Elite Dangerous Is Out, Here Are Our Review Plans
A dangerous game
Elite: Dangerous is out! Perhaps it's just me, but isn't it weird to live in a world where that's not a bigger deal? Oh, I'm looking forward to getting in there and having a proper play, certainly. But the alpha and the beta and the gamma have been around for months, and somehow it feels like an anti-climax given the long, chilly decades of longing for a new Elite game that preceded it.
This'll be Half-Life 3 one day. In the meantime, let me tell you about our review plans.
Here's the launch trailer, in case you missed it last week. No, you can't walk around with fabulous pectoral muscles like that.
The RPS Hivemind and friends have played a lot of Elite over the past year. We've gawped at it in virtual reality, ventured through a five-part diary series, recorded audio interviews with its creators and players, paired it with joysticks and nostalgia, and produced many hands-on impressions.
We've also, of course, covered the ongoing consternation over the game's lack of offline mode and troubles with refunds. Frontier asked that people forego reviews based on early code, but the need for a functioning online mode means that we wouldn't have wanted to anyway. We want to Wot I Think it not only after we've reach further into the corners of the universe, but when we've had a chance to test how it holds up in launch conditions, how it plays with a general population of players, and so on.
You shouldn't have to wait long before you hear something in the vacuum of space, at least. Our Alec will return from a voyage later this week with some early impressions, before a full review follows in the new year.
In the meantime, are you in? Are you playing? Share your thoughts below, that we all might learn and be warned should anything be immediately amiss.