There’s some pretty reasonable tutorial videos on Frontier’s youtube page, such as this playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weAoY7kw2NM&index=6&list=PL7glm5rbPHKxnltQU1SLxdqQrENIXJGUr
Some things can be a bit opaque, and it’s worth watching a couple of videos on the basics of jumping from system to system, navigating within a system, docking at stations, etc. You’ll be doing those things a lot, and there’s some quality of life techniques for getting around that will save time and frustration. Surf the six, fear the five.
It’s not too bad, though, and I think Frontier has done a great job with the way navigation is handled. It’s a near-perfect balance – to me – of a sense of travel and scale while still being time-efficient and not too fiddly.
Guap
5842
Nope. No tutorials. There are training videos, but they didn’t explain that the game has permadeath and it costs you every time you die. I just wanted to jump in and explore.
Now it’s 5000 CR to buy a new one. I have 1000 CR. The only job on the job boards is a mining job which requires me to buy around 10,000 CR worth of modules just to get started (and dump modules like my shields and ability to approach planets to make room for the slots).
So I’m stuck with no way to earn money.
What a fucking waste of $33. What a scam. What a terrible, terrible game. I wish games still had demos.
If you’ve done absolutely nothing, why not just restart?
Wait, the Xbone version doesn’t have the tutorials that the PC version has?
Guap
5845
How? There is no restart option.
On PC, it’s options and “clear save” or some-such.
Really? Can’t you start a new game? I remember doing just that after inevitably crashing a few times with my first attempt, or something.
Guap
5848
The main menu has: Training (which I did to make sure I could fly, mostly its combat training), Play, options, etc. Never does it explain how death or money or buying things works.
Edit: It’s 2016. How can this company be so good at creating pretty space stations and so bad at actually making a game? It’s like they ignored or didn’t pay attention to the improvements of gameplay, or UI, or storytelling, or any of the other improvements over the last 20 years in their industry. They made it look pretty and called it a day. How lazy. And I have this company money? Their lead designer should be blackballed from the industry forever.
Sounds like you’ve given up, but if you’re willing to persevere …
Dying in ED is really not a big deal. When you’re first starting, it just means going back to your starting Sidewinder, or paying a small bit of money to get your ship back as it was equipped. As you get better ships, you just want to make sure you’ve got enough cash in your account to cover the insurance. I died 5 times the other night bounty hunting, and the only loss was really a bit of frustration at hauling my ass back out there to try again.
When you start out, you can take your starting sidewinder and pew-pew wanted ships in a resource extraction site (found in the rings of gas giants, usually) – not a hazardous one! – for easy cash. Like hundreds of thousands of space-coins relatively quickly. Or, if you’re not into combat, you can just take mundane missions or start doing some trading. Populous bases will have courier missions that don’t require any particular modules.
Guap
5850
Thank you! You just did a way better job giving me direction than the designers ever did. For shame!
@Guap: I played through the tutorial for docking and such on the Xbox One version. I skipped that stuff on the PC. So I know it was there in both. Maybe it’s a separate executable on Xbox? I noticed on Xbox I could fire up separate programs. Plus I played it in the early preview days on Xbox, so maybe they changed things? Anyway, on PC I relied on my prior Space Sim experience and skipped the tutorials, but on Xbox I played through them since I was trying to learn how to play using the controller instead of a joystick, and I remember there being a very clear docking tutorial.
I’m thinking Guap’s problem isn’t how to do things like fly and fight, there are tutorials for that as you mentioned - but rather he isn’t sure what he should be doing. And he’s got a point, there’s not a lot of hand-holding in this game, they just turn you loose and let you get into as much trouble as you can handle (and more). I kind of like that personally, but it’s quite unlike most games that walk you through the early stages to get you eased into the flow of things.
Well, the docking tutorial and such are still useful because it’s worth knowing how to do those things with the controller. And to avoid problems like not getting shot when you land the wrong way or in the wrong landing platform.
Sure, but it’s not going to tell you how to make money.
Guap
5855
I don’t mind games that don’t “hand hold” you. But in order to do that, those games have to have a UI, controls, and systems that are clear and intuitive. If your system is complex and deep (say like an Elder Scrolls game) you must show the players the system before letting them loose. The difference between say, Bethesda and Frontier is that Bethedsa understands this now because they’ve been making games for years, paying attention to industry trends and improvements, and continuously improving. I suspect Frontier started not with the gameplay and interface, but with the technology to make a pretty and physics based space game. They ignored the user experience, the players experience.
I’ll see if I can get some money tonight, but if it looks like its gonna take me 30 hours just to land on a planet again, there are dozens of other fun games I can be playing.
How disppointing. Again, wish there was a demo. Guess I learned my lesson, not to trust indie game developers. The big guys are big for a reason, because they know what they are doing and have been rewarded for it.
Guap, maybe walk away a bit and come back later? I’d hate you to keep banging your head against it while you’re feeling agitated.
Guap
5857
Yeah, that’s true. Thanks. I’m all riled up lol. I’ll come back to it this weekend. :)
Clay
5858
I completely bounced off of Elite: Dangerous. As much as I wanted to like it, I felt it was just a monotonous grind. I also ended up in a similar situation where I couldn’t find work to do for the $ that I had and ended up needing to restart. I think I did that several times.
Well there are tutorials for the UI, controls and systems. And when I played on the Xbox there was a demo too, but that may have been because I played when it was in early release and they gave you that 1 hour window to decide if it’s worth your cash. Do they stop allowing that if the game is out of early release?
We’ve had a couple angry posters with purple-pink G avatars lately. I can’t help but wonder if they’d be less vindictive toward game developers if they had a cool, calming green letter T.
