

BBC interview with creator of Elite - whyleyc
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/rorycellanjones/2011/03/david_braben_-_an_elite_gamer.html

======
wladimir
One of the comments on that article really hit home with me:

 _I personally think this just highlights everything that is wrong with the
games industry at the moment.

Genius creator of an epic, brilliant, open-ended, proper clasic game is
reduced to making cutesy, family-friendly gimicks that (here's the big sell)
uses a motion controller. Woooooo - Big deal.

No games pubslisher nowdays would ever take a punt on what might end up being
the next Populous, Civ or Elite games. Braben should be livid with the
stagnation._

Sure, I understand the market mechanics behind the game industry these days,
and do see he has little other choice. But it does make me feel a little sad
inside. Things have changed so much in gaming, I don't think we can expect an
Elite 4 ever.

~~~
reitzensteinm
Woah, I think you're overreacting a bit there! Just like any other
entertainment industry, money has entered the gaming industry and it has
matured. Mainstream big games cost tens of millions of dollars to make.

But there are more cool projects happening on the fringe than ever before, led
by small teams of indie and commmercial developers, willing to take on a whole
bunch of risk and try new things. Minecraft, Dwarf Fortress, Braid and the
like basically _are_ the Elites of the 21st century.

The most expensive games to produce are basically formulaic safe bets, but
that should not take away from your enjoyment of the great games being made
every day. In much the same way as the music charts being topped by pop
rubbish shouldn't take away from enjoyment of the many great innovative bands
with small(er) followings.

I think there's a good middle ground, too, which I think creates substantial
value. Lots of high quality games take elements from existing successful
games, and reshape them to make something fresh (but not innovative). This is
basically what I'm attempting to do with my gaming startup (see:
<http://www.bigblockgames.com>). But this approach is inherently cautious - I
know it's not going to make me stumble on the next Minecraft!

~~~
wladimir
Ok, you are completely right there. I hadn't thought about that. I was just a
bit awash with one of my childhood hero game developers now making shallow
toys :)

------
Graham24
I sorry, but what does he mean by "reintroducing into schools the kind of
basic programming skills he learned".

He would have been a school in the 1970s, what school taught programming then
and what on?

I don't believe that there was an actual computer class at any ordinary school
in the UK at that time (outside of Eton or something) that'd teach you how to
program.

Or have I got the wrong end of the stick?

~~~
creatorix
I think you've got the right end of the stick, with one detail missing: yes,
there weren't any computer classes in the 1970s/80s. But in some fee-paying
schools in England, there _were_ computers around, like BBC Micros.

Thus a few pupils learnt how to program without interference from teachers.

~~~
timclark
It wasn't just fee paying schools that would have had BBC micros, the
government was actively promoting computing in schools during the early
eighties -
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microelectronics_Education_Prog...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microelectronics_Education_Programme)

------
jalada
I would've asked: "Where's my Elite 4?" :(

~~~
iwwr
The next Elite is stuck in development hell, delayed indefinitely.

However, I would think the next Elite should come in the form of a MMO.

~~~
stuhacking
You mean like Eve Online? :-)

<http://www.eveonline.com/>

Actually, this response is directed towards shogunmike also. Just in case you
haven't heard of Eve, it's a spaced themed MMO very much to the tune of Elite.
You can make a living mining, trading, fighting. The factions are split onto
two levels: Corporations (companies that employ/hire individual players) and
Alliances (gropps of corporations with similar vision/goals)

The ecomony is almost entirely player driven.. the materials are mined by
players, the equipment is built by players from those materials. You are free
to engage in hostile activity even in controlled space, although the penalty
is severe.

It's worth a look. The freedom of play has allowed some players to gain
notoriety even in the mass media (Note: exchanging game money for real world
currency is a violation of the rules):

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7256069.stm>

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7256069.stm>

~~~
shogunmike
Yes, I have heard of Eve Online, but didn't realise all of these dynamics had
been put in place.

I'm sure I can dig answers out to these questions elsewhere, but I thought I'd
ask how the economy is balanced. For instance, mining new materials obviously
increases supply. To what extent is this activity capped by the game mechanics
in order to keep demand at a reasonable level?

I've heard of space stations being bought and sold, but I think this was a
separate MMO. Not far off restoring houses and flipping for profit in the real
world!

~~~
stuhacking
I'm afraid I can't personally provide a detailed run down - I played the game
for about 6 months near the end of university and after that I never really
found enough free time to justify continuing the subscription.

The Wikipedia page seems to be comprehensive though:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eve_Online#Economy>

I would take a look at the development section also. They use a Python variant
called Stackless (<http://www.stackless.com>) which provides lightweight
threads and message passing. I actually started using this as an alternative
to regular CPython.

------
pella
"Elite (video game)" <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite_(video_game)>

"The Making Of: Elite" <http://www.next-gen.biz/features/the-making-of-elite>

------
cletus
I played Elite a lot on the Commodore 64 back in the day. Great game but at
some point it was a little too directionless.

If anyone in the modern gaming era has captured that (semi-)open game play
it's Rockstar with its Grand Theft Auto (GTA) series (and also Red Dead
Redemption, which is just a mouthful).

My particular favourite type of game is turn-based strategy. I spent hundreds
of hours playing the original Civ (not so much 2 or 3 but an awful lot of 4
due to the Fall From Heaven 2 mod and almost none of 5). Heroes of Might and
Magic was another big one.

Frankly RTSs annoy me as they descend into "how fast you can click". I realize
there's skill there but it's just not for me.

Anyway, it's easy to lambaste the game industry with it's cookie-cutter
FPSs/RTSs and the samey console titles (although I for one don't share the
same nostalgia for old NES/arcade/Atari games that some fervent zealots do).

But the fact is, it's never been more possible to write indie games than it is
right now. Successes like Minecraft should tell you that you don't need a big
studio $30 million budget for art. Nor do you need the latest, greatest 3D
engine. Mobile gaming has a plethora of smaller developers.

I, for one, would dearly love to see an Elite-style game but no one has made
one (worth talking about), be it single-player or an MMO. Yes there's Eve
Online but, for me at least, it falls short. It's aimed at the raiding crowd
really.

But think about it: how amazing could Elite be as a game you play on your
iPad?

~~~
rsaarelm
_I, for one, would dearly love to see an Elite-style game but no one has made
one (worth talking about), be it single-player or an MMO._

Have you taken a look at Egosoft's X3? It starts out like Elite, but
eventually you can apparently end up buying the stations you used to trade in,
building your own factories that make the stuff the stations sell, and using
the ensuing wealth to build your own war fleet.

------
wnoise
Reimplementation/extension here: <http://www.oolite.org/>

