Game Discussions Star Citizen Discussion Thread v12

[sovapid]

I think part of me focused too much on the no bugs part rather than the gamebreaking part in relation to LittleAnt's post, but i still think he (and you) have been very lucky, considering the frequency of gamebreaking bugs you can witness when watching streamers.

A few things.....

SC is buggy, but not as buggy as is usually presented here. Some of the descriptions here are on the edge of unbelievably unlucky. You can run into a string of bugs all in a row, so I guess it is in the realm of possibility. But like I said, I cant remember the last time I got a series of bugs that prevented me from playing.

30k's happen occasionally, every now and then when you quantum around a planet to a ground base you quantum through the planet and explode, sometimes you will be flying along and smack into an invisible asteroid (or something) and blow up. But you just respawn and keep going.

However, those bugs that kill you can be super frustrating if you have all of your money tied up in a Caterpillar cargo run and now you have lost days worth of credits. You've spent the last hour mining and the server dies so you loose all that ore. And the worst, you die to a bug and end up in prison with a 12 hour sentence. Even worser is when you escape prison, get picked up by a friend, fly to a hacking terminal, hack for a few minutes and the server dies before you finish so you end up back in prison. When you combine a rare-ish bug with those scenarios it really stings.

I'm also biased because I'm aware of so many of the bugs and how to work around/avoid them.

• I dont spend much time at the big stations because the train rides are nuts. Have to go there occasionally to by parts or a random mission. But for the most part I'm not there.
• If you are QT'ing to a party member and they are flying around somewhat low in atmo: don't. Thats how you quantum into a planet. If they are landed its fine, but not if they are flying just above the surface.
• If you are going mining, just get 1/2 full. Dont bother completely filling up. If the server 30k's it stings less, because you havent spent as much time.
• If you have your QT drive engaged and go to the map to set a destination it isnt going to work. QT drive cant be engaged.

And probably countless others I dont even really think about because working around the bugs is now second nature.


I also get the feeling you aren't really watching that much Star Citizen streaming. You just see the clips of the bugs that get posted. No one makes a clip of the player character successfully getting out of bed. But they do when the character gets out of bed and falls through the floor. I put twitch on in the back ground while I work for hours on end. Until the past week was almost exclusively SC. Streamers are not running into debilitating bugs every 5 minutes. Once every couple hours maybe. Once a day.

 

[Vasious]

Pro-tip for the Free Play

Apply the free fly code to your account

Otherwise if you have no ships you cannot join the PU

 

[Agony_Aunt]

I also get the feeling you aren't really watching that much Star Citizen streaming. You just see the clips of the bugs that get posted.

I do watch the odd stream, but not intensively. Sometimes in the background while doing other things, but my attention can be drawn by things like someone saying "If this game 30ks now i'm quitting" and then i hear a curse as the game 30ks.

So, for sure, some viewing bias, but it seems often enough that someone can say something like that and then immediately get hit by one tends to speak to enough of a frequency to make it an annoying issue.

Like many things in life, we tend to remember the negative more than the positive.

 

[ArAsH]

My experience yesterday. I had a small session in the evening. Started at New Babbage. Took the train to the space port, but when I arrived there, the assets weren’t loaded so all I could see there was landscape and the doors didn’t open. No biggie since it was the start of my session and I was still setteling in getting a drink ready and such. Left my character in the train and when it did a loop around, the second time at the space port everything was loaded and I’ve had no further problems for the rest of the session.
Later that night I played again, went to do some mining. Started at PO. Place zas crowded, but I had no problems at all in that few hour session.
I really don’t understand the problems some of you guys here have trying this game. It really isn’t as bad as some of you here like to paint it.

 

[Dooguk]

Watching a number of Twitch SC streams, it seems to me that the removal of lots of NPC's has improved the games framerate. You may get two or three following a set route, but the military/police NPC's tend to not move at all. So you've these large areas with hardly anyone in them. The NPC's that are there still stand on the furniture though.

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

New Cabbage.

 

[Mole HD]

Noticed last night I didn't have any of the free fly ships...not that I need them or anything but it would be nice. Might have to reset my account, I've not done that since 3.9 so might be worthwhile. I'll check today to see if they're there.

 

[ZeeWolf]

So, here's a thought. ED next year will presumably move to version 4.0 with Odyssey.

4.0 as far back as 2016 was labelled the version where they would add a second system. We see CIG not being able to do this, and even LittleAnt suggested that if the tech isn't ready they may add the second system via a main menu option rather than in-system travel.

So, taking bets folks. Before ED releases Odyssey (and therefore version 4) CIG will one way or another, by hook or by crook, add a second system and update to version 4.0 (alpha)

Chris Roberts said the tech wasn't ready pre-2012 regarding Freelancer and his other attempts at realising his "vision" but during the 2012 Kickstarter he said the time was right and the "tech is ready"

2020, "the tech still isn't ready"

A so called "creative genius" who can't make a game around the available tech is not a decent game developer. Real developers plan around constraints early on.

I have a great idea for a game but until Holodecks are available the tech isn't ready, but yeah I'll take cash in advance cheers

 

[Firkrayt]

Chris Roberts said the tech wasn't ready pre-2012 regarding Freelancer and his other attempts at realising his "vision" but during the 2012 Kickstarter he said the time was right and the "tech is ready"

2020, "the tech still isn't ready"

Somewhere in the corner one Jensen Huang is weeping, despite all his 20 teraflops for $500.

SSD is required because SC constantly stream huge assets while you move (or entities move toward you). And when you stream huge assets, like SC do, at the speed of a HDD, your assets come too slowly (stutter) or worse, can't load if you don't have enough memory to stock them.
SC have structured it's rendering workflow similarly to the rendering workflow proposed in the new PS5 with its SSD. It's a cool techno, but it only works if you can stream assets fast, disqualifying HDD.

Dear sir, you are quite wrong here.
First, constantly streaming huge assets is just bad design and unoptimized engine. It screams of lack of developers' skill.

Second, basically any game will benefit from SSD, one doesn't need to "structure rendering workflow".
Have a look at Fallout 4, a game that had a bid dated graphics when it was released:

Bethesda haven't bothered with "structuring rendering workflow" 4 years ago, and neither need any other developer. It's just innate advantage of SSD having higher reading speed.

Third, this has nothing to do with PS5 - PS5 has improvements on driver nad OS level. SC simply doesn't operate on those levels, it even has no direct access to them. SC functions over DX11, and those levels are below that.

The reason why SC is running on SSD better is the same as with Fallout 4 - SSD is just faster than HDD. CI-G accomplished nothing.

 

[Viajero]

So that's a “no” then? Unless you can actually dig up said “dev talk”…

Also worth noting that based on track record to date CIG “dev talk” is not worth much, and is not really a guarantee or reference for anything.

 

[Skizomeuh]

SoonTM?




Because sounds like they're pretty cosy in DX11.1 land right now

EDIT: Dammit ninja'd

Looks like Chris almighty is not the only one we shouldn't trust words afterall ^^. What do you say about that LittleAnt?

 

[Agony_Aunt]

It really isn’t as bad as some of you here like to paint it.

Granted.

I think this is partially because we tend to look at the whole project as a big dumpster fire fulled by lies, boasting, and predatory marketing practices that will never be the game that backers paid for.

This tends to give us a jaundiced view of the project and a love of seeing the game at its worst.

I think the boasting comes into it a lot, when CIG and backers alike tend to make grand claims about how awesome it already is (or will be - future as present tense) so its doubly funny when things go sideways.

What has been bragged about as being the BDSSE for years, might, maybe, one day, be a half-decent space sim, with a few systems and a few complete game loops, and lots and lots of expensive ships with not that much to do in them.

 

[TiberiusDuval]

Can't quite remember the specs required, but we were poor students at the time and the only guy that could run it was the guy with the most expensive comp. It was like most who had PCs were on 386s and it required a 486/DX2 or something. I was still on an Amiga at that point.

Some old games magazine I had mentioned reviewer having performance problems with 486 DX2 66. And that was about best one could have at that time.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Some old games magazine I had mentioned reviewer having performance problems with 486 DX2 66. And that was about best one could have at that time.

Ah, then it looks like i was in the ballpark with my memory of what computer the guy had.

Cool guy. Programmer. Unfortunately he had a life-threatening disease and died a few years later after he finished his studies. Not sure how he afforded the computer as a student. Either from his parents or perhaps because of some sort of disability allowance. I remember it was more powerful than just about anything anyone else had at the time though.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

So, this guy did a cool video. Apparently quite a big streamer, although never heard of him.

Watched a bit of it, and it is indeed cool looking (and i bet took plenty of edits to make it that cool - but fair's fair, that's not unusual with such videos, not just for SC).

However, this part struck me.

Look at the curve of the scenery as he gets out of the ship. Looks lovely rough and bumpy. Until he backs off a little and you see the terrain slope away, and then can see they don't even have a bump map on it. Its just a texture to make it look 3D from the right angles. That's not very fidelitious. I wonder if something changed here. I've never seen that before. Have they removed bump maps in an attempt to increase performance? Is it a client option? Maybe the streamer disabled them?

Also check out the face at 0:25. This is one thing i've noticed about SC. The huge disparity in the faces in their marketing materials with how they look in game. They look like they have dead eyes, lifeless.

Perhaps LittleAnt would like to suggest the streamer has hardware below spec

 

[Mole HD]

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

The free fly is surprisingly stable...usual minor orgs spamming the global chat looking for new victims to bolster their attempts at global domination...inventory is still as slow as molasses...like the new flight model for the bigger ships...hangar doors still aren't fixed.

Apart from that, business as usual in the PU.

 

[TiberiusDuval]

That SSD requirement makes me think a little comparison. I happen to have RDR2, and can run it with quite high graphics settings due to me having RTX2060. Now then it is installed on HDD. Works without problems. Only difference between SSD and HDD install is loading times. Tells me something about quality of work I say.

 

[PiLhEaD]

As an aside, how long has it been since we were promised the roadmap to a roadmap and the SQ42 video?

I'm asking for a friend who suffered an arithmetic overflow on day++.

I guess he'll have to move to 64 bit..

 

[Agony_Aunt]

That SSD requirement makes me think a little comparison. I happen to have RDR2, and can run it with quite high graphics settings due to me having RTX2060. Now then it is installed on HDD. Works without problems. Only difference between SSD and HDD install is loading times. Tells me something about quality of work I say.

I get this with a few games. On HDD, works fine, but loading speeds a bit slower than on SSD.

The only game where i really appreciate the SDD is GTA, as when driving around the city at high speeds, on the HDD sometimes ground textures would fail to load or would only load at their lowest resolution. On the SSD that goes away.

Funny though, considering GTA is now 7 years old on PC and back then SSDs were not so common or as reliable.

Funny also to think when SC started development (and i meant, really started development, not whenever backers claim it started), SSDs were even rarer as the cost and reliability back then wasn't really good enough to install OSes and games on for most people.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

As an aside, how long has it been since we were promised the roadmap to a roadmap and the SQ42 video?

I'm asking for a friend who suffered an arithmetic overflow on day++.

More than a month now isn't it?

My, how time flies!