What is the ELITE ship pack?

[Gibbon]

Good question and while i could explain it, this site does a better job of it.

elite.frontier.co.uk/

Saying that for those that can't be bothered to look, ELITE was the grandfather of all the space trading games you see today. Released in 1984 and written by David Braben & Ian Bell, the game introduced many concepts that we all take for granted in modern 3D space games and was a huge influence for the creators of EVE Online amongst others.

I played it when it came out and nobody had ever seen a 3D space game where there was actual combat, trading and travelling the universe all in one tidy little package. ELITE used wiremesh representations of the ships in the game, although later versions started to use shaded graphics on the models.

There hasn't really been a similar game like it to be honest, many have tried and been found sadly lacking. I'd like to say Freelancer came close, but in all honesty it didn't, although the basic principles were there. Freelancer offers the same ideas but in a much smaller universe, but the advantage Freelancer has is it looks a million times better.

With the 25th anniversary of ELITE, i've taken it upon myself to create an ELITE ship pack featuring all the models from the original game, kindly supplied by a gentleman called Griff who not only made these excellent models but textured them as well.

First thing, the Coriolis Station, a little flyby

[Cadfael]

We even didn't have a computer until 1989...

pity I didn't know of the game back then, would have changed my world i think.

[Gibbon]

It changed a lot of peoples worlds, mine included. It's the grandaddy of them all and these models i've been given to convert are great. Fans of the original will instantly recognise them

[Gibbon]

First video uploaded

[drom]

Great Idee..)..i play that game on my good old C64..and i wonder still today how i come clear with that analog joystick..hehe..That game was the "start" point for me to play over the years a lot of Space/shotting/RPG/mission/trading/hunting and lot of fun games so far..)
Games like tie fighter..WC..(3 was the best)..Privateer ..X-series..and a lot of more.
If u can take in that landing-prozess(without landing computer)..hehe..that should be learn some people to correct landing on a base ..*smile*..oh..last word..)..some over the cockpit window crawling Tribles..where be funny..
greetings:..Drom..)
Ps:.sorry..for that long replay..i wrote it and dreaming about old times.

[Gibbon]

Hi drom
Yes i agree with you, Elite is what started me off, there's a version you can play now called Oolite which is basically the original Elite with dozens of little mods for it so it looks much better than the original and plays a lot better as well.

[HunterKiller]

Nice Gibbon. Looks really good. You always do great work when it comes to converting things over to Freelancer.

HK

[Gibbon]

Thanks HK, tbh i've been looking for some decent ELITE models for years and this guy Griff who made them has done a fantastic job on them. I know they are not everyones cup of tea but for fans of the game you won't find better renditions of them

[Gibbon]

piccies added

[Gibbon]

Got them all hardpointed and scripted now, next thing is to test them in game and apply the lightmaps and hopefully, job done

[elitefan]

I've not played Freelancer. I'm buying a copy of the game so I can check out your mod pack!

The original BBC B version of Elite is the best in my opinion, but I'd love to try the Archimedes version - ArcElite. Emulators just don't do games justice sometimes - I played Elite on my BBC machine last week for the first time in decades, and it's got me hooked again.

[Gibbon]

Hiya and welcome. It's been years for me as well regarding playing Elite, wasn't until recently i found Oolite, which is an awesome remake of the original, better than any other version i've played. What i like about it is the fact it's so easy to add extras if you want them, addons made by the community, that it blows all the old versions of Elite into the water. HAve a look here:

wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Oolite_Main_Page

[elitefan]

Bloody hell! I first saw Oolite quite a number of years ago. It looks fantastic now! Just bought an Archimedes to try out Arc Elite on it's native hardware, too....

Thanks for the heads-up.