Elite: Dangerous Update #95

Hello, Commander,

Welcome to Elite Dangerous Newsletter #95.

This week we're firing up the Scarab's engines and revealing new details about this SRV, giving you a behind the scenes look at how the music was created for Elite Dangerous, recapping the How to Make a Real World livestream and catching up with the latest GalNet news.

As always, you can hear the latest news and updates directly from the development team on our Forums, Twitter, Facebook, Community Homepage, and right here in the newsletter every week, and we're always eager to hear your feedback.

Pre-order links:
Elite Dangerous: Horizons
Elite Dangerous: Horizons Beta

Contents This Week

• Surface Recon vehicle
• Inside the SRV Livestream
• Behind the Music
• How to Make a Real World Livestream
• Store Spotlight
• Community Goals Update
• Comms Chatter
• GalNet

The Surface Recon Vehicle

The SRV's thrusters glow, ready to venture across an unknown world

In Elite Dangerous: Horizons many will choose to spend a lot of time in an SRV, so now's the time to get familiar with the vehicle that will help you explore entire worlds. As part of this week's Dev Update, Executive producer Michael Brookes went in to detail about how the SRV will handle.

"We’ve approached adding the SRV in the same way that we did when originally adding the flight controls into the game. They key here is to have the driving as a fun experience in itself as well as with the gameplay elements layered on top of it. As with the ships we have a robust physics system at the core and it’s with the controls we turn that into a fun experience.

The SRV has some cool advantages over normal ground vehicles you may be used to, the most obvious of which are the thrusters. These provide two key features, the first is the ability to boost off the surface allowing for powered jumps to get out of craters or to cross chasms. While in the air you can you can manually adjust the thrusters in the same way as in a ship with Flight Assist turned off. This allows for some amazing acrobatics as well as allowing you to reach locations that would be difficult to reach with normal driving. It’s also useful if you get yourself stuck!

The Scarab's turret in action - more on SRV weaponry soon

As with the rest of the game the surface of the worlds you can land on is recreated on a 1:1 scale, not only spatially but with gravity as well. Gravity has a big effect on the handling of the SRV and here the thrusters provide their second major function. When testing the SRV in different environments there are edge cases with very low gravity and extremely high gravity where the SRV becomes impossible to handle. The thrusters help compensate for these extremes in handling, but only to a limited degree – it feels very different driving on a tiny moon compared to a massive terrestrial planet.

As already mentioned making the driving fun in itself is an important goal for us. While the thrusters do add to a large extent (there’s something quite magical with boosting out of a crater and into the sunrise!) the actual contact with the vehicle and the surface provides a lot of feedback. Similar to sand buggies, if you try to push the SRV’s performance then you need to work harder to keep it under control. Feedback is very important here – the ships audio and VFX, along with the handling, create the response you need to let you know what’s going on.

The SRV is equipped with a turret optimised for engaging local opponents like skimmers (see last week’s dev update for more information on these) and other SRV’s (if hostile players are in the area). In theory you could take on a ship, but ship mounted weapons are much more powerful than the SRV’s so it’s best not to! You should also beware some of large defensive turrets – these are equipped to tackle low flying ships, but pose a threat to SRVs as well.

Combat is just one feature of an SRV. The Scarab is capable of carrying two cargo canisters and also has a new device for finding things on the surface – more on that in a couple of weeks’ time!"

Preorder Elite Dangerous: Horizons now.

An SRV approaches a base wall in this piece of early Horizons concept art. More on Settlements in the coming weeks

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"Inside the SRV" Livestream

A few of you caught Frontier CEO David Braben's latest YouTube upload earlier today, showing the very first in-game footage of the SRV in action. Now, we want to show you more.

We're hosting another stream on Wednesday October 21 at 7PM BST, with a live demo showcasing the handling and controls of the SRV. Tune in to our official YouTube channel at 7PM to watch Designer Mike Evans talk you through the SRV's controls in a live environment.

To add to the excitement of the night, Art Director Chris Gregory will show and tell us about the artistic decisions behind the Scarab, from concept to completion. We’re sure there will be time for questions afterwards, so don’t miss this must-see event!

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Behind the Music

Music plays a huge part in creating Elite Dangerous' unmistakable and immersive atmosphere. Behind the Music is a short documentary about composer Erasmus Talbot, and the composition and creation of the Elite Dangerous soundtrack. Click the image above to watch the video on YouTube.

You can vote for the Elite Dangerous audio team to win at the Golden Joystick Awards. As mentioned in previous newsletter, if we win any of the four awards we're nominated for we'll make a Golden Sidewinder available on the Frontier store for free!

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"How to Make a Real World" Recap

Thanks to the thousands of you who came to watch the How to Make a Real World Livestream. Artists Jon Bottone and Matt Dickinson spoke at length (nearly one hour!) about the incredible tech behind the creation of planets in Elite Dangerous: Horizons, and made time to answer questions afterwards.

If you weren't lucky enough to watch it as it went out live, you can catch up with the livestream in full on our official YouTube channel. We've got loads more to show you in the coming weeks, so keep a lookout on the newsletter and our social media channels for more exciting Elite Dangerous: Horizons info.

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Store Spotlight

In the newsletter every week we’ll tell people a day, a time and a social media channel they should keep an eye on to get access to a limited-use discount code.

This week's code will get you 40 percent off the Onionhead T-shirt. All you have to do is keep an eye on our official Twitter page on Saturday October 17 between 8PM and 9PM BST to see the posted code, and be one of the first 20 people to redeem it. Good luck!

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Community Goals Update

Greeting commanders,

Welcome to this week’s Community Goals blog.

On Sunday, Arissa Lavigny-Duval will be crowned Emperor. It has long been a tradition for Imperial citizens to bestow gifts upon their new ruler and this invitation has been extended to all galactic citizens with any who wishes to deliver a coronation gift in the form of slaves. Pilots who respond to the request will be offered discounts on Imperial ships, as well as being granted access to vessels that would ordinarily require a rank in the Imperial Navy. The permit restrictions on Achenar have also been temporarily lifted to allow pilots to deliver gifts to the future Emperor.

Long live the Empire, Long live Emperor Lavigny-Duval.

The War against Emperor’s Dawn Continues. Following the Empire’s recent discovery of five additional Emperor’s Dawn bases, Senator Denton Patreus has despatched military fleets to three of the systems occupied by the insurgents: Namarii, Tabaldak and LTT 874. The insurgents, meanwhile, have responded in kind, promising to reward pilots who help repel the Imperials. Some news feeds have speculated that the Senator’s actions are designed not only to maintain the pressure on Emperor’s Dawn, but also to minimise the chances of the insurgents disrupting Arissa Lavigny-Duval’s forthcoming coronation.

The outcome of the battle is by no means certain, but one thing is for sure – the wider conflict between the Empire and Emperor’s Dawn is far from over.

If you are looking for a goal this week the breakdown below should help guide you:

Achenar, Dawes Hub: Delivery Slaves to Dawes Hub to celebrate the coronation of Arrissa Lavigny-Duval as Emperor

Namarii, Hughes Hub: Emperor’s Dawn Supporters: Deliver Emperor’s Dawn combat bonds to Hughes Hub, Drake Orbital or Bell Dock

Namarii, Hughes Hub: Empire Supporters: Deliver Empire combat bonds to Hughes Hub, Rogers Dock, Parkinson Orbital

Tabaldak, Rogers Dock: Empire Supporters: Deliver Empire combat bonds to Hughes Hub, Rogers Dock, Parkinson Orbital

Tabaldak, Drake Orbital: Emperor’s Dawn Supporters: Deliver Emperor’s Dawn combat bonds to Hughes Hub, Drake Orbital or Bell Dock

LTT 874, Bell Dock: Emperor’s Dawn Supporters: Deliver Emperor’s Dawn combat bonds to Hughes Hub, Drake Orbital or Bell Dock

LTT 874, Parkinson Orbital: Empire Supporters: Deliver Empire combat bonds to Hughes Hub, Rogers Dock, Parkinson Orbital

Safe flying out in the black, Commanders!

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Comms Chatter

FantastiCon 2015 is coming to Hull again on October 26 and 26 at the Country Park Inn, right under the Hull side of the Humber Bridge. Elite Dangerous has a large presence at the science fiction, fantasy, technology, comics, gaming, books and cosplay festival, so if you live in the area, or you're up for the trip, make sure you don't miss out.

Edward Lewis, Zac Antonaci and Michael Brookes from Frontier Developments will be at the convention, so come and say hi if you're around. Mike will also be talking about his book, Elite Legacy, and might even have a copy or two to sign.

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Exploration activity has been brought to a near standstill after a data-encrypting firmware bug threatened to compromise recently acquired astronomical data. A spokesperson for Universal Cartographics released the following statement: "Commanders started noting discrepancies between the exploration records stored in their ship systems and their own personal records. When we investigated, we found that one of our contractors has purposely altered a recent firmware update that was applied to all discovery and surface scanners. We also found that the contractor had a connection to Emperor's Dawn. An arrest warrant has been issued, and our staff worked through the weekend to recover the encrypted data and replace the compromised firmware."

Exploration activity has been brought to a near standstill after a data-encrypting firmware bug threatened to compromise recently acquired astronomical data. A spokesperson for Universal Cartographics released the following statement: "Commanders started noting discrepancies between the exploration records stored in their ship systems and their own personal records. When we investigated, we found that one of our contractors has purposely altered a recent firmware update that was applied to all discovery and surface scanners. We also found that the contractor had a connection to Emperor's Dawn. An arrest warrant has been issued, and our staff worked through the weekend to recover the encrypted data and replace the compromised firmware."

After months of research, scientists working for the Canonn Interstellar Research Group observed a change in the transmissions emanating from the so-called 'unknown artefacts', also known as 'anomalous extraterrestrial objects' (or AEOs). Now the organisation believes it has decoded at least part of these strange transmissions. Startlingly, the messages appear to contain schematic diagrams of the ships being used to study the objects.

Gutamaya Shipyards' latest vessel, the Imperial Eagle, is now available for purchase for any pilot holding the appropriate rank in the Imperial Navy, and positive consumer feedback is already flooding in. Commander Corrigendum, operating in the Prism system, said: "The Imperial Eagle is a blast to fly. It handles beautifully and has looks to match. I was able to stick on the tail of an Imperial Courier during combat exercises. It's a great addition to the Gutamaya portfolio." Commander Stateira 'Starcloak' Eleshenar added: "I love my Eagle, so I was curious to see if Gutamaya could improve on Core Dynamics' classic design. Now I've taken it out a few times, I'm happy to say it retains all the sublime responsiveness of the Eagle, and packs a harder punch in combat."

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That’s it for Newsletter #95. As always, if there's anything in particular that you’d like to hear more about, or if you'd like to ask a question, then please contact us at elite-newsletter@frontier.co.uk.

Click for the latest Game Manual, Quickstart Guide and Pilot Training Videos. Visit our Support team here and read our previous newsletters here.

Until next time, fly safe and Right On, Commander.

The Frontier Team