Star Citizen Thread v6

[Noctrach]

I guess it depends on your definition of "Alpha".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softwa...ase_life_cycle

I believe that Alpha is usually concept complete but certainly NOT feature complete.
The feature complete or nearly feature complete is the Beta release or near Beta released respectively.

In that respect 3.0 will be an Alpha in any but the most pedantic sense.

Remember the alpha of this game started with one system then 7 or something then 20 then 200 then 10,000 etc...
most of the concepts were in place, however.

If we're talking the kind of terms marketing rolls with these days, then yes, alpha is "concept complete".
However, in development terms it's still mostly considered the stage where production has been completed to the point that all core features are complete and implemented.
Note that this doesn't mean no features will be added 'till Beta, but 99 out of a 100 cases these will be largely "bonuses" that do not impact the fundamental game experience. (Way too much time has gone into refining that at this point to risk mucking it up)

For fairness though, this varies from company to company as well.
I've attended a bunch of guest talks from producers and leads for big-name-publisher titles, during alpha the core gameplay and everything related to it is "set".
This means if you have a single player story, it's playable from start to finish without crashes, while missing stuff like cutscenes, voiceovers, polished animations, finalised graphics assets etc.

As an example, Witcher 3 passed the "alpha" milestone with the main storyline, combat and core gameplay elements completely finished, but the majority of the world still in whitebox.


I would refrain from trying to use the "real definition" of pre-alpha/alpha/beta/master states for projects like Star Citizen (and early access/kickstarter in general) because they rely so heavily on showcasing art and polished 3D assets to attract people.
Therefore their development process greatly differs from industry definitions.

Best to go with whatever CIG calls it, because it's their game, their development process and therefore their milestone labels.
They mostly go with "pre-alpha" still as far as I know though.

 

[1500]

Well from our friendly insider (He seems to like trolling people as well, so unknown if this is real or not, he has also been right multiple times in the past)

https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3800238&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1309#post473596536

hello

What we are giving them soon is our first approach at a commercial release. Although some small features are not yet implemented, everything that has been promised to our backers will eventually be in Star Citizen. It's been an amazing journey for all of us, and to those that stayed with us and supported us for the last six years, I can only give my sincerest thanks and appreciation for our success. Here, right now, behind a computer monitor, memories that will last a lifetime are being made in a universe that we created and will continue to reiterate on. You have all been a part of that and will always remain the largest reason for Star Citizen's successful launch.

I'd like for a moment to discuss Squadron 42. As you know, due to certain constraints and outside factors, we will unfortunately be able to make a fully stand alone, single-player game. The good news, however, is that all Squadron 42 content will be added into Star Citizen in quarterly patches. The content team and I decided that in order to get our over 100 hours of gameplay into the hands of the backers, several big updates a year would be the way to do it. This allows new content to coincide with new updates, including professions, planets and organic gameplay elements. When this is announced, I'm sure the majority of backers will understand and accept this as the only way to move forward, as tying the two games together into one single, seamless interactive universe has really been the goal from the beginning.

Gamescom was always the goal for our first launch and I don't have any doubt we can hit that this year.

 

[McGlashan]

Well from our friendly insider (He seems to like trolling people as well, so unknown if this is real or not, he has also been right multiple times in the past)

https://forums.somethingawful.com/s...id=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1309#post473596536

Assuming the Squadron 42 quote is supposed to read "unable to make" or something like that, no chance. Not just because S42 is the "easy" one - forget the co-op nonsense and it's just a single player game like any other, something even CIG ought to be able to manage - but also because it's Chris "Wing Commander Movie" Roberts in charge, and I don't believe he would give up such a prime showcase for his cinematic genius. Not to mention they need the money from it to pay for SC.

"several big updates a year would be the way to do it", right, because we've all seen how well that has worked for the PU so far.

"continue to reiterate on", I take it back, that is dumb enough to be something Roberts would actually say.

 

[dayrth]

Assuming the Squadron 42 quote is supposed to read "unable to make" or something like that, no chance. Not just because S42 is the "easy" one - forget the co-op nonsense and it's just a single player game like any other, something even CIG ought to be able to manage - but also because it's Chris "Wing Commander Movie" Roberts in charge, and I don't believe he would give up such a prime showcase for his cinematic genius. Not to mention they need the money from it to pay for SC.

"several big updates a year would be the way to do it", right, because we've all seen how well that has worked for the PU so far.

"continue to reiterate on", I take it back, that is dumb enough to be something Roberts would actually say.

I might be true. If the money has run out then it could be a case of 'Push what we have out the door'. 'Claim the stuff we didn't do is already in the game and hope no one notices'. (heard that one before) and 'Pray it fools enough people into buying the game so we can keep going'.

I am not convinced it is true though. I think our friend over at SA is winding us up.

 

[Henkka77]

Cant wait for the 3.0 PTU, hopefully i will get invited as a subscriber. (fingers crossed)
That thing is going to keep me busy until 2.4 drops in Elite.

 

[Britney]

I also can't imagine Chris Roberts would throw the wing commander part away after recycling this concept so many times and making tons of cash through that. They must be able to make a game that was made 27 years ago with updated graphics.

 

[ZioYuri78]

Wait wait, time ago they have splitted the game package and stripped off SQ42 from the SC pack to make more money and now they are tell us that SQ42 will only be into SC instead of a separate product?

EDIT:

Sorry for grammar errors but is morning here and english isn't my language.

 

[Tippis]

I also can't imagine Chris Roberts would throw the wing commander part away after recycling this concept so many times and making tons of cash through that. They must be able to make a game that was made 27 years ago with updated graphics.

Must? All evidence points to “no.”
The modal verb you're looking for is “should.”

 

[Britney]

Must? All evidence points to “no.”
The modal verb you're looking for is “should.”

What evidence?

 

[Knightshark]

Well from our friendly insider (He seems to like trolling people as well, so unknown if this is real or not, he has also been right multiple times in the past)

https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3800238&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1309#post473596536

That is not very plausible. Why should SQ42 be the hard part?

 

[Memnoch]

Being unable to make a fully stand-alone game could just be a form of DRM, tethering you online to play it offline, as it were.

IIRC similar arguments were being thrown around years back about ED, about it being "impossible" to play offline, the galaxy would be too nuanced with constant updates to offer this in an offline form. That arguments been done to death but you have to admit its a sure fire way of deterring pirates and keeping your shareholders happy.

 

[Knightshark]

Being unable to make a fully stand-alone game could just be a form of DRM, tethering you online to play it offline, as it were.

IIRC similar arguments were being thrown around years back about ED, about it being "impossible" to play offline, the galaxy would be too nuanced with constant updates to offer this in an offline form. That arguments been done to death but you have to admit its a sure fire way of deterring pirates and keeping your shareholders happy.

For ED the technical framework makes an offline mode impossible.

 

[Skizomeuh]

That is not very plausible. Why should SQ42 be the hard part?

Because many systems they're struggling with are probably common to both SC ans SQ42. And given their development methodology, SQ42 may not be easy either, so IF they can't even manage to make a solo scripted experience how in heavens could they be able to make what SC is supposed to be(come)?

 

[Ian Skippy]

That is not very plausible. Why should SQ42 be the hard part?

Because it requires content, whereas a MVP SC could be just, well, space. You dont need AI, mocap, storylines or anything for SC, you could claim 'emergent content' will fill it, plus future updates. In a singleplayer experience that simply dont fly. AI needs to prevent some kind of challenge. There needs to be a story of sorts, and all the mocapped data needs to turned into an actual experience for the end-user.

Beyond that, I doubt everything The Agent has been saying for over a year, its mostly trolling. Fun maybe, but trolling nevertheless.

 

[GaryII]

Because it requires content, whereas a MVP SC could be just, well, space.

Yes that requires content, but that space - PU requires content, too.

Because if they do not have much content in PU like in todays Pre-Alfa, a lot of people will just grind to "end game" ships and complain like in Elite that there is nothing to do anymore...

 

[GaryII]

For ED the technical framework makes an offline mode impossible.

Yes, to run Elite outside FD you need, servers that hosts Galaxy data, runs BGS etc.
And sure nobody from FD will give that software to you, too.
For SC is the same.
If FD or CIG servers goes down = game dead..

 

[Ian Skippy]

Yes that requires content, but that space - PU requires content, too.

Because if they do not have much content in PU like in todays Pre-Alfa, a lot of people will just grind to "end game" ships and complain like in Elite that there is nothing to do anymore...

Sure, but at least it is something. Maybe boring crap, but still. A single player story-based game with story and AI isnt anything at all. So I can see a mvp sc release before sw42.

 

[Memnoch]

For ED the technical framework makes an offline mode impossible.

Do you think that if CIG make the same argument it will be so readily accepted?

Yes, to run Elite outside FD you need, servers that hosts Galaxy data, runs BGS etc.
And sure nobody from FD will give that software to you, too.
For SC is the same.
If FD or CIG servers goes down = game dead..

True...now. But the argument back then was does it have to be this way? The group that lost out the most were the SP only people who had no interest in MP at all. It's not what they were sold in the Kickstarter and felt short changed or at worse outright lied to.

Someone would have been happy for an ED Light experience, accepting that there would be no background simulation etc. but untethered. The suspicion was that there was reason to tether the game to an online server and that was how the game was developed.

Perhaps SC will go down that road. For CIG it makes it harder for them to sell online content to a group that only want to play offline SP. We are seeing shades of this now with the recent GTA V/Take 2 debacle, strangling single player mods because that allows for community created content content and not buy from Rockstar. Pure greed.

 

[Tippis]

What evidence?

Exactly.


…or, if you accept external evidence, there's the long line of nostalgia projects where '90:s developers have utterly failed to reproduce the games that first made them famous — especially among those who have gone to the crowdfounding model to make it happen.

 

[Skizomeuh]

Do you think that if CIG make the same argument it will be so readily accepted?

Fidel Citizens already proven their ability to swallow huge things with delight.