Star Citizen Online - The search for more money

Optimist.

Soygen_sl said:

Honestly, though, last time I moved that Richard Garriot "not really an MMO" thread into Other Games, that thread's regulars cried that I was over-moderating.

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I thought you were wrong, so I posted it. I think having the capacity for a personal emulator does not change the fact the main persistent world is an MMO. It's not really comparable to Star Citizen which is still up in the air.

Chris Roberts is hitting those of us who were huge Privateer, Wing Commander, and Freelancer fans with his promises. I haven't spent that much, but I have friends who have dropped quite a few dollars on this game just on the promise of what it might deliver. It's great marketing. I am a miser and I need to stay away from their site and news for fear of nabbing a cool looking ship.

I'll wait for a real demo. I have no interest in Arena Commander. I'm not sure how they'll pull of a living, breathing economy but I'm hopeful they'll find a way a la Eve with a flight sim that's more fun to play.

Maybe they'll realise their ambitions were unreasonable and turn this thing into a Freelancer 2 instead. Damn, I would give someones newborn for a Freelancer 2 anyday.

bytes_sl said:

Maybe they'll realise their ambitions were unreasonable and turn this thing into a Freelancer 2 instead. Damn, I would give someones newborn for a Freelancer 2 anyday.

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QFT

Install the original every now and then. Not sure why that game works so well. So many things they did I didn't usually approve of (no joystick? BLASPHEMY!), but it's still fun.

pretty badass video of one of the ships, linking cuz you can watch in 1440p or 4k if your monitor supports it. looks drop dead gorgeous. i assume this is supposed to be a top gear spoof, and it looks like its all rendered in game

Galactic Gear Reviews the Origin M50 - YouTube

Nice vid. I think design of SC ships is still a little "samish" compared to what they currently have in EVE. Probably not a fair comparison with Eve being out for so long already, but it looks as if Eve ship designers are a bit more daring. For instance, I love the typs of ships that are not so much elongated, but have a lot of height. Combine this with a "predatory" look and you get stuff like you see here:http://i1.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/...90/240/a96.jpg

Here is pic of SC ships:http://i.imgur.com/zWsL3Dw.jpgAlso cool. I am sure the details on SC ships are much, much more refined though. So, not ripping on the SC graphical approach, I just hope they do a bit more freaky designs too.

Treesong_sl said:

Nice vid. I think design of SC ships is still a little "samish" compared to what they currently have in EVE. Probably not a fair comparison with Eve being out for so long already, but it looks as if Eve ship designers are a bit more daring. For instance, I love the typs of ships that are not so much elongated, but have a lot of height. Combine this with a "predatory" look and you get stuff like you see here:http://i1.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/...90/240/a96.jpg

Here is pic of SC ships:http://i.imgur.com/zWsL3Dw.jpgAlso cool. I am sure the details on SC ships are much, much more refined though. So, not ripping on the SC graphical approach, I just hope they do a bit more freaky designs too.

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I think the Xi'an Scout is a good example of something you are looking for but not on that list. All of the Xi'An ships are freaky looking or planned to be. Initial concept was entirely vertical but has since been refined to be much more practical but still obviously alien and so unlike other SC ships.http://imgur.com/a/PfrrGFair warning most of those images are 4k. I was never a fan of the vertical club/dildo looking ships that they planned previously but this re-design is amazing. Can't wait to see what else they plan.

Tuco_sl said:

It cracks me up that the revenue stream of SC has pushed its marketing into selling ships rather than a game to play.

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I agree they could do a much better job and should have shifted towards that when AC first hit. Their marketing dept is Sandi and while I love many things she has done they clearly don't know how to market the game without SQ42 and the PU.

A lot of people want to see traditional marketing for SC because we have been spoon fed in a certain way for decades. Perhaps that's their problem too. Outside of that how can they market the hangar and AC? Until this time next year that's mostly what they will have to work with.

If I had to take a stab at marketing I would say do some commercials for AC and the Hangars and re-design the site to be far more up front with what is going on with the game development. I mean at this stage why NOT do that? They have more than enough money. They need to shift focus to the game. The recent change to the front page is a welcome start but it's not enough.

Anyone try the racing feature yet? (There was lag for me, so I decided to wait a few more days and see if they fix)

Ive had a few solo runs around the race track but havent dared get into a competitive race yet. I dont have either of the racing ships, so flying the 300i in a multiplayer race is like bringing a Civic to a drag strip. It's been good for helping improve my piloting skills though.

So CIG is retroactively giving LTI for anyone who pledged for a Gladius or Xi'An Scout concept recently.

Also they are bringing back LTI for concept ships they are releasing over the next six weeks starting next Friday.

https://robertsspaceindustries.com/c...ept-Sale-Plans

The latest Forum Meltdown is in full swing.

Personally I haven't decided on what the hell I'm going to do. Depends on the concepts I suppose. It's stretched over six weeks so it's not nearly as bad as last November.

I still think they are doing it half arsed but there still isn't much of the game to show off in commercials. With all this money they raised and will raise in the next month and a half I hope they massively expand exploration and create a dedicated team/studio for it. God knows they can afford it.

I pledged $50 for the 300i package originally because I loved Freelancer. If it gets closer to completion and I like it I'll probably throw in the extra to upgrade the 300i to the super version or what not but I don't think even if the game looks like it will be the messiah will I buy any more. There's no doubt purchases will remain post launch and I still want to see the net work effort to buy/maintain one of these '$200' ships.

Are there any clear design docs for this game since it's kickstarter? I know there were a lot of details released a few years ago, but with some much extra shit they've been doing, have they put out a concise vision again?

Is this still a pseudo MMO with tons of instancing/sharding/whatever?

Draegan_sl said:

Are there any clear design docs for this game since it's kickstarter? I know there were a lot of details released a few years ago, but with some much extra shit they've been doing, have they put out a concise vision again?

Is this still a pseudo MMO with tons of instancing/sharding/whatever?

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SC had a design doc built something like 3+ years ago. It included certain core designs meant to be in the initial release of the game. Then there were "Would be nice" sections CR didn't think he could get into the game at release even if studio backed. But he hoped to include them later. Since his team grew 10x the size since then and we are moving to almost triple the original budget available for the game it has changed drastically. This is mostly due to all those "Would be nice" sections which have since entered the design pipeline and then some. I think he exhausted all of the "Would be nice" sections late last year. Almost everything since then has been random doohickeys to give people something at each million mark. We actually voted to stop it entirely but it passed with something like 56% of the vote so it continues. However nothing substantial has been added to the design in almost a year and none are expected.

If you want a vision statement I'm not sure if there is one. I think there are several major posts about how the game is meant to work like Death of a Spaceman but one complete brows-able design doc? The closest thing I can find is this:https://robertsspaceindustries.com/about-the-gameIt's sectioned so you have to expand each part and read/watch it. If you are looking to start somewhere start here.

Game mechanics have changed so much that it's hard to really nail down what is or isn't an MMO anymore. Here are some details.

Will instancing be used? Yes. But it's important to point out that it won't be possible to play single player in the Persistent Universe as you won't be allowed to set your PvP flag to 0, only to 1. Also that flag won't mean jack and shit outside of controlled space. Think of null sec space in EvE. We don't know yet how many users can end up in an instance because the Devs themselves don't know how far they can push the engine. They want between 50-100 players per instance. It could be half that or double that.

Arena Commander 2.0 will help figure this out as that will be the first true full instancing in space where everything is expected to work. AC 2.0 is expected early/mid next year. Persistent Universe Beta testing is expected this time next year. That's when we find out how instancing will end up working in the galaxy shard. The current plan is to have a seamless experience where assets are created/destroyed as you move and in theory when you cross into another instance there shouldn't be any noticeable lag as the assets within your visual range are already pre-loaded and you can "see" and even engage/be-engaged across instances. Supposedly the engine already allows for this but it's still in R&D as far as we know. Until we have it in hand a year from now there is no way to be sure.

Will sharding be used? No. It's one complete galaxy that will exist on Google Cloud with all users/economy etc all in one place. Regardless of what happens with instancing it will stay on one shard like EvE. Arena Commander and the Hangar is there already and other modules will be connected as they come online. The next major modules, Planetside and FPS, is expected late this year early next. Planetside will connect the Hangar module which is connected to Arena Commander. The FPS module will likely be connected to Arena Commander. You may not know this but Arena Commander is an in-fiction way of accessing a simulator of space combat/racing and FPS.

In case you are wondering how the hell do they plan to actually deliver on any of this... it's because they have dedicated teams working on each module. They often work together since the game is meant to work as one but each has their core responsibilities. All the teams are working in parallel. It's not just a couple of guys in a corner but an entire studio is dedicated to each module. It's why their team grew from around 30 to 300. About half of them are out-source teams/studios including the Hangar and FPS module teams.

If you have any specific questions go ahead and ask. No matter how harsh I'll try my best to give you an answer.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that SQ42 in Manchester which is part of CIG is working on the Squadron 42 story module which will go on top of the rest of the game. That will be a single player experience like Wing Commander with an absolutely massive campaign. It's technically not Co-Op but you will be able to ask your friends or random people to hop into missions with you in single player to help you complete a mission. That will be entirely optional. You will be allowed to skip the story if you wish but it might be required the very first time you play to actually complete the entire campaign. It will introduce you to all of the game mechanics and it's a complete game onto itself. So we are getting about 5 games in one: Arena Commander 2.0 (which will combine space and FPS elements), Murray Cup Racing, FPS Arena, SQ42 and Persistent Universe.

I appreciate your updates, Variise. Still a pretty long timeline, though on par with any triple A game-project. I guess people get impatient with these "early access" type of projects. But good to hear a bit more about their approach for an eventual release.