The Star Citizen Thread v 4

[ianw]

The Infinite Warfare devs probably had a nice giggle about that article in January. Boy, when that comes out the comments sections of all the pieces on it are going to be filled with Angry Young Lesnicks complaining about journalists not doing enough "research." Journos today don't get that you need to have watched the full run of Wingman's Hangar and every episode of ATV at least twice before opining on this project! I think what these guys don't appreciate is clueless journos write much kinder pieces about Star Citizen. If they DID watch all the videos and keep track of all the conflicting promises, the articles would be WAY THE HELL HARSHER.

Roberts explained: "[Stealth] is part of the core design. We are trying to make the FPS gameplay itself be more tactical, less just 'run and gun'. Especially since it is more lethal than you would normally expect with a Call of Duty or something."

Mmm, yes. I can see how tactical it is right now, since it's "in the game." Really tactical stuff. It's a good thing they nailed stealth mechanics for the core design almost five years into the project. Oh wait, stealth mechanics aren't in yet? What year will the core design be attempted, then?

"We have vents where you can sneak around or crawl around in and outflank people and do stuff like that."

Well enough about the Santa Monica offices, what about in the game?

I think you'll find that CoD won't have spaghettified Commandos that can destroy a large ship on a pad by means of a flying tactical headbut and then just laugh it off!

If that isn't stealthy then I don't know what is!

 

[Rolan]

Around the Verse Episode 2.30

TLDR

Spoiler

Intro

• Current Version is Star Citizen Alpha 2.3.1. with Star Citizen Alpha 2.4 looking to go to PTU soon, not necessarily today or tomorrow.
• Ben and Alexis are on Bereavement leave, the studios and communities thoughts are with them at this time.
• MISC Prospector was very popular and the “prospect”(ayy) of more small mining ships is definite.
• A reminder to check if you have a 5% coupon in your account from April Fools as it expires at the end of May.

News From Around The Verse
Los Angeles

• L.A. have a new hire: Josh Herman. He is the new Art Director in the L.A. office
• Only 3rd day in the role and still wrapping head around everything!
• Will be working on all the characters from Sq. 42 to the PU including aliens

Austin

• Ongoing work fixing blockers for 2.4
• Work started on being able to modify ship ports in Crusader on the landing pads
• First release is being worked on now
• Only want the owner of the ship to be able to modify the ship
• Should be able to swap out weapons and components but only if the ship is in a landed state.
• Design work on kiosk and terminal shopping.
• This is for large items that can’t physically fit in a store i.e. a ship
• Want the terminals to be different as in real life each shopping experience is different from the last
• A Technical Animator has joined the team and will integrate with the Animation team and assist with new animations to be implemented

Foundry 42 UK

• A lot of focus on the capital ships. The Javelin, Idris and Bengal have all been looked at
• The Argo, Reliant and Starfarer have been given attention to get flight ready
• Concentrating on bug fixing shopping systems
• Will soon be able to earn cash at Comm Array’s and spend it on clothes, armour, weaponry, components etc
• Squadron 42 shoots going on right now
• Tuning FPS and AI work

Foundry 42 Frankfurt

• Greg has a name we probably couldn’t pronounce
• He has been working on ‘Inner Thought’
• The system is to replace the intrusive, huge ‘USE’ button.
• It seems at this current stage it will work roughly like so: If you approach a door you will have the option to open it, at a window you can look, with look you can pick up, and use it in conversation choice
• It’s a unifying system as it will be the same for AI and player
• Early prototype of some of the system might make it into 2.4
• Greg’s System Design Department has a huge amount of detailed documentation

ATV Interview: Cheyne Hessler

• Cheyne Hessler is an associate character artist currently working on the RSI jetpack.
• He used to do freelance work for toys and scanned data cleanup.
• He grew up with consoles. Plays PC a lot now, HearthStone, Overwatch, Street Fighter V.
• He’ll work on the BDU engineer for Squadron 42 next.
• Hennessy uses Waze.

Loremakers Guide To The Galaxy

• Adam Wieser talks about a UEE system which the UEE doesn't have complete control of: Nexus
• Nexus is a five planet system with a bluish-white Type A main sequence star and an asteroid belt
• Nexus II is a terrestrial smog planet with an atmosphere that will glow due to aerosols
• Kellar's Run in 2930 revealed to the UEE how big a problem the pirates were
• Dean Kellar shot an undercover UEE agent in Cathcart, was chased by the Advocacy through 5 systems to Nexus where the UEE were confronted by the pirates and Kellar was finally killed by Anna Flynn
• Nexus has four "all-access" (i.e. large) jump points: three of which are to unclaimed systems
• Nexus was discovered in 2445 by UNE Navy pilot, Dominic Thapa, but the first jump point was from Cathcart which at the time was classified so for 20 years it was known as UDS-2445-3-09
• The military established operations on Nexus III and then attempted to terraform Nexus II and Nexus IV (Lagos) but racked up huge budgetary deficits instead so sold the entire system to a corporation
• In 2468 the Hather Group based their operations on Nexus III (Lago) to mine the Elcibre Asteroid Belt and stripmine Lago without civilian infrastructure investment and was infiltrated by pirates over the next 200 years from the Cathcart System.
• In 2672 the Hather Group reassessed the bottom line and pulled out after getting what they needed and left Nexus to the pirates, resulting in it being named after becoming a jump point nexus for pirates.
• Nexus I is a charred rocky protoplanet close to the star without resources to mine. Nexus II is a smog planet that is also uninhabitable. Nexus III is habitable and the historical base of control in the system.
• In 2930 the UEE decided to retake the system, pushed the pirates off Nexus III and make it a military classified planet where proper clearances are encouraged.
• Greed has been suggested by conspiracy proponents as a motive more than pirate annihilation for the UEE sudden resurgence.
• This is also the location of the famous Dean Keller Run where he hid in an within an asteroid for repairs and stealthily EVAed out to steal his pursuer's ship, turn it upon his enemies and to make his getaway.
• Nexus IV (Lago – derived from a 26th century Pirate Paradise vid) was stripmined out by the Hather Group and remains a pirate stronghold despite UEE's efforts to this day.
• Small basic civilian encampments from sweetheart military vet deals provide possible good sources of profit with accompanying risk.
• And finally there is The Red God, a gas giant, named by The Sang Guestos, a cryptic pirate group that actually worship it.

ATV Fast Forward: Aegis Javelin Destoryer

• Interior and exterior shots of a troop drop pod.
  
  Spoiler

  [video=youtube;E3T1BwUWruQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3T1BwUWruQ#t=46m38s[/video]

Source: http://imperialnews.network/2016/05/around-the-verse-episode-2-30/

 

[MaxLexandre]

• It seems at this current stage it will work roughly like so: If you approach a door you will have the option to open it, at a window you can look, with look you can pick up, and use it in conversation choice
• It’s a unifying system as it will be the same for AI and player
• Early prototype of some of the system might make it into 2.4

It's a *might* but it's a long time coming.

Goodbye the Evil USE "F" madness! If it reaches 2.4 then this is already the Item System 2.0 engine rewrite already making it's way into the game.

 

[Wind195]

http://www.express.co.uk/entertainm...Black-Ops-3-Star-Citizen-FPS-Stealth-Revealed
*cough*

lmao......if that isn't click bait I don't know what is.... There is zero scenarios where COD needs to worry bout Star citizen...

 

[Rolan]

Also: 2.4 is on PTU now. NDA is in effect.

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/starcitizen/comments/4i1emm/around_the_verse_episode_230/d2uge55

 

[MaxLexandre]

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/starcitizen/comments/4i1emm/around_the_verse_episode_230/d2uge55

There's like 20 CIG on Discord right now, Sean Tracy is around, we may get him replying questions and other talks, good chance for as it's rare to ever even see him!

 

[Tuub t Tute]

Progress is good. Hopefully the ETF don't hold onto it too long and the rest of the PtU players can try it out soon

 

[Viajero]

*Mod hat off

Open development or not, if Backers visit their studios and get to see/know stuff they haven't shown/told to everybody yet, why shouldn't they be ruled by NDA?

Wouldn't be fair otherwise have the persons who would visit studios be the sources of information before the developers actually share it. The only way i see to rule out NDA, is to not show or tell anything that isn't publicly know

Because that sounds pretty much like what a biased member of the community would actually say anyways.

- Is there a source quote by either CIG or that "community member" confirming what you posted? Or better yet, both.
- Even assuming it was true that some significant progress existed, why not actually invite a media outlet instead and, under NDA, allow them as an independent(er) party to at least confirm that there is indeed progress? So far all media outlets that were invited in only reported along the lines of "a lot of nice words, but we could not see anything". This would have been the perfect opportunity to dispell that image.

 

[MaxLexandre]

Because that sounds pretty much like what a biased member of the community would actually say anyways.

- Is there a source quote by either CIG or that "community member" confirming what you posted? Or better yet, both.
- Even assuming it was true that some significant progress existed, why not actually invite a media outlet instead and, under NDA, allow them as an independent(er) party to at least confirm that there is indeed progress? So far all media outlets that were invited in only reported along the lines of "a lot of nice words, but we could not see anything". This would have been the perfect opportunity to dispell that image.

Well on the 1st, is very known and publicly shared the backers that do visit the studios. Those claims are their opinions of what they were told and saw, that claimed by all that did, were under NDA when shown those things. Even the developers share the photos and pictures with such backers from the tours to the studios, so it's no need speculation that they were or not there, hear by i just relay what was claimed by them because they were there.

It's up to you to ignore it as a biased community member... I would actually be interested into see the backers who are most critics of CIG actually enrolling to visit their studios and see by themselves, then share their views of it after.

On the 2nd, i don't even think the media outlets that had access to the studios, like FQ42 UK, were not under NDA, if you notice the articles they pretty much say "we were shown things", but never say and describe in detail what they were shown, so they just relay the developer interview side.

Progress is good. Hopefully the ETF don't hold onto it too long and the rest of the PtU players can try it out soon 

Yeah pretty much already know what's up with 2.4, it's raw in some parts far said (functionality like UI seems to be rolling in, possibly holotable is removed and added to mobiglass as well), as it's already friday the global PTU is to expect starting next week.

 

[Knightshark]

On the 2nd, i don't even think the media outlets that had access to the studios, like FQ42 UK, were not under NDA, if you notice the articles they pretty much say "we were shown things", but never say and describe in detail what they were shown, so they just relay the developer interview side.

I remember several articles explicitly stating "we did not see any of this" an not a single one stating the opposite.

 

[lysan]

Well on the 1st, is very known and publicly shared the backers that do visit the studios. Those claims are their opinions of what they were told and saw, that claimed by all that did, were under NDA when shown those things. Even the developers share the photos and pictures with such backers from the tours to the studios, so it's no need speculation that they were or not there, hear by i just relay what was claimed by them because they were there.

It's up to you to ignore it as a biased community member... I would actually be interested into see the backers who are most critics of CIG actually enrolling to visit their studios and see by themselves, then share their views of it after.

On the 2nd, i don't even think the media outlets that had access to the studios, like FQ42 UK, were not under NDA, if you notice the articles they pretty much say "we were shown things", but never say and describe in detail what they were shown, so they just relay the developer interview side.


Yeah pretty much already know what's up with 2.4, it's raw in some parts far said (functionality like UI seems to be rolling in, possibly holotable is removed and added to mobiglass as well), as it's already friday the global PTU is to expect starting next week.

If I was invited, I would be 100% neutral but very critical, I only deal in facts, so I'm a kind of black or white guy
However I do not believe we would see that, they only invite their friends who already has the glass splinter in the eye.

 

[MaxLexandre]

I remember several articles explicitly stating "we did not see any of this" an not a single one stating the opposite.

Yeah that was about SQ42, when several media outlets were invited to visit the studio there.

I'm most specifically talking about the PU, on that and recently i don't think there was any outlets with access, but bits of PU work is what who visits their tours says they are shown.

If I was invited, I would be 100% neutral but very critical, I only deal in facts, so I'm a kind of black or white guy
However I do not believe we would see that, they only invite their friends who already has the glass splinter in the eye.

Well you are not a backer anymore so no chance there for that to happen. The tours seem to be organized as you send a CS ticket sharing interest into enroll on a tour to X studio, so assuming that most of the critics already have some kind of beef with the CS staff... RIP. [knocked out]

 

[Viajero]

*Mod hat off

i don't even think the media outlets that had access to the studios, like FQ42 UK, were not under NDA, if you notice the articles they pretty much say "we were shown things", but never say and describe in detail what they were shown, so they just relay the developer interview side.

This is one of the media outlets visit to CIG premises that I remember, but there are probably a few more indicating a similar situation:

http://www.gamestar.de/spiele/star-citizen/artikel/star_citizen_squadron_42,48820,3239947.html

Nach meinem Besuch bei Foundry 42 war ich Feuer und Flamme für Squadron 42. Die Begeisterung des Entwicklerteams ist ansteckend, das gilt nicht nur für die Roberts-Brüder. Auf dem Rückflug musste ich mir allerdings in Erinnerung rufen, dass ich eigentlich kaum was von der Solokampagne gesehen habe. Ich weiß jetzt zwar deutlich besser, wie das Spiel funktionieren soll und es klingt nicht nur ambitioniert, sondern auch vielversprechend. Aber ob die Kampagne spannend wird, ob sie als Spiel Spaß macht? Ich kann es nicht sagen, zum jetzigen Zeitpunkt kann das noch niemand.

German speakers may be able to help here:

"The enthusiasm of the development team is contagious, and not just the Roberts brothers. On the return flight, however, I had to recall that I had hardly seen anything from the solo campaign."

That being the case wouldnt it be be much more productive and powerful to invite those outlets again so generic progress can be attested publicly even if under NDA, instead of just inviting anonymous and biased private individuals?

 

[Earthshine]

The "hype train" must be slowing down by now though...I certainly feel that I can no longer be bothered looking at anything they put out because it tends to be more of the same kind of thing. Certainly the models they produce and the designs they share are very good - the detail is great...but ultimately I feel that there hasn't been anything truly attention grabbing to get me excited (ok, tentatively excited) about the prospect of another modern space game.

Does anyone else feel this way, and do you think - like I do - that there must be many others who feel the same?

 

[MaxLexandre]

"The enthusiasm of the development team is contagious, and not just the Roberts brothers. On the return flight, however, I had to recall that I had hardly seen anything from the solo campaign."

Yeah i know, they had access to SQ42. In terms of media CIG had not open up to invite media outlets to have a look at what's the PU development, in fact when it comes to PU they don't show anything new the media the backers already knew, with things like PG planets being there but not discussed until publicly revealed to all.

That being the case wouldnt it be be much more productive and powerful to invite those outlets again so generic progress can be attested publicly even if under NDA, instead of just inviting anonymous and biased private individuals?

Wasn't there a backfire on CIG for giving interviews and information to the media that the backers were on the dark about? I remember the gamestar interview revelaing a lot from how SQ42 is played and so on, nobody else knew and some people do not like that the information wasn't told to the backers until told to the media.

 

[Viajero]

*Mod hat off

Wasn't there a backfire on CIG for giving interviews and information to the media that the backers were on the dark about? I remember the gamestar interview revelaing a lot from how SQ42 is played and so on, nobody else knew and some people do not like that the information wasn't told to the backers until told to the media.

Not really. If anything CIG has shown that it feels very comfortable with leaks of all kinds and sizes, even when they come from its own team members.

 

[MaxLexandre]

*Mod hat off


Not really. If anything CIG has shown that it feels very comfortable with leaks of all kinds and sizes, even when they come from its own team members.

The big leak last year was still publicly there for all, the media ended up reporting on what the backers already could see. But i do remember people all angry about having to read media articles to find information about some aspects of the game because that information was not anywhere else available to backers. That is, what normal publishers do when the media gets to see everything before anyone else.

I'm not sure if that drama impacted CIG on the terms of reveal stuff to media that backers do not have, at least since that case i don't remember it happening again, and on recently on all the stuff they attend to, they are not showing or telling anything that we don't already know, same trailers, same footage, same information.

 

[Viajero]

*Mod hat off

The big leak last year was still publicly there for all, the media ended up reporting on what the backers already could see. But i do remember people all angry about having to read media articles to find information about some aspects of the game because that information was not anywhere else available to backers. That is, what normal publishers do when the media gets to see everything before anyone else.

I'm not sure if that drama impacted CIG on the terms of reveal stuff to media that backers do not have, at least since that case i don't remember it happening again, and on recently on all the stuff they attend to, they are not showing or telling anything that we don't already know, same trailers, same footage, same information.

The point is "fears of leaking" in general do not really seem to be of huge concern for CIG. On the other hand, allegedly and if your stories are to be believed, both CIG and the community seem significantly more concerned with demonstrating progress.

If actual progress could be shown, even if under NDA, an independent media outlet would be a much better vehicle to solve that concern than a biased, anonymous and individual backer. Hence why your story makes little sense.

 

[MaxLexandre]

The point is "fears of leaking" do not really seem to be of huge concern for CIG. On the other hand, allegedly and if your stories are to be believed, both CIG and the community seem significantly more concerned with demonstrating progress.

If actual progress could be shown under NDA, an independent media outlet would be a much better vehicle to solve that concern than a biased, anonymous and individual backer. Hence why your story makes little sense.

It's because they're unlike before, actually releasing progress on a more frequent basis, not just saying there is progress, making scripted demos or making cinematic trailers.

Bias goes both ways. A fan who visits the studio is still obviously a fan, the ones i got to talk privately that did so, could result on more productive discussions about what's going on, i have yet to meet one of those who would said what they saw did not exceed what they were expecting to see, and we're talking about tours with dozens of people at once. Anyway what this is, it's simply backers who got into tours to visit their studios, that share their opinions and views, same opinions and views you are completely free to completely ignore and take as "it's just a biased backer.", other people opinions are not meant neither effective to clear your concerns as I view it, or try to enroll on a tour yourself and get face-to-face with the developers of this game, or just keep following the development as it is.

 

[lysan]

Yeah i know, they had access to SQ42. In terms of media CIG had not open up to invite media outlets to have a look at what's the PU development, in fact when it comes to PU they don't show anything new the media the backers already knew, with things like PG planets being there but not discussed until publicly revealed to all.

a.

And here we have it, the magical PG tech that surpass everything we have ever seen before? The tech that will leave the competitors in a cloud of dust, behind the CIG PG racer.

However its funny that we have never seen anything from CIG before regarding PG, they didn't attend to symposiums or published a white paper on anything related to PG, and yet again they are blowing everything away with their PG tech.

I really really can't wait to see it, I will bow for the PG masters if its true. I will buy new ships and join the cult of SC if this is true.

So lets summarize what they say they already can do.

A full PG universe with orbiting mechanics, high fidelity worlds with different biospheres and wildlife. Full weather pattern on all the inhabitable planets.

ST: So the first one that I want to deal with is, “Will planets have variant biomes?” Of course! We have to. Otherwise you’re gonna end up with planets that all looked rocky.

FS: Yeah.

ST: Planets that all looked frozen. Planets that all look…and we’ve got some of the best atmosphere technology that I’ve ever seen.

FS: Oh it’s incredible.

ST: It’s absolutely phenomenal.

Source

So everything we have seen so far, in any game or demonstration, lecture, symposium, whitepaper is outdated by this new CIG PG Tech, one small step for man, one giant leap for CIG, I just can't wait to see it.

Frontier, you are outdated, they will just roll over you with this and you need to giddy-up to get back in the game. (my face expression is a secret)