Making Space Travel Not Pointless

[UlfricsRevenge]

Happily I'm seeing the modding community beginning to address the problem of space travel and how there's no real need for it.

 

In the comments under the new "Better Space Exploration" mod, Gogogo123 put it beautifully: "Without the ability to actually fly to other planets, like you can in the X series or the old Freelancer and Wingcommander games, there is just no need to be on your ship outside of the occasional space combat. Unfortunately, ships are only a very pretty, customizable location from which you can access special loading screens - that's it. Obviously, you do whatever floats your boat, but more or longer unskippable travel animations are not what I would call conducive to the whole space exploration thing."

 

It was quickly noted that traveling from planet to planet is possible, but I'd like to suggest another way that space travel can become more meaningful. Two things are necessary, in my opinion.

 

1) A mod was released earlier which forces the player to fly closer to the target before they can dock. I believe this needs to be expanded upon. Imagine if we also needed to fly closer to a planet before we could land, and imagine if we needed to get further away from a planet before we could engage our grav drives. In the former, it could be that we need to get closer to the planet to achieve orbit, while in the later, it could be that we need to escape the planet's gravitational pull before the grav drives can be safely used. These changes would have the effect of forcing us to actually fly our ships for a period of time, adding to the illusion that they're actually vehicles instead of props.

 

2) I could be wrong, but it appears to me that the only time we have actual encounters in space is when we first enter a cell. Whether it's a pirate, or grandma inviting us over for stew, or someone needing repairs, these encounters are always waiting for us at the very beginning of our entry into a system. Once that encounter is over, no matter how long we fly around, that cell will remain devoid of encounters forever (fast traveling away and then back to it will of course reset this). Yet we know (or at least I assume?) the game engine allows for ships warping into a cell after the player is already in it because we see this happening in the space around busy ports like New Atlantis. So it appears to me that if someone could make it so that there's a chance for new ships---either hostile or friendly---to warp into any system at random intervals after the player is already in the cell, it would make actually traveling through the system more meaningful. If you're a pirate looking for prey, or if you're a hunter looking for pirates, rather than having a zero chance for such encounters the longer you fly through space, the chances of such encounters would increase. I hope I've explained this right.

 

These are both very small changes or tweaks from a game-play perspective, though they may or may not be massive endeavors for a modder trying to script all of it and get around any game engine limitations. But in the end, the need to fly in space for a period of time before landing or warping out, and the possibility of encountering other ships along the way, seems to me like the most simple and elegant solution to the present pointlessness of space travel.

 

EDIT: I also assume such a mod would require the editor and possibly SFSE. But if anyone believes these changes are worth making, it would probably also make sense to offer different versions of #1 so that players could decide how long they want to travel before being able to land/warp away. Some players would want to be forced to just fly for 30 seconds, while other more masochistic players would want to have to fly for 15 minutes, etc. Choice here would be crucial.

 

EDIT 2: It feels like the direction modders are going with this problem is to make the game more like No Man's Sky with planet-to-planet travel. And while this would be great, I guess what I'm advocating for is to go the route of most other space sims which divide their systems through gates of some kind. In games like Freelancer and the X series, travel is necessary within a system to reach these gates and along the way, encounters are also possible. Of course Starfield has no gates, per se. But the changes I've suggested in #1 would create a kind of de facto gate system. Even though the player isn't traveling to a specific point in space (i.e. the gate), travel for a period of time is still necessary.

[zanity]

You are asking for a game that DOES NOT EXIST.

 

Here's the thing. When Todd (the non-gamer) dreamed pointlessly of his space version of Fallout, all of his ideas game from TV shows/films. Everything was going to be in his game, far more than your suggestions. One little problem got in his way. There is no-one with talent left on the Beth dev team- the skilled people left years ago- all the visual quality in the original fallout 3 and skyrim came from a young concept artist who died shortly after Skyrim.

 

The first phase of Starfield development was a total disaster. Nothing Todd imagined could be achieved- the engine wasn't up to it and Todd's crew certainly weren't. After wasting years and hundreds of millions of dollars, a new vision was created for starfield- a desperately simplified design that the entire dev team agreed would easily work with the engine and their existing tools. At that point, all decent space concepts were DEAD. And no, you cannot ever mod them back in, because the Creation Engine is far too primitive.

 

There's a very good reason the released version of the game is a loading screen simulator. This was never Todd's original vision. No form of flight sim can be done in Starfield, so forget any idea of 'flying'- whether in space or landing etc.

 

One can SCRIPT random events- and believe me the fully modded Starfield in 2-5 years time will very much have this kind of content, on land and in 'space'. But never thru a 'vehicle system' like a 'flying' spaceship under player control. Again that cannot be done in this engine. And just because you list any number of games that can do this will NOT change the limitations of the Creation Engine.

 

Starfield ain't Elite, or star raiders or any game like that. Indeed the current 'arcade' shooty that represents space battles is just putrid. Better that modders replace it with RPG DnD like systems.

 

What Starfield should have done was use TWO engines- Creation Engine as usual for land surface, and say Unreal 4 for space. But with Todd in charge, only the worst possibly technical decisions were ever going to happen. Every modder ever could have told Todd that using the Creation Engine for space was a recipe for disaster, but every modder has some level of technical awareness, and Todd literally has none.

 

And look, what far too few people understand in these forums is that mods, for a given engine, CANNOT overcome the limitations of that engine. Please read this again and take a moment to let that fact sink in. You cannot mod away inherent limitations of an engine.

 

Fix bugs- yes. Rewrite certain functions to make them faster, and maybe reduce data limits- sometimes. But the engine stays itself. And if the engine is aging and rotten, as the Creation Engine and its script system most certainly are, then any mod bashes its head against this limit.

Edited September 30, 2023 by zanity

[RazielLewach]

You are asking for a game that DOES NOT EXIST.

 

Here's the thing. When Todd (the non-gamer) dreamed pointlessly of his space version of Fallout, all of his ideas game from TV shows/films. Everything was going to be in his game, far more than your suggestions. One little problem got in his way. There is no-one with talent left on the Beth dev team- the skilled people left years ago- all the visual quality in the original fallout 3 and skyrim came from a young concept artist who died shortly after Skyrim.

 

The first phase of Starfield development was a total disaster. Nothing Todd imagined could be achieved- the engine wasn't up to it and Todd's crew certainly weren't. After wasting years and hundreds of millions of dollars, a new vision was created for starfield- a desperately simplified design that the entire dev team agreed would easily work with the engine and their existing tools. At that point, all decent space concepts were DEAD. And no, you cannot ever mod them back in, because the Creation Engine is far too primitive.

 

There's a very good reason the released version of the game is a loading screen simulator. This was never Todd's original vision. No form of flight sim can be done in Starfield, so forget any idea of 'flying'- whether in space or landing etc.

 

One can SCRIPT random events- and believe me the fully modded Starfield in 2-5 years time will very much have this kind of content, on land and in 'space'. But never thru a 'vehicle system' like a 'flying' spaceship under player control. Again that cannot be done in this engine. And just because you list any number of games that can do this will NOT change the limitations of the Creation Engine.

 

Starfield ain't Elite, or star raiders or any game like that. Indeed the current 'arcade' shooty that represents space battles is just putrid. Better that modders replace it with RPG DnD like systems.

 

What Starfield should have done was use TWO engines- Creation Engine as usual for land surface, and say Unreal 4 for space. But with Todd in charge, only the worst possibly technical decisions were ever going to happen. Every modder ever could have told Todd that using the Creation Engine for space was a recipe for disaster, but every modder has some level of technical awareness, and Todd literally has none.

 

And look, what far too few people understand in these forums is that mods, for a given engine, CANNOT overcome the limitations of that engine. Please read this again and take a moment to let that fact sink in. You cannot mod away inherent limitations of an engine.

 

Fix bugs- yes. Rewrite certain functions to make them faster, and maybe reduce data limits- sometimes. But the engine stays itself. And if the engine is aging and rotten, as the Creation Engine and its script system most certainly are, then any mod bashes its head against this limit.

Do you realise there is already a mod that allows you to literally fly between planets without any loading screen? The only limitation it has, it that it needs to trigger a save/load to make planets stuff load. But the possibility to fly between planets is there, as an example. Being able to modify internal things of the game, it sounds viable.

 

I'm not a professional programmer. I never touched any engine besides Game Maker. But I do have a Computer Engineering grade and work, and I don't totally understand why are they constantly saying that there are "engine limitations". ANY ENGINE allows you to do all the basic stuff: create and check variables, arrays, objects... you have type of data: booleans, numbers, strings... you can do for, while loops... you can have events to detect buttons pressess... you can draw things in the screen... Even you can make a game from 0 in notepad! I find hard to believe that a engine really doesn't allow you to make stuff. Maybe some engine makes it difficult, or doesn't allow to magically do some stuff that now is AUTOMATICALLY DONE by the engine basics. But I refuse to believe that you LITERALLY can't do other stuff. They just don't want it. Cost expensive. Time expensive. Who cares. But they don't WANT it, it's not that they CAN'T do it. Give enough time and any modder will achieve it. Because almost ANYTHING can be done in ANY engine.

 

Maybe I'm doing mistakes, and yes, I don't know about engines. But I know about programming, I have decades making games almost from zero, and I can't believe they can't do stuff in their engine. Or at least stuff that is CLOSE to that. I can buy an small "loading" when reaching a planet. But not being able to fly between planets and make events trigger? Just I can't believe it

[randomocity327]

You are asking for a game that DOES NOT EXIST.

 

Here's the thing. When Todd (the non-gamer) dreamed pointlessly of his space version of Fallout, all of his ideas game from TV shows/films. Everything was going to be in his game, far more than your suggestions. One little problem got in his way. There is no-one with talent left on the Beth dev team- the skilled people left years ago- all the visual quality in the original fallout 3 and skyrim came from a young concept artist who died shortly after Skyrim.

 

The first phase of Starfield development was a total disaster. Nothing Todd imagined could be achieved- the engine wasn't up to it and Todd's crew certainly weren't. After wasting years and hundreds of millions of dollars, a new vision was created for starfield- a desperately simplified design that the entire dev team agreed would easily work with the engine and their existing tools. At that point, all decent space concepts were DEAD. And no, you cannot ever mod them back in, because the Creation Engine is far too primitive.

 

There's a very good reason the released version of the game is a loading screen simulator. This was never Todd's original vision. No form of flight sim can be done in Starfield, so forget any idea of 'flying'- whether in space or landing etc.

 

One can SCRIPT random events- and believe me the fully modded Starfield in 2-5 years time will very much have this kind of content, on land and in 'space'. But never thru a 'vehicle system' like a 'flying' spaceship under player control. Again that cannot be done in this engine. And just because you list any number of games that can do this will NOT change the limitations of the Creation Engine.

 

Starfield ain't Elite, or star raiders or any game like that. Indeed the current 'arcade' shooty that represents space battles is just putrid. Better that modders replace it with RPG DnD like systems.

 

What Starfield should have done was use TWO engines- Creation Engine as usual for land surface, and say Unreal 4 for space. But with Todd in charge, only the worst possibly technical decisions were ever going to happen. Every modder ever could have told Todd that using the Creation Engine for space was a recipe for disaster, but every modder has some level of technical awareness, and Todd literally has none.

 

And look, what far too few people understand in these forums is that mods, for a given engine, CANNOT overcome the limitations of that engine. Please read this again and take a moment to let that fact sink in. You cannot mod away inherent limitations of an engine.

 

Fix bugs- yes. Rewrite certain functions to make them faster, and maybe reduce data limits- sometimes. But the engine stays itself. And if the engine is aging and rotten, as the Creation Engine and its script system most certainly are, then any mod bashes its head against this limit.

 

 

You sound like someone who truly enjoys being alive and isn't pessimistic about anything. /s

 

As someone said above, there is already a mod that allows interplanetary travel which will only get better with time. Also, there are more than 1 way to make space travel in a game feel real. I personally don't care about loading screens and think it's a petty, entitled and childish complaint to have. No, I will not be convinced otherwise.

 

But imagine this, outside of Gravjumps (Or implement it with them too), interplanetary travel still takes time and as someone who doesn't like the systems from NMS (Hate that game on a fundamental level) as well as Elite Dangerous where it's literally "Fly faster to get to planets faster" I'd rather have Interplanetary travel take some time, Maybe 10-20 minutes in game time, maybe more. BUT you can move around your ship, Craft, research, talk to crew/companions and sleep to pass the time. therefore making your ship more of a home among the stars then a "Loading screen access point". Imagine getting ambushed by pirates while talking to your companion or sleeping and having to rush to the pilot seat as alarms blare.

 

Or, you know. everything is s#*! and nothing is good and I don't like anything and this game has loading screens and I love to complain and hate on things I was never going to like in the first place because it's all i've got in my life that gives me any ounce of enjoyment.

[DeckardKain]

Yea, don't belive the nay sayer. This is not impossible to make.
in-fact quite simple, I made a quick draft for a papyrus script that will spawn in a ship with random timer, should look something like this :

ScriptName SpawnRandomShipScript extends ObjectReference

Event OnActivate(Actor akActivator)
    Float minDelay = 5.0  ; Minimum delay in seconds
    Float maxDelay = 20.0 ; Maximum delay in seconds
    
    Float randomDelay = Utility.RandomFloat(minDelay, maxDelay)
    
    Debug.Notification("Spawning enemy in " + randomDelay + " seconds.")
    Game.Delay(randomDelay)
    
    ; Calculate a random distance and angle
    Float randomDistance = Utility.RandomFloat(3000.0, 10000.0)
    Float randomAngle = Utility.RandomFloat(0.0, 360.0)
    
    ; Calculate the spawn position based on player's position
    Vector3 playerPos = akActivator.GetPosition()
    Float spawnX = playerPos.x + (randomDistance * Cos(DegreesToRadians(randomAngle)))
    Float spawnY = playerPos.y + (randomDistance * Sin(DegreesToRadians(randomAngle)))
    
    ; Set the spawn position
    Vector3 spawnPosition = Vector3(spawnX, spawnY, playerPos.z)
    
    ; Spawn the enemy at the calculated position
    SpawnEnemy(spawnPosition)
EndEvent

Function SpawnEnemy(Vector3 spawnPosition)
    ; Replace this with the code to spawn your enemy.
    ; You may need to reference a specific spawn point or create one.
    ; Example: EnemyBase.spawnItem(spawnPosition) or similar code.
EndFunction

Function DegreesToRadians(Float degrees)
    return degrees * (PI / 180.0)
EndFunction

 

[FALCmods4all]

 

You are asking for a game that DOES NOT EXIST.

 

Here's the thing. When Todd (the non-gamer) dreamed pointlessly of his space version of Fallout, all of his ideas game from TV shows/films. Everything was going to be in his game, far more than your suggestions. One little problem got in his way. There is no-one with talent left on the Beth dev team- the skilled people left years ago- all the visual quality in the original fallout 3 and skyrim came from a young concept artist who died shortly after Skyrim.

 

The first phase of Starfield development was a total disaster. Nothing Todd imagined could be achieved- the engine wasn't up to it and Todd's crew certainly weren't. After wasting years and hundreds of millions of dollars, a new vision was created for starfield- a desperately simplified design that the entire dev team agreed would easily work with the engine and their existing tools. At that point, all decent space concepts were DEAD. And no, you cannot ever mod them back in, because the Creation Engine is far too primitive.

 

There's a very good reason the released version of the game is a loading screen simulator. This was never Todd's original vision. No form of flight sim can be done in Starfield, so forget any idea of 'flying'- whether in space or landing etc.

 

One can SCRIPT random events- and believe me the fully modded Starfield in 2-5 years time will very much have this kind of content, on land and in 'space'. But never thru a 'vehicle system' like a 'flying' spaceship under player control. Again that cannot be done in this engine. And just because you list any number of games that can do this will NOT change the limitations of the Creation Engine.

 

Starfield ain't Elite, or star raiders or any game like that. Indeed the current 'arcade' shooty that represents space battles is just putrid. Better that modders replace it with RPG DnD like systems.

 

What Starfield should have done was use TWO engines- Creation Engine as usual for land surface, and say Unreal 4 for space. But with Todd in charge, only the worst possibly technical decisions were ever going to happen. Every modder ever could have told Todd that using the Creation Engine for space was a recipe for disaster, but every modder has some level of technical awareness, and Todd literally has none.

 

And look, what far too few people understand in these forums is that mods, for a given engine, CANNOT overcome the limitations of that engine. Please read this again and take a moment to let that fact sink in. You cannot mod away inherent limitations of an engine.

 

Fix bugs- yes. Rewrite certain functions to make them faster, and maybe reduce data limits- sometimes. But the engine stays itself. And if the engine is aging and rotten, as the Creation Engine and its script system most certainly are, then any mod bashes its head against this limit.

 

You sound like someone who truly enjoys being alive and isn't pessimistic about anything. /s

 

As someone said above, there is already a mod that allows interplanetary travel which will only get better with time. Also, there are more than 1 way to make space travel in a game feel real. I personally don't care about loading screens and think it's a petty, entitled and childish complaint to have. No, I will not be convinced otherwise.

 

But imagine this, outside of Gravjumps (Or implement it with them too), interplanetary travel still takes time and as someone who doesn't like the systems from NMS (Hate that game on a fundamental level) as well as Elite Dangerous where it's literally "Fly faster to get to planets faster" I'd rather have Interplanetary travel take some time, Maybe 10-20 minutes in game time, maybe more. BUT you can move around your ship, Craft, research, talk to crew/companions and sleep to pass the time. therefore making your ship more of a home among the stars then a "Loading screen access point". Imagine getting ambushed by pirates while talking to your companion or sleeping and having to rush to the pilot seat as alarms blare.

 

Or, you know. everything is s#*! and nothing is good and I don't like anything and this game has loading screens and I love to complain and hate on things I was never going to like in the first place because it's all i've got in my life that gives me any ounce of enjoyment.

Ive been thinking about in system out of system travel mechanics and realism as well.

 

Definitely agree about idle ship time during travel. Engines and grav drives could have LY/min and AU/min travel speeds. Furthermore, in system, it could be possible either to set a course and hang out onboard unless attacked or if boosts do not end with auto deceleration, one could build up speed, but then also have to slow down properly. Boosts could also gradually consume radioactive rods. As grav drive should consume he3. Travel takes time on board also makes one consider travel with weapons and shields down to minimize detection.

 

In deep space, occasionally the grav drive could fail or be sabotaged (by crew with ptsd or that may be spies) leasing to being attacked or having to activate a distress beacon if repair parts are unavailable.

 

Id also like to see a need for some manual repairs of hull breaches or even ship exteriors once spacewalks can be modded. Put the welders and rivet guns to use.