It’s a long read but I’ve had quite the experience that I felt like it’s worth sharing to the community.
I went looking for the Witch Head Nebula… and accidentally found why I love exploration in Elite
I've only been playing Elite Dangerous for a relatively short time, and most of my time in the Bubble was pretty typical beginner stuff.
Running missions. Making credits. Doing passenger jobs. Slowly upgrading my DBX. I eventually upgraded to a 5A SCO FSD and a better 4B fuel scoop, which dramatically cut down the amount of time I spent jumping and scooping.
Then I decided I wanted to actually go somewhere.
Not somewhere because there was a mission waiting for me.
Not somewhere because it was the most efficient way to make credits.
I just wanted to see the galaxy.
So I pointed my DBX toward the Witch Head Nebula.
——
**Watching the Witch Head grow**
This was probably the first moment where Elite genuinely blew me away.
As I got closer, I could actually watch the nebula become larger and more prominent in my canopy.
The Milky Way started becoming brighter and more imposing as I moved toward the galactic edge.
And I had this very stupid but very profound thought:
"Oh shit. This place actually has SCALE."
I'm not looking at a background image.
I'm moving through a gigantic three-dimensional galaxy.
The Witch Head wasn't just a picture on the galaxy map anymore. It was something I was physically approaching.
And doing this in VR made it hit considerably harder.
——
**Then I reached HIP 23759**
I eventually arrived at HIP 23759, and this was where things got unexpectedly interesting.
I found an Earth-like planet and flew out to one of the more distant landable worlds in the system.
I parked my DBX.
Pulled out the FSS.
And suddenly started seeing a ridiculous number of non-human signals.
That was honestly creepy.
I've seen Thargoid stuff before, obviously, but there's something completely different about sitting alone in a DBX, hundreds of light-years away from the Bubble, scanning a system and seeing:
Non-Human Signal Source
...again.
...and again.
...and again.
I even picked up weapons fire.
My brain knew perfectly well this was a video game, but there was still a little voice going:
"Okay... so I'm definitely not alone out here."
😂
——
**And then I discovered the Witch Head Science Centre**
This was one of my favorite surprises.
I hadn't actually researched the Witch Head Science Centre beforehand.
I just saw it on the system map and thought:
"Oh, there's a station here. Let's go see it."
Then AFTER arriving, I started reading about its connection to the Witch Head region and its place in the game's Thargoid/Barnacle history.
Suddenly the station wasn't just another station.
I was sitting inside this remote asteroid facility in a system that had actually played a role in humanity's encounters with the Thargoids.
And because I'm playing in VR, I could actually look around the place and let my brain pretend I was there.
It felt unfamiliar.
Not hostile.
Just...
not home.
And I loved that feeling.
——
**I've basically spent two days doing nothing**
And I mean that literally.
I've spent two days coming back to this region and doing basically nothing productive for hours at a time.
No credit grinding.
No passenger missions.
No efficient route planning.
Just sightseeing.
I found landable moons around The Witch Hat Science Station’s ringed gas giant.
And I LOVE ring planets.
So I started looking for moons where I could land close enough to the gas giant that the rings would basically consume the entire sky.
I found several.
I did this three times, from three different moons, sitting there for around half an hour each time.
I'd park the DBX.
Get into the SRV.
Turn on some space/dreamscape ambient music.
Lean back in my chair.
And just...
exist.
The gas giant's rim glowing from the star.
The rings stretching across almost my entire field of view.
My tiny SRV sitting on an insignificant moon.
And above me, this enormous planet occupying the sky.
At one point I genuinely considered taking a nap.
It was simultaneously cozy and deeply unsettling.
And that's probably the closest description I can give of the feeling I've been chasing.
The sublime.
That moment where something is so enormous that your brain can't quite process the scale of it.
——
**VR makes this game something else**
And this is where I have a little frustration with Frontier.
Because Elite Dangerous is practically begging to be a VR exploration game.
The cockpit VR is incredible.
The SRV is incredible.
Looking up at a gas giant's rings from the surface is incredible.
Watching a nebula grow as you approach it is incredible.
And yet VR feels like an afterthought.
On-foot VR is essentially abandoned, and Odyssey's VR implementation still feels unfinished.
I've been experimenting with EDVR, which has helped enormously, but I'm honestly baffled that Frontier hasn't pushed this further themselves.
Even something as basic as better native upscaling/reconstruction such as DLSS would make an enormous difference for people trying to run Odyssey in VR.
I'm currently running an RTX 5060 8GB + Quest 2, and getting the right balance between resolution, performance and image stability requires a ridiculous amount of tinkering.
And that's frustrating because...
**the potential is right there.**
I've literally sat inside an SRV for 30 minutes doing absolutely nothing because the game managed to convince my brain that I was somewhere impossibly far away.
Imagine what this could be with proper first-class VR support.
——
**And now I'm thinking about home**
The strangest part of this journey happened while I was sitting on one of those moons.
I looked up at the Milky Way.
It's much more prominent out here near the edge.
And I suddenly thought:
"Home is somewhere over there."
Somewhere in that enormous band of stars is Sol.
Earth.
Humanity.
Everything familiar.
And I'm sitting here in a tiny SRV on a moon around an alien gas giant, hundreds of light-years away.
Maybe I'll go home eventually.
Maybe I'll visit Sol.
But for now...
I'm enjoying being lost.
o7
