Elite : Dangerous

[kalniel]

So with all the recent clues on galnet and the CG for more formidine rift mysteries I slogged my way over there...

.. only discover that anyone who approaches a location revealed in the clues suffers from a crash to desktop because Frontier forgot to push a required asset to player installs. AGAIN (same thing happened with barnacles). Sigh.

[cptwhite_uk]

Frontier really need to get their act together, the game mechanics are annoying enough without things like this. I'm developing a love/hate relationship with this game.

[Dashers]

I feel FD like a lot of software houses simply don't put enough investment into testing.

[Ttaskmaster]

I never liked the fact the game had gimballed lasers in the first place. Should have been an option of fixed or completely unmanned turrets (for the trade ships) - with dedicated hard-points. None of this auto-aim malarkey.

They seem to work best for the mid-size ships, like the Python and Fer-de-Lance.
I tried going fixed with those and they're great in a straight line charge, but against anything more manoeuvrable you're kinda stuffed as you cannot bring to bear. The strength of big gunships is in time on target, not nipping about for firing position.

Frontier really need to get their act together, the game mechanics are annoying enough without things like this. I'm developing a love/hate relationship with this game.

Go play Star Citizen, then.... After CTDs every time you dock, undock, die, change settings, look up controls or even breathe, I'm sure you'll be back in Elite soon enough!!

[cptwhite_uk]

O I'll still play it, in fact I've just bought a Tobii Eye Tracker 4C for Elite, but they need to invest in some more meaningful testing or at least patching out the issues faster.

[Ttaskmaster]

Well, they do put these things out to Beta playtesting with us lot before it gets fully implemented...
Between that and their own testing, what more can they do if no-one finds the problems before release?

As far as patching goes, it once seemed to take just a few hours for FD to get a patch out. Mabe it's a bit more complicated with 400 billion systems to factor in, now?

[cptwhite_uk]

Texture warping and the the failure to match station rotation when you enter a Coriolis station has been present since the release of 2.2 and it still hasn't been patched. It requires logging out to main screen and reloading the game to solve. It's just an example of something that's fairly common (I've had it happen 5 or 6 times personally) and needs resolving, yet they haven't fixed it yet. It was introduced with 2.2 as far as I'm aware, I'd never experienced it previously.

[Ttaskmaster]

Texture warping and the the failure to match station rotation when you enter a Coriolis station has been present since the release of 2.2 and it still hasn't been patched.

AFAIK, it doesn't match until you're inside the station proper... and then cuts out again as you leave.
Can't say I've ever had a rotational match failure, though... except the one time I intentionally turned it off in the Systems panel, for a laugh!!

[kalniel]

It is hard to test things in the live situation sometimes - particularly if you have secret assets you don't want to reveal in a beta test. But still, you'd have thought that they had an accurate client image that represents what files are actually present on client computers and that they'd double check that new assets they put in were working on the server shortly after release rather than leaving it to players to discover via CTD and have the report sitting there for a while.

[Ttaskmaster]

Given the huge long lists of new features and fixes that accompanies every release, I'd be amazed if they didn't miss anything.
Heck, we're a team of four here at work and we make loads of mistakes. Seems the more people you have, the greater the chance of slip-ups.

[cptwhite_uk]

I've had the lack of rotation match around 6 to 8 times now. You're physically trying to land on the pad when you realise you're drifting off and can never get a lock because the stations constantly moving off to the side...it's just an annoying bug, I've seen that for many months now, probably since the end of 2015 at least.

In other news, I've bought the new Tobii Eyetracker 4C as a sort of half way house till VR matures a little. I've only tested it for 45 minutes but I'm already getting used to it - though I still need to tweak the settings some more. I'll post a video soon to show you all, however being able to follow targets with your gaze is pretty awesome. It does both head tracking and eye tracking simultaneuously and you can tweak the strength of the turning effect each has to suit your preference. I've gone for a stronger head tracking profile with weak tracking of eye movement - seems to work well for me, but more tweaking is needed I suspect.

[Dashers]

So, do you just look where you want to go instead of jiggling your joystick?

[Ttaskmaster]

So, do you just look where you want to go instead of jiggling your joystick?

IIRC, this controls your Headlook, not your joystick. Same way that a VR headset would...

[Ttaskmaster]

In other news, I've bought the new Tobii Eyetracker 4C as a sort of half way house till VR matures a little.

Didn't Steelseries do an eyetracker thingy?
How does the Tobii compare to that and, say, the TrackIR-type stuff?

Is it supported by enough games to be worth chucking on my Christmas list, do ya think, or should I save up for a car instead?

[cptwhite_uk]

It definitely needs improvement, but the fact I can just sit at my PC and it works without anything attached to my person is its major selling point. That and it tracks both head movement and eye movement (yes I know that sounds a little weird). I had a little conversation going with ObsidianAnt, and this a message I've sent to him to see if he can give me any tips (he's been using it for over a month).

Hi there ObsidianAnt,

You might recall we sent a few messages back and forth on your video reviewing the Tobii Eye Tracker 4C. Well my Eye Tracker arrived yesterday and I've done some initial testing. First impressions are promising.

I've installed the regular software, and also the additional Infinite Screen extension.

I've still got to get my head around what software is doing what, but it does seem Elite is tracking my head movement as well as eye movement (I squinted so it couldn't track eye movement, but would still respond to head rotation to test this).

I know at the point you made the video you were only using Eye Tracking,, so I was wondering if you've installed the Infinite Screen software since then and if you have any tips for the setup values in the Elite profile within the software.

At present I've got a greater effect tied to head movement and a small influence linked to eye position which seems to work okay, but I'm finding there's still a degree of lag / not moving to the exact position I'd want it too. Especially in the up and down plane

I accept there will be a degree of personal preference and tweaking, but wondered if you have any tips for optimising set-up given you've been using this for a while now.

By the way they included a free USB extension cable to enable the device to be connected into a PC ~ 1.5m away, maybe as a direct result of your comments in the video.

Best wishes,
CMDR Matt White (aka cptwhite)

I'm waiting for his reply.

BTW You can disable it when you're at menus using hotkey to toggle it on/off, something Scott Manley noted as being annoying, but obviously hadn't realised.

[Ttaskmaster]

All the ships post-Engineers really do suck....
A fully kitted Vulture and even the Fer de Lance seem to really struggle with just a mkIII Cobra NPC now, whereas before I could drop an Anaconda solo with just the Vulture and barely blink.

I'm sure I have to just go away and grind for a few years to get the right Engineer upgrades, but this is just ridiculous. Feels very forced in terms of gameplay...