And the chart looked rosy at that time to. Makes you wonder doesn't it about that chart
Star Citizen Discussion Thread v11
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All pretty pictures. Made up and coloured nicely.And the chart looked rosy at that time to. Makes you wonder doesn't it about that chart
Viajero
Volunteer Moderator
Gonna call this off topic for bringing about ED’s Alpha Centauri and Hutton Orbital.
Can't help but see a habit here: almost half of revenues come from hype built up during the last 3 months of a year, the worst months are those following the "release" of year-1 hyped content.
Yeah.
SC has always had pay-to-win aspects. It's the entire business model. That CIG claim that it isn't has always rubbed me the wrong way.
IMO CIG have managed to create the macrotransaction model, and I'm surprised that more attention hasn't been given to them from the shoutier critics of game industry shenanigans who normally pick up on this stuff.
Its because nothing is set in stone yet....alpha remember? Slamming them for a business model that might or might not be there on release only opens them up for fierce backlash. Theres no pressure for critics in this....they can take their merry time and wait until SC is done....its going to have a lot of material to draw upon when those reviews are going to come in eventually
Nothing is set in stone except the P2W model as they've been selling upgrades from the start!
And the chart looked rosy at that time to. Makes you wonder doesn't it about that chart
I'm pretty sure that chart is as trustworthy as their roadmap.
Viajero
Volunteer Moderator
Yeah, assuming the CIG funding charts are true whales money is going to be hard to beat with a release, of any kind, unless it becomes a definite blockbuster past the 7-8 million units within a few yearsI think you might be on a 'fingers crossed' kick with this one M...
Sales. It Figures:
If we take ED as a comparison point, they shifted 1.4m in the first year on PC. They've now shifted 3 million units of the base game across PC and consoles, 5 years after launch.
Now sure, the 'dream version' of SC has more draws than ED (legs, atmospheres, servers etc). But it would have to be a functioning dream to capitalise on that (features, tech & bug wise). And it would still have similar niche aspects that narrow its appeal (long travel times, non-arcade cockpit faff, sci-fi trappings).
I recognise you haven't gone for GTA V numbers, but 5 mil is possibly still optimistic. And it presumes a fanfare launch. Not the soft launch which Chris has hinted at with his 'What is Release?' talk.
Death of a Whaleman:
Assuming that whale cash will run dry is an oft-dashed prediction as well...
Personally I don't see CIG doing anything to tamper with that income stream as long as the taps are still open. Whether it means partial ship-sales, or the credit pricing, or continued subscription 'deals & access' incentives or whatever. They will keep that stream open for as long as it's there IMO.
If they have an official launch, and do ED numbers at $60 pricing, they're looking at 1.4m x 60 = $84m. Pretty sweet. But if they experience similar drop off, even with ongoing support & consoles, that becomes: 3m x 60 = $180m. Divided by 5 years = $36mil per year.
That's not so hot. That's... parallel to the whale revenues.
Whale Bones:
Whales are their current business model, and it has impacted lots of design areas over the years. (Travel times, grind walls, pleb-invulnerability etc). Those are the facts on the ground. It's probably not insurmountable, in terms of rebalancing, despite lots of knock-on effects. But at what point do they address that?
I'm sure they'd be happy to drop the whales like hot cakes if a bigger revenue stream was nailed on. But at what point will they know that? Not pre-launch, that's pretty certain, in lieu of crazy pre-orders. (And let's be frank, they've already had a lot crazy pre-orders from their core market
So they start rebalancing the game's mechanics wholesale post-launch? Not ideal... or liable to be particularly popular with either side of the fence. Or liable to garner the greatest gameplay results. (Redesigning your core trade & combat metrics at that point etc).
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I dunno man. There's a lot of barriers to superseding the whales.
But fingers crossed eh
And the chart looked rosy at that time to. Makes you wonder doesn't it about that chart
The tracker is definitely... dubious...
Source: https://i.imgur.com/XKJ5amE.gifv
We just don't know in precisely which ways. (Are they including non-backer revenue, smoothing the numbers, just making it up entirely?)
I think there's enough in the Companies House filings to suggest that the overall ballpark could be correct though. Granted they're only for the UK + Germany branches, but we can extrapolate a bit from that.
I'll turn to the words of an SA accountant named shrach for a pro assessment:
shrach said:
shrach said:
It all fits broadly with the claims in their unaudited / semi-opaque financial blogs. They may actually be pulling in $35m+ pa from backers, and burning through it all maintaining the 500-ish overall staffing (400-ish devs) that they claim.
The Space Wales Weigh In:
Is it really so impossible that they have actually garnered $212 per account on average? That's the question.
Think of all of the little ship upgrades that backers often discuss. The extra $10 dollars here, $20 there, that brings them stability and ability in the PU. Think of how many years this has all been going on. The guys in this very thread who hit $1k Concierge without meaning to. The $5k Star Marshal that breezed through recently, reverberating with Sunk Cost. Then embrace the full absurdity...
Source: https://twitter.com/SpearmintVR/status/1001551327200194560
Is it possible? Yeah. It's possible
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How often have we seen brand new people appear on this section of the forum...especially ones rushing headlong and wallets open toward Ci¬G?...And where have you ever seen anyone on this thread talking about Ci¬G or Star Citizen in those ridiculous terms?
You want to cry scam every 3.6 seconds...that's fine by me... but don't try and justify your flair for the dramatic by claiming you're trying to help potential victims...or whatever you want to call them. As far as I was aware, most of us on here were proper adults, don't really need some Star Citizen nannying service and this isn't Twitch.
Like I said, try Facebook for the drama...or even stick to Twitch since you mentioned it. I'm sure you'll have a rapt audience in those circles...or do you need more cat pictures?
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You mean the Company House filings where the numbers don'r add up sometimes?The tracker is definitely... dubious...
Source: https://i.imgur.com/XKJ5amE.gifv
We just don't know in precisely which ways. (Are they including non-backer revenue, smoothing the numbers, just making it up entirely?)
I think there's enough in the Companies House filings to suggest that the overall ballpark could be correct though. Granted they're only for the UK + Germany branches, but we can extrapolate a bit from that.
I'll turn to the words of an SA accountant named shrach for a pro assessment:
It all fits broadly with the claims in their unaudited / semi-opaque financial blogs. They may actually be pulling in $35m+ pa from backers, and burning through it all maintaining the 500-ish overall staffing (400-ish devs) that they claim.
The Space Wales Weigh In:
Is it really so impossible that they have actually garnered $212 per account on average? That's the question.
Think of all of the little ship upgrades that backers often discuss. The extra $10 dollars here, $20 there, that brings them stability and ability in the PU. Think of how many years this has all been going on. The guys in this very thread who hit $1k Concierge without meaning to. The $5k Star Marshal that breezed through recently, reverberating with Sunk Cost. Then embrace the full absurdity...
Source: https://twitter.com/SpearmintVR/status/1001551327200194560
Is it possible? Yeah. It's possible
Wow, just had a look at his twitter: the commando doesn't happen to talk about SC very much (did he refund?
), and more disturbingly seems more focused on hentai waifus thingies. 
I guess he wears a Crossbow Rabbit costume every now and then...
Yeah, where is Jimquisition on this? You would have thought he would have been having a good old rant about SC... unless he's a backer and not practicing what he preaches.
Excepting that they don't seem to include refunds on the tracker, it has to be true. If it wasn't, CIG would have been bankrupt years ago, unless of course they are getting other investments we don't know about and the tracker is just some RNG based system to keep up confidence.
Wow, just had a look at his twitter: the commando doesn't happen to talk about SC very much (did he refund?
He's a strange one for sure. I mean, don't go as far to watch the games he streams/plays.
Viajero
Volunteer Moderator
I don’t know man, I can think of quite a large number of ways to grossly missrepresent the financial situation. It does not need to be an all or nothing dilemma. For as long as they have not been properly and fully (all group entities) publicly audited the risk of CIG grossly misrepresenting those numbers (or the spend side of the equation, or both) is still very, very high.
Judging purely from discussions with a general cross section, on average, backers usually spend between $150 to $450 on their SC package...that includes base packages and consequent upgrades.The tracker is definitely... dubious...
Source: https://i.imgur.com/XKJ5amE.gifv
We just don't know in precisely which ways. (Are they including non-backer revenue, smoothing the numbers, just making it up entirely?)
I think there's enough in the Companies House filings to suggest that the overall ballpark could be correct though. Granted they're only for the UK + Germany branches, but we can extrapolate a bit from that.
I'll turn to the words of an SA accountant named shrach for a pro assessment:
It all fits broadly with the claims in their unaudited / semi-opaque financial blogs. They may actually be pulling in $35m+ pa from backers, and burning through it all maintaining the 500-ish overall staffing (400-ish devs) that they claim.
The Space Wales Weigh In:
Is it really so impossible that they have actually garnered $212 per account on average? That's the question.
Think of all of the little ship upgrades that backers often discuss. The extra $10 dollars here, $20 there, that brings them stability and ability in the PU. Think of how many years this has all been going on. The guys in this very thread who hit $1k Concierge without meaning to. The $5k Star Marshal that breezed through recently, reverberating with Sunk Cost. Then embrace the full absurdity...
Source: https://twitter.com/SpearmintVR/status/1001551327200194560
Is it possible? Yeah. It's possible
From discussions on #concierge chat on Spectrum, the average concierge backer has a spend of $1500 to $3000 on their small fleets....these aren't the whales of course. I have friends both in real life and in game who are from the $10k to Legatus level...but those are the exception rather than the norm.
Most Concierge add 1 or 2 ships per year at around the $1500 mark...or a couple of smaller $200 to $500 additions. Some like me have spent all we're going to spend.
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I never thought I'd see the day where someone described people who dropped 1.5k to 3k dollareedoos on an unreleased game with "these aren't the whales though."
Truly these are the end times. I can only imagine the things I could do with an extra cool three grand layin' about in my bank.
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