Vapourware Scam Citizen - Only people with too much money can become StarCitizens! WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE?

[Direwolf]

I haven't been following this.
What's the current state of the game? Is there anything playable? I am not sure if I should update my client or not.

 

[Grunker]

It's called a brolapse.

False. You can't Brolapse a Brofist that wasn't given in the first place.

I actually gave you one before reaching the butthurt part

 

[Blaine]

What's the current state of the game? Is there anything playable? I am not sure if I should update my client or not.

Yes, Arena Commander has been out for a long while now.

You can change your keybindings now too (without a lot of fussing around with files), so that's nice.

 

[buzz]

What isn't par for the course is the same people returning week after week, month after month, to post complaints about the exact same shit.

No, that's exactly RPG Codex in a nutshell
That's why there's a 545 pages long Bioware thread and 136 pages long thread about Fallout 4, a game not even announced yet. The funniest part is that many of them will end up buying said games and playing them.

 

[Blaine]

Well, you're probably right.

I'm only peripherally aware of such idiocy because I don't constantly revisit and post in threads about things I don't like.

 

[Direwolf]

I get stuck on loading screen and can't get past it. Tried everything on the official forums. Is it worth trying?

 

[Blaine]

a bloo bloo bloo a bigger and more expensive ship means you automatically win the game

Spoiler

That said, this is a double-edged sword for me, because I'm not going to play this game if the mouse-waving gimbaling cursor isn't addressed.

 

[Blaine]

 

[Drax]

Long-ass Monthly Report from all the studios: https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/transmission/14191-Monthly-Report-September-2014

 

[Ulminati]

Recently, the ship pipeline was moved from Austin to LA, and we have been hard at work refining our process and improving our workflow so that we can develop ships more quickly and more efficiently than we have ever done before.

Good to see they've got their priorities straight

 

[Blaine]

You know that this is a game about spaceships and that the majority of spaceships actually won't be flyable by players, right? There is one flyable player ship from each of the Xi'an, Banu, and Vanduul races. There are no flyable Kr'thak ships.

Ships sales or no ship sales, having a wide variety of ships makes sense unless you have your ass screwed on where your brain should go.

 

[Ulminati]

So are you contesting that producing many, many spaceships should be a high priority or not?

 

[Blaine]

They're a necessity and are of higher priority than some other features, yes. As far as flyable ships are concerned, those are released many, many months apart.

The features (rarely specified, I note) that you and the rest of the peanut gallery have been squealing aren't in Arena Commander are being worked on at the same time the ships are being worked on, as indicated by the full report. You focused on a single section of the report in order to feed your absolutely, most assuredly disingenuous and stupid "they're only selling ships, it's a big scam!" narrative. Your opinion is obviously biased, and I've discarded it for garbage.

 

[Ulminati]

You're too easy to bait, Blaine-chan.

It is true though. At the moment, the sound business decision would be to delay the game ad nauseam to sell more virtual ships. The money earned per hour of development time on $250+ ships probably overshadows what they'd get for releasing the game. That is assuming that a considerable part of the people who'd actually be interested in SC already preordered through pledges (which the pledge numbers suggest they have). Once the game is out, the honeymoon ends and people will be a lot less likely to buy new ships for money upfront. Especially if they are supposed to be earnable within a realistic time frame in game. (If they aren't, then the P2W argument you pretend we toss around certainly applies).

Basically it's a case of the goose that lays golden eggs. Once the game is released, the goose is slaughtered and there may or may not be a gold mine within it. The prudent thing from a business standpoint would be getting as many eggs as possible before reaching for the knife.

But hey, at least Star Citizens mouse gimballing looks like it'll finally make us a space game where KB+mouse is the superior form of input. R00fles!

 

[Blaine]

I don't have a problem with legitimate criticism of the game. I have a problem with wild speculation presented as fact, and with disingenuous bullshit like "the P2W argument you pretend we toss around." Pretend? There's no pretending involved. There are hundreds of posts complaining about P2W in this thread. I realize you didn't start shitposting in this thread until you eventually tried Elite Dangerous and it made you so giddy you felt the need to gloat in another thread as though ED is your local football club, but you might want to get your facts straight before you start spewing bullshit.

 

[bonescraper]

This thread should be trolled hard, and if you don't see why, it's your problem. This is the Codex, we troll people who are wrong about vidya gaems. Deal with it.

But let's back that up with some "legitimate criticism". Beware, i'll compare this turd in the making to the space sim messiah - Elite: Dangerous.

There's a giant contrast between SC and Elite. For someone who admittedly backed and follows both games, you seem a bit deluded. Every time a new ship is made or shown, you make a post about it. I don't see you discussing Elite on the other hand, when there's a lot more to talk about. Every beta release adds a ton of new conent. Every single ship released so far not only can be viewed, it can be flown, refit and repurposed. Yet you continue to dwell in a thead devoted to a game that gives all signs of vaporware. I can't, in all honesty, understand why anyone would root for this game when you have a superior alternative. Let's get some facts.

Elite is a far better game when it comes to the technology it's built on. The Cobra engine was created specifically for a massive space sim. It's built for free-form gameplay in a mindbogglingly huge universe. It uses real scientific data and features realistic astrophysics. Orbits, day and night cycles, gravity, it's all there, working. Procedural generation allows to create immense, diversified gameworld for a fraction of SC's budget. From what i've learned so far, Elite's budget is close to 10-15 million dollars. That's where a space sim tailored engine shows its potential, it simply saves a lot of work and money. Sure, the CryEngine may have shinier graphics and more bells and wisthles. But where Elite has a 1:1 scale scientificly accurate galaxy with 400 billion star systems, SC has... decent character animation? Well, duh. It's a FPS engine! I bet they have all the tools to make corridor shooters and nice looking grass.

Braben follows simple, yet effective design policy. Build solid foundations, then a house. Make sure it's a solid, well built house. Then decorate it, add furniture and stuff. That's why Elite is playable since december 2013. Frontier Developments continuously keep testing, tweaking and perfecting the game mechanics, while Roberts releases minigames, hangars and new ships totally disconnected from the core game experience. Elite is being made form ground up, and tested in the meantime. Using the house analogy, Roberts made windows, doors and a bunch of expensive chairs. And he lets you play with them too keep people occupied.

Finally, Elite will come out this year. The game will be feature complete, rich in content, incredibly big, with working, living, dynamic universe and economy. But the development won't stop there. Seamless planetary landings, spaceship and space station interiors, boarding, crews and other mechanics will come in expansion packs. In time, the game will get even larger and richer in scope and features. And it's not just wishful thinking or false promises. I can already see the technology behind it. For example, you can't find 2 identical planets in ED universe. Their surfaces are procedurally generated. All those craters and canyons, all those continents and islands are unique. Elite is going to be bigger and more ambitious than SC, it will also come out earlier and cost less. Is it magic?

I have no faith in SC. With an incredible budget, it definitely looks like its development is being totally mismanaged. Roberts has wrong tools and wrong priorities... But when he fails at basics, he definitely has more media attention and more time for marketing.

 

[Drax]

I'm still waiting for news about my beloved Caterpillar... Stop making NEW ships and finnish the starter ones, ffs!

 

[Blaine]

This thread should be trolled hard, and if you don't see why, it's your problem. This is the Codex, we troll people who are wrong about vidya gaems. Deal with it.

But let's back that up with some "legitimate criticism". Beware, i'll compare this turd in the making to the space sim messiah - Elite: Dangerous.

There's a giant contrast between SC and Elite. For someone who admittedly backed and follows both games, you seem a bit deluded. Every time a new ship is made or shown, you make a post about it. I don't see you discussing Elite on the other hand, when there's a lot more to talk about. Every beta release adds a ton of new conent. Every single ship released so far not only can be viewed, it can be flown, refit and repurposed. Yet you continue to dwell in a thead devoted to a game that gives all signs of vaporware. I can't, in all honesty, understand why anyone would root for this game when you have a superior alternative.

Ah yes, I'm deluded. This coming from a guy who believes it's important to "troll" (about half of Codexers have no idea what this actually means)—or more typically, shitpost in—Internet forum threads in order to accomplish what, exactly? Is your hyperbole and exaggerated speculation going to convince the dozen or so Codexers who haven't decided the game will definitely be shit to change their minds? You can dress up your shitposting and whining however you like. I'm not buying it. Worse still, you and your fellow whingers are typically ignorant of various basic facts about the game or its development, and in many cases haven't played Arena Commander at all.

So then, I "dwell in" this thread and don't spend enough time in the ED thread for your taste. I haven't been devoting much time to either thread recently, except to post one new ship here and argue with shitposters. If we discount arguing with shitposters, I've posted my fair share in the ED thread. Regardless, your football club-esque way of viewing the two threads is ridiculous. No one has to choose one game over the other in the first place.

Let's get some facts.

If I cut the personal opinions and speculation out of your "facts," I'm left with about half a paragraph.

 

[buzz]

 

[Drax]

(about half of Codexers have no idea what this actually means)

It'd be good to remember the Master Troll in these cases:

 

[Infinitron]

Long article about the Star Citizen "grey market" at Eurogamer: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-10-08-inside-star-citizens-grey-market

Excerpt:

During our chat Chris Roberts expresses no desire to clamp down on the Star Citizen grey market ("That's amazing to me"). In fact, the way he talks, it sounds like it'll only get bigger once Star Citizen launches proper.

Here's his vision, as he explains it to me: When the persistent universe is up and running, ships will be manufactured from shipyards, then sold and traded to other players in universe. Some of these ships will be highly coveted because they are rare, or expensive, or take a lot of time and effort to produce, such as a cruiser. There will be players who simply have to have that cruiser right now, but there won't be one coming out of the shipyard for, let's say, a month. Those players may want to do a deal with a player who owns that cruiser - for the right price. "But that would be cool," Roberts says. "That's what happens in the real world.

"The whole goal is to be able to have a lot of trading and e-commerce inside the game. We have a dynamic economy. If you have tools in there for the players to buy, sell, create jobs, work for other people and build their own empires, it's better for you. Otherwise you always have to provide the content. But if the players are doing half of this stuff for you you can focus on things that matter.

"Eve Online does a pretty good job of having a lot of player generated content drive the drama of the universe. I'd like to have the tools to be able to allow the players to do a lot of that; create missions for each other, take over a part of the galaxy or build up a trading empire, and then we focus on expanding the universe, creating more locations for people to explore or trade, more ships to fly around in. And then occasionally some narrative stories in there. That would be the best balance and that's the model we're going for."

Roberts' vision for all of this is that it occurs inside the game - on in-universe. But really we shouldn't be surprised that Star Citizen trading has already established itself outside of it. By manufacturing the rarity of these ships CIG has inflated their perceived value.

Perceived is the operative word here. Unlike say, CCP's Eve Online, which has a working, well-established universe in which players invest a huge amount of time gathering resources in order to manufacture ships that can be used, right now, in huge space battles or to fuel a complex game of virtual politics, Star Citizen currently trades off of pie in the sky economics. Until the persistent universe is up and running, there are no game mechanics involved in determining the rarity of ships. They're rare because CIG says they are.

"It's kind of cool in the fact it's real-world economics at work," Roberts says of Star Citizen's grey market.

"But it wasn't intentional. It fell out of something we did as a creative design decision to make sure the persistent universe isn't unbalanced."

For now, then, Star Citizen's grey market rumbles on, services such as Kane's Megastore continue to thrive, and the money keeps on flooding into CIG's coffers. The Roberts Space Industries website tracker shows how much money is being made on an hourly basis. I'm looking at it now and in the last hour players spent $6836. On 27th September 2014 $451,701 was made. For the whole of September just over $2.7m boosted the bank balance. Roberts tells me Star Citizen will be finished - in that it'll be feature complete and stuck together to form a cohesive whole - at some point in 2016. I remember a video game developer once telling me it may be in Roberts' best interest never to release Star Citizen, the way things are going.

"The party has to end sometime," Nigel says. "But the game seems a long way off, so I expect things to last."

 

[Duellist_D]

"At release, roughly how many gameplay hours do you expect it to take to earn a Constellation Andromeda for a new player just starting the game?" Nigel wonders.
With specific regard to the sale of concept ships with lifetime insurance, here's CIG's comment:
"Remember: we are offering this pledge ship to help fund Star Citizen's development. All of these ships will be available for in-game credits in the final universe, and they are not required to start the game. Additionally, all decorative 'flare' items will also be available to acquire in the finished game world. The goal is to make additional ships available that give players a different experience rather than a particular advantage when the persistent universe launches."

Nice (and telling) way of dodging the Question.
Did they hire a politican to write their speeches?

 

[Ulminati]

Probably like a tier 10 tank in WoT. You can grind for a few months or make a teensy tiny microtransaction. And by tiny it's probably going to be similar to what people have to pay for them now, because otherwise people who already "pledged" will get "upset" at the "sudden discount" after release.

Source: Speculation

Here's his vision, as he explains it to me: When the persistent universe is up and running, ships will be manufactured from shipyards, then sold and traded to other players in universe. Some of these ships will be highly coveted because they are rare, or expensive, or take a lot of time and effort to produce, such as a cruiser. There will be players who simply have to have that cruiser right now, but there won't be one coming out of the shipyard for, let's say, a month. Those players may want to do a deal with a player who owns that cruiser - for the right price. "But that would be cool," Roberts says. "That's what happens in the real world.

In before chinese shipfarmers. He's basically talking about legitimizing gold farming.

Roberts tells me Star Citizen will be finished - in that it'll be feature complete and stuck together to form a cohesive whole - at some point in 2016. I remember a video game developer once telling me it may be in Roberts' best interest never to release Star Citizen, the way things are going.

Wow. That sounds exactly like the thing I've been saying that makes Blaine hugely upset.

 

[The Fish]

Here's an article on the people trying to make a profit through selling star citizen ships.

 

[Infinitron]

Planetside gameplay:

Here's an article on the people trying to make a profit through selling star citizen ships.

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