You have resparked my interest in elite. I played back when players were hunting for the formidine rift, which was all a part of the upcoming thargoids patch in the form of lore. I love this game! I always wanted a "galactical space battle game" and this is it. Ive had since 1984 to find it and it wasnt until E:D that i discovered it.
This game isnt just a game, its a way of life, and elite: dangerous is not just a game it is many! Everything that is added or implemented is all a part of the storyline. Series of events are what create the content. To someone who is unaware of how crazy the lore of this game is, this game is far from new. The developers of this game have done exactly what i think all other games should do. Instead of having 10,000 versions of the same game (call of duty for example) have one game that you update. As the Engine changes for better graphics etc surely a new name is due but the previous game should be ported to the new one as a continuation.
This is what elite devs have done. The name is "Elite" and what i consider timeframes come after the :colon
Elite is our world set in the future, assuming humans will colonize outerspace. It is also in real time, so when the first version of elite was released in 1984, Day 1 (set by a futuristic date) was literally 24 full hours along with every day. One "real life day" is equal to one full day in elite. So the "lore" in the game and progression and storyline of the game literally goes back 34 years.
The "galaxy" is literally a 1:1 scale of our very own milkyway galaxy. So much so that when a new system was found by Scientists with multiple earth-like planets, E:D went to add this info to the game only to realize the system was already there! All they had to do was rename the systems name! The galaxy (our galaxy) is so massive that to jump from system to system from one edge of the galaxy to the other (in-game) literally takes up to 2 months of real-time back-to-back jumps. Want to travel to the center of the galaxy? It will take you an extremely long time! Exploration in elite is extremely time consuming and rewarding. If you find a never before explored system, scanning and turning in data will put your name as the founder of the system. The freedom to do as you please makes this game very unique!
I could keep going too! The lore is very political and actually makes for a great story and there are books written that you can read! Great article!