Elite Dangerous’ Odyssey expansion has been a bit of a bungle, all told. While players initially embraced the new content, even we noted it felt rushed and unfinished, and players have since been complaining bitterly about bugs and issues and dropped features the slow pace of fixes and the perception of poor communication from the studio. And then last week, the community was in an uproar again as Frontier threatened to ban players who were harassing developers on social media.
Now, Frontier’s own David Braben has finally issued a direct message to the community, saying the studio has “heard the feedback clearly and […] will act on that feedback.” He essentially admits that the console launch, already slowed, is going to be delayed further, but for good reason: Frontier is going to focus on fixing the PC version after all.
“[W]e have spent a lot of time discussing and re-evaluating our previous plans and we have made the decision to prioritise the core PC experience for Elite Dangerous. Ultimately, we believe it is right to focus our efforts on the core Elite Dangerous Odyssey experience for the platforms that we have released on, before opening up to more. We know that the work that we do to improve players’ experiences of Elite Dangerous Odyssey on PC will benefit other platforms in the future, but the dates and details of the console platforms are going to change. We do not want to rush into confirming any dates or changes this has on our console release, as we must remain fully focused on the core Elite experience. Only when we feel that the foundation of the PC release is solid, will we be able to re-lay our console roadmap on top.”
Braben specifically promises “more game updates” in the next few months. “We will continue to work through Issue Tracker, fix bugs and improve performance, but we will also be able to explore and add additional features, content and improvements into the game,” he says. “We will continue to give open monthly development updates where we discuss WIP content, challenges, the issue tracker and more. We know that the previous levels of detail for the roadmap and developer update have not met expectations, but we are grateful for your patience while we shift and adjust plans, in the face of such clear feedback.”
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