Game Discussions Star Citizen Discussion Thread v12

[PiLhEaD]

Roberts' imagination. And by imagination i mean he saw something similar once in a film.

Do they startle easily, but return in greater numbers?

 

[Agony_Aunt]

When I played ED there were no NPCs. Just pics of ppl who gave you missions. Didn't really qualify as NPC.
Then you had the powerplay figureheads. ED just was a game to me where there was a player and some faceless world. And that was OK because that's what Elite always was. Can't say if SLF pilots or ODY NPCs changed that feeling up, because I didn't try them out - I kinda doubt it tho. World-building or narration was never Elite strong suit.

One thing i do like about EDO's mission givers is that you can bargain with them for better rewards, as opposed to the mission boards which are fixed rewards.

While there are only a max of 7 on any station, i make it a point to run around each of them quickly (as opposed to SC where even if there were 7 mission givers they would be spread out over kilometers of train rides and tunnels) and check what they are offering. You can turn a mission for 5 MIs into 10 MIs if you have good reputation with them or double the credit reward.

 

[PiLhEaD]

....
LOL, CIG are already at over 900 employees and Chris plans to reach 1500 in total. Still no games though
....

It's long accepted that beyond a certain size, adding more people will slow development. That's not to be confused with less gets produced, it's that per head productivity drops.

Similarly it's well known that any projects beyond a certain size will tend to run it to difficulties. This is why [redacted] chop every project or programme of work into manageable chunks of iro 6-8 months duration, or they used to when I worked with the 'household-name multinational' in question.

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

It's long accepted that beyond a certain size, adding more people will slow development. That's not to be confused with less gets produced, it's that per head productivity drops.

Similarly it's well known that any projects beyond a certain size will tend to run it to difficulties. This is why [redacted] chop every project or programme of work into manageable chunks of iro 6-8 months duration, or they used to when I worked with the 'household-name multinational' in question.

They never have 900 employees. That is some bloated number blown up to size the scam up. The truth is likely a much smaller number - a fraction.

 

[Darkfyre99]

They never have 900 employees. That is some bloated number blown up to size the scam up. The truth is likely a much smaller number - a fraction.

If that’s truly the case, it makes you wonder where all those reported salary expenses are going to.

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

If that’s truly the case, it makes you wonder where all those reported salary expenses are going to.

Ortwin would have a good idea, I bet.

 

[Ronzer]

In games like Dwarf Fortress the little characters are all protagonists with the odd chance to do something spectacular. NPCs in games like SC arent because the player is the protagonist. Why simulate the NPCs when players dont give a rack about it.

Simulating NPC's is just an excuse while nothing else can work together. If they "removed" it or just admitted it's not simulated, but the animation is developed through a simulation process and then just inserted like a normal animation, then you'd know the rest of the game not working is just because the game doesn't work, let alone while simulating lives.

not sure if you are being sarcastic however that is very much not the case for this player. For me most humans tend to ruin decent roleplay in MP online games, I will take NPC's almost every time

Humans rarely stay in character and are highly unreliable, in a game or not

Wasn't it Skyrim where the NPCs grabbed something from behind their back and presto there was the spoon to use in the cauldron. The animation was the tell but it's good enough for the purpose. There doesn't need to be a real spoon for the show. It can vanish after use just like it appeared. The trick is to conceal the spawning and the vanishing. They don't need to grab a physical spoon from the drawer. Just spawn it in their hand while it is in the drawer. No game does it realistically.

What if there's a full mess and there are no spoons left? You think spoons are just made out of thin air? Maybe that could trigger an announcement "Remember....there are no spoons"

For me it's the quality of the NPCs that make all the difference. I'm not impressed with NPCs in Elite, so I welcome encounters with CMDRs, but over in Elder Scrolls Online I actually prefer having a delve all to myself. Eveli (an NPC) has started to feel more real than many players. Part of this is that a good NPC plays their role and feels part of the world, whereas another player often feels like just that - someone playing a video game, rather than someone who is part of the game. Too many humans turn Elder Scrolls Online into a theme park rather than an immersive world.

Now over in Elite, when I wing up with other players, I get an immersive bond that we just don't get from NPCs in Elite. Elite's NPCs are just autopilots with holome avatars and cheesy text lines. In Elite's case, players tend to make the game feel more real, except for certain gankers (pad-rammers, idiot children screaming profanities in the system chat, etc), and I just block those folk.

Regarding Star Citizen, I'm personally more interested in Squadron 42, because that game at least has the potential of offering meaningful, believable NPCs. If CIG puts as much energy into character narration and "humanity" systems as they do bed deformations, I'm sold!

I prefer Elites NPC's to their mission boards. I wish they could have more, though, but my guess is they have it maxxed out. Regarding Star Citizen, they have put the same energy into character narration as their bed deformations...none. It's not hard to see all these dream items as potential, but making them real? Not going to happen.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

It's long accepted that beyond a certain size, adding more people will slow development. That's not to be confused with less gets produced, it's that per head productivity drops.

Similarly it's well known that any projects beyond a certain size will tend to run it to difficulties. This is why [redacted] chop every project or programme of work into manageable chunks of iro 6-8 months duration, or they used to when I worked with the 'household-name multinational' in question.

Doesn't help that Chris is a micromanager.

 

[GuruNot]

A sign that the actual alpha convince more and more gamers ?

It's a sign of something alright.

I would love to see a break down of the funding, I personally still think the majority of the big spending comes from existing backers and would love to believe it will allow them to release SQ42 on the 10th Anniversary, but it wont.

 

[McGlashan]

That’s the kind of “busywork” you put team on when all the core and secondary work is finished, not when even the background AI goes all Puppetmasters so frequently.

Or, when you have literally hundreds of employees twiddling their thumbs waiting for the core engine teams to find solutions to problems they have no idea how to overcome, but the boss man won't take no for an answer.

 

[VR Golgot]

Talking of absurd assets and side-projects filling a technical void...

Here's the capital ship controversy, for anyone who hasn't seen

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRBY_u5aQXc&t=3642s

Lando:
Why do some ships get prioritized over others? Uh there are some ships we've been waiting for, like the currently being built Banu Merchantmen, since 2013.

John Crewe:
Uh this is another thing to write it write a book on. There is no one answer that applies to every ship, it is a combination of the resources we have at the time. If you take, uh, if I could click my fingers now, put the Polaris into production, um, that would take out a big chunk of the the UK team for maybe 12-18 months. Which means we can't deliver a constant flow of other vehicles in patches. So you could go multiple patches without any vehicle release or any support for other features coming out. So we have to balance that across not just delivering vehicles, but supporting the other teams.

The last few years we've been trying to not push vehicles out without their gameplay, so things like the Crucible... We could make the Crucible now, but we don't really want it floating around without the repair gameplay to go alongside. So whilst I can control the production of the vehicle, I have to rely and work with other directors to get their side delivered, alongside it. Um and the problems that affect me of: Hey, we've, we've changed our minds for IAE [anniversary sale], we want to do this instead, also affects them for other things. Like that, the feature they're working on now might be delayed for another team, which delays the feature I need for this vehicle. So we, we chop and change a lot.

And then also if you have, uh, artists especially: Hey you're working on this big ship for 18 months. You don't want to put them on another big ship for 18 months after. You want to break that and give them, hey, here's a nice little snub ship to do. So that's why you might see like a random ground vehicle come out from nowhere, um, because they are much quicker, relatively, to do. And gives gives those people a nice like pallet refresh of what they're doing.

Um so yeah, they're, we're not actively ignoring the older ships. A lot of them have gameplay consequences and gameplay requirements that, uh, I don't have an answer of when they will come online. So I can't plan, um, developing those ships at that point

Lando:
And, not for nothing, the larger you know the larger ships I mentioned. The Banu Merchant in 2013, but there's also the Idris from 2012. It's like this, uh, multi-crew gameplay and resource management. I mean, I mean even if we could make an Idris right now, I mean, because most of it's, you know, part of Squadron 42 instead of this, and put it out there, it'd just be like driving around in a giant canoe. I mean it's, it's like you need the multi-crew gameplay you need the resource management in order to to have a capital ship experience.

(The Polaris has been on sale since 2016 priced $750)

I thought John Crewe having to deal with sales pitch flips for the anniversary sale, drawing him away from other work, was particularly telling. (As was, like, the whole thing about domino rallies of missing tech and gameplay )

 

[VR Golgot]

They never have 900 employees. That is some bloated number blown up to size the scam up. The truth is likely a much smaller number - a fraction.

Nah, I reckon the UK filings give us enough of a steer there. They're unlikely to fudge too far there, especially with tax credits on the line. It seems likely they do have chonky staff numbers.

Linkedin stats also back up the principle:

Sep 2019:

May 2022:

Not to mention the absurd bespoke offices they're seemingly kitting out in Manchester.

At the end of the day though, the benefits to having high staffing numbers are legion...

• Germany is expected to give over $10m in tax credits to F42 in 2020(1?) alone
• costs continue to rise and studios continue to expand which promote higher tax incentives
• "You can make money from failure. Thank the taxpayers for keeping us alive and investment spry."

Spoiler: Just for fun here's the rest of that gossip

• a new hire is expected to be an "expert" in less than 12 weeks from hire date
• confusion about what exactly management does or what newly hired "leads" do
• "rudderless" direction until "last second" changes, including art and design
• due to this, programmers create shortcuts that will be "fixed later"
• if those programmers leave, it causes massive confusion within the team as they try and piece together solutions
• this happens "often" but should be "eased" in 2020 due to new 3rd party help from an outside firm
• this help involves a custom built CE toolset, better regs and code oversight
• "This isn't something everyone is happy about."
• this includes "dailies-like" bi-monthly updates to top brass and outside firm
• the sq42 visual teaser shown xmas day was one of these
• updates consist of three "courses": gameplay, in-game visuals and cutscenes
• supposedly SQ42 content is already in SC - mission givers like miles eckhart are considered SQ42 NPCs
• huge issue when the 3rd party played a recent SC patch (3.8?)
• "They were surprised because [CR? ER?] gave them the impression of a fully-functioning game with little-to-no bugs."

 

[VR Golgot]

For anyone who would like a cheery jackfrags video after all that dour backroom stuff, here you go

https://www.reddit.com/r/starcitizen_refunds/comments/v1me48

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/starcitizen_refunds/comments/v1me48/jackfrags_behind_the_scenes_2_invictus/

 

[Mole HD]

Nah, I reckon the UK filings give us enough of a steer there. They're unlikely to fudge too far there, especially with tax credits on the line. It seems likely they do have chonky staff numbers.

Linkedin stats also back up the principle:



Not to mention the absurd bespoke offices they're seemingly kitting out in Manchester.

At the end of the day though, the benefits to having high staffing numbers are legion...

Spoiler: Just for fun here's the rest of that gossip

• a new hire is expected to be an "expert" in less than 12 weeks from hire date
• confusion about what exactly management does or what newly hired "leads" do
• "rudderless" direction until "last second" changes, including art and design
• due to this, programmers create shortcuts that will be "fixed later"
• if those programmers leave, it causes massive confusion within the team as they try and piece together solutions
• this happens "often" but should be "eased" in 2020 due to new 3rd party help from an outside firm
• this help involves a custom built CE toolset, better regs and code oversight
• "This isn't something everyone is happy about."
• this includes "dailies-like" bi-monthly updates to top brass and outside firm
• the sq42 visual teaser shown xmas day was one of these
• updates consist of three "courses": gameplay, in-game visuals and cutscenes
• supposedly SQ42 content is already in SC - mission givers like miles eckhart are considered SQ42 NPCs
• huge issue when the 3rd party played a recent SC patch (3.8?)
• "They were surprised because [CR? ER?] gave them the impression of a fully-functioning game with little-to-no bugs."

The aforementioned 3rd party from the agent's bullet points being Turbulent I guess?

 

[VR Golgot]

The aforementioned 3rd party from the agent's bullet points being Turbulent I guess?

Hmm, dunno. Doesn't quite sound like their beat. (Cryengine toolset etc). And Agent's leakers usually reference Turbulent by name as a known entity etc.

Guess it could have been some Calders style stipulation. Haven't heard anything of it since though. (Or the Earth build with land claims from the prior leak for that matter ). Who knows ¯\(ツ)/¯. (Within the strange vortex that is Cigland, almost anything is possible )

 

[VR Golgot]

Some fun nuggets in the Monthly Report:

Star Citizen Monthly Report: May 2022 - Roberts Space Industries | Follow the development of Star Citizen and Squadron 42

Roberts Space Industries is the official go-to website for all news about Star Citizen and Squadron 42. It also hosts the online store for game items and merch, as well as all the community tools used by our fans.

robertsspaceindustries.com

Salvage / damage maps will be networked:

The team also created a model for serializing damage maps online, which is required for salvaging. The client is able to make accurate predictions but can also rewind and replay applications of hits on the damage map. The server will still send the full map to a client when required but this prediction will keep the need to send full data to a minimum.

That’s some bonus server load right there.

The 'Oops we built Lorville buildings too small' thing is ongoing:

We’re still in early days and are discussing how best to organise the conception so that concept art, environment art and level design all work together in the most efficient way. We’re also defining what we want to tackle in the proof of concept and what should be our target. Everyone here is eager to tackle this challenge and find a way to add pockets of gameplay directly inside landing zones.

Various examples of the animation workflow being clunky, as rumoured:

This will see us redefine our workflows for creating rigs and see a much-needed improvement to character deformation throughout the game. It will take a long time to develop, but it’s a worthwhile venture.

 

[varonica]

Got my latest S42 notice in email.....what?

On the Human combat side, the team worked with Design to implement the new weapon accuracy system that will give greater control to the designers, particularly over difficulty and playability. Previously, weapons would fire directly down the barrel and any inaccuracy would have to come through the simulation of wrong aiming direction, the seek time of the character’s aiming, and recoil. They’re now looking to implement a more controllable accuracy system that takes various factors into consideration when choosing if a shot hits or misses, including distance to target, how long the target has been seen, the angle to the shooter, and the base accuracy of the AI that’s firing

People been saying how great SC FPS combat is compared to ED, I mean they haven't even done the basics, the sort of stuff that any FPS shooter in the last, well forever, has done, they aren't even calculating distance to target and speed of shot? What sort of FPS combat system is that? No wonder people find it so great, it's magic!

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Talking of absurd assets and side-projects filling a technical void...

Here's the capital ship controversy, for anyone who hasn't seen

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRBY_u5aQXc&t=3642s



(The Polaris has been on sale since 2016 priced $750)

I thought John Crewe having to deal with sales pitch flips for the anniversary sale, drawing him away from other work, was particularly telling. (As was, like, the whole thing about domino rallies of missing tech and gameplay )

Also worth keeping in mind the Polaris isn't necessarily the biggest or most complex ship to build.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Some fun nuggets in the Monthly Report:

Star Citizen Monthly Report: May 2022 - Roberts Space Industries | Follow the development of Star Citizen and Squadron 42

Roberts Space Industries is the official go-to website for all news about Star Citizen and Squadron 42. It also hosts the online store for game items and merch, as well as all the community tools used by our fans.

robertsspaceindustries.com

Salvage / damage maps will be networked:



That’s some bonus server load right there.

The 'Oops we built Lorville buildings too small' thing is ongoing:



Various examples of the animation workflow being clunky, as rumoured:

early days

LOL

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Got my latest S42 notice in email.....what?



People been saying how great SC FPS combat is compared to ED, I mean they haven't even done the basics, the sort of stuff that any FPS shooter in the last, well forever, has done, they aren't even calculating distance to target and speed of shot? What sort of FPS combat system is that? No wonder people find it so great, it's magic!

Previously, weapons would fire directly down the barrel and any inaccuracy would have to come through the simulation of wrong aiming direction, the seek time of the character’s aiming, and recoil.

What the hell?

The gun is pointing in a direction, the ammo goes in that direction. How on earth are they struggling with this concept? Why are they making it so complicated?