The Star Citizen Thread v 4

[MaxLexandre]

These bugs occur in the main game too

The collision bug (derp of physics on pad) on the Hangar Pad, where do they happen on the Universe?

There were bugs with the pads that would clip on the pad or collisions that would bug a ship physics, that were already fixed.

 

[Rolan]

And when they use that codebase for more elements in the PU? Or was hangar development a sidepath that performs no useful function outside of itself? Did CIG really spend X many years on hangar development just to have it as a standalone entity with no further use, full of bugs, incompatible with every other asset they were creating, and be abandoned dev time?

It was probably the codebase for more elements... like 2 years back in time. Right now there's no reason to use that code, I wouldn't use it, when the times comes to integrate the hangars in the PU you will not need it.

Well since you ask the only other example of an alpha I know of was ED - and it was never anywhere near as buggy as SC as far as I can recall.

One would normally make allowances but given that CR has positioned the game as the saviour of PC gaming - the BDSSE etc. etc. one would expect progress to be a little further forward after all this money and time and such a huge dev team.

So the answer is no. You don't know of any game with no bugs... great. With that clear.
(For some reason, this part sounds a bit harsh, it wasn't my intention )

ED was never that buggy(Even Elite had many bugs not so long ago) and ED was never trying to integrate that many things in the first place. Differents development different type and quantity of bugs. If that many bugs continuous to appear near released I would be the first to flip the table, but right now... it's something with no real reason to criticize(well you can, but bugs should appear so that they can fix them and some will only appear in some cases in any particular circumstances), even the devs have talked about that many times. There always going to be bugs, some big and some little, some have more priority than others. Some will be fixed in a branch of the development so there's no reason to fixed something in a system that will have no use in the future.

I can understand a critic in how many days or weeks it takes them to fix the bugs, in the PU in something that should have a priority and will be in the game. You say its buggy... everyone can say it's game development, bugs will appear and if you dont understand that...

 

[Asp Explorer]

EDIT - you forgot the capships humping each other - that was one of my favourites.

That wasn't a bug - it was a feature

 

[Rolan]

These bugs occur in the main game too

I have not seen that happening in the PU, if that's(first time I hear about it) the case then they should fix it soon

 

[milligna]

It's a shame the project is being so mismanaged. It would've been fun to have a nice story based space shooter in 2014 instead of an endless drama and self-perpetuating P2W dream machine so in your face about it that even the excruciatingly polite BBC has to make reference to the eternal specter of rip offs.

The hangar wasn't useless development. It served its purpose: serving as a ship showroom and collectible fetish platform to enable this bizarre ship collector subculture for several years. Gotta have em all! Perhaps if they hadn't put so much focus and effort into ship sales and internet shows, perhaps if they hadn't foolishly outsourced development of key features to amateurs without having a solid base of engine code to all work from, perhaps if they hadn't chased a ludicrous mocap dragon around several studios and continents when not many particularly care if it's Gary Oldman physically acting out a 3D model and not some chubby guy in Austin, perhaps if they hadn't enabled the worst excesses of a former VGA visionary enthusiastic tho profoundly unfamiliar with modern game development who keeps referring to this as a "movie," perhaps perhaps perhaps....

 

[bitstorm]

The collision bug (derp of physics on pad) on the Hangar Pad, where do they happen on the Universe?

There were bugs with the pads that would clip or bug ship's physics, that were already fixed.

Well here's an example at 1m36.

[video=youtube_share;uXTCwsfI_7c]https://youtu.be/uXTCwsfI_7c?t=96[/video]

That's from CIG themselves from a few days back so a reliable source I think.

Though as I say if it doesn't work in the hangar, a cut back single player scenario with all objects stationary and none of the complexities that networking brings, I'm not sure why it should be ok in the main game.

Have to say, God knows why they think these bug videos are good PR.

I mean imagine watching these videos and laughing if you'd put a few thousand in.

 

[milligna]

I guess they figure, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em to try and drown out the snarky SC vids from our friends in the Fourth Stimpire.

 

[Rolan]

Well here's an example at 1m36.

https://youtu.be/uXTCwsfI_7c?t=96

That's from CIG themselves from a few days back so a reliable source I think.

Though as I say if it doesn't work in the hangar, a cut back single player scenario with all objects stationary and none of the complexities that networking brings, I'm not sure why it should be ok in the main game.

Have to say, God knows why they think these bug videos are good PR.

I mean imagine watching these videos and laughing if you'd put a few thousand in.

That's from june 2015 I think...

As seen on Around the Verse: Episode 1.48.

Found it!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJSx3qvlM2w

 

[MaxLexandre]

I mean imagine watching these videos and laughing if you'd put a few thousand in.

That is one video BEFORE even AC 1.3, using the old animations and everything. lol
.edit, yeah Rolan got it



Because alpha games have bugs! Unbelievable isn't it? I never ever imagined i would ever play a alpha game on my life that had bugs, crashes, bad optimization and so on... ever... how dare them!!!
I'm still stunned, how can one alpha game have bugs? This is un-acceptable!!!!

REFUND PLEASE!!!! I'm going to call Derek Smart now and sue CIG for have bugs on an alpha release, they'll pay for this!

 

[milligna]

I think it's more like, how can an alpha 4 years in be so depressingly lacking in everything they've been saying was in the game and showed for two years. Where's all the great stuff they showed in 2013 and 2014? Stuff we'd have in mere weeks or months. Yet, nowhere to be seen in the alpha. How many more years until the pipeline is firmly established and it really picks up pace? When will things actually start coming together? 2020? Even their own people know damn well they won't make 2016 for S42. How demoralizing must that be?

It's all down to poor management. No wonder there's been a nonstop revolving door of senior producers. Who could cope with this kind of unprofessionalism? You can compare it to Blizzard development in deceptive charts all you like, there's no way actual Blizzard vets would work this way. Hence they flee to the exit door.

 

[MaxLexandre]

I think it's more like, how can an alpha 4 years in be so depressingly lacking in everything they've been saying was in the game and showed for two years. Where's all the great stuff they showed in 2013 and 2014? Stuff we'd have in mere weeks or months. Yet, nowhere to be seen in the alpha.

Because it's game development, delays happen, features might change or might even not see the light of the day, and the things we might have been shown were labeled as demos or even prototypes.
People who work on the industry know this, people who don't, think game development is something perfect and shiny and beautiful... just because you don't see it, as behind closed doors... you won't know.

As a wise game developer once said, "The easy part is develop 80% of something, the remaining 20% that usually take 80% of the time."

 

[bitstorm]

Because alpha games have bugs! Unbelievable isn't it? I never ever imagined i would ever play a alpha game on my life that had bugs, crashes, bad optimization and so on... ever... how dare them!!!
I'm still stunned, how can one alpha game have bugs? This is un-acceptable!!!!

REFUND PLEASE!!!!

Please stop generalising what people are saying

Alphas have bugs yes, we all know this. Everybody knows this. You should accept everyone here knows alphas have bugs, we play ED right.

Even released games have bugs, people know this too, please credit people with a bit of intelligence.

Folk are putting forward nuanced arguments and you generalise them into something that wasn't even said.

Your argument is like saying "houses take time to build therefore when the builder is sorting the decorating it's fine that the foundations seem to be having trouble."

BECAUSE IT'S STILL BEING BUILT YOU IDIOTS!!!!

There are bugs and there are bugs. Not all bugs are the same, don't generalise into:

1. All bugs are the same
2. Therefore bug A must be exactly the same as bug B
3. Bugs happen in alpha and the project is still marked alpha
4. Therefore it is ok that ALL types of bugs should exist 4 years in

Clearly a typo in some mission text is a world apart from a bug stopping objects interacting properly.

 

[swfanatic717]

I think it's more like, how can an alpha 4 years in be so depressingly lacking in everything they've been saying was in the game and showed for two years. Where's all the great stuff they showed in 2013 and 2014? Stuff we'd have in mere weeks or months. Yet, nowhere to be seen in the alpha. How many more years until the pipeline is firmly established and it really picks up pace? When will things actually start coming together? 2020? Even their own people know damn well they won't make 2016 for S42. How demoralizing must that be?

Doesn't help that it pays for them to stay in alpha and drag out development as long as possible. As long as people continue to fall for their hype machine they won't actually need a working pipeline or product to make money, just the promise of one. In that case they even have less of an incentive to make progress. In fact, it's already happening now.

It's the capitalist's wildest fantasy: People giving you revenue in exchange for nothing. EA wishes they could rip people off this much.

 

[MaxLexandre]

Only that game development is not really like building a house on that aspect.

Specially when we talk about bugs, that are usually not the priority over the technology, and core features being fully at place. On a game like SC, where they have to release one early alpha, of what will become the PU, they do have to maintain it some a basic extent when it comes to bug-fixing and optimization. And that's what they do.


As Sean Tracy explained before, there's places of the game they won't fix bugs on, because they do are working on systems that will replace current place-holders or other releases that will fix the problems. Hear by, putting developer time and effort into that, is wasting time. For example, the old EVA (to be replaced on 2.2), the Repair and Re-fueling Mechanic.... The old animations, the old damage models, and stuff like that that were also cases of this.


It all falls into Game Development really, some games do choose to release something when it's already pretty finished... SC instead, releases early, and improves over time. Example of this is AC.

 

[milligna]

AC that's been ignored for ages? AC that they suddenly are quiet about 2.0 and multicrew on, because they damn well know what a nightmare it would be to merge the codebase? yeah, great example there. Of their mismanagement, poorly thought out planning, and complete failure of so-called "modular development."

It's a vestigial limb at this point. Atrophied, useless. With barely anyone playing because it's so unfun. Some test bed!

So let's recap: AC. Abandoned. Star Marine. Totally messed up, dismissed. Hangar. Completely disconnected, holotable still garbage.

Modular development, huh? Just like LEGO to put em together, simple! All these great components were supposed to rise and combine together seamlessly like Voltron to bring us the PU. Instead the years drag on, they change plans completely, waste months of work on useless abandoned code, and concentrate on S42 suddenly because it's the only thing they could conceivably deliver. The man bit off far more spacefood than he could chew, simple as that.

 

[MaxLexandre]

Oh really? I think you're not aware of the Current Universe Alpha existence, are you?

Since when is Arena Commander a different codebase now? Odd, i could swear i saw on the Universe Alpha, both what AC introduced the game, what SM was to introduce on the game, and multi-crew, all together.

That way, they don't need to maintain several releases at once, instead, they maintain the Universe release, until it's the Persistent Universe. WIN / WIN.
Why should the game match-based modes the priority over the PU now, when they were made to introduce a game aspect to SC, that was already merged? lol

 

[milligna]

Yes, it's all a resounding success and truly a victory for "modular development." If only more games were built this way, we could really glitch thru doors till the cows came home!

Still, mustn't grumble. Wouldn't want to "annoy" CR with petty questions like where's the game module he was promising for a full year. Why, we had the ability to play Star Marine all along, turns out! It's in the PU that is neither persistent nor a universe!

It's a Christmas Miracle! Or a threadbare excuse and a cheap dodge. Not sure which. Anybody else want to help out?

 

[MaxLexandre]

The code base is already a single stream, since SC 1.3, clearly visible on 2.0.


If you don't believe me check the studio reports, there's not several code bases since around 5/6 months ago, when SM was merged into the rest of the game (and we got Illfonic's EVA, Animations, on SC 1.3).

 

[milligna]

I hope you don't consider it a conspiracy theory when I say I don't see anything at all they've been showing as Star Marine in the game as it exists today and due to that I figure CIG really made a huge mistake hiring Illfonic and pretending it would be easy to incorporate Star Marine into the main game, much less release anything fun to the backers.

This we already have Star Marine stuff is really an odd defense. Might as well claim we already have the VR support CR promised was a few weeks away a full year ago too. That's what hacks me off the most as a backer, their abandoning all their promises about VR. You can see that any time a dev talks about it.

 

[MaxLexandre]

Neither have they said it is delivered, much less complete.

What was said was the prioritization of complete the FPS features on the 2.X release set, and then yes, enable Star Marine, that is, the match-based game played on the Gold Horizon Map, that is already in-game.
The next update, 2.2, is delivering the new EVA that far said, was a blocker on the whole SM project and is being fully replaced now.

Because over that, like the game part AC introduced to the game, SM was to introduce the FPS part, that, was introduced with Alpha 2.0.