Got Elite Dangerous on console? We’ve got some really bad news for you.
Elite Dangerous requires an always online connection so if developer Frontier Developments pulled the plug, short of implementing an offline patch, it’d be unplayable. However, that’s not happened.. yet. What has happened, which makes us nervous about the future of the console’s incarnation, is that Frontier has declared it’s done with developing content for Elite Dangerous’s Xbox and PlayStation incarnation.
“Over the last several months, we have been wrestling with the best way to move forward, and it is with a heavy heart we have decided to cancel all console development… Elite Dangerous will continue on console as it is now together with critical updates, but we will focus on new content updates on PC on the post-Odyssey codebase”, reads creator David Braben’s statement. In other words, PC players will be getting new content, but console players won’t.
So, what happened? Elite Dangerous, if you’ve yet to dive into it, is an open-universe space combat and trading sim, a reimagination of the original 1984 Elite. Its latest update, Odyssey, was set to inject a dose of No Man’s Sky, giving you the ability to land on planets and more.
A statement on Odyssey console development: https://t.co/9CGEFY1uyt pic.twitter.com/o9Wby77Oek
— Elite Dangerous (@EliteDangerous) March 10, 2022
However, as reported by PC Gamer, the launch didn’t go so well, to the point where Braben apologised for its buggy state. That, in turn, has lead to the situation where Frontier has felt the need to “… focus on a single codebase.”
In other words, developing for both PC and consoles is juggling too many plates. If you’re wondering what happened to the Mac version, by the way, that was completely discontinued six months ago.
Frontier Development has plenty of strings to its bow, including the upcoming F1 Manager 2022, but cutting the console versions of Elite Dangerous loose is not going to win it any goodwill.
