Star Citizen Thread v6

[MTBFritz]

Back in 2012 Penny Arcade called Star Citizen a bad bet. This is CR's response.

https://images-ext-2.discordapp.net...FIcAqmXUAImt4T.jpg:large?width=478&height=421

Gems like this one along with the CRoberts play-fail video will make for a truly amazing hindisight book after the smoke settles down

 

[1500]

Gems like this one along with the CRoberts play-fail video will make for a truly amazing hindisight book after the smoke settles down

I forgot the actual article

Chris Roberts’ Star Citizen needs your money to get more money, and promises everything to get it

Chris Roberts earned much media attention when he announced the details of his upcoming open-world space simulator Star Citizen yesterday, and he wasn’t shy about promising the sun and the moon. The game will feature a solid single-player campaign, as well as a strong multiplayer setting. You can fly around the huge world, have areas named after you, create your own ships, and the whole thing will be supported by a one-time purchase price for the game, followed by microtransactions.

This is the sort of ambitious, large scale space title PC gamers have been dreaming about, and Roberts has some tech demos and videos to show how much work he has finished already. Of course, for all this to happen, he needs your money.

Why that’s a bad bet

Let’s look at what’s being promised here. A complete single and multiplayer game. A persistent online world. Microtransactions. Customization. Roberts talked about ships you can create and then sell for a profit. A world that’s updated every week or two, with a team that continually creates content. All of these things, combined with the level of graphical fidelity that’s been shown in the videos, cost money. A ton of money. The game is being crowdfunded, with Roberts looking for $2 to $4 million from players to get the ball rolling.

While other games like Planetary Annihilation have reached that level of funding, the creators of those games go out of their way to cut costs and think of realistic ways to deliver the content being promised. Planetary Annihilation won’t ship with a single-player game, nor will there be multiple factions. In many ways it’s a conservative project, because everyone at Uber Entertainment is aware that they’re working with a very limited budget for game development. I’ve sat down with people behind that project, and budget concerns along with a realistic look at features that can be promised were big parts of their business plan. That’s a good bet.

Roberts, on the other hand, is promising damn near everything. During a demo he showed a ship with eight thrusters, and said flying it could change if an enemy took one or two out. “We model damage to that level,” he told Polygon. “This ship has 300 different parts, 60 of those are articulating and animating. This is a level of fidelity that hasn’t been done in this style space flight game before.” The game will support a wide variety of peripherals, including the Oculus Rift. There is talk of space ships that you can fly with your friends, so that everyone can jump onto a turret or get into the cockpit and fly as a team. Everything is possible at Zombo.com.


Other outlets share my disbelief at the promised features. “I’m reluctant to keep on listing features though, because all this stuff is very much future tense. Star Citizen is still a couple of years away – at least – and as much as I’d love to see everything promised come to fruition and be amazing, I wouldn’t bet against more than a few bits being put on the backburner or falling through the ‘Molyneux Gap’ during development,” Rock Paper Shotgun wrote. “The single-player campaign in particular (which in keeping with Star Citizen’s slightly shaky grasp on what makes for a cool sounding name is called “Squadron 42″) seems like a great addition for Wing Commander fans, but distinctly snippable if pressed for time.” I can’t imagine funding the game only to find that my favorite feature is cut; what’s being promised and what is likely to be delivered in the shipping product will likely only feature a passing resemblance to each other.

You’re not funding the game, you’re baiting other investors

Keep in mind that the $2 to $4 million Roberts hopes to raise won’t fund the game, it will merely attract the interest of other investors who will provide the rest of the money. Your cash is just bait, and your interest will hopefully make the game seem like a good bet to other investors.

“If we can raise between $2 to $4 million we have investors that have agreed to contribute the balance we need to complete this game as long as we can validate that there is a demand for a high end PC space game,” the official site states. Major publishers won’t be interested in a project like this, and Roberts says that venture capitalists are only interested in mobile or social games, which is why our money is so important up front.

“Roberts will create Star Citizen without a publisher. He has private investment, but needs to do ‘an element’ of crowdfunding to raise between two and four million dollars and validate the private investors’ valuation of the project,” Eurogamer reported. “The game itself will cost between 12 million and 14 million dollars to create.”

Let’s be clear, just because there’s no publisher doesn’t mean there’s no middle man. We’ve just become the middle men ourselves, except with little to no power over the game, and Roberts will still be responsible to the people putting up the other $10+ million. This isn’t a strike against “the man,” this is the last-ditch effort for a developer with big ambitions to get the money he needs to create his dream game, and many of the features listed feel like exactly that: Dreams.

There is nothing to lose when it comes to promising things at this stage. The more people like a certain feature or idea the more people will give money. During production it’s likely that many of these features will be dropped, or pushed way back into an expansion or update. This is a single-player game mixed with an MMO mixed with a player-driven economy, all wrapped around space ships with complex physics and amazing graphics that will be sold as product and then given free-to-play-style mechanics. It could be the most complex project possible in gaming, and Roberts only has experience with a few aspects of the design. This is a risky, expensive, and deliriously optimistic project.

Keep in mind all this funding is going through Roberts’ own website, so don’t assume any of the Kickstarter or IndieGoGo rules apply. If funding fails you can choose to get a refund but, as with all crowdfunding efforts, don’t give anything you wouldn’t be comfortable losing.

Don’t mistake my skepticism for a lack of enthusiasm, as I want to play the game Roberts is describing. I want to give him money to make that game. If Roberts can buckle down, show something a little more real, and give players a stronger idea of the core feature set that will be available at launch, I may do so. Promising so much when there are such high stakes involved with this first round of fundraising may make sense to get the initial interest of players, but this would be a project that would seem nearly impossible with a huge publisher throwing masses of money at each problem. For $14 million and an independent team it’s downright quixotic.

 

[JohnMice]

So the $6m stretch goal stating "Star Citizen will launch with 100 star systems" has been clarified as "Star citizen won't launch with 100 systems".

Ok.

Yes, around 2015 when the German Office came "online" and CIG got hold of some of the main Crytek guys who had already some groundwork of Procedural Generation with the engine.

Spoiler

[video=youtube;yisaDxvBH9s]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yisaDxvBH9s[/video]

The funding given by the backers allowed for the development of PG tech and a change of scope from a Freelancer game cutscenes to planet aproach to seamless landings, as Chris Roberts adamantly said he didn't wanted barren planets but curated content that felt alive the focus was then on making said planets "crysis quality" and fill them with as much engaging content as possible.

21:20 is SC in a nutshell. A guy shooting a spinning object in SC wondering "If it has enough force to slow it down." Its all pretend-play with dramatic music.

It's possible to create/slow the momentum of ships with weapon firing so it wasn't that far fetched aproach, the thing is that ship is just to big and had a lot of force going already . Usually works with the small ones if they are rotating slowly.

I m sorry that translation holds no value because after checking the source that was available to me I cannot confirm a 1:1 translation.

I'm sure that the article will become free 2 read eventually or be shared by some kind german folks. Either way I'm sure the reports of seamless planetary landing's were not mistranslations.

Pedant mode engaged: fauna is animals, not vegetation.
Expand on the "etc", because you already listed everything that's currently possible. Unless you want to add "sit on toilet" or something equally inane.

Yes, my bad, I was refering to vegetation and not animals, although there's already been confirmed that alien life will be a thing on planets sometime in the future, some were teased in ATV's before

Spoiler

As for "expanding on the etc" concerning the gameplay that ships with modeled interiors and physics grids: The etc could be the role of the copilot by managing the Engines/Shields/Weapons:

Spoiler

[video=youtube;QfhiJx28psw]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfhiJx28psw[/video]

Transporting smaller ship's without quantum jump to other side of space:

Spoiler

[video=youtube;OqGW3jPqh1A]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqGW3jPqh1A[/video]

Or just playing tetrishauling with cargo:

Spoiler

[video=youtube;DLqbSc5JIIc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLqbSc5JIIc[/video]

From the linked original post on the Star Citizen development thread:

"Chris Roberts tells Gamestar he plans to launch with 5 to 10 star systems, not the 100 claimed in the 2012 Kickstarter"

I do have some sympathy with them on this one. If I remember it correctly originally they were planning on each planet containing just a few tiny but highly-detailed points of interest with a loading screen to take the player from orbit to the POI. Switching to modelling entire planets/moons (even if it is technically possible using their engine) completely changes the amount of work needed to model a system so a reduction in the number of systems/increase in the amount of time needed is entirely expected. As far as I could see the entire community of SC backers were in favour of the change, so it's not 100% the fault of the developers. Of course Chris Roberts should never ever have suggested it as a viable option in the first place or should have put more effort into telling them why it was a bad idea...

Yes, this. In "russian math" Instead of 100 shots were getting 5-10 bottles of vodka to get drunk.

Back in 2012 Penny Arcade called Star Citizen a bad bet.


https://web.archive.org/web/2013122...ds-your-money-to-get-more-money-and-promises-

This is CR's response.
https://images-ext-2.discordapp.net...FIcAqmXUAImt4T.jpg:large?width=478&height=421

Edit: I added the article.

Cool find in what reads as ancient history by now. Completely understandable (and ethical) that he showed a skeptical aproach. The project was presented like a really big endeavour from the start. The fact that Star Citizen as come so far and gained such recognition show's quite well how much of a visionaire and ambitious talent Chris Roberts is. It's really extraordinary how far this adventure as come.

Also Ben Kucera (the journalist that wrote that article back in 2012) ended up colaborating in another piece about Star Citizen in 2015 this time already as Polygon employee and a bit less skeptical:

[video=youtube;QqU2I8GwbEU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqU2I8GwbEU[/video]

Funny to watch him listen to a enthusiastic co-worker playing and praising Star Citizen when 3 years ago he was so cynical about it. Endearing to hear that excitement and pride to supporting the biggest crowdfunded game and seing it come alive.

That video was the follow up to another article if anyone cares: https://www.polygon.com/2015/2/3/7971363/my-first-week-as-a-star-citizen

 

[AJW]

...
That video was the follow up to another article if anyone cares: https://www.polygon.com/2015/2/3/7971363/my-first-week-as-a-star-citizen

An article clearly written by someone unfamiliar with what other games/sims have been doing for years:

The other unique aspect of Star Citizen is the dynamic, cinematic camera. The default view is from inside the cockpit, through the eyes of your avatar. With a hat switch you can lean your whole body left and right to see around the ship. Add a Track IR system and you can actually move your head inside your space helmet, giving you finer control of where you're looking. But then, with the tap of a button on your throttle, you switch to a chase camera outside and behind your ship. Tap again and you're perched over the nose, looking backwards. Once more and you're inside the cockpit, behind the heads-up display, looking back at your avatar. The transitions are seamless and the effect is dramatic.

There is nothing remotely unique about TrackIR being used to do exactly what it was designed for, and neither is the ability to switch viewpoints around - I can't think of an air combat sim for example that doesn't have the option. Not that this would matter much if it wasn't yet another example of the way SC hype is built around claims of 'uniqueness' that simply don't stand up to scrutiny.

 

[n4p0l3on]

Or just playing tetrishauling with cargo:

Spoiler

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLqbSc5JIIc

first in, last out cargo system, much fidelity...

but imagine this

imagine, someone put some crates of very valuable gems on a starfarer, those gems would be 'buried' behind hundreds or thousands of junks and worthless cargo..., questions :

1. exhibit A, can you imagine having to unload all the junk first before selling the gems in a port? because you know, due to much fidelitious, you need to deliver that gem crates to the trader kiosk if you want to sell it.
2. exhibit B, can you imagine a pirate having to unload all those junks first before pirating the gems? because of the exact same reason as above, pirate would literally need to get their hand on their specific target crates.

be honest

does anyone think that's fun? much fidelitious fun? or just nonsense insane game design?

does anyone believe there's a game AI that can handle such fidelity? how do you imagine NPC pirates would be in such game?

 

[n4p0l3on]

An article clearly written by someone unfamiliar with what other games/sims have been doing for years:



There is nothing remotely unique about TrackIR being used to do exactly what it was designed for, and neither is the ability to switch viewpoints around - I can't think of an air combat sim for example that doesn't have the option. Not that this would matter much if it wasn't yet another example of the way SC hype is built around claims of 'uniqueness' that simply don't stand up to scrutiny.

Because sadly, mainstream gaming journalism is so out of touch with real pc gaming, you know, pc gaming that involves sim, strategy and crpg games, they are rather completely oblivious to those genres.

Not surprising if they got in awe with such decade old feature.

 

[lysan]

An article clearly written by someone unfamiliar with what other games/sims have been doing for years:



There is nothing remotely unique about TrackIR being used to do exactly what it was designed for, and neither is the ability to switch viewpoints around - I can't think of an air combat sim for example that doesn't have the option. Not that this would matter much if it wasn't yet another example of the way SC hype is built around claims of 'uniqueness' that simply don't stand up to scrutiny.

Not only that, but this is already a reality in many SIMs out TODAY! and ED does it very well too, some of the best VR and or TIR implementation in the business. I understand that there is a need to hype SC up to something it's not, and that is the failure of the whole campaign.

They can't deliver the hype, only the hype for the sake of the hype. When ED at some point get legs attached to our avatar there is not much more in SC to make you buy that game. Unless they make a SP story driven game, as this is not something we get in ED, and it's not on the list as far as I know.

 

[Viajero]

I'm not at home so I cannot be 100% sure this is the exact source I'm thinking of, but it ought to be close enough - there were about half a dozen near-identical ones.

http://www.gamersnexus.net/gg/2613-...-citizen-procedural-planets-alpha3-citizencon

The quote I used earlier is from the Red Bull article last year.

https://www.redbull.com/int-en/making-star-citizens-planets-believable

Ta.

Asuming the tools allow CIG to generate those planets as quickly as Chris Roberts suggests in the Red Bull article, then I fail to see how one can excuse/rationalize the system number reduction based on the extra (?) work required for those.

What I suspect is the real blocker or critical path here is not the actual planet or system generation but their Points of Interest asset and feature building.

But that was always going to be an issue with or without new procedural tech work. Seems to me once again the community is using the red herring of "enlarged scope" to wave away development issues that would have been there either way.

PS: Is there any info that CIG may have stated with regards to number of PoIs originally planned for the 100 systems? And how the number of those compares to how many PoI they plan to build now?

 

[BurnyBurns]

But it's a million-poly, high fidelity and ultra realistic wall, voice acted and motion captured by Famous Actors, and it's script is 1500 pages long.

What they said. But you'll have to wait another year before we show it to you, because we have had to refactor our industry leading fidelious game and asset production pipelines and are now really ramping up the production of the game.

...is more or less the funny line paraded around every year.

 

[Vasious]

PS: Is there any info that CIG may have stated with regards to number of PoIs originally planned for the 100 systems? And how the number of those compares to how many PoI they plan to build now?

I don't thing so but the general argument is that there will be parity to the original plan.

If it is 5 to 10 systems , I wonder which sections of the star map will be the "live release" part.
Will it be a line from Stanton to Earth and Terran, then a line to Xi'an Banu and Vanduul space, or will we only see the Human-Vanduul board regions, with the core regions of Earth and Terra, as well as the other Alien systems coming later


Makes me think of the Eranin (RIP Eranin Peoples Party's independence of of Azeban) Bubble and the Pill of beta, as they clearly have bundles or lore for the 100 or so systems they hopefully wont waste.

 

[Viajero]

I don't thing so but the general argument is that there will be parity to the original plan.

Let´s think that through for a moment.

Let´s say, being overly conservative, that we have only 1 PoI per planet, and an average of 3 planets per system. The original plan would mean 300 PoI. And that is probably a very conservative (low) ballpark.

You really think that for each and every one of the 5-10 systems now stated CIG is going to build around 40 distinct full of personality and fidelity PoI´s for release?

 

[Vasious]

Let´s think that through for a moment.

Let´s say, being overly conservative, that we have only 1 PoI per planet, and an average of 3 planets per system. The original plan would mean 300 PoI. And that is probably a very conservative (low) ballpark.

You really think that for each and every one of the 5-10 systems now stated CIG is going to build around 40 distinct full of personality and fidelity PoI´s for release?

If I apply a principal of good faith yes.

Assuming they had a plan for 300 POIs then changing where they put them shouldn't change them much, lest they realised on specifics of location.

if they had a plan and could meet the plan to have the 300 POI done for release then no reason to think they couldn't still do that for the mall system numbers just with a high density.

It just comes down to two things
1) when is relapse planned
2) could they achieve the 300 POI by then regardless of the number of systems they are sprinkled about.


Which is really saying I see how those who say "Yes they could" would feel they down size is not that much a loss as it is an increase of density of content, not a loss of content.

But that is not to say those that worry about the downsize being a loss in POIs as well is also not a valid point of view.

I don't think either view is unreasonable.

I am not sure what Exploration really was going to be like to really know of the down size will effect it that much, as they would still ever only be a handful of new systems to discover, or alternative temporary jump points to chart to begin with.

Giving us game play loops In one system will be the proof test methinks

 

[Zetta]

Why is it being called "high density" now? Are these the new buzz words to replace hand made?

If the old system was 300 needles in a hay field and the new system is 300 needles in a haystack, it's still needles in a haystack.

There was a post about this on the subreddit earlier. A moon in 3.0 is ~785,000 square kilometers, you could put all 300 POIs on that single moon and it would not be high density, spread them out over all the planets and moons in 5-10 systems and it's massively further from "high density".

 

[Vasious]

Why is it being called "high density" now? Are these the new buzz words to replace hand made?

If the old system was 300 needles in a hay field and the new system is 300 needles in a haystack, it's still needles in a haystack.

There was a post about this on the subreddit earlier. A moon in 3.0 is ~785,000 square kilometers, you could put all 300 POIs on that single moon and it would not be high density, spread them out over all the planets and moons in 5-10 systems and it's massively further from "high density".

I just picked the term as a relative measure

 

[MTBFritz]

I'm sure that the article will become free 2 read eventually or be shared by some kind german folks. Either way I'm sure the reports of seamless planetary landing's were not mistranslations.

Once it does I ll make a proper translation if this is still an ongoing point by then or maybe just to point out any possible differences.

I dont know the guy who made that thread but my statement is still true......its not a "translation"....its an "interpretation". I could make a translation of an ATV to german OR voice my own thoughts of whats shown in that episode. I m pretty sure both results would differ drastically. The author of that thread isnt neutral so his translation holds no value.

Why is it being called "high density" now? Are these the new buzz words to replace hand made?

If the old system was 300 needles in a hay field and the new system is 300 needles in a haystack, it's still needles in a haystack.

There was a post about this on the subreddit earlier. A moon in 3.0 is ~785,000 square kilometers, you could put all 300 POIs on that single moon and it would not be high density, spread them out over all the planets and moons in 5-10 systems and it's massively further from "high density".

Whatever helps in hyping this monstrosity up and convince ultras their investment was proper and the right thing to do. Next term to change is "first" which doesnt mean "never been done before" but" never been done before BY CIG" and of course everybody and their mother knew that because cmon...its self-explanatory.

 

[Zetta]

I just picked the term as a relative measure

No probs, it wasn't a dig at your comment per se. More that it is something being bandied around on the subreddit and elsewhere, I just feel that the term high density is a bit disingenuous because of the land area involved.

 

[Knightshark]

Let´s think that through for a moment.

Let´s say, being overly conservative, that we have only 1 PoI per planet, and an average of 3 planets per system. The original plan would mean 300 PoI. And that is probably a very conservative (low) ballpark.

You really think that for each and every one of the 5-10 systems now stated CIG is going to build around 40 distinct full of personality and fidelity PoI´s for release?

The only company that would manage that is CD Project RED.

 

[Tuub t Tute]

I might be mistaken (easy to do), I'm sure after "Pupil to Planet" was shown, there was some discussion around it being on rails and not really showing a planet where a pilot could land anywhere they chose?

This was dismissed with "Look, he is flying it, he is making control inputs, that drop out of QD next to the space station wasn't a loading screen at all... See, SC planets are much better than other games planets".

Whichever way it pans out, getting planetary landings out of the in-house sizzle reel and into the hands of players is going to be very telling for the progress of the game (imho) only 4 weeks to wait for Gamescom!

 

[Memnoch]

Isn't Genuine Roberts on record as saying that the tech had been generated to allow their artists to build entire worlds in an afternoon, and that they could churn them out in no time at all?

That would allow them to roll out entire planets worth of empty wasteland, for sure. But without the hand crafted stations and other POI that would be one lonely dust ball.

 

[PiLhEaD]

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