Spending a month in deep space with Elite Dangerous

I'm not really a veteran of Space Sims. Sure, I played a bunch of X-Wing back in the day during my early years, and dabbled with Freelancer a bit, but never to the extent that it was my go-to genre. Suffice it to say, I was nervous taking on the task of playing Elite: Dangerous and giving my final impressions. I'm not at that stage yet by any means, but I have put in enough hours to finally get a good feel of the game.

Despite being worried about the game overwhelming me, I actually jumped in head first. Even though I was provided a code courtesy of the game's PR company, I actually did invest a bit into the game by purchasing the AI Voice pack along with the Voice Attack software. This stuff is completely optional, but I wanted to immerse myself completely into the game, and without an Oculus Rift, the next best thing I could think of was to be able to talk to and give commands to my ship. Needless to say I was ready to dive headfirst into Elite: Dangerous, despite not really being all that familiar or even comfortable with the genre.

Elite: Dangerous actually doesn't really hold your hand. Sure, you can partake in the flight and combat tutorials, but outside of that, you're left to your own devices. After spawning inside a space station, you have a bunch of options open to you, that aren't clearly visualized, but that's not really a negative point to the game. It's truly sandbox experience.

I had a lot of decisions to make right then and there, without even fully realizing it yet. I could become a pirate and drift through space, targetting lowly cargo ships. I could become a smuggler and pick up illegal goods or even slaves and transport them to individuals who are willing to pay top Credits for them. I could become an explorer and try to uncover unexplored sectors, selling those coordinates to far away space stations. I could become a bounty hunter and target ships with high bounties and earn reputation with the Federation. I could become a trader, buying goods at low prices and then flying to sectors with high demand and sell high. The point here is, I could pick one of those routes, or even multiple, and then build my career and reputation that way.

Though there are a bunch of these options, there are really three ranks to rise through; Exploration, Combat and Trade, each being able to rise up to Elite. That's pretty much the only way the game tracks any kind of progress through the job you choose to do.

In the first (almost) month that the game's been out, I've noticed that the best way to gain a bunch of credits is through trading. The game makes it pretty manageable to check out trade routes and see which sectors were lacking in a certain resource, which basically points you in the direction of profit. Sure, it's not as foolproof as it sounds, since there is always a danger of getting "interdicted," a fancy word of getting intercepted by another ship who usually wants to start some trouble. Though in all honesty, through my month of playing, I haven't really encountered a lot of it.

Often I look at other videos of what others are experience in the game, and sometimes I come across these crazy space battles between a bounty hunter and a smuggler like in this video:

Or even a friend of mine who has been playing had an experience with a pirate who attacked him while mining, which then escalated into a chase, getting shot and losing oxygen, with a race to safely make it to a starport, only to get shot down five seconds before reaching it.

I haven't really had that moment, and I'm still hoping it happens. But it's really a double-edged sword. When I'm taking a full cargo of clothes and beer to a system that wants it, the last thing I want is to lose it and potentially lose my ship in a pirate attack, and yet, I long for the excitement. It's not that I think Elite: Dangerous is a boring game, but the excitement factor it provides is a very small percentage of the overall experience. But I understand that Space Sims are generally like that.

Elite: Dangerous is really good at immersion though, even without the additional AI Voice pack I purchased. You're view is always fixed into the cockpit, meaning you can't ever change the camera to be behind your ship. With that said though, you can't ever get up and walk around your ship, or any of the starports. Your butt is glued to your seat from the very beginning until the end, whenever you choose that to be. That's not a bad thing per se. I think games like Star Citizen might have opened up people's eyes to be able to do more than just sit in the cockpit, but I don't think Elite: Dangerous calls for that sort of interaction. It having a precise focus on flight is certainly one of its strengths.

I still have yet to truly play cooperatively with someone. Right now the social features are somewhat wonky for me, but I do hope that at some point me and my buddies can all log on and tackle a few missions together, perhaps go bounty hunting for scoundrels and earn some credits in the process.

The game is extremely massive. Sure, I can see the Sol System on my Galaxy map, but man is it hard trying to get there. You can only get so far with the ship you have, and you have to plot your route carefully not to run out of fuel.

What I'm trying to say is that I still have lots planned for Elite: Dangerous. I am enjoying it. More so than I thought I initially would. In fact, I'm so engrossed while playing it that it's making me want to invest in an Oculus Rift once it becomes available, and even an X52 Flight Stick to make it that much more authentic.