The latest updates for “Elite: Dangerous” are pushing the game in a more social direction, as players have now been given incentives to “feed” their space stations, providing them with resources that help them grow and eventually reach “adulthood”. The new 1.1 update now allows space stations to mature and grow old, and the trailer for the update shows how a station develops from a small one to a major complex.
Community goals now provide players with objectives that are shared among them, promoting teamplay and encouraging people to stick together. For example, players can now team up for transporting goods to build a station, or providing a specific faction with the resources they need to go to war. Of course, players can also choose to take part in those wars and help one of the factions, destroying another one in the process.
Discovery tags were also added in 1.1, which allow players to place their names permanently on discoveries they’ve made, allowing everyone to see them later on. The route planner has been improved as well, allowing players to go quite a bit further without having to take breaks for another plan. It’s now also possible to tell when a planet is inhabited from space, as it will have visible lights on it.
Development of the game is moving on with full force, as 1.2 is already being prepared for a March release, according to the latest release of the game’s newsletter. The new update is going to include the Fer-de-Lance craft, returning from the original “Elite” and preserving its characteristic look to a large extent.
The 1.2 update will apparently focus heavily on the game’s online component, and it will give players even more options for teaming up and taking on greater challenges alongside one another. It will be easier for friends to find one another as well. Some players have drawn analogies between this and “Player wings”, a feature that has been discussed quite a lot by the game’s community.
1.1 was already a great step in the right direction as far as making the game a better social experience goes, and it looks like 1.2 is going to do an even greater job in this regard, making the game a fantastic online title, great for spending some quality time with friends. It’s not clear if future updates will still move in that direction, or if the developers plan on paying some extra attention to solo players as well, but considering how much the community has been requesting improvements to the multiplayer features, it’s great to see that the developers are putting work in this area.