than it was. Even star citizen does that right cuz I can go fully nomad and land my ship somewhere in the middle of no where and know that I’d be perfectly safe. The ability to repair and move modules in SC now makes it feel even more immersive. Elite loses that and it’s one of the reasons I haven’t been back at all during the entire of the thargoid war. None of it appealed to me. Starfield had that part good as well since you could customize it partially. I could modify the ship to be functionally logical as well… (or not).
I am not the ship. I’ve never been a ship. I didn’t like it in Eve online either. I always felt that game was missing the station experience and people said it didn’t need it, but I think it really could expand on the game and I hope they eventually do move forward with it. A space game needs to be about the human and their ship, not just the ship. But that’s my 2 cents.
Indeed! You just DID provoke a STRONG response:
And that response be my honest thanks and my promise to stay subscribed for a LONG time!
As an Elite player, I personally don't care one bit about interiors, I don't much see the point in it. If they were to introduce boarding actions and such I'd change my mind ofcourse, but unless there is some real gameplay point of it I would rather not have an extra transport distance to move through to get to and from the cockpit.
I wouldn't complain if they were to add it though, it'd be nice for the players that care about it to get it.
Thanks for the vid ObsidianAnt :)
Yeah, I don't trust FDev to come up with reasons to interact with interiors. Especially if they're not a core part of the game for every version and thus wouldn't be able to alter how the game already functions.
Thats not to say interiors couldn't have gameplay:
- Fires and repairing damage.
- diffuse unexploded ordnance lodged in the hull
- take care of special cargo like animals that need feeding, or creatures/smuggled drones that could get loose (possible combat encounters)
- flesh out crewmates, have them linger around the ship and you can talk to them, receive missions, etc.
- have bounties that must be taken alive, requiring boarding
- maintain and access the rover in a garage kinda area
- once there's enough things to validate it's existance, allow players to customise and decorate with items discovered on their travels, have holograms of photos taken, etc.
For me, if the game is in first person at all, it should have ship interiors. Even minimal interiors like what X4: Foundations has. It makes the ship feel more real to me and gives you a sense of the scale of the ship. It's why I got into Star Citizen with a friend of mine and it was the same reason for him. No matter how many times I walk through the ship to the cockpit, I enjoy it every time.
There’s a reason I have 500 hours in Starfield and only 200 in Elite. Elite is objectively a better space flight experience, but my heavily modified Shieldbreaker is home in a way I wish my Clipper could be
Agreed 100%. Ship exploration, customization and some interactivity would be wonderful. On the other hand I don't think is a good idea to keep adding time-consuming boring chores to pilots with more overcomplicated maintenance, constant fixes and menial tasks.
Sadly, every time I mention ship interiors to the Elite Dangerous community they come with pitchforks - although they seem to react the same way with ANY changes.
100% agree with everything you said in the Video Ant. I think the biggest problem for Elite is.. it was PROMISED by Dave Braben in the Kickstarter. It was what we all wanted when get got Elite on our spectrums and BBC's but knew deep down that wasn't possible, they even started developing interiors (I believe Anaconda still has an inaccessible interior) and then.. they just gave up because I guess they found out it was going to be hard.
SC on the other hand started with ships and interiors (remember we had a hanger but couldn't fly the ship), then they built the game engine around that. I seem to remember a long time back they had to virtually rewrite the entire game engine because they hadn't factored in Quantum Travel whilst walking about the ship.
I mean even Flightsim 2024 looks is going to allow you to get OUT the seat into the world IE flightsim is going to be an FPS :) Id be willing to bet plane interiors will be a thing.
If you get a game that you know you are rooted to the cockpit (Star wars or something) you don't expect to get out the seat because its a single seat ship and that's fair enough because you know what your getting, but if you promise big ships and interiors and don't deliver that causes annoyance.
I wonder how people would react if Elite added ship interiors but it turned out to be just hall ways and passages you could walk through and look at the "pictures" on the walls? Maybe you can see some crew models standing in rooms you can't enter, or you can but you can't interact.
Basically, if you have used the camera to pan around your cockpit and really looked at the jpgs and gifs that make up the screens, coffee pots, etc, imagine that but for the whole ship. There's a bed..but you can't go to sleep in it, etc.
Frontier Dev always neglected interiors because they had no idea what to do with them. That's why they reacted with "it would be boring to run through the same interior over and over again", they were not able to imagine any interesting gameplay... as with so many other parts of Elite Dangerous.
Have you played PARKAN? A 1997 game that already had the ability to fly a spaceship, seamlessly walk around in first-person, board other ships, and land on planetary bases that you could capture and build with your drones.
Something Yamiks and others have raved about for years.
Personally I'd LOVE to have such a thing to Elite... give me something more to get attached to on my ships. Let me see all the wires Delacy left that I need to fix, or all the leather everything on my Gutamaya ships that I can't see without breaking my neck...
Heck it'd be a neat mechanic to be able to repair interior modules while traversing the ship, being able to walk to each hardpoint or module and repair damage to it.
*clears throat* EMERRRRRRRRRSIOOOOOOOOOOOOOON
Elite should add an offline and co-op mode in wich you can have access to ship interiors without worrying not being on the helm when you get attacked, because THAT'S the reason why frontier hasn't added the feature yet....
Ship interiors is truly part of next gen gaming. I don't want to just play 1990s style scifi space games with pretty modern graphics into my elderly age.
It just baffles me they still did not fix this already. It seems so obvious! Just read through the comments here...! I am a 1985 Elite starter (when we "simulated" ship interiors in my childhood bedroom, behind my C64😂) and ship interiors were a major dream when backing the ED Kickstarter. IMMERSION!! ... the persistent lack of them was also one of the reasons for finally leaving ED in 2020. I am now just coming back ... and still no ship interiors?? 😢
The easiest way to implement ship interiors is to render a separate space from the game world and use camera objects to render exterior visuals for the cockpit and other windows. A lot of ship games do this like pulsar, warframe's railjack missions, X4's large ships, marauders, angels fall first, etc. I think maybe starfield(?) too
It's extremely difficult to constantly render a detailed interactable structure like an interior constantly moving, ESPECIALLY if you have AI involved. Even just a moving platform can be a monumental challenge for AI. You have to consider how CPU/GPU calculate efficient pathfinding on a stationary object but then imagine having to accurately and timely update that for every time the object changes position in an XYZ space.
Elite Dangerous does not have the infrastructure in the game engine to do this and likely does not have the resources to implement some version that could work, even the easy method. That would probably involve an effort on the scale of odyssey's dev, with full reworks on every ship, as the cockpits are all rendered within the gamespace as part of the ship.
I recently in love with X4 Foundations and picked up Elite Dangerous to get some more food for me space sim fix. I have to say I really miss the interiors and the immersion they bring. Hope they come someday.
being only a player of elite and loving it, of course adding interiors would be an awesome addition and i don't think any people are really against it, it would be cool to feel that this is a true ship and not just a cockpit while flying, exploring the inside gut mecanics and techs maybe with floors, bays, and command boards, but that said in term of pure gameplay, for elite at least, i genuinely don't see a real plus to it aside cool visuals. i don't play elite to be annoyed by the obliged gestion of modules potentialy randomly shuting down etc and is not attracted by the "being a human" side having to survive and walk kms to do a thing. i love elite mainly for its universe, its great and dark story/lore, its designs, its cool references to other SF stuff i like, and the very unique concept of the game direction like all the mysteries hidden and investigations left by the devs to uncover them, leaving players who wants to explore, investigate (the most about the thargoid, their intentions and the guardians, with small "puzzles" to resolve to collect informations) and understand things around by themself, thinking about their actions, taking side, of faction or simply money, etc and of course the beauty of its astronomicaly accurate galaxy and the feeling of complete freedom of flying from stars to stars, doing what we want in all relative "simplicity" (but keeping a complexity in its possibilities and gameplay mecanics), and the sensation of real vastness of the void. so it would be nice sure but i think elite doesn't obligatory need it because offers a very different direction for me, more focus on space itself and its beauty in which i immerse myself and less on just being someone in space, more on the adventure than the survival
It would benefit Frontier. They could sell collectables in the market, ship decor items, etc. Its a no brainer.
If Elite Dangerous adds ship interiors , I will definitely back play it everyday .
I never heard anyone complaining about ship interior in a game that has them, but i seen a lot of people complaning about games who don't have ship interiors.
I think of ship interiors in space sim as analogous to being able to enter and explore many buildings in an open world game. It might not be necessary to make the game work, but it adds a level of immersion that cannot be overstated. And similarly, in the future I expect it'll become something similar where it's commonplace and we even take it for granted.
I still remember playing Driver 2 and GTA 3 and wondering how long it was going to be before games would let us explore more than just city streets.
Space sim games as a genre feel fragmented, where every game is missing something that other games have. To get the perfect immersive space experience you have to switch games depending on choice of activity or focus on immersive detail. Star Citizen has a lot, but no ship building. Starfield has ship building, but space flight between places barely exists. Elite Dangerous has space flight, but no interiors. X4 has limited ship interiors, but the cargo loading is handled through menu only. Star Trucker has physical cargo and loading, but you have only one truck with one interior. No Man's Sky has a lot of different ships, but planets feel infinitely interchangeable because of repetitive procgen. Some games have more than others, and some absences are even deliberate design decisions, but you're always compromising to some degree.
I think with newer technology there will come a time where a game has everything I'm looking for, but I investigate nearly every space game I come into contact with. One thing I do know though is that a game with all those features is going to be janky as hell.
as a space game dev, we looked at interiors and the feasibility, but ultimately decided against it. basically it generates a tremendous amount of extra work. if the ships move while you're in them, you have to work out the physics. you have to add additional gameplay on top of the planed game to have something to do for the player once on foot. and then you have to create higher detailed interiors than the exteriors of the ships and structures because the player can now get extremely close to them. its not practical for a lot of development team sizes and experience levels.
FD are smart not wasting their time developing ship interiors. So many players bang on about wanting them, but like a child at Christmas begging for a toy they absolutely can't live without, 2 weeks later the novelty has worn off, and the thousands of hours the developer spent is wasted on something players don't even notice anymore. Same goes for the detailed cities in SC that will be totally empty a few weeks after the game launches, if it ever does.
It would be so cool having your own pad with lots of cosmetics they could charge for and maybe a little mini game or two. Hang out with buds drinking some galactic buds.
They have no argument for why they shouldn't. It takes to long to get out the ship, well just make a trapdoor and drop us from the cockpit, or launch us.
Some people just like to take offense to anything, it's what keeps them grounded, I suppose. I used to make positive videos about black women; you won't believe the crap I got for that. If you're negative, you get hit hard; if you're positive, you get hit equally (and sometimes more) hard. It's a sad state of affairs these days. Best remedy is to ignore these people.
Original Elite backer but not played since the launch of odyssey. The one feature that would bring me back is ship interiors. It's all I've wanted since the start when David Braden first talked about stowing away on other ships or hijacking them. I've tried to get excited about the new ships they added, but after so long away, a couple of new cockpit screens (which is all a new ship really is if you cant move around it) just isn't enough
Without intiriors, you aren't playing a spaceman in a ship, you are plating as a spaceship
It's the only thing that would bring me back, but the reality of implementing it into Elite would probably necessitate them making a whole new game with how complex it would be.
The bigger issue that is actually linked to ship interiors is the lack of competent NPC crew who are capable of navigating the ship as I walk through the interior. It all goes to a lack of immersion by the devs who don't prioritize NPC crew specifically designed to handle functions on the various ships. The idea that we would have lone explorers in spaceships is ridiculous because you need multiple specialists to assist with the functioning of the ship and be able to manually fix whatever AI can't or won't do. Ship interiors and NPC crew are a must for open world space sims/games.
Pausing to comment at the point you said to go ahead and comment. I'll edit later to give my thoughts on your thoughts.
My Thoughts:
I've only played Elite Dangerous for a couple of weeks now, and I've played a good bit of X4. I finished the campaign of SW Squadrons, and have played a few other SW dogfighting games. So only really two games that could qualify for ship interiors (dogfighting games utilizing single-seat fighter-craft don't really lend themselves to ship interiors). I do have an interest in Void Crew, but haven't played it.
I don't miss ship interiors in Elite Dangerous. I also think it's silly to compare it to X4 as if that matters. X4 has "ship interiors". I.E. you can walk around the cockpit and maybe a couple of other rooms (on the XL ships). No where near the full interior of the ship. Sure, it would be cool to be able to walk around the cockpit in Elite Dangerous (although I haven't flown a ship yet where it would matter, I've seen videos featuring cockpits where it would be more interesting). But at the end of the day, what's the point? I can see around the cockpit with the free camera if I want, and there's nothing else to do. Are people really going to get up and pretend to use the bathroom or get a coffee from a part of the ship that doesn't exist? Unless there are actual controls that you can interact with, it's just window dressing, which I can already access with the free camera. The only benefit I can think of in Elite would be hot-swapping the pilot with a secondary multi-crew seat. Which opens up a whole can of worms about who own the ship, who has to rebuy, etc.
After Watching:
So, I do agree with everything that you said. I think the only difference is that while I do wish sometimes that I was a more RPG/narrative type person, I tend to a more gamey approach (outside of some soft more macro level decisions like choosing to not commit piracy or something).
For Elite specifically, I think adding just a non-interactive cockpit with a door that teleports you to the SRV or the exit hatch (like how L and XL ships work in X4) wouldn't be too much to ask for the developers (since they already have all the scaffolding and the problem I mentioned above could be solved by locking out the pilot chair from all but the owner). It would make it more immersive, and would be cool. I would appreciate that immersion, but I don't miss it as much as some. It could also provide another monetization opportunity via additional cockpit customization.
I think what would be too much to ask would be larger interiors for the M and L ships in Elite that had interactive stuff like a synthesis room or whatnot.
I do find the idea of a ship interior like in Void Crew or Starship Simulator very interesting, but in Elite even the large ships are way smaller than the ships in those games. That sort of gameplay would make sense for fleet carriers, but probably wouldn't be financially worthwhile.