Star Citizen Discussions v7

[dreamer1986]

I've actually been following SC's development since 2014, and its not that dramatic as you make it out to be, with a bazillion broken promises, and only tech demos to show for it. CIG started the true work on a lot of its advanced system about then, in 2014, with the UK office just starting to hire people in that year (http://www.develop-online.net/interview/meet-foundry-42-s-star-citizens/0194206), the Frankfurt office opening its doors in 2015 (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/...mes-Opens-New-Development-Office-In-Frankfurt), and hiring continuing since then constantly. Game development is extremely difficult, as I know from personal experience, and even with 2.6, Star Marine being playable, and 3.0 so close to release, only after 2-3 years, is quite amazing to be honest.

Games just don't pop up with moving your mouse a little on the screen in Cryengine, its a lot of work involved, and doing that with a new studio, without the advantage of the big companies, Beth, Ubi, Bioware, that have years of experience, huge budgets, and vast armies of game devs, is to be appreciated and admired. Even these huge companies work for many years on their releases, that bring very few innovations (Mass Effect Andromeda took 5 years to develop).

They are doing a fantastic job so far, even though some mistakes were made, and I'm surprised and disappointed you can't see it.

Edit: CR is indeed too optimistic with his release dates, but he started to tone it down with experience. In the last presentation he didn't make this mistake again. Its easy as a developer to make this mistake, to think you can easily solve some problems that are actually extremely difficult.

 

[Ian Skippy]

I've actually been following SC's development since 2014, and its not that dramatic as you make it out to be, with a bazillion broken promises, and only tech demos to show for it. CIG started the true work on a lot of its advanced system about then, in 2014, with the UK office just starting to hire people in that year (http://www.develop-online.net/interview/meet-foundry-42-s-star-citizens/0194206), the Frankfurt office opening its doors in 2015 (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/...mes-Opens-New-Development-Office-In-Frankfurt), and hiring continuing since then constantly. Game development is extremely difficult, as I know from personal experience, and even with 2.6, Star Marine being playable, and 3.0 so close to release, only after 2-3 years, is quite amazing to be honest.

Games just don't pop up with moving your mouse a little on the screen in Cryengine, its a lot of work involved, and doing that with a new studio, without the advantage of the big companies, Beth, Ubi, Bioware, that have years of experience, huge budgets, and vast armies of game devs, is to be appreciated and admired. Even these huge companies work for many years on their releases, that bring very few innovations (Mass Effect Andromeda took 5 years to develop).

They are doing a fantastic job so far, even though some mistakes were made, and I'm surprised and disappointed you can't see it.

Edit: CR is indeed too optimistic with his release dates, but he started to tone it down with experience. In the last presentation he didn't make this mistake again. Its easy as a developer to make this mistake, to think you can easily solve some problems that are actually extremely difficult.

Then why did CR say 3.0 with the whole stanton system, dozens of stations, the new netcode and gameloops would come in a few weeks over a year ago? Does he not understand game development either or was he simply lying? Beyond that, 2014 was the original release date. And he learned from the past? They missed +-15 release dates of 3.0 this year alone! And if you're trying to tell me they started working after the release date, well, we all perceive the past in our own way I guess.

 

[dreamer1986]

Then why did CR say 3.0 with the whole stanton system, dozens of stations, the new netcode and gameloops would come in a few weeks over a year ago? Does he not understand game development either or was he simply lying? Beyond that, 2014 was the original release date. If you're trying to tell me they started working after the release date, well, we all perceive the past in our own way I guess.

Well, Stretch goals? The release of 2014 was supposed to be a much smaller project, similar to Wing Commander. With bigger financing came bigger ambition, with the adding of multiplayer, 100 playable systems, alien races, a combination of FPS and Space Simulator, with trade, combat, exploration, dozens of unique ships, capable of having multiple players serving various functions + the single player SQ42. Its incredibly ambitious, and to have even 2.6 and Star Marine now is an amazing achievement. Look at ED or Eve Online that finds the idea of space legs incredibly hard to implement. CIG already done it, and its an early alpha. Outstanding work.

Edit: and all this while fighting against an engine that was built only for small scale multiplayer and small levels (Cryengine). They had to modify it completely.

Edit2: and 3.0 is almost out, so what if it took one year instead of a few weeks. Check out the ATV's to see how many bugs they had to fix in the last few months. Like I said, Robert was generally too optimistic with the release dates.

 

[MarktJones]

Well, Stretch goals? The release of 2014 was supposed to be a much smaller project, similar to Wing Commander. With bigger financing came bigger ambition, with the adding of multiplayer, 100 playable systems, alien races, a combination of FPS and Space Simulator, with trade, combat, exploration, dozens of unique ships, capable of having multiple players serving various functions. Its incredibly ambitious, and to have even 2.6 and Star Marine now is an amazing achievement. Look at ED or Eve Online that finds the idea of space legs incredibly hard to implement. CIG already done it, and its an early alpha. Outstanding work.

Edit: and all this while fighting against an engine that was built only for small scale multiplayer and small levels (Cryengine).

Just read the last 10,000 posts then come back and apologise.

 

[Ian Skippy]

Well, Stretch goals? The release of 2014 was supposed to be a much smaller project, similar to Wing Commander. With bigger financing came bigger ambition, with the adding of multiplayer, 100 playable systems, alien races, a combination of FPS and Space Simulator, with trade, combat, exploration, dozens of unique ships, capable of having multiple players serving various functions. Its incredibly ambitious, and to have even 2.6 and Star Marine now is an amazing achievement. Look at ED or Eve Online that finds the idea of space legs incredibly hard to implement. CIG already done it, and its an early alpha. Outstanding work.

Edit: and all this while fighting against an engine that was built only for small scale multiplayer and small levels (Cryengine). They had to modify it completely.

That is factually not true: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cig/star-citizen

The original 'smaller scope' had a persistent multiplayer universe, plus hostable servers by individuals (already dropped) and drop-in coop with the singleplayer part (also already dropped from sq42). 100 systems were promised for 2014, the latest news is CR stated that SC will have a maximum of ten systems on launch. Every year you guys claim the original game was smaller and smaller, and Real Development started later and later. Besides, they promised that the additional money would mean the stretch goals wouldnt delay the release. But I guess they dont understand game development either. They later claimed to have been given permission by their million backers to delay indefinitely based on a poll were a small majority of a couple hundred people said a small delay would be fine if the game would become much better. Oh how it all looked so nice back then. Ah well, neither of us influence any of it so if you're positive about it more power to you.

 

[VidarSnipes]

Well, Stretch goals? The release of 2014 was supposed to be a much smaller project, similar to Wing Commander. With bigger financing came bigger ambition, with the adding of multiplayer, 100 playable systems, alien races, a combination of FPS and Space Simulator, with trade, combat, exploration, dozens of unique ships, capable of having multiple players serving various functions + the single player SQ42. Its incredibly ambitious, and to have even 2.6 and Star Marine now is an amazing achievement. Look at ED or Eve Online that finds the idea of space legs incredibly hard to implement. CIG already done it, and its an early alpha. Outstanding work.

Stretch goals weren't supposed to delay the development.

 

[ianw]

For me it's really simple.

CR has been blowing so hard about how awesome SC is going to be for years - and he rarely misses an opportunity to put some other game down by comparison when he can.

So it seems entirely reasonable to me to hold him to much higher standards than any other game simply because of his boastfulness.

So if anything he shows is not 10 times better than anything else should we not ridicule him?

(I think that's a yes)

ETA - actually that should be a no - double negative and all that...

 

[MarktJones]

Stretch goals weren't supposed to delay the development.

More money was supposed to speed it up wasn't it?

 

[Ian Skippy]

More money was supposed to speed it up wasn't it?

Yup, they originally literally said that. But that was in 2014, which is pre-historic in SC circles. No promises survived those turbulent and dark times.

 

[ZeeWolf]

I've actually been following SC's development since 2014, and its not that dramatic as you make it out to be, with a bazillion broken promises, and only tech demos to show for it. CIG started the true work on a lot of its advanced system about then, in 2014, with the UK office just starting to hire people in that year (http://www.develop-online.net/interview/meet-foundry-42-s-star-citizens/0194206), the Frankfurt office opening its doors in 2015 (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/...mes-Opens-New-Development-Office-In-Frankfurt), and hiring continuing since then constantly. Game development is extremely difficult, as I know from personal experience, and even with 2.6, Star Marine being playable, and 3.0 so close to release, only after 2-3 years, is quite amazing to be honest.

Games just don't pop up with moving your mouse a little on the screen in Cryengine, its a lot of work involved, and doing that with a new studio, without the advantage of the big companies, Beth, Ubi, Bioware, that have years of experience, huge budgets, and vast armies of game devs, is to be appreciated and admired. Even these huge companies work for many years on their releases, that bring very few innovations (Mass Effect Andromeda took 5 years to develop).

They are doing a fantastic job so far, even though some mistakes were made, and I'm surprised and disappointed you can't see it.

Edit: CR is indeed too optimistic with his release dates, but he started to tone it down with experience. In the last presentation he didn't make this mistake again. Its easy as a developer to make this mistake, to think you can easily solve some problems that are actually extremely difficult.

What you're saying is Chris Roberts intended to make a "AAA" game beyond the budget/scope of fully developed studios building on previous success, engine development and subsequent sequels. He thought that crowd funding was an appropriate platform to do that?

That's an absurd notion quite frankly. If you want to make one of the most expensive games ever made with an unlimited timescale, asking the public to fund it is just a terrible idea. If the original Kickstarter had said "we're looking for upwards of $160m expected delivery whenever we please" they'd have failed. The average consumer has no concept of development and Roberts seems to take advantage of that to obfuscate details on timescales, technology and goals. The excuse "you don't know about games development" doesn't hold water when you've taken what is effectively pre-order cash for it, you have a duty to deliver something tangible in a reasonable timescale otherwise go find some private backers that understand the deal.

To date they continue to take cash on their website and sell ships but there is virtually no detailed explanation of what this proposal is, what the goals are and clearly state that this game probably isn't coming within the next few years. It continues to advertise itself with the stretch goals of a five year old Kickstarter campaign that didn't deliver when it said it would. Where is the wording on the website that tells people that they should have an understanding of games development before they pledge? Shouldn't it clearly state the risks, missed dead-lines and changed project plan before they accept credit card details?

This whole idea that he raised some money to build a game, then decided that because he had some more money he'd make a better game and now he needs constant money to make an even better game is absurd. It's basically an excuse for continued scope creep. The progress to date is fairly poor, I would expect a game this far into development to have many fundamental critical paths nailed. The currently deliverable consists of a very average arena shooter, very poor racing game, a basic arena FPS that was mostly developed by a third party, a social module with nothing to do, the PU where you just walk to a terminal, wait for your "P2W" asset to turn up and go press a button on an array or shoot some very basic AI with a very small amount of possible concurrently connected players. Not much for half a decade and $160 million of the public's cash.

Quite frankly I don't believe there was much of a game plan before the imaginary "change" to this. It's just a constant loop of pitching, fund raising and delivering just enough to keep funding while avoiding any criticism that would inevitably come if they were to produce any game mechanics.

 

[ianw]

More money was supposed to speed it up wasn't it?

Just more - that brought money in - that they absolutely deserve to be called out on constantly.

 

[dreamer1986]

That is factually not true: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cig/star-citizen

The original 'smaller scope' had a persistent multiplayer universe, plus hostable servers by individuals (already dropped) and drop-in coop with the singleplayer part (also already dropped from sq42). 100 systems were promised for 2014, the latest news is CR stated that SC will have a maximum of ten systems on launch. Every year you guys claim the original game was smaller and smaller, and Real Development started later and later. Ah well, neither of us influence any of it so if you're positive about it more power to you.

Too bad I'm in the "you guys" club. I actually came to this thread hoping to see other people excited about SC, since we are all space games fans, but the more I look back in the thread, as Jones suggested, I see mostly unfounded criticism and pessimism. I choose to be excited about this project, and after following it for years, I find very little reason to be doubtful if it will succeed. And about the real development, a lot of the planetary tech was done by the Frankfurt office, which opened in 2015. Now, in 2017 we are close to actually playing with this technology. I don't get it, how fast do you expect development to be? Its hard and it takes a lot of time.

(hostable servers by individuals pretty much pointless now with true persistence, co-op in single player would have been nice, but what can you do if they decided not to invest resources in it, their choice)

 

[milligna]

Yeah yeah yeah. Heard it all before. Deliver a game and then take the victory lap. Inadequate worship of Chris Roberts on this thread is not the reason he utterly fails time and time again to meet any of his goals but those involving buying cars. You want slavish appreciation of a glib con man, go to the appropriate venues for that.

 

[VidarSnipes]

Too bad I'm in the "you guys" club. I actually came to this thread hoping to see other people excited about SC, since we are all space games fans, but the more I look back in the thread, as Jones suggested, I see mostly unfounded criticism and pessimism.

That's the crux of the issue. We don't think it's unfounded criticism. You can have a different opinion on that matter, of course, but it doesn't invalidate scepticism in this thread.

 

[Ian Skippy]

Too bad I'm in the "you guys" club. I actually came to this thread hoping to see other people excited about SC, since we are all space games fans, but the more I look back in the thread, as Jones suggested, I see mostly unfounded criticism and pessimism. I choose to be excited about this project, and after following it for years, I find very little reason to be doubtful if it will succeed. And about the real development, a lot of the planetary tech was done by the Frankfurt office, which opened in 2015. Now, in 2017 we are close to actually playing with this technology. I don't get it, how fast do you expect development to be? Its hard and it takes a lot of time.

(hostable servers by individuals pretty much pointless now with true persistence, co-op in single player would have been nice, but what can you do if they decided not to invest resources in it, their choice)

You claimed multiplayer wasn't part of the original plan. I show you that is factually not true. You ignore it. That is what I mean with the you-guys-club: its a persistent pattern that is pretty unique to SC. A more usual response would be:"Hey, I didnt know that. Guess this talk about multiplayer adding a lot of scope is simply nonsense, I will no longer claim that in the future."

Dont get me wrong, I am normally very positive about pretty much every creative endeavour. I dont even care what it is, if someone has the ambition to do some amazing knitting I'll support them 100%. But SC is just irksome. It doesnt matter what happens, people keep whitewashing what happens, paint false narratives, claim things that aren't true and when pointed out and shown that it is factually, demonstrably false they just ignore it and start talking about something else. That is no longer being just positive, that is being willfully ignorant. What I expect? I dont expect what you saw in the clip to be on your HD in at least three years. I expect 3.0 to have very little actual gameplay, and be bug-riddled. I expect 2018 to bring marginal improvements over 3.0, but lots of shipsales and amazing new videos at gamescon and citizencon. These have been my predictions for years (change 3.0 to x.y where appropriate) and so far I have been spot on. Every time SC supporters tell me I am a hater, that it wont be like that, that soon the magic patch comes that'll shut me up. Every year they'll just forget about it and repeat the same stuff without acknowledging they would burn everyone at the stake for doubting the release in 2014 2015 2016 2017. And every time everyone knew in hindsight that it was never going to happen and everyone else 'doesnt understand game development'. I dont care if something takes a lot of time, but I do care about people constantly claiming the next Amazing Thing will come in a couple of weeks when they know its false. Its the dishonesty that is upsetting.

So go ahead: what do you expect yourself? Give me a timeline and we'll compare down the road.

 

[dreamer1986]

I think this thread should be renamed to Anti Star Citizen Discussion, since it seems I'm the only one with something positive to say. The rename would be appropriate so optimists like us would know to stay away, to let you critics have fun tearing down anything CIG shows, or what CR says.

Edit: "You claimed multiplayer wasn't part of the original plan. I show you that is factually not true. You ignore it." Didn't know/forgot about the multiplayer promise. Doesn't seem like such a big deal.

Edit2: You want a timeline? I give it about 5-6 more years until initial release, if I follow the normal release schedule of games launched so far.

 

[Asp Explorer]

I think this thread should be renamed to Anti Star Citizen Discussion, since it seems I'm the only one with something positive to say. The rename would be appropriate so optimists like us would know to stay away, to let you critics have fun tearing down anything CIG shows, or what CR says.

We'd love to have positive things to say about the game. Many of us have backed it to the tune of hundreds or thousands of quid, and it's the type of game we really want to play.

But there is no game, there hasn't been one for years, and what there is - is a huge pile of lumpy steamers in every technical aspect imagineable.

 

[milligna]

I think this thread should be renamed to Anti Star Citizen Discussion, since it seems I'm the only one with something positive to say. The rename would be appropriate so optimists like us would know to stay away, to let you critics have fun tearing down anything CIG shows, or what CR says.

Edit: "You claimed multiplayer wasn't part of the original plan. I show you that is factually not true. You ignore it." Didn't know/forgot about the multiplayer promise. Doesn't seem like such a big deal.

Or CR could finally release a game, maybe. That would help. He's been dining out on his 90s work for a bit too long, isn't it about time the great visionary of PC gaming stepped up? It's really not anyone on this thread's fault that CR doesn't have the talent or organizational abilities to back up his fat mouth. I do like the narrative that you're the only one with a good thing to say about Star Citizen, must make this feeble attempt at defending an utter debacle seem faintly heroic.

 

[ianw]

I think this thread should be renamed to Anti Star Citizen Discussion, since it seems I'm the only one with something positive to say. The rename would be appropriate so optimists like us would know to stay away, to let you critics have fun tearing down anything CIG shows, or what CR says.

I'm gonna go out a limb here and guess you're a dreamer - who was born in 1986?

Do you think CR can demonstrate a track record of doing things he says he's gonna do with this project? Examples if you have them.

Please/

 

[dreamer1986]

"CR doesn't have the talent or organizational abilities to back up his fat mouth." How rude. Are you able to do even a small portion of what he's done so far? Wing Commander for example? He deserves to be treated with at least a little respect, no matter if you don't agree with him.

I'm gonna go out a limb here and guess you're a dreamer - who was born in 1986?

Do you think CR can demonstrate a track record of doing things he says he's gonna do with this project? Examples if you have them.

Please/

Yes and yes.

The best example will come in 3.0. But I say again, 2.6 and Star Marine are still good examples, even if they aren't perfect. Its good for an early release.

Anyway, going to bed, will try to reply more tomorrow.