After the failure of Hello Games' No Man Sky, all eyes were on Frontier Games' Elite: Dangerous to fill the void after the lofty promises of the former game's ambitious developers failed to deliver. Since the game's PC launch in 2014 (or 2015 if you want to credit the Xbox One version instead) Froniter has, for the most part, succeeded in this task in eyes of most gamers and critics. But how does last year's PS4 version hold up on it's own? Well, in honor of Fronter's work on the currently in-development "Jurassic World: Evolution" game, I decided to give this title a try.
A few pointers to give before I proceed with the review. First off, I myself played the afformentioend No Man's Sky back when that game first came out, so comparisons will be made here. Secondly, I'm well aware of the multiple factions and player status ranks (ex. combat, exploration, trading, etc). However, as I did not get to experience these gameplay options during my many hours of playing, they will not be a factor here. As the game also doesn't have anything in the way of a plot, this review will be an observation of my time in the game and my personal feelings on the overal experince. With that said, let's continue.
You start off the game with a pre-made ship in a random space station somewhere in the game's universe (starting locations vary for each player). From there, it's pretty much free range: you can venture outside and explore the rest of the current galaxy you're in, hyperdrive to other galaxies, find quests inside the station's menu areas, sell items you find outside, customise your ship, etc. I started off by venturing around the local star system and pick a fight wtih some nearby players. Yes, unlike Hello Game's hasty promise of "multiplayer" in No Man's Sky, Froniter right away gets one up on them by actually seemless incorporating other players into the game's universe. For those who rather play alone with just A.I. controlled ships in thier expereice, however, there IS an offline option. Despite my best efforts, unfortunately, my ship's starting weapions were not really designed well for ship-to-ship combat, and i was quickly annihilated. Thankfully, any time your ship is destroyed, you can use in-game credits to have your ship respawn with all its current equipment back at the last station you visted. These same credits, which you can get for doing quests or buying with microtransactions, can also be used to buy new ships, refuel/repair your ship, pay off penalty fines by nearby authories a la Red Dead Redemption or customize your current one. Some of the parts you can buy included] bigger cargo holds, more powerful hyperdrives, better weapons, and even an automatic landing manever for whenver you dock with any nearby space station.
This last component is a must-have from the get go, as this leads to one of the few complaints i had with the game: having to manuly land your ship in order to dock is surprisingly hard. The landing pads you are assigned to not only require pin-point precision, but there's a time limit in order to be able to dock. If you can't land by the time it hits zero, you'll have to go back outside and re-request permission to land. That's IF you haven't already bown up your ship or badly damaged it by that point, anyway. While the game does, have tutorial modes in the main menu that can help with this feature, along with getting use to the other gameplay mechanics, they don't really help much if you're having trouble with landing to begin with. The auto-land component you can buy removes this frustration as it allows your ship to fly to the assigned pad on it's own and land with no problem, so for those just starting off, make sure to buy this component as soon as you can! The other big issue i have is in regards to getting quests done. Most of the ones i came across were primarily item retrival/delivery quests that involved me scooping up whatever items i could with my cargo loader in a specific galaxy and then delivering said items to another station in another galaxy or region. Given my starting point, most of these delivery points were too far for me to reach and my cargo hold could only hold a ceratin amount of items. This could prove problematic for beginngers, but eventually i was able to get these quests done after completely overhauling my ship's cargo hold and other features.
Overall, Elite Dangerous, despite my issues with it, is a game that'll probably make most hardcore space simulator fans happy. While the reaslitic feel of piloting your ship might be a turn on for some, certain features like the previously-mentioned manual landing mechanics might prove trouble for people used to smoother controls in other games. However, if you think this is up your alley, give it a shot!
PROS:
* The universe of Elite Dangous is massive and full of varied galaxy and star stystems.
* Realistic ship handling makes for a immersive experiece.
* Customization and craft variation are vast and plentiful.
CONS:
* Manual landing is a pain in the butt.
* Quests can be troublesome to complete very early on.
Final score:
7/10