Note: This isn't a major feature suggestion, it's just an eye candy type suggestion.

I like the idea of having to manually fly into the docking bay. However, once you're inside, all you have to do is press Enter, and you're docked... it just doesn't seem very fitting, especially considering that fact that right in front of you there appears to be a doorway of some sort. Not to mention the implications that the current procedure has in 3rd person view. When you see someone else dock, they fly into the bay, and *poof* their ship disappears.

Here's what I propose: Just like you do now, you fly into the bay, and you press Enter. However, pressing enter opens the doorway ahead of you (it splits at the seem in the middle with the top retracting upward, and the bottom retracting downward). What's left could be a force-field similar to the force-field you pass through when you exit the station.

Then, in order to dock, you have to fly through the field / open doorway. To another pilot, they see your ship go in, and not suddenly disappear. The station interface appears after you've passed through.

I'm guessing that odds are that this has been suggested before. I looked at the list and didn't see it... oh well.

Well it hasn't been suggested recently, and it's not on the list, so you have carte blanche.

i really like this idea, actually

This adds up to combat tension, if you're running away from someone who dares to attack you in the vicinity of the station, all you have to do is to bump in dock and press Enter. In this case, you might take few more hits or a rocket before the door open wide enough to let you in. Therefore no safe haven in docking bay.

Ooo...

[Stamp of Approval]

Rado...

If you were already in the first holding area, wouldn't there be sheilding behind your ship once your in it? I've noticed that on exit ports of stations, there seems to be a shield blocking it.

I'm sure they could add this feature, i like the idea of giving the docking experience a more realistic approach.

It would also be interesting to see your customized ship actually move to a proper docking area, beside other ships. This way you can actually compare the size of your ship, color etc with others. It will look even cooler when we are able to customize our ships later with stickers or graphics, it'll be like a old fashioned (car) ship show.

hmm... I like the idea of an internal parking bay, but am not so hot on the "I fly into the outer bay, hit enter, and then KEEP MOVING into the inner bay" idea... hitting enter in every other instance (jumping/warping) brings up an external-view cutscene animation...

maybe we could have an outer bay-inner bay animation as well?

This suggestion is.. exactly what we wanted to do from the beginning (conceptually I even had an idea for doing fake "volume light" when the docking bay would open, with a very bright area inside). But, due to other pressing gameplay needs, a lot of "eye candy" type features have been left out :(.

I hope we can add this sort of stuff eventually. There's a lot of things I'd like to do along these lines.

Yay! :) I was thinking of something along the lines of a 'volume light' coming from inside the station. That way you wouldn't have to worry about designing the contents of the station... they could remain hollow...

for now.... :-P