The Star Citizen Thread v5

[Viajero]

They failed to deliver the game in the 18 months past the due date stated in the TOS. Although the original had 12 months, until they extended it because they went flying past it.

This is kind of a mash up of the original and the new, as the new TOS states that CIG does not have to release anything. Basically CIG wants you to agree to give up all your consumer protection.

As far I have seen so far, CIG will always prefer to issue a refund than to disclose financials. It can indeed be argued that the old TOS grants backers the right to request the financials given current delays but, unless you are prepared to go to litigation/arbitration or similar, CIG will always refuse obviously.

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Back to real news dep - so we know there's 2.6.1 coming in "few weeks" coming (LOL), and CIG and Chris is unsure about Squadron 42 coming this year (at least verbatim quote indicates that).

So....what else is new?

 

[Zyll Goliat]

They failed to deliver the game in the 18 months past the due date stated in the TOS. Although the original had 12 months, until they extended it because they went flying past it.

This is kind of a mash up of the original and the new, as the new TOS states that CIG does not have to release anything. Basically CIG wants you to agree to give up all your consumer protection.

Well yeah the new TOS is just a disgrace and poke in the eye for crowdfunding,gaming industry and most of all gamers itself.....
Hmm...that quote:"In the unlikely event that RSI is not able to deliver the Game and/or the pledge items, RSI agrees to post an audited cost accounting on the Website to fully explain the use of the amounts paid for Pledge Item Cost and the Game Cost"-well here I can clearly see your point but still thats very debatable line of text and yeah sure we could said that CIG miss to deliver "full" game until promised date so they should provide us with the financial info but also in CIG defence they still kind of making a game....so...I don´t know man........

 

[Asp Explorer]

Sorry, there's never going to be a vacancy to fill lulzbuckets.

Just add CIG and the lulzbuckets fill themselves

 

[Tuub t Tute]

Just add CIG and the lulzbuckets fill themselves

Fantasia?...

 

[Monk]

Easy. Quality people are hard to find.

On top of that Cry Engine is painful to work with which hits at the engineers positions.

This is true. Despite everyone and their mother getting a comp sci degree these days there is still high demand and short supply for developers and other IT professionals. Just look in the classifieds and you will see more consulting companies offering IT services than you will find actual people looking for jobs. I've been in consulting (fancy word for long-term contractor) for two years now and the immense need that all our clients have for staff is pretty dominant.

However, interesting companies doing interesting work with new technologies and established development lifecycles will attract devs like moths to a flame. It would seem that CIG/RSI have lost some of that sheen and excitement that attracted talent. It may be expensive but I'm not sure they will ever fill those positions with full-time salaried hires and will have to rely on contractors/consultants to fill those positions.

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

This is true. Despite everyone and their mother getting a comp sci degree these days there is still high demand and short supply for developers and other IT professionals. Just look in the classifieds and you will see more consulting companies offering IT services than you will find actual people looking for jobs. I've been in consulting (fancy word for long-term contractor) for two years now and the immense need that all our clients have for staff is pretty dominant.

However, interesting companies doing interesting work with new technologies and established development lifecycles will attract devs like a moths to a flame. It would seem that CIG/RSI have lost some of that sheen and excitement that attracted talent. It may be expensive but I'm not sure they will ever fill those positions with full-time salaried hires and will have to rely on contractors/consultants to fill those positions.

It might be just a rumor/ruse/speculation, but CryEngine is notoriously famous (or in opposite - it's not well received) in industry, and that alone adds to lack of quality workforce and other obstacles. There's good reason for FD position about having solified core team brushed in many projects and using their own engine was a core during Kickstarter ED pitch. You *have* to have that stuff already available when you start your project. Heck, you will have even hard time to hire sysadmins with specific requirements, nevermind core developers who can do high fidelity 3D graphics.

It is just bad planning. I don't know - or I just lack info - how it actually impacts CIG delivery, but I will suspect that adds to the whole problem quite a bit.

 

[Toumal]

It could be argued that finding people for Cobra is even harder, as this is a completely proprietary engine nobody outside FD has any experience with. So CE isn't *that* exotic in comparison.

 

[Stormprooter]

This is true. Despite everyone and their mother getting a comp sci degree these days there is still high demand and short supply for developers and other IT professionals. Just look in the classifieds and you will see more consulting companies offering IT services than you will find actual people looking for jobs. I've been in consulting (fancy word for long-term contractor) for two years now and the immense need that all our clients have for staff is pretty dominant.

Sounds like I should go freelance....
Any demand for an SQL Server and .NET kung-fu master who can also bridge the gap between older tech (VB/FoxPro) and modern platforms?

 

[Monk]

Would love to be a fly on the wall over at the recruitment office in HR.

I wonder, are they not getting applicants for those positions?

Or

Are they getting applicants and rejecting them for not being qualified?

Or

Are they getting applicants, having interviews and then the applicant is like "uhh, no thanks" after? (interviews for experienced devs are the opposite of a normal interview. The hiring manager is being interviewed by the applicant)

 

[ghcannon]

It could be argued that finding people for Cobra is even harder, as this is a completely proprietary engine nobody outside FD has any experience with. So CE isn't *that* exotic in comparison.

FD does not look for people with Cobra experience - there are none.
If you can develop on CE then you're a good candidate for FD.

You will argue that learning Cobra for a newly hired dev pads overhead and you'd be right more or less.
But surely that is to a significant extent compensated by keeping a smaller team. In contrast to CIG staff numbers.

 

[Monk]

Sounds like I should go freelance....
Any demand for an SQL Server and .NET kung-fu master who can also bridge the gap between older tech (VB/FoxPro) and modern platforms?

Are you kidding me? Yes, absolutely. If you can throw some java experience on top of that there are droves of corporate opportunities available. I'm just an IT business analyst but when I moved into consulting I experienced a 100% pay increase. Granted, my previous employer had the golden handcuffs cinched very tightly on me and was underpaying me for several years.

I would recommend working with a firm rather than going it alone. My firm treats me as a salaried employee (even though I bill hours but I'm billing for the firm) and that makes benefits and taxes a lot easier to deal with...they also have a business team that ensures I always have work with a client. Now, if I had the appropriate contacts I could go it as freelance and earn more than double what I make now but I would then be responsible for my insurance and for ensuring I have consistent work.

 

[Stormprooter]

(interviews for experienced devs are the opposite of a normal interview. The hiring manager is being interviewed by the applicant)

Ain't that the truth! I've tried explaining that to some of my younger colleagues over the years.
+1 virtual rep as real is not available

 

[Stormprooter]

Are you kidding me? Yes, absolutely. If you can throw some java experience on top of that there are droves of corporate opportunities available. I'm just an IT business analyst but when I moved into consulting I experienced a 100% pay increase. Granted, my previous employer had the golden handcuffs cinched very tightly on me and was underpaying me for several years.

I would recommend working with a firm rather than going it alone. My firm treats me as a salaried employee (even though I bill hours but I'm billing for the firm) and that makes benefits and taxes a lot easier to deal with...they also have a business team that ensures I always have work with a client. Now, if I had the appropriate contacts I could go it as freelance and earn more than double what I make now but I would then be responsible for my insurance and for ensuring I have consistent work.

I don't have the Java knowledge - I never got into it. My problem is that I am comfortable where I am, I am very reasonably paid, and I have a lot of autonomy with relatively low stress levels. The commute to work is easy (20 mins), I have a lot of flexibility in my working hours, and a guaranteed paycheck at the end of every month. I should count my blessings, but the work is mostly tedious, and not much of a challenge.

 

[Monk]

I don't have the Java knowledge - I never got into it. My problem is that I am comfortable where I am, I am very reasonably paid, and I have a lot of autonomy with relatively low stress levels. The commute to work is easy (20 mins), I have a lot of flexibility in my working hours, and a guaranteed paycheck at the end of every month. I should count my blessings, but the work is mostly tedious, and not much of a challenge.

Fair enough. I only made the switch because I had to at least get fairly paid and I needed to move to a different city for family. All told, it was a fine move. My commute is long, I have many clients but it is mostly for telecom...which is a super laid back industry. At my last job things were exciting and we were producing new code at a very high pace. I was getting exposed to leadership/management roles, predictive analytics and more SQL than I could shake a stick at. But that pay...it is almost criminal how little I was paid for the amount of work and responsibility I had. Funnily enough, I got a message from my old Director, now a VP and he offered me a very very competitive salary to get me to come back. However, I agreed to set roots and start a family with the wife...soooo

Anyway, really OT, sorry about that everyone.

Solid talent is tough to find and even tougher to keep. If I were CIG, I'd just give up on trying to hire Senior folks and just train up the people I have. Though, I don't know if backers would like the thought of their funding going towards career development.

 

[Insignificant_The_Galaxy_Cat]

Would love to be a fly on the wall over at the recruitment office in HR.

I wonder, are they not getting applicants for those positions?

Or

Are they getting applicants and rejecting them for not being qualified?

Or

Are they getting applicants, having interviews and then the applicant is like "uhh, no thanks" after? (interviews for experienced devs are the opposite of a normal interview. The hiring manager is being interviewed by the applicant)

[SPECULATION ALERT!]




....it's the first and last options.

 

[shadragon]

The numbers are all made up. Still funny though.

Mmmmm, if only they had promised to release regular financial statements when they did their Kickstarter. All of this confusion could have been avoided.

 

[GaryII]

Solid talent is tough to find and even tougher to keep. If I were CIG, I'd just give up on trying to hire Senior folks and just train up the people I have. Though, I don't know if backers would like the thought of their funding going towards career development.

Question here is how many Cryengine/C++ devs they currently have, is it enough ?!
Looking at current state of the game (delays and bugs), they need senior devs like now and yesterday

 

[DLewth]

Learning the tools is sort of secondary, though. Being something of a greybeard I've bounced off everything from Basic to Assembly to VB: The last one I had a proper go at was Ruby. The tricky bit is understanding data structures and coming up with good algorithms: The rest is just remembering where the semi-colons go this week.

OK, a bit of an over-simplification, but I can imagine FDev are far more interested the core skills than whether you can apply them to Cobra on day 1.

 

[frostypaw]

Question here is how many Cryengine/C++ devs they currently have, is it enough ?!
Looking at current state of the game (delays and bugs), they need senior devs like now and yesterday

What if those new devs say that it just can't be done too?? Then what do you do?

Be interesting to see if the staffing figures rise after this round.