Don't forget the refunds that are being done in some incredibly flag raising ways.
The Star Citizen Thread v5
- Thread starter Brett C
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*sigh*
If only Frontier had similar capital like CiG.
Having said that, the progress FD have made in the last two years has been impressive to say the least, but still.
I feel the SC whales backed the wrong horse, (It is their own money, whatever) but what happens when reality sinks in and it all comes crashing down around their ears when they discover that their horse turns out to be a lame flea-bitten nag?
If only Frontier had similar capital like CiG.
Having said that, the progress FD have made in the last two years has been impressive to say the least, but still.
I feel the SC whales backed the wrong horse, (It is their own money, whatever) but what happens when reality sinks in and it all comes crashing down around their ears when they discover that their horse turns out to be a lame flea-bitten nag?
The thing is, money is great for project longevity but really doesn't build a game any faster - just great management with a good solid plan with as much thought out before hand will turn into a well run project.
CR/CIG/RSI/SC is lacking all of that except the money - which is the one thing that is guaranteeing this thing is a turd soup.
CR/CIG/RSI/SC is lacking all of that except the money - which is the one thing that is guaranteeing this thing is a turd soup.
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Seriously I'd love to know from some of the Commandos what do you think is going to happen with these multi-crew requiring ships? See you talk about the crew requirements as if they're going to need real people to crew them and therefore that stops them being a "win button" as people have to organise others etc to play.
So what happens if you had out flying in your 2 crew to fly ship and your friend has to drop out?
Are you left drifting helpless in space?
So what happens if you had out flying in your 2 crew to fly ship and your friend has to drop out?
Are you left drifting helpless in space?
Yeah, I feel the same way at times...however, in my experience, the most innovative and satisfying solutions occurred under strictly limited budget. Give a good dev a challenge, as opposed to unrestricted engineering pet projects, and you will get something you've never seen before.
When I've had projects where our engineers had nearly unlimited funding with far off nebulous deadlines, we always came in late and bloated.
Too much imagination, not enough reality. People imagine it is going to be like x number of friends/players in a ship going on a few hour adventure but the reality is that you aren't all physically there together in this environment - you are in your own homes and stuff happens at home. People think it's going to be like some movie - like Memphis Belle or something - where you're all together and reliant on each other but the reality is far different because you aren't sharing the same space at the same time, you are separated by hundreds to thousands of miles and an internet connection which can go out at any time.
That's any thing about multi-crew, the imagination bit is way better than the reality of it.
I dunno, that stuff is still pretty powerful in VR. Positional audio and social stuff work very well with avatars nearby, even if they are just floating cartoon heads.
That said, huge challenges making multicrew gameplay worthwhile and interesting for anything other than socializing. I suppose SC needs ED 2.3 to come out before coming up with their brilliant ideas for multicrew gameplay beyond manning turrets and clipping through geometry.
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I meant the fact that you aren't in the same reality together. Let's take multi-crew tank for example in real life, you are a soldier with other soldiers working this tank. You are all physically together, you all work together constantly. There is no chance for a disco, or for a poopy diaper, or a house fire, or etc. You are all THERE, and that's what a lot of people imagine multi-crew to be. You are all THERE, working together making this thing happen. But you aren't, you are in distinctly different realities/locations/time zones/two seconds away from the microwave exploding/your dog eating through your LAN cable/etc.
Everyone seems to imagine multi-crew like it would be if you were in that environment in real life, but it isn't - it really is different simply due to the fact you all aren't actually doing it in real time in the same location physically.
So when reality comes knocking, and causes half your crew to disappear and they were needed to fight off this horde of whatever - or to simply manage a power unit or whatever to get back to base and they can't stay on anymore... you are boned.
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I wonder how long it will take before all the multicrew positions get botted 
Or you have people deliberately sabotaging expensive ships just for the lulz.
Or you have people deliberately sabotaging expensive ships just for the lulz.
Sure, but VR really gives a nice simulation of that, something about audio coming from someone next to you really can trick your brain into thinking your friend IS next to you for a second. Even with cheesy avatars, which I find surprising. I've played a lot of stuff with a few people using Bigscreen lately, and it really is a hoot and a fun simulation of being in the same room playing games and riffing on bad movies with friends, more so than anything other than... being in the same room playing games with friends. My dearest friends have spread across the country now so it's harder to get together, but I'm really impressed with social VR apps and what they bring to the table for multiplayer. The audio streaming keeps up, it's not plagued by horrendous lag. So I just see multicrew as an extension of that - just playing ED together instead of Mario Kart.
Wings are ok but I like being in a shared space, the lizard brain accepts it. Star Trek Bridge Crew is getting a lot of good responses for the same reason! Have you tried that one? It gets the point across.
Of course if things go wrong and someone logs off, we'll have to deal with that. I'm sure ED will manage it sensibly. SC and it's grave warnings about NEEDING crews to run big ships? I'm with you on that one. Plus the whole "they'll never have proper VR support" aspect which makes my point utterly meaningless.
Like most fantasies about SC!
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Still not talking about the visible aspect, I'm talking about the physical reality of not doing the same thing being directly interconnected like crewing an actual airplane or a tank or working an actual base aid station with actual physical people together in the same "reach out and touch" - that is what I mean, people think it will be like that when it won't be. What I'm talking about has nothing to do with VR or seeing someone rendered.
Most people imagine multi-crew like the movie Memphis Belle where they work together, call out bandits, each person has their specific duty - never mind the fact that won't work well in games at all due to tedium and boredom - but there are also things like internet stability, real life interfering, other things that break the gameplay due to the fact you aren't actually occupying the same actual reality and physical space with the same actual duties as this is just a past time/hobby that takes second seat to real life.
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Sure, it's not going to be perfect and free of all latency or drawbacks. But you can come really close, give Bridge Crew or Bigscreen a try before claiming this has no relation to your point -- it's a compelling experience when done right and real life interfering doesn't really impact it to the point of making it worthless. Obviously nobody is going to have the insane Firefly life experience they picture having in Star Citizen, but a couple hours with friends on an Anaconda or Trek-type-ship on a sunday night? Totally doable, even with instancing grumbles. A crew of people serving a digital big spender for weeks/months? I reaaaally doubt it.
Sure. Manning turrets? That's garbage. Golf swing sensors? Crap. Which makes me appreciate Frontier adding ship launched fighters FIRST -- much more fun than a turret and a great way to make additional crew a little more dynamic. I don't mind a little boredom as a backdrop for chat punctuated by hectic SLF combat, if they come up with a few other aspects to it -- great. Let's see where else they go with 2.3, but multicrew was really the main feature I was excited about for Horizons... just for the VR. With the right friends, it'll add some nice value to the package. It won't appeal or apply to a huge chunk of the Elite playerbase, of course -- but what does?
I doubt SC will manage a fun implementation of it except for the incredibly persistent and borderline masochistic. VR is off the table.
Sure. Manning turrets? That's garbage. Golf swing sensors? Crap. Which makes me appreciate Frontier adding ship launched fighters FIRST -- much more fun than a turret and a great way to make additional crew a little more dynamic. I don't mind a little boredom as a backdrop for chat punctuated by hectic SLF combat, if they come up with a few other aspects to it -- great. Let's see where else they go with 2.3, but multicrew was really the main feature I was excited about for Horizons... just for the VR. With the right friends, it'll add some nice value to the package. It won't appeal or apply to a huge chunk of the Elite playerbase, of course -- but what does?
I doubt SC will manage a fun implementation of it except for the incredibly persistent and borderline masochistic. VR is off the table.
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You mostly got it, but just having experience with trying to organize a small group of 6 to 10 people in a "virtual squadron" for a flight night in itself is a challenge let alone hoping everyone stays connected or doesn't decide to leave after a half hour because they got bored or their wife needs them or the pizza delivery man showed up with a knife and wants to rob the house or etc. I mean, hopefully the robbery thing doesn't happen, but you never know.
I still suspect though, based on a lot of the way the SC individuals present themselves - and especially in those new videos they have created - they expect a Firefly type experience through and through, which is a very unrealistic expectation.
Getting together for an hour or two and doing a run, or winging, or whatever - do able - but doing some long drawn out pillage and run, create a huge controlling empire with 3 ships fully crewed that dominates a system is just, I can't see that realistically happening.
But you mostly got it, I prefer winging with friends/other players rather than "crewing" simply because the crewing aspect almost always doesn't work out without lots of practice. For example, in ArmA I'd be the helo pilot because I can control them really well and a nearby friend and two other goofballs would be door gunners. We'd take out vehicles and do some pretty awesome teamwork, then I'd drop them off and fly over while they go on foot... and suddenly one is wounded, one is dead and the other is high tailing it out of there, so I try to set down for the one non-wounded because despite my protests they all had to be on foot leaving me with no door gunners, and everything went sideways from there. That's multi-crew in just about every scenario involving the change between ship to foot because SC has 'space legs' so obviously gotta get on foot to steal other ships for some reason. However, as frustrating as it was to have that go south - and it happens frequently - just imagine with a ship you paid real hundreds of dollars for and it is now gone.
I still suspect though, based on a lot of the way the SC individuals present themselves - and especially in those new videos they have created - they expect a Firefly type experience through and through, which is a very unrealistic expectation.
Getting together for an hour or two and doing a run, or winging, or whatever - do able - but doing some long drawn out pillage and run, create a huge controlling empire with 3 ships fully crewed that dominates a system is just, I can't see that realistically happening.
But you mostly got it, I prefer winging with friends/other players rather than "crewing" simply because the crewing aspect almost always doesn't work out without lots of practice. For example, in ArmA I'd be the helo pilot because I can control them really well and a nearby friend and two other goofballs would be door gunners. We'd take out vehicles and do some pretty awesome teamwork, then I'd drop them off and fly over while they go on foot... and suddenly one is wounded, one is dead and the other is high tailing it out of there, so I try to set down for the one non-wounded because despite my protests they all had to be on foot leaving me with no door gunners, and everything went sideways from there. That's multi-crew in just about every scenario involving the change between ship to foot because SC has 'space legs' so obviously gotta get on foot to steal other ships for some reason. However, as frustrating as it was to have that go south - and it happens frequently - just imagine with a ship you paid real hundreds of dollars for and it is now gone.
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Ah yeah, that makes more sense now. It's about context and clarity.
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The price of the JPEG going on sale this Sun during CitizenCon. Yes - this is a thing they're still doing. This despite the fact that they have a massive backlog of JPEG ships sold, and which have neither been built, nor in the game.
https://i.imgur.com/Msoq7TL.png
Interesting that many of those JPEG's are related to in-game mechanics and professions that were told by CR in a recent interview as coming "in the long term". Just imagine what that means, considering that was Roberts who said that.
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I think that multi-crew will be a big failure, in general, getting a bunch of people to work on the same ship in smaller roles will be pretty hard I imagine unless you are pretty hard core. Also, I just don't think that CIG can make it fun past the level of any other game out there that has multi-crew.
The most interesting thing that will happen in my opinion is now to watch which mechanics actually make it into the game and which ones get cut and the forum drama
....I think too many people expect too much honestly and over hype it past 9000.On another note, yay Polaris sale, which should have never happened given that CIG promised to never sell capitals, or to sell LTI again, etc....**eye roll**
They really do! Due to the lack of game available, I guess the mind fills in the gaps. But you read those forum threads and the expectations are through the roof. These people need to see what other games do, what can be accomplished, what's fun and what isn't. Learn from Star Wars Galaxies, ArmA, etc.
We definitely agree more than disagree, I'm just saying very small crews in VR make for a fine experience that get us closer to the experience of being in the same room playing a game with friends. But these fantasies -- there's no way that's happening. 6-10? Never. 2-4 on a crew in ED? That'll work and make for a quite fun social experience.
Yeah. That introduces so many other potential screwups to the process, doesn't it. A streamlined experience like Bridge Crew is one thing, but mixing janky FPS elements in with it too? Whew. No wonder current SC multicrew is absolutely awful and not raved about by any gaming sites.
I think we're in mostly full agreement, it just is difficult to fully express things on a forum due to the post and wait and then try to re-clarify and wait, etc.
Multi-crew can work with certain expectations - just not what is being imagined over on the SC forums.
They are getting the Firefly experience. Misleading (and now awkward) promotions. The pilot episode was refactored into the last episode and a new pilot produced after the initial effort was thrown away by management. Time slot keeps shifting. I'm just waiting for it to get moved into the graveyard slot and Wash to die now.
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