The Exocraft are Broken. But I think it's an easy fix.

[Anarkitty :3]

They are on the surface so much fun (no pun intended, really), but using them is a pain, for reasons that i think would be a relatively easy fix and a massive Quality of Life improvement for new players especially.

1) No advanced mining laser for the Nautilon, which is the craft that arguably needs them most as most underwater resources are locked behind the advanced mining laser. It's literally unusable.

2) The first person controls don't match the third person controls making the whole affair awkward and unintuitive

3) FPV controls for some godforsaken reason aren't WASD + mouse for aiming like any other video game ever made and are instead mouse steer + mouse aim, I've literally never seen another game do this, and as i've found out playing NMS it's for a very good reason that other games don't do this. It's awful.

4) In first person they are WASD the way god intended, but there's weird drift to aiming the laser when in third person it snaps into position like it should.

5) There's no descent key for the Nautilon but there's an ascend key (Space). So to descend, you point your mouse downwards, which because it's also the camera control, means you can't see ♥♥♥♥ with it blocking your view but for some reason ascending upwards is not an issue. Just copy Subnautica, that's a video game where a submersible feels satisfying.

6) The weird weight added by the exocraft makes mouse steering really annoying, on high sensitivity it's too sensitive for small adjustments, and on low sensitivity you'll run out of desk before you get the damn thing to turn properly. That's not to say the exocraft shouldn't have any weight mind you - but to say that they should control with WASD like they're supposed to.

7) The Minotaur controls are an actual cruel joke. In First Person View, pressing S, instead of walking backwards, turns you around in place. In Third Person View, pressing S makes the body turn 90 degrees while the mech slowly starts making a half-assed turn in the general vicinity of where you want while also moving forward, making it less of a turn and more of a walk in a circle. Both are wrong, but the TPV one is just a real gamer moment.

The fix for all these issues is very simple:

1. Add the advanced mining laser to Nautilon and put it in the upgrade tree for it on the Space Anomaly so it's existence is actually justified and the underwater portion of the game is explorable.

2. Roamer/Pilgrim/Colossus Exocraft should have controls as follows:
W to Accelerate
S to go backwards (not turn around like they do right now but reverse like you would expect a car to work)
A to turn left
D to turn right
Mouse to aim laser (and look around in TPV)

3. Nomad/Minotaur Exocraft should have controls as follows:
W to move forward in the direction of the camera
S to go backwards (again, reverse, not turn around, in Minotaur's case - walk backwards like any other video game mech)
A to strafe left (walk sideways to the left)
D to strafe right (walk sideways to the right)
Mouse to aim laser and steer (in case of the Minotaur, it should only turn towards where you look with the top half of the body, and then turn the rest of the body to fully face the camera when you press a directional key, in case of the snappy Nomad, it should just turn along with your camera as you rotate it around, Left Alt still allows freelook as it does now)
Shift to boost (In Minotaur's case - Sprint)

4. The Nautilon Exocraft should have controls as follows:
W to move in the direction of the camera
S to go backwards (again, reverse, not turn around)
A to strafe left
D to strafe right
Ctrl to Descend
Space to Ascend
Shift to Boost (for the love of god add high speed boosters to it)
Mouse to aim laser and steer (Hint: it's a sci-fi fantasy submarine, not a barrel, it should steer accordingly fast and snappy and be satisfying, but in TPV, the camera should also be more "over-the-shoulder", so that it doesn't block the view, rather than having the Nautilon even vaguely centered)

Really what I've described is just like how any other game does it. And likewise for controllers many games have implemented controls for similar vehicles infinitely better.

I know HG is busy right now doing it's expeditions stuff, but there are players like me who will absolutely never engage with any social/multiplayer portions of the game outside of mucking around with friends, and will appreciate the game much more if simply driving/flying/powerwalking in a mech suit/swimming around exploring was just more fun. I don't know who designed the controls for this game or what they were thinking, but judging by the fact the ship controls aren't set to Locked Inverted by default, they have some weird ideas about how games control.

Maybe they grew up with the N64 controller instead of a good one. But just like how you can torture yourself and switch back to what the game calls "Normal" flight controls, you could easily add remappable (or even just as a switch between new/old) controls for exocrafts for veteran players. You might need to tweak some acceleration values for Nomad and Nautilus to be snappy but not feel rigid and un-animated, but other than that I don't think you'd need to alter the physics of the craft at all for the controls. Unless there's some enormous spaghetti codebase involved that for some reason makes the exocraft function the way they do, there's no reason to reinvent the wheel with this when so many games have already done it better. It's like if the game had you look around with the D-Pad on a controller.

Please devs, consider this. I love the game. I want to love it more. 18 Quintilion times more. And from other forum goers i'd love any comments or suggestions you have for the exocraft.

[Dirak2012]

I don't know, to me the mouse controls seem very intuitive, but maybe I'm just weird.
What bothers me, is that they made the exocraft slower when they introduced the ability to upgrade them. They should be twice as fast without upgrades.

[Mr. Bufferlow]

The Devs "sort of" fixed my major complaint....namely that you give us a horrible FOV and have us use them on planets that are essentially swiss cheese so you are bound to fall into holes on a regular basis since you can't see them coming.

It seems like they have toned down the holes on most planets since Origins so it is not as terrible as in the past.

Rather then fix the driving mechanics as OP recommends, I would just scrap them all except the land speeder (one that also glides over water) and the sub and actually add some new variants that are fun. And I mean FUN not just interesting to mod out.

The Colossus is just the oddest addition. I am not sure who came up with the concept that players would love to drive around in a big dump truck at slow speeds on planets. They should have added the back-up warning if they wanted to go that direction.

It is telling when most players who do the exocraft tech missions end up doing them in their ship because they just suck to do in the actual exocraft...not fun at all.

[Dirak2012]

Ironically, the Colossus is the easiest to fix. Just give it an interior, where you have storage and space to set up refineries.

[wkitty42]

Oprindeligt skrevet af Mr. Bufferlow:

It is telling when most players who do the exocraft tech missions end up doing them in their ship because they just suck to do in the actual exocraft...not fun at all.

i figured out real quick-like that the exocraft aren't up to the task for most all of their missions... they're definitely too slow... we won't even point out the problems of a land exocraft on an island world with a lot of water... when i missed my first exocraft missions because the thing was too slow, i reloaded my save and used my ship instead... yeah...

[Anarkitty :3]

Yeah the colossus should sort of be like a mobile base with a portable refiner and a signal booster and tons of inventory (the last part is right)

I don't agree with scrapping them, I think as they are the designs are fun (though it'd be fun if two players could ride some of them, maybe with one controlling the gun/mining laser and other driving). If they simply controlled better, they'd be much more fun. And just using your ship is kind of not fun, yeah it's faster as it stands and more fluid, but you miss out on all the cool stuff you might have found driving to your destination. Just yesterday i found this awesome massive canyon on an ice planet i would have missed if i took the ship instead of the roamer. My issue is only the controls, personally.

[Rexxer]

Oprindeligt skrevet af Mr. Bufferlow:

Rather then fix the driving mechanics as OP recommends, I would just scrap them all except the land speeder (one that also glides over water) ..

That's what I always do: I only build and upgrade one exocraft, the Nomad. It is generally the most useful as it hovers over surfaces and hence can drive over both land and water. All other exocraft will sink into water and be much less useful except on land. For surveying in particular this is important since hotspots are discoverable over water as well as land, and it's a pain to go diving to survey.

Hotspots over water, btw, I always build up in air, not water. The hotspot extends vertically outward, so you can build extractors in the air over the hotspot even if it is in a deep ocean. Just runs some platforms out to it and put down the extractors, then delete all the extra walkways so only the extractors remain.

[tkwoods]

I never use exocraft. Don't think they fit my play style, but I'd not go as far as to say they are broken. They are not broken, they just to meet certain player's expectations.

[Voodoojedizin]

Why do people think if they say something way over the top, and not true, more people will view their post?
The exocraft are not broken, all of them work perfectly fine.
You may have the opinion that they could be improved, and that's ok but don't over dramatize your opinion because it's wrong. Or maybe you don't understand the difference in broken, and improve.

[Lindy Bomber]

The Minotaur should have the same controls you have when you are on foot, wh9ich is kind of what you're saying. I don't have any issues with the controls for the other craft, just their lack of function. What I want is something like this;

https://youtu.be/SoJSKH7jDzE

[Weaver]

The core issue with exocraft is that when they changed things so you could call your ship to you anywhere on any planets surface, exocraft became pointless.

[Rexxer]

Oprindeligt skrevet af tkwoods:

I never use exocraft. Don't think they fit my play style, but I'd not go as far as to say they are broken. They are not broken, they just to meet certain player's expectations.

In reality, after I build my first mining bases, I rarely use even the one exocraft I do upgrade. I use the one exocraft mainly because mining often takes place on stormy planets, so it makes surveying a little easier. On any game start I'll build 7 or so mining bases within the first few hours, then after that its just jumping from one galaxy to the next.....and the exocraft is left somewhere on a distant planet where I built my last mine.

[Grimmslayer73]

Oprindeligt skrevet af Weaver:

The core issue with exocraft is that when they changed things so you could call your ship to you anywhere on any planets surface, exocraft became pointless.

Thats very true! Personally, I'd like to see some rare planets that have no fly zones...call it a magnetic disturbance for lore... Ships can't fly in the zones... only way in or out is by exocraft. Would give them a purpose!

[SirProsik]

Exocraft are really fun on planets without storms. I really enjoy the Nomad on paradise planets.

Only real gripes are the nerfs with Mech release which needs to add slots for hazard protection. The Nomad also has its resistance factor all jacked up since you jump backwards on airless planets :( Should be able to build up speed and make some impressive jumps on regular planets without the jacked up resistance blocking jumping.

If you max out the engines and put them in a square formation you can really get them moving pretty fast.
I setup the Roamer and Mech due to their hazard protections/more space and use the nomad on 'safe' planets only.

[Anarkitty :3]

Oprindeligt skrevet af Voodoojedizin:

Why do people think if they say something way over the top, and not true, more people will view their post?
The exocraft are not broken, all of them work perfectly fine.
You may have the opinion that they could be improved, and that's ok but don't over dramatize your opinion because it's wrong. Or maybe you don't understand the difference in broken, and improve.

That's just like, your opinion, man. It's also incorrect.

Here's some facts:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/broken
2: damaged or altered by or as if by breaking (see BREAK entry 1): such as
: not working properly

So, by definition, if something is not working properly - it is broken.

For example:
If your keyboard arrived without keys it's not "to be improved" by having the rest of the keys on it - it is broken.
When a game does not control as it should, it's not "to be improved upon" - it is broken.

The important thing here to distinguish is that if the controls were simply bad, like move forwards mapped to the Page Down key, that would be something to be improved upon, but as it stands, there are essential upgrades missing to the exocraft (Nautilon specifically as specified in the OP) and the controls do not allow the range of motion that the exocraft should have, and absolutely not in the way it should have. Therefore, my point stands. They're broken.
A sentiment echoed by countless players here and on the /r/NoMansSkyTheGame subreddit.

That's not to say i'm just bashing HG, in fact if you read my OP, you can see I've suggested clear paths to improvements, outlining what I personally believe controls should look like. I love it anyway, as i originally stated, and it's not without flaws, but this particular aspect is so flawed it's simply not functioning as one would expect and as i assume was intended.

[ShadowKatt]

Oprindeligt skrevet af Ｄｅａｄｆｒｉｅｎｄ:

Oprindeligt skrevet af Voodoojedizin:

Why do people think if they say something way over the top, and not true, more people will view their post?
The exocraft are not broken, all of them work perfectly fine.
You may have the opinion that they could be improved, and that's ok but don't over dramatize your opinion because it's wrong. Or maybe you don't understand the difference in broken, and improve.

That's just like, your opinion, man. It's also incorrect.

Here's some facts:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/broken
2: damaged or altered by or as if by breaking (see BREAK entry 1): such as
: not working properly

So, by definition, if something is not working properly - it is broken.

For example:
If your keyboard arrived without keys it's not "to be improved" by having the rest of the keys on it - it is broken.
When a game does not control as it should, it's not "to be improved upon" - it is broken.

The important thing here to distinguish is that if the controls were simply bad, like move forwards mapped to the Page Down key, that would be something to be improved upon, but as it stands, there are essential upgrades missing to the exocraft (Nautilon specifically as specified in the OP) and the controls do not allow the range of motion that the exocraft should have, and absolutely not in the way it should have. Therefore, my point stands. They're broken.
A sentiment echoed by countless players here and on the /r/NoMansSkyTheGame subreddit.

That's not to say i'm just bashing HG, in fact if you read my OP, you can see I've suggested clear paths to improvements, outlining what I personally believe controls should look like. I love it anyway, as i originally stated, and it's not without flaws, but this particular aspect is so flawed it's simply not functioning as one would expect and as i assume was intended.

I wholeheartedly agree that it is broken... yes BROKEN! it doesn't work "fine" and could maybe use some "improvements"... the controls are straight up broken. And to voodoojedizin I would say... have you actually USED the Minotaur? That thing is complete and utter garbage... the controls for all of the EC need improvement, and I think D e a d f r i e n d 's suggestions would probably fix all of the issues I have with the way they drive... but particularly the Minotaur... I have never, in my over 30 years of gaming, never ever come across an in-game vehicle that drives as badly as this piece of garbage... even if the only thing the developers changed was to make the S key REVERSE... THAT would be HUGE... to be able to walk up to a precipice, take in the view, and then be able to STEP AWAY BACKWARDS FROM THE CLIFF... instead of having to step off of the edge in order to move again... I mean... seriously... how do these things not even have simple REVERSE?

yeah... broken