Elite Dangerous: Horizons

 PC
User Score
5.2

Mixed or average reviews- based on 92 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 40 out of 92
  2. Mixed: 11 out of 92
  3. Negative: 41 out of 92

Review this game

  1. Your Score
    0 out of 10
    Rate this:
    • 10
    • 9
    • 8
    • 7
    • 6
    • 5
    • 4
    • 3
    • 2
    • 1
    • 0
    • 0
  1. Submit
  2. Check Spelling
view
per page
  1. Much
    Dec 19, 2015
    0
    Only a total sucker would buy this for a price of a full AAA game.
    Same as E:D, this is an empty boring shell game mod, selling non-existing features.
    What a joke.
  2. Soopyyy
    Apr 22, 2017
    1
    I have way more hours in this game than I should. But that's not indicative of compelling gameplay. It literally takes hundreds of hours to get ANYTHING. The game does not respect the time of the player at all.
    The gameplay loop its self (the things you do to get anywhere) are shallow and repetitive. Frontier lacks direction and the design team simply don't seem to have the capacity to    I have way more hours in this game than I should. But that's not indicative of compelling gameplay. It literally takes hundreds of hours to get ANYTHING. The game does not respect the time of the player at all.
    The gameplay loop its self (the things you do to get anywhere) are shallow and repetitive. Frontier lacks direction and the design team simply don't seem to have the capacity to put together a game that is fun.
    As of the time of writing, the latest 2.3 patch has added nothing of value despite being 6 months late. There has been no noticeable change or improvement to the game since release in early 2015. It's entirely likely that there won't be.
    If you want a "Space Engine" game with slightly more interactivity than Space Engine, but massively less scientific accuracy, maybe pick up this title if it's $5-10...    … Expand
  3. fitteslim
    Oct 28, 2017
    0
    Frontier Developments showed themselves as a company that doesn't keep its promises with this expansion, or "season" as they chose to call it. There is almost no content or gameplay here, just the possibility of driving around in a buggy on practically empty planets.
  4. Almostpilot
    Apr 7, 2017
    2
    The biggest disappointment I had with such a long awaited game. In addition to the developer lies during the campaign. The game was released on bare bones and still remains so today. Neither the Horizons expansion with the landing on completely empty planets. Also they still can not deliver the content of all season 2, this is completely late. The multicrew will be born dead, because theThe biggest disappointment I had with such a long awaited game. In addition to the developer lies during the campaign. The game was released on bare bones and still remains so today. Neither the Horizons expansion with the landing on completely empty planets. Also they still can not deliver the content of all season 2, this is completely late. The multicrew will be born dead, because the gameplay presented during the beta is ridiculous. Other than that, they added and lost time with unnecessary developments like CQC, PP, Arena, Engineers and the gaming mechanics that needed to be deepened such as exploration, trade, mining still relegated to the background. 400 billion systems with the same planets repeated in all of them plus points of interest completely repeated in each of them.… Expand
  5. KenDoNagasaki
    Jul 6, 2016
    0
    You can land on planets - great for the first few times then... well... There's nothing on 'em really.
    Engineers? Worse thing FD ever introduced to this already lacklustre affair.
  6. MartangTheFirst
    Sep 3, 2016
    0
    Waste of money tbh. Just gives you another way to get more boring pointless missions that offer no real progression. Currently it feels like a prototyped feature they're promising to improve at some point in the future.

    Oh and the car you can drive around on the planet surface WILL MAKE YOU SICK IN VR. 100% guaranteed, they really don't seem to care about the VR experience at all.
  7. nba2k17_pro
    Oct 16, 2016
    2
    I have spent playing elite for hundreds of hours. Now before you go on your: "he plays game for hundreds of hours and complains, clearly he got his moneys worth!" , have in mind how wast of majority of that time was spent: grinding and flying in boring super cruise.

    Do you like watching sliders go up when dealing with system factions, major powers, powerplay characters, your ratings?    I have spent playing elite for hundreds of hours. Now before you go on your: "he plays game for hundreds of hours and complains, clearly he got his moneys worth!" , have in mind how wast of majority of that time was spent: grinding and flying in boring super cruise.

    Do you like watching sliders go up when dealing with system factions, major powers, powerplay characters, your ratings? Do you like xploring and like watching slider fill up before a discovery is made? Do you like sitting and doing nothing and watching the little distance timer slowly fall toward 1000km? Do you like watching 5 second timer reach zero before every jump? do you want to upgrade your ships and watch additional sliders randomly stop and decide what your upgrade will be? Well then this is the game for you! If you are not a fan of watching sliders go up or down, then the game isn't for you.

    I have seen some rotten grind in games, but how disgustingly not fun and grindy so called gameplay in elite is, is mind blowing.

    I'm giving horizons 2 out of 10, cause it allows you landing on planets and planets do look good. Engineers are garbage, broke pvp and broke "blaze your own trail" to. They also gave the middle finger to everyone not owning horizons, as if a guy with acess to engineers can upgrade his ship by 40%, well then he clearly has a huge advantage toward a guy with the same ship that doesn't own horizons, that can't upgrade it.    … Expand
  8. darkbladebfg
    Feb 25, 2016
    1
    The most repetitive and boring game I ever bought in my life,the expansion whose main feature is landing on planets is a total joke unless you think landing on planets with same 3 ugly texture types is worth 50 dollars.
    There are no epic random events like it should be in any space game,no new interesting stuff to discover now and then,players can only be found in starting areas because    The most repetitive and boring game I ever bought in my life,the expansion whose main feature is landing on planets is a total joke unless you think landing on planets with same 3 ugly texture types is worth 50 dollars.
    There are no epic random events like it should be in any space game,no new interesting stuff to discover now and then,players can only be found in starting areas because everyone is scattered all over the galaxy or just play offline,pvp feels unrewarding...maybe it's decent for people who always wanted an euro truck simulator in space because this is exactly how the game feels like now.    … Expand
  9. Goseigen
    Dec 27, 2015
    1
    Elite Dangerous has always felt like a backbone for an amazing game. It has so much untapped potential which could really push the game to the next level. The original version was riddled with bugs and many core features, like missions, were just broken for a really long time. Every time something was fixed, something else broke in the process. It also quickly ran out of content andElite Dangerous has always felt like a backbone for an amazing game. It has so much untapped potential which could really push the game to the next level. The original version was riddled with bugs and many core features, like missions, were just broken for a really long time. Every time something was fixed, something else broke in the process. It also quickly ran out of content and different ways of playing were completely imbalanced compared to others. For example trading brings in tens or maybe hundreds of times as much credits as bounties/exploring.

    Horizons continues the same path as the main game. Landings on planets and bring a whole new aspect to the game... in theory. You will quickly find out that none of the interesting planets are landable. You can only land on rocky/ice bodies which contain absolutely nothing. Materials found on the planet surface are tedious to gather and worth almost nothing. Even the special encounters are totally useless and will net you credits worth of one low bounty pirate kill. After messing around an hour with the SRV, you won't ever land on a planet again. It's just not worth it.

    Again I'm just baffled how amazing features like building your own base and co-op heavy content isn't even in the planning. The update is said to have two person piloted ships, but with no real content it will get boring really fast. Without serious addition of undocumented features (Base building, co-op/group content, ship/equipment construction, unique module drops, THARGOIDS!) this game will just fade away. This game has so much potential but the developers just don't seem to have any idea what people want or how to properly balance the game.

    Pros:
    - Driving SRV on the planet surface is fun for a while

    Cons:
    - Planets contain nothing of interest
    - New missions are broken and probably take ages to get fixed.
    - You can't land on interesting planet types like earth-like planets.
    - Planet landing being the main feature of this expansion, 50€ price tag is outrageous. Pre-orderers got 25% discount but even that for an incomplete expansion is a joke.    … Expand
  10. CptBadger
    Feb 20, 2016
    0
    This is such a blatant money grab it's not even funny. It's very hard to find another company selling you "an expansion" with so little actual content.

    2 rocky, very ugly planets to land on.

    That's it.

    Seriously.

    Avoid Braben and his company.
  11. Blackcompany
    Jan 29, 2016
    1
    This is not a game. Its a space flight simulator with a few boring, repetitive proof of concept activities thrown in to create useless time sinks. It adds nothing of significance to the base game yet cost almost as much. Add to that unstable servers that cannot handle peak traffic for transactions and authentication. If you're on the East Coast of the US, forget playing during evenings andThis is not a game. Its a space flight simulator with a few boring, repetitive proof of concept activities thrown in to create useless time sinks. It adds nothing of significance to the base game yet cost almost as much. Add to that unstable servers that cannot handle peak traffic for transactions and authentication. If you're on the East Coast of the US, forget playing during evenings and weekends, its a slog waiting on servers all the time.… Expand
  12. Vio
    Dec 30, 2015
    0
    Way way overpriced for what your getting; essentially they are selling "early access" to their expansion at the price of a full priced game, and its not really an expansion it is a replacement for the old game which you need to buy again full price...
  13. eldumloido
    May 29, 2016
    0
    First dlc to the dlc selling platform elite dangerous. Not worth the money and still doesn't have actual game part unless you count mmo grinding as gameplay, to me it's just a way to sell boosters and crap.
  14. Hangar18
    Dec 27, 2015
    0
    Disgraceful upgrade....exactly what I'd expect from EA but not David bradben. Expected so much more especially considering the price. Game is just a monotonous grind and nowhere near as much fun as it should be.
  15. CareBear
    Dec 19, 2015
    0
    Game is unplayable. Do not purchase through Steam as Frontier will not recognize your cd key. Contacted support and they gave no response. Game is also full price for what should have been an expansion. Just don't buy this game you literally won't be able to play and support will ignore you.
  16. Pannon
    Dec 26, 2015
    0
    If you are buying this barely alpha expansion, you are part of the problem. Companies releasing broken/barebone expansions now, for full price of an entire game. I'm not even gonna mention, how Frontier has completely deserted the ones, who actually gave them their starting cash to create the game itself. The alpha backers are completely ignored and told basically to re-buy the entire gameIf you are buying this barely alpha expansion, you are part of the problem. Companies releasing broken/barebone expansions now, for full price of an entire game. I'm not even gonna mention, how Frontier has completely deserted the ones, who actually gave them their starting cash to create the game itself. The alpha backers are completely ignored and told basically to re-buy the entire game all over again, not allowing to upgrade their base game, they have purchased for almost twice as much in alpha stage, than the general public. It is not uncommon (Frontier do censor them off their forums and Steam pages), that people who payed over $70 or even over $100.00 are not welcome to own the expansion, even though they paid twice as much money upfront, 2 years ago.
    If you are a regular buyer, who bought this game for $49.99 in 2014, and then bought Horizons in Dec- 2015, you are enabling these companies to get away with robbery. Your actions as a consumer basically create an unfriendly atmosphere for other kickstarter projects too, since the ones, who would love to see new ideas and ready to pay twice the final product's price, are becoming concerned, that later on, the company will walk all over them and throw them away, like a dirty napkin, but taking their money along.
    You, the consumer, you have the right NOT to purchase products like this, not because it's terrible, but to protest unfair business practices and reject the notion, that companies would brake their promises and threw their base supporters under the bus, for another basket full of money.
    At the end, it you - the end user/consumer- who is getting hurt, because you are going to pay a fortune in the near future, after every bug fix , every extra additional color, or a new sound effect. And you will complain and try to find answer, how did we end up to here?
    If you bought Horizons, well, THAT way. That's your first step. Mark it down.    … Expand
  17. eduardvictor
    Dec 20, 2015
    0
    It would be great if Frontier Developments toned down the completely pointless grind by about 90%.

    Grind is NOT fun in ANY game. There is a reason why only 3000 players are playing this on Steam, meanwhile FD is bragging that they sold over a million copies. I had a ton of fun in the Horizons Beta, because everything costs 10% of what it does on the live server. I actually felt    It would be great if Frontier Developments toned down the completely pointless grind by about 90%.

    Grind is NOT fun in ANY game.

    There is a reason why only 3000 players are playing this on Steam, meanwhile FD is bragging that they sold over a million copies.

    I had a ton of fun in the Horizons Beta, because everything costs 10% of what it does on the live server.

    I actually felt like I was progressing every time I killed someone, sold something, or did a mission.

    Meanwhile, on the live server, I barely scraped together enough money in 4 hours of play just to upgrade my Cobra Mk 3 to a Cobra Mk 4, and I can't equip jack **** on it because everything good costs over half a million for each part, sometimes over 1.5 million.

    At this rate, I will never get into that ship that costs 170 million+ and requires faction rep grind, unless I literally only play this game all day every day for the next 2 years straight.

    Grinding money for years to go through 10 different **** ships in order to get to an actually good one is not my idea of fun, if I wanted that, I'd still be playing Eve Online.

    I do enough grinding IRL, TYVM, when I get into a game, I expect to have fun.

    They should either make the rewards not be complete and utter **** for everything, or lower the prices to beta server levels (10% of live server prices), or double that, hell, even triple, but not **** 10 times more.

    Add to that the fact that it takes ages to get anywhere in this game, because of the much too slow supercruise, and you have a recipe for a game that no one but the most hardcore and unemployed people will want to / have time to play past 2 weeks at a time with 10 month breaks in between.

    Most frustrating, grindy and boring game I've ever played in 20 years, with the possible exception of Archeage.

    Absolutely FRUSTRATING to play, and less fun that Eve Online.

    The developers are making a game that THEY want to play, and they are completely IGNORING every single ♥♥♥♥ing piece of feedback that the community gives them to make this ♥♥♥♥ game more fun and less of a ♥♥♥♥ing chore to play.

    They are not increasing mission rewards or reducing prices, so you don't have to grind an arbitrary number of credits back for half a day in order to get your ship back.

    They are not fixing the completely BROKEN interdiction system, which makes it completely ♥♥♥♥ing impossible to avoid an interdiction every time you take a courier mission.

    Earlier today, I took a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ 6000 credit reward courier mission and got interdicted 4 times in a ♥♥♥♥ing row (IMPOSSIBLE TO AVOID) by a CLIPPER, in my COBRA MK IV, and lost it. There, 900000 worth of ship gone to ♥♥♥♥ in minutes.

    Uninstalled the game after that ♥♥♥♥.

    ♥♥♥♥ Frontier Developments for charging people crap tons of money for this ♥♥♥♥ game, I'd rather return to Eve, which I played from 2004 to 2014.

    Hell, X3 Albion prelude ♥♥♥♥♥ all over this game in terms of fun and properly done progression, this ♥♥♥♥ game is all flash no substance.

    In 2000 hours of playing X3 AP, i never felt frustrated or like i was wasting my ♥♥♥♥ing time grinding.

    I have over 500 hours in Elite Dangerous and a bunch more in Horizons, which did not register on my Steam account, because I played on the separate launcher that beta players get.

    Yeah, don't waste your money, this game is being handled by old farts who don't know a fun game if it ♥♥♥♥ed them in the face.    … Expand
  18. Squicker
    Jan 15, 2016
    1
    Basically this is the same empty shell as the original release, just with lots of empty procedurally generated plants to land on. When are Frontier going to understand that a good game requires more than just a vast empty shell to traverse? A sandpit needs tools and sand, here we just have the bland framework of the wooden sand container and nothing else.

    Another missed opportunity    Basically this is the same empty shell as the original release, just with lots of empty procedurally generated plants to land on. When are Frontier going to understand that a good game requires more than just a vast empty shell to traverse? A sandpit needs tools and sand, here we just have the bland framework of the wooden sand container and nothing else.

    Another missed opportunity because the Frontier developers and managers have zero vision for this game.    … Expand
  19. noobmsu93
    Nov 11, 2017
    3
    First off I have to apologize to all those players, if any, who might have bought the game on my recommendation. ED:H 2.3 turned out to be a total disaster. I was excited because I foolishly thought FDEV would further develop crew roles...nope! In fact, FDEV nerfed the payouts that crew member received for their work. This despite the fact that the head moron, I mean, "lead designer",First off I have to apologize to all those players, if any, who might have bought the game on my recommendation. ED:H 2.3 turned out to be a total disaster. I was excited because I foolishly thought FDEV would further develop crew roles...nope! In fact, FDEV nerfed the payouts that crew member received for their work. This despite the fact that the head moron, I mean, "lead designer", Sandro Sammarco said that he wanted to keep the payout up for all players to "keep it fun"! Furthermore, there has been NO mention at all about further development of multicrew.
    Whelp here we are with 2.4.03 The Return...pretty boring. It appears that development on the story has nearly come to a stand still. I guess this isn't too surprising since Drew Wagner, a decent author and the lore master, has left. Missions are still a cobbled together mess, e.g. you could get a pirate massacre mission to destroy 40+ ships to complete within 36 hours (yeah good luck) but then pick a salvage mission for literally 4 items and get 6 DAYS to complete! Wow good job FDEV!
    This game is a massive waste of potential (and time). It could be epic! IF FDEV hired an actual competent lead designer (Sandro is the genius behind such titles as Haze and Evil Genius). What a shame!    … Expand
  20. downliner
    Sep 11, 2016
    2
    It's a bit of a kick in the jewels when a dev charges the original buyers of Elite: Dangerous (£20 currently) an extra £20.00 to get the Horizons Season pass when new players can just buy the Horizons pass for £20 and get Elite: Dangerous with it. Maybe a lesson to learn here is never to pre-order a game from any Publisher and actually buy when its future is decided 3-6 months afterwardsIt's a bit of a kick in the jewels when a dev charges the original buyers of Elite: Dangerous (£20 currently) an extra £20.00 to get the Horizons Season pass when new players can just buy the Horizons pass for £20 and get Elite: Dangerous with it. Maybe a lesson to learn here is never to pre-order a game from any Publisher and actually buy when its future is decided 3-6 months afterwards otherwise like Sky TV they are going to try and squeeze the existing customers wallets whilst offering the new customers a bargain deal. The Gaming industry has transformed over the last 10 years into nothing more than a cashcow.… Expand
  21. ScottsPorage
    Jan 22, 2016
    3
    Being able to land on planets is nice, but the gameplay is awful.

    Not only is it awful, but the ideas are just plain naff.

    I would avoid this, its just not worth it currently.
  22. frazzefraz
    May 13, 2021
    2
    One of the Worst Space games ever made. Star Citizen is 1000 times better than this game even its not finished, NMS its more fun. The new odyssey will not help them to save this game.
  23. Analyst77
    Mar 10, 2019
    2
    Well - I bought the game (E:D plus Horizons) just 7 weeks before, after playing around 200 hours, and being just below the Elite-Explorer rank, here is my review:
    The core game - SuperCruise (SC), Jumping, Landing on planets, Exploring, Trading and Mining is very well done. I like it. Longer waiting times during SC or flight times do not bother me. Graphically the game is very beautiful.    Well - I bought the game (E:D plus Horizons) just 7 weeks before, after playing around 200 hours, and being just below the Elite-Explorer rank, here is my review:
    The core game - SuperCruise (SC), Jumping, Landing on planets, Exploring, Trading and Mining is very well done. I like it. Longer waiting times during SC or flight times do not bother me. Graphically the game is very beautiful. Landing and driving SRVs is fun, even if there is not much to find on airless planets. So the core game is just right for me. Or would be, if it were designed well...

    It is as if the game after the core development (StarForge, etc.) fell into the hands of amateurs. Incompetent amateurs. As it is now, they have delayed the next major update to 2020(!!), and are not telling what it will bring. Nothing probably. In the meantime the game has an ever growing amount of bugs, which are reported and never fixed. The 'developers' who are on the game now are not even a 'maintenance team' and incompetent. The only thing they do is nerf and modify, with the result, that the background simulation is broken, Missions do not work, and new bugs are introduced after each patch. I think there is _no_ dev team at all at work for the next E:D update (in 2020), since Frontier has new games announced. The reason for the delay is obviously not the size of the update but the fact that nobody works on it. Except the incompetent 'maintenance team'.

    But all this would not put me off, since I did not see too much of the game. I have 3 ships at the moment and do not feel without success. But I am seriously put off this game, because of the balance for newer players.

    The reasons are the 'engineers' and the awful grind connected to them. The problem is, engineering your ship (making it better in certain aspects) is calculated in the balance. If you do not engineer, you cannot compete. It is as simple as that. And I am not talking about PvP. Those people engineer their ships so complete, that a normal person with other things to do has no chance at all. But even as a peaceful explorer, you cannot compete if you do not have the jump range, and this is only possible with a lot of grind. Instead of playing the game as advertised (Exploring, Trading, Mining, Doing Missions,...) you have for example to buy a special 'wake scanner' and sit for hours in front of a busy starport and scan ships, just to gather 'materials' for engineering. And this is only a small part of it.
    These materials are completely senseless things, which are a second 'currency' in the game, and which you need to grind. You cannot buy them. You can exchange one for another material at material traders with rates 6 to 1 or worse, and other limitations.

    The engineers ruined the game, especially for new players who stand speechless reading the countless hints and tips how to get these materials. And every module you want to change starts at level 1, and need around 3 'rolls' to reach the next level. And each 'roll' uses up several materials. After engineering one module, you cannot buy it - no if you need another module, you start from the beginning with a new module. That means, that 75% of your time in the game is material grinding!!

    The person(s) who developed this nonsense should be promoted to the cleaning department.

    If I could buy materials, I would not hunt for them, I could actually play the game and earn the money, even if it were expensive. But no, you _have_ to grind.

    Also - being nearly Elite in Exploration (I estimate around 6-8 hours in game to reach Elite status) and not even have traveled very far from the start system is ludicrous. The game gives money (Credits) much too easy, I could buy 2 expensive ships now. But without the jump range to really explore, no ship helps. You have to do engineering to even talk to other players on the same level. So - refuse the grind and boring activities and you are out.

    There are other things with involve a lot of grind. Fighting the Thargoids - grind for days on end to receive the equipment you need (normal weapons do not hurt them). So a player has to grind to be _allowed_ to play a part of the game. Not many do this. Additionally your anti Thargoid ship is useless against human NPCs or players, because the special equipment will not do much damage to human ships.

    It goes on. NPCs are now engineered too, sometimes ludicrous, so you are stumped if you do not engineer too. Pirates now have a habit to demand cargo, while they are shooting. The grace period does not work. New bug, introduced by the last 'bug fixing patch', which fixed not even things it said it fixed.

    Summary: The core of the game is awesome, but it is ruined by total carelessness and incompetence of the so called 'developers'. They are in the process to ruin the game, and they are successful, I fear.

    I recommend reading the games forums and outside comments and hints before buying the game. And wait until it costs 15 Euros maximum...    … Expand
  24. Geolite
    Nov 20, 2020
    2
    Graphics are beautiful, really great, but don't let that sucker you. The controls are so slow, I set my sensitive to max and, I could turn fast enough, although this game could be designed for controllers, whatever, but I have the largest problem with the tutorial. The final combat drone is so difficult, it almost always goes out of the combat range which, if you do you'll be directedGraphics are beautiful, really great, but don't let that sucker you. The controls are so slow, I set my sensitive to max and, I could turn fast enough, although this game could be designed for controllers, whatever, but I have the largest problem with the tutorial. The final combat drone is so difficult, it almost always goes out of the combat range which, if you do you'll be directed towards the fighting zone, while the bot is allowed, and once you get the shield done, the bot will get so far out of range, you cant touch it. I spent over an hour on the tutorial, and still haven't finished it, ill just stick with other games. Yikes. Again beautiful graphics, but graphics alone can not support a game.… Expand
  25. texnar6
    Jan 1, 2021
    0
    I am a very calm person, but after half an hour of torment, it was so wildly bombed ... Management is just darkness! full bottom! I've never seen anything worse! Having picked the settings, it became a little better, but still ... radar is worth special attention - it's just a top, nothing is clear from it where is the enemy. IMHO another port, sharpened for gamepads. (I hate sticks)

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
tbd

No score yet - based on 2 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2 out of 2
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 2
  3. Negative: 0 out of 2
  1. CD-Action
    Mar 4, 2016
    85
    If you love interstellar travels, you’ve got nothing to mull over, because right now Elite Dangerous is the best space sim. [02/2016, p.36]
  2. Brash Games
    Feb 4, 2016
    80
    My time so far with Elite Dangerous: Horizons has been amazing. I really didn’t know what to expect going into this game and was blown away by the scope of it. I usually like a game to have a strong narrative, but this game is heavily focused on exploration, which it absolutely nails. The game looks amazing, plays well and I’m excited to see how the game develops over the coming months.
    Read full review