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[Subpar Scrub]

That title was one step removed from "You won't believe how much fans dropped on this guy's bugy, half-built game"! " Publishers hate him!"

"This one buggy half-built game gets you ripped in 3 weeks!"

 

[CyberPunked]

Some gorgeous screenshots from the latest monthly update:

 

[Kabouter]

This shot kinda reminds me of an area in Freelancer, I think in the starting system where there's a pirate base.

 

[tuxfool]

Is this really a screenshot? Looks like concept art to me.

 

[flyinpiranha]

In a space sim that focuses heavily on ship-to-ship combat? What do you think?

Wait, this game focuses on PVP or ship vs ship and not adventure and exploring and stuff?

Damnit, E did the same thing, sucked me in with thinking I could explore and be an adventurer and now they just focus on PVP bullshit.

Guess I'll be waiting years before we get an adventure game in space that isn't just dogfighting over and over.

 

[frontieruk]

Wait, this game focuses on PVP or ship vs ship and not adventure and exploring and stuff?

Damnit, E did the same thing, sucked me in with thinking I could explore and be an adventurer and now they just focus on PVP bullshit.

Guess I'll be waiting years before we get an adventure game in space that isn't just dogfighting over and over.

Have you considered just you know joining Mobius in E and play in a group just doing the PvE RPG side of it they have like 6000 members or something near that.

As to star citizen I never caught the hype train, my best memories of gaming probably come from wing Commander 2 it was perfectly pitched, SC the scope is to large, they should of promised the story component, got that working then started another round of funding building out the universe for mp and then added features the way they've gone about it just screams mess to me, but I really do hope they reach their goals.

 

[staticneuron]

Wait, this game focuses on PVP or ship vs ship and not adventure and exploring and stuff?

Damnit, E did the same thing, sucked me in with thinking I could explore and be an adventurer and now they just focus on PVP bullshit.

Guess I'll be waiting years before we get an adventure game in space that isn't just dogfighting over and over.

Not really. The sandbox isn't available yet because the components that make it up are still being worked on. But there is a reason the dedicated mining, exploration, salvage, merchant and transport ships are armed to the teeth. While there would be less of of a reason for pirates to attack Exploration or salvage ships, the other ships may have something worth value which would make them a target. Considering there might be a system in place that lets you find and get paid for retrieving artifacts then the exploration ships might be a target as well.

We can't really comment on that yet because it isn't up but again they have scheduled this for end of year and if there are more you want to find out, there is a wealth of information in the Star Citizen Pre Alpha Gaf page.

Have you considered just you know joining Mobius in E and play in a group just doing the PvE RPG side of it they have like 6000 members or something near that.

As to star citizen I never caught the hype train, my best memories of gaming probably come from wing Commander 2 it was perfectly pitched, SC the scope is to large, they should of promised the story component, got that working then started another round of funding building out the universe for mp and then added features the way they've gone about it just screams mess to me, but I really do hope they reach their goals.

The end goal as pitched in the kick starter was the persistent universe. The story mode will take place inside the engine/universe create for the PU. There is a dedicated team working on Squadron 42, so if you took a glance at the monthly update page kindly posted above us by epmode then you would see how all of this is being worked on in parallel.

 

[flyinpiranha]

Have you considered just you know joining Mobius in E and play in a group just doing the PvE RPG side of it they have like 6000 members or something near that.

As to star citizen I never caught the hype train, my best memories of gaming probably come from wing Commander 2 it was perfectly pitched, SC the scope is to large, they should of promised the story component, got that working then started another round of funding building out the universe for mp and then added features the way they've gone about it just screams mess to me, but I really do hope they reach their goals.

Been in Mobius for a long time. EDIT: took out my other sentence, not really OT.

Not really. The sandbox isn't available yet because the components that make it up are still being worked on. But there is a reason the dedicated mining, exploration, salvage, merchant and transport ships are armed to the teeth. While there would be less of of a reason for pirates to attack Exploration or salvage ships, the other ships may have something worth value which would make them a target. Considering there might be a system in place that lets you find and get paid for retrieving artifacts then the exploration ships might be a target as well.

We can't really comment on that yet because it isn't up but again they have scheduled this for end of year and if there are more you want to find out, there is a wealth of information in the Star Citizen Pre Alpha Gaf page.



The end goal as pitched in the kick starter was the persistent universe. The story mode will take place inside the engine/universe create for the PU. There is a dedicated team working on Squadron 42, so if you took a glance at the monthly update page kindly posted above us by epmode then you would see how all of this is being worked on in parallel.

OK, cool. I am close to doing a $80-100 ship and just want to make sure that the game still will cater to people who don't just want to pewpew ... hopefully it pans out!

Probably will pick this up in another month or so after doing some more research on it. I've read a lot but it's always kind of fragmented and hope that the developers stick to their vision.

 

[frontieruk]

Not really. The sandbox isn't available yet because the components that make it up are still being worked on. But there is a reason the dedicated mining, exploration, salvage, merchant and transport ships are armed to the teeth. While there would be less of of a reason for pirates to attack Exploration or salvage ships, the other ships may have something worth value which would make them a target. Considering there might be a system in place that lets you find and get paid for retrieving artifacts then the exploration ships might be a target as well.

We can't really comment on that yet because it isn't up but again they have scheduled this for end of year and if there are more you want to find out, there is a wealth of information in the Star Citizen Pre Alpha Gaf page.



The end goal as pitched in the kick starter was the persistent universe. The story mode will take place inside the engine/universe create for the PU. There is a dedicated team working on Squadron 42, so if you took a glance at the monthly update page kindly posted above us by epmode then you would see how all of this is being worked on in parallel.

Actually having read before posting I was still of the belief that the way they are building it out is the wrong way, but you know thanks for assuming I've not been following the thread or development of the game

 

[staticneuron]

Actually having read before posting I was still of the belief that the way they are building it out is the wrong way, but you know thanks for assuming I've not been following the thread or development of the game

Ah I see. Then I must point out to you that the original kickstarter pushed the persistent universe first. Every other mode they are working on is a component in the PU. So not sure about the order you think they should have worked on things. Could you elaborate?

 

[frontieruk]

Ah I see. Then I must point out to you that the original kickstarter pushed the persistent universe first. Every other mode they are working on is a component in the PU. So not sure about the order you think they should have worked on things. Could you elaborate?

The start would of been the physics demo (AC) as every space sim relies on its physics engine, it gives players something to do and refinements can be made on feed back so I agree with their choice.

Build the story hub, this would be the like the hanger but extended to encompass the command ship in total like in Wing Commander. Players could explore the ship to learn fastest routes to where they need to get in S42.

Perhaps here open the fps/3ps with tests in AC and on the command ship


Build out the story mode, I believe they've committed to something like 50missions? I know I read about 5 chapters to the story each being about 15hrs long, but do this episodically rather than hold the whole story until it's finished. This allows for new ships to be introduced, weapon upgrades to be added regularly but in a meaningful way to add not break AC, is by letting players use the ships they've obtained access to by donating.

Use the environments built for the story to extend new environments to AC aka enemy command ships for boarding, an increase in ships players can use, objective based play ie disable the opponents CS or capture the CS. Allow credits to be earned to purchase new ships or ship/weapon upgrades

At the end concentrate on the persistent universe as a there is a good sized part of it built, it's then just extending and integrating the various play styles that can be had, they'd have a wealth of info on how the fighting ships were being kitted out by this point to allow for balancing.

Which was basically the original plan, from memory, but my understanding is they've moved S42 to a when it's finished you get it.

The plan is to give you guys a final polished S42, but S42 will be a standalone game given free to all those who have backed before Star Citizen launches. Having said that, as S42 will be using all the elements from these different modules, and improving the game based on the communities feedback as they are released for Alpha, you will all be making a contribution to making S42 a much better game.

In a way I understand the way they are building it, if they change the physics engine / damage engine etc they change the whole of S42 including the released chapters which could break the S42 part, so they want a full experience. But at the same time if they were confident in their physics engine they could lock development for S42 physics and build out the game setting as they are treating it as a separate entity, giving the backers something more to do and probably stopping the recent trend of shit stirring articles about SC as people would feel they were getting something.

I think the fact they've pulled back on the S42 original plans has played a large part in the whole Scam Citizen / Buggy mess views, if they'd carried on with their original plan (which seem's my idea was close to) as all backers would have something other than tech demos to play with. As it stands as a backer you have a hanger to look at your ship, a physics engine 'game', some nice damage tech demos (those looked awesome BTW) and the FPS module is more or less just around the corner.

4 years in to the project they've launched a 6 (8 if you count solo separately) game modes module which while impressive (it launched 3 years after work on the game started) which they've built up to its current state since it launched last august, it was a year late and has had teething issues (which modern online game hasn't?), but it does go to odds with the original draft FAQ which read

The purpose of the higher stretch goals is to ensure that the game-as-described is finished in the two year time period. We intend to build the game that Chris Roberts described at GDC Online regardless, but without additional funding we are going to have to do it one piece at a time, starting with Squadron 42, rather than as a single larger production. With more funding we can include more ships, systems, unique locations, animations and cinematic sequences.

The bolded part of the quite is the part that circulated the web at the time (Oct 2012), it seemed overly ambitious at the time more so now. Notice that without the backing they were going to build out the story first? A concentrated effort on the story, even episodic content would hopefully have kept the devs on point... viewing the development from outside the hype bubble, feature creep seems to be the enemy rather than commitment. I don't see the universe going live until 2017 and I'm happy to wait before buying in, but for the backers I do wonder how many have just written their donation off.

 

[staticneuron]

At the end concentrate on the persistent universe as a there is a good sized part of it built, it's then just extending and integrating the various play styles that can be had, they'd have a wealth of info on how the fighting ships were being kitted out by this point to allow for balancing.

Which was basically the original plan, from memory, but my understanding is they've moved S42 to a when it's finished you get it.

That wouldn't make any sense because the ships that you see in S42 are military ships that civilians don't have access to. The various play styles to be had outside of combat is very large while S42 mainly is going to focus on combat. If that is all you wanted to see, that would have been a much easier task and to be honest I wouldn't have hoped on board if it was pitched that way. Thankfully that is not what the original kickstarter page stated or even implied.

What they pitched

Real quick, Star Citizen is:

A rich universe focused on epic space adventure, trading and dogfighting in first person.
Single Player – Offline or Online(Drop in / Drop out co-op play)
Persistent Universe (hosted by US)
Mod-able multiplayer (hosted by YOU)
No Subscriptions
No Pay to Win

At its core Star Citizen is a destination, not a one-off story. It's a complete universe where any number of adventures can take place, allowing players to decide their own game experience. Pick up jobs as a smuggler, pirate, merchant, bounty hunter, or enlist as a pilot, protecting the borders from outside threats. Chris Roberts has always wanted to create one cohesive universe that encompasses everything that made Wing Commander and Privateer / Freelancer special. A huge sandbox with a complex and deep lore allowing players to explore or play in whatever capacity they wish. That universe is Star Citizen.

The timeline based off meeting goal

The people who pledge for their spaceships will get to test-fly them long before the general public. 12 months in, we will allow the early backers to play the multiplayer space combat Alpha, and then 20-22 months in they will get to play the Star Citizen Beta, adventuring around the huge open galaxy, well before the general public.

but they also put the caveat

You as the customer get the ultimate vote in whether we make this game. Your dollars are your votes and the better we do the more resources we’ll have to bring you a great game.

So they never pitched the idea that S42 was the main and the PU was extended. It was pitched that Star Citizen is the PU and the s42 is a component in it. The only thing you could point to is a development schedule and scale and that was most likely based off of current budget at the time.

In a way I understand the way they are building it, if they change the physics engine / damage engine etc they change the whole of S42 including the released chapters which could break the S42 part, so they want a full experience. But at the same time if they were confident in their physics engine they could lock development for S42 physics and build out the game setting as they are treating it as a separate entity, giving the backers something more to do and probably stopping the recent trend of shit stirring articles about SC as people would feel they were getting something.

Since you have been following development that is something they recently have done so even if you were waiting on the physics and multicrew to finished first before S42, we would be at the same spot. That is unless you think that it is wise to build out the subsystems in discrete pieces which would I highly doubt would have made for a stable environment for the devs or the players.

The bolded part of the quite is the part that circulated the web at the time (Oct 2012), it seemed overly ambitious at the time more so now. Notice that without the backing they were going to build out the story first? A concentrated effort on the story, even episodic content would hopefully have kept the devs on point... viewing the development from outside the hype bubble, feature creep seems to be the enemy rather than commitment. I don't see the universe going live until 2017 and I'm happy to wait before buying in, but for the backers I do wonder how many have just written their donation off.

That isn't ambitious, that is practical given the budget that they had. The end goal was always the Persistant Universe, that is what they refer to when saying the title star citizen while the specific story mode was called Squadron 42.

But lets look it again

We intend to build the game that Chris Roberts described at GDC Online regardless, but without additional funding we are going to have to do it one piece at a time, starting with Squadron 42, rather than as a single larger production. With more funding we can include more ships, systems, unique locations, animations and cinematic sequences.

That post stated that without additional funding they would have started with S42 only. They surpassed that before kickstarter ended so off course nature of the project changed.

You must realize that around the time of that post(October 16th 2012) the kickstarter had not started yet (October 19th 2012) and even with help from investors, it would have been hard to take him seriously if he was going to try to make the PU first then S42 without additional funding. You could basically tell based off of the budget goals that when the funding hit 30 million the entire project including s42 was going to be a different beast. But there has been communication every step of the way, so there was no surprises, no sudden lapses of logic. They have met their deadlines so far so if they mention the PU alpha will be out by end of the year there is absolutely no reason not to believe because so far they have delivered. Even if your don't think the way it was delivered was correct that doesn't detract from the fact that they have produced results.

 

[flyinpiranha]

Page 10 is broken on mobile. Testing.

 

[Houndi101]

Can someone please explain how this game works?
Some old FAQ says:

Is Star Citizen “free to play”? A subscription game?
To play Star Citizen you need only to buy the initial game. There will never be a monthly charge for usage. Some in-game items may be available as microtransactions, but we will NEVER sell anything that can’t be acquired through honest (and fun!) gameplay.

However I cannot find this from robert space industries website, has everything changed? Will it ever be an actual game? What the hell do the different tiers mean with the different ships?
I'm so confused

 

[Dictator93]

Can someone please explain how this game works?
Some old FAQ says:


However I cannot find this from robert space industries website, has everything changed? Will it ever be an actual game? What the hell do the different tiers mean with the different ships?
I'm so confused

To play the game on release, both the first mission pack for squadron 42 singple player, and the persistent universe MMO, you need to spend: on this package, or the equivalent Mustang Alpha package.

This package, which costs a bit more, includes beta access.

This package, which costs more than the previous, includes beta and an arena commander pass to play the current dog fighting alpha.

I recommend posting any follow up questions in this thread. It is dedicated to the game unlike this news story thread.

 

[KKRT00]

Can someone please explain how this game works?
Some old FAQ says:


However I cannot find this from robert space industries website, has everything changed? Will it ever be an actual game? What the hell do the different tiers mean with the different ships?
I'm so confused

There are 3 games in the package.

Singleplayer Squadron 42 campaign with coop options.
Multiplayer sandbox in limited Star Citizen universe that You can host and mod by Yourself
MMO-like game called Star Citizen hosted by CIG.

You pay 60$ on release, 40-45$ now and nothing else for access to all of them.

 

[Houndi101]

To play the game on release, both the first mission pack for squadron 42 singple player, and the persistent universe MMO, you need to spend: on this package, or the equivalent Mustang Alpha package.

This package, which costs a bit more, includes beta access.

This package, which costs more than the previous, includes beta and an arena commander pass to play the current dog fighting alpha.

I recommend posting any follow up questions in this thread. It is dedicated to the game unlike this news story thread.

There are 3 games in the package.

Singleplayer Squadron 42 campaign with coop options.
Multiplayer sandbox in limited Star Citizen universe that You can host and mod by Yourself
MMO-like game called Star Citizen hosted by CIG.

You pay 60$ on release, 40-45$ now and nothing else for access to all of them.

Alright thanks guys, I'll head to the other thread

 

[Xplatformer]

It's up to 84 million now. E3 should push it up to 100 mil by years end.

 

[Alric]

The more threads I read on this and seeing the pics people have posted the more I realize my computer is just too weak.

Also,

Nice

 

[Roberto Larcos]

The more threads I read on this and seeing the pics people have posted the more I realize my computer is just too weak.

Also,

Nice

An R9 280x should be able to handle Star Citizen absolutely fine on medium settings. By the time this game releases, that should be a very reasonably priced card. It wouldn't surprise me either to see some great R9 290 deals when the new AMD cards hit the market.

 

[tuxfool]

Why are people necroing this thread instead of the AC OT?

 

[Roberto Larcos]

Why are people necroing this thread instead of the AC OT?

Wow, fair point. Didn't realise this thread was so old.

 

[Etnos]

Call me crazy but I've always thought Star Citizen business model is as predatory as the worst mobile games, hence do not want anything to do with it

Say so, its other's people money, they can do whatever the hell they want with their money

 

[bj00rn_]

Considering the content of the article was actually pretty well balanced (did anyone else RTFA btw..?) it's safe to conclude it's a clickbait title. Evidently it works and attracts concerned gamers like flypaper.

Edit: wtf, the date.. Fucked in the ass by a thread-bumper.. I'm ashamed..

 

[KKRT00]

It's up to 84 million now. E3 should push it up to 100 mil by years end.

They wont be at E3.

 

[Xplatformer]

They wont be at E3.

What are you talking about? They are one of the presenters at the PC Gaming Conference.

So...crowd funded they've made 84 million. How much "investment" money has gone into this.

I assume when a AAA title goes into production the up front $$$$ prior to release is given by investors?

Croud Imperium had $10 million from investors outside of the crowd funding part...when the project started.

 

[aeolist]

this just seems like one of those weird ultra-niche PC things that's impossible to understand unless you devote a good amount of time, and then once you get it you feel like everyone else is stupid for not being on the same page

there's already a lot of these, this one just gets a lot of flak thanks to it not actually being out yet and still making a ton of money

 

[Xplatformer]

this just seems like one of those weird ultra-niche PC things that's impossible to understand unless you devote a good amount of time, and then once you get it you feel like everyone else is stupid for not being on the same page

there's already a lot of these, this one just gets a lot of flak thanks to it not actually being out yet and still making a ton of money

How do you figure it's ultra niche? It's currently shaping up to be what everyone wanted Destiny to be. How many people bought Destiny?

FPS...check
Space combat...check
MMO persistent universe...check
Deep singleplayer campaign...check

Hell, if Star Wars Battlefront were giving all this to people they would be wetting themselves.

Speaking of that...how long has that title been in development?

 

[aeolist]

How do you figure it's ultra niche? It's currently shaping up to be what everyone wanted Destiny to be. How many people bought Destiny?

FPS...check
Space combat...check
MMO persistent universe...check
Deep singleplayer campaign...check

Hell, if Star Wars Battlefront were giving all this to people they would be wetting themselves.

Speaking of that...how long has that title been in development?

niche in the same way something like dota 2 is. not in numbers of players but in the interests of those players and the required time investment.

maybe that's a bad word. specialized? i dunno

 

[Aureon]

To be fair, they have shown little gameplay considering it is 2 years into development.

To be fair, the scope of the damn thing is insane.

 

[Shining Sunshine]

To be fair, the scope of the damn thing is insane.

There is no fair. Developers need to keep their scope in check.

That's how game development works.

 

[BreezyLimbo]

niche in the same way something like dota 2 is. not in numbers of players but in the interests of those players and the required time investment.

maybe that's a bad word. specialized? i dunno

Nah, I would say that's the right word to use, Niche. I mean the poster you're responding to says 'It's currently shaping up to be what everyone wanted Destiny to be. '. I play a shitload of destiny, you can check my posts on the OT. And I'm not half interested in SC. The amount of money it's made fascinates me however.

 

[staticneuron]

There is no fair. Developers need to keep their scope in check.

That's how game development works.

Actually the increased scope is something that was what got people to invest. It is the promise of the pitch and what continued afterwards. No one wants them to cut corners the BDSSEE was and continues to be the goal. And after seeing the gameplay and the leaked content, it seems they have ALOT of stuff under wraps so people who are actually following along with the updates wouldn't be worried and even less after the leak which shows even more asset creation and work that is going on behind the scenes.

EDIT: And one would think you wouldn't be up to criticizing devs and anticipated base reaction after what earned you that tag. lol.

 

[SnowTeeth]

Call me crazy but I've always thought Star Citizen business model is as predatory as the worst mobile games, hence do not want anything to do with it

Say so, its other's people money, they can do whatever the hell they want with their money

You're crazy.

As mentioned a hundred times before the game will cost you $60 at launch. Or you can pay between 40 to 45$ now to access the alpha/beta. That's it. No-one is forcing you to pay for ships now. You can earn them all in game. What's predatory about that?

 

[epmode]

You're crazy.

As mentioned a hundred times before the game will cost you $60 at launch. Or you can pay between 40 to 45$ now to access the alpha/beta. That's it. No-one is forcing you to pay for ships now. You can earn them all in game. What's predatory about that?

It all depends on the economy at release. The fact that you'll be able to buy in-game currency with real money doesn't fill me with confidence.

And yes, I know about the planned caps on currency purchases. It's all meaningless until we have actual economy numbers.

 

[Basileus777]

Call me crazy but I've always thought Star Citizen business model is as predatory as the worst mobile games, hence do not want anything to do with it

Say so, its other's people money, they can do whatever the hell they want with their money

It's worse than most F2P games. At least in those the monetization is for immediate things, here you are pre-ordering IAPs years in advance. It's the highest level of whale hunting, they're exploiting their userbase before there is even a game.

 

[KKRT00]

What are you talking about? They are one of the presenters at the PC Gaming Conference.

Thats false. PC Gaming show guys put Star Citizen without CIG permission
http://www.reddit.com/r/starcitizen/comments/366r6k/just_so_everybody_knows_cig_will_not_be_at_the/

---

It all depends on the economy at release. The fact that you'll be able to buy in-game currency with real money doesn't fill me with confidence.

And yes, I know about the planned caps on currency purchases. It's all meaningless until we have actual economy numbers.

You can do that in EVE Online and its economy is fine.

---

It's worse than most F2P games. At least in those the monetization is for immediate things, here you are pre-ordering IAPs years in advance. It's the highest level of whale hunting, they're exploiting their userbase before there is even a game.

No one is forcing anyone to buy ships. Game cost 40$, for the amount of content they will provide it is a steal. And many put more than 40$ just because they wanted to support a game, the ships are a bonus.
And You of course forgetting that this game will have 30h+ replayable SP campaign and MP with mods.
Its not a solely MP game.

 

[epmode]

I have no problem with CIG funding the game with ship sales so long as they stop when the game launches. The prices are crazy and some people can take it overboard but it's preferable to outside funding.

My big concern is that CIG designs the game economy around the whales. You know, making it difficult to do anything worthwhile without supplementing your in-game income with real money.

You can do that in EVE Online and its economy is fine.

Yeah, it can work. And I understand that games with such a huge online component need to have some kind of persistent income to cover infrastructure costs. I just wish it was more like Dota or Path of Exile where money doesn't directly impact the game.

 

[Risible]

Here's the perspective from someone who thinks this looks interesting but has only glanced at some of the info available about the game.

First of all, when is the game due out? It seems (from my uneducated position) that it won't be out for MANY years from now. Is that correct?

Secondly, it seems like at least as far as MP if you don't spend a lot of money you won't be viable in MP. It seems like dudes are spending thousands of dollars to get insane ships that I assume will wreck someone in a regular old cheap ship.

Is any of this correct or are my impressions all out of whack?

edit: I should add that I enjoyed space games back in the day so I'd love for a good new one to be released.

 

[KKRT00]

Here's the perspective from someone who thinks this looks interesting but has only glanced at some of the info available about the game.

First of all, when is the game due out? It seems (from my uneducated position) that it won't be out for MANY years from now. Is that correct?

Secondly, it seems like at least as far as MP if you don't spend a lot of money you won't be viable in MP. It seems like dudes are spending thousands of dollars to get insane ships that I assume will wreck someone in a regular old cheap ship.

Is any of this correct or are my impressions all out of whack?

edit: I should add that I enjoyed space games back in the day so I'd love for a good new one to be released.

Singleplayer portion is scheduled to be released this year.
Persistent universe is scheduled for late next year with alpha starting in Q1 of 2016.

Ships are not a gear from fantasy MMOs with +1000% stats in comparison to different ship.
Gear is size based and You can equip everything on lowest tier ships as long as they are proper size.
All have prons and cons. Fighting is almost solely skill based and You cant even pilot properly the most expensive ships by Yourself, they are meant to be played with friends.
You can also buy every ship with ingame credits. Or hijack them from other players as well.

 

[Dreams-Visions]

Here's the perspective from someone who thinks this looks interesting but has only glanced at some of the info available about the game.

First of all, when is the game due out? It seems (from my uneducated position) that it won't be out for MANY years from now. Is that correct?

Secondly, it seems like at least as far as MP if you don't spend a lot of money you won't be viable in MP. It seems like dudes are spending thousands of dollars to get insane ships that I assume will wreck someone in a regular old cheap ship.

Is any of this correct or are my impressions all out of whack?

edit: I should add that I enjoyed space games back in the day so I'd love for a good new one to be released.

Ships will be able to be earned in game. People buying ships now are doing so to support the project.

Game is due out in 2016.

 

[epmode]

Here's the perspective from someone who thinks this looks interesting but has only glanced at some of the info available about the game.

First of all, when is the game due out? It seems (from my uneducated position) that it won't be out for MANY years from now. Is that correct?

Secondly, it seems like at least as far as MP if you don't spend a lot of money you won't be viable in MP. It seems like dudes are spending thousands of dollars to get insane ships that I assume will wreck someone in a regular old cheap ship.

Is any of this correct or are my impressions all out of whack?

The game will be released in pieces. An episodic single-player campaign will launch first but I wouldn't expect the MMO-style persistent universe until late 2016 or 2017. The persistent universe will launch in stages as well so this is all up in the air.

Direct ship sales will cease before the game is out out and there's no way to tell how much real money will impact the game until it's closer to launch.

Right now, CIG is using ship sales to fund a AAA game so it makes sense to charge ridiculous amounts. Space sim fans are an underserved market with a lot of disposable income.

 

[Risible]

Awesome, thanks for all the replies, more excited for this now .

 

[Risible]

Space sim fans are an underserved market with a lot of disposable income.

This was an interesting sentence and really stood out to me. Do you think that is because space sim people are an older generation? Does it appeal to the STEM crowd that might have more lucrative jobs? Curious as to why you say this.

Note, this is coming from a 50 year old dude with an EE degree, so I think I understand what you're getting at .

 

[Jinkies]

Here's the perspective from someone who thinks this looks interesting but has only glanced at some of the info available about the game.

First of all, when is the game due out? It seems (from my uneducated position) that it won't be out for MANY years from now. Is that correct?

No official date, but I think it will be 2018Q1.

Secondly, it seems like at least as far as MP if you don't spend a lot of money you won't be viable in MP. It seems like dudes are spending thousands of dollars to get insane ships that I assume will wreck someone in a regular old cheap ship.

You won't be able to spend a lot of real money on in-game assets when the game comes out. The multiplayer mode out right now is really more of an arcadey testbed, as opposed to the deep simulation of the final game. But yeah, if you helped the game's funding more, you'll win more in that testbed.

Singleplayer portion is scheduled to be released this year.
Persistent universe is scheduled for late next year with alpha starting in Q1 of 2016.

This is not correct. The singleplayer campaign is being split up into 3 episodes, each said to be about 20 hours long, and episode 1 is releasing at the end of the year. However, most people following the project closely don't believe that it is remotely possible to hit that timeline, considering recent developments.

Also, because CIG has spent months just redoing the netcode for the arcade-style FPS mode, I doubt we will see the persistent universe alpha until Summer 2016, if not later.

 

[KKRT00]

This was an interesting sentence and really stood out to me. Do you think that is because space sim people are an older generation? Does it appeal to the STEM crowd that might have more lucrative jobs? Curious as to why you say this.

Note, this is coming from a 50 year old dude with an EE degree, so I think I understand what you're getting at .

Basically space sim were very popular genre 15+ years ago, so all people that were playing those games then, now are over 30, so should have stable job.
The easiest way to observe this is by looking at EVE Online stats. When i played it 5+ years ago, the average age of a playerbase was slightly under 30.

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This is not correct. The singleplayer campaign is being split up into 3 episodes, each said to be about 20 hours long, and episode 1 is releasing at the end of the year. However, most people following the project closely don't believe that it is remotely possible to hit that timeline, considering recent developments.

Also, because CIG has spent months just redoing the netcode for the arcade-style FPS mode, I doubt we will see the persistent universe alpha until Summer 2016, if not later.

I think that they are splitting campaign to two episodes with 3rd being expansion pack, which was free only for early backers.
Definitely earlier than summer. They will start with single solar system and expand from that. The 64bit precision conversion is ready or almost ready already.

 

[shadowsdarknes]

When did this project start?

I'm rooting for this game.

 

[KKRT00]

When did this project start?

I'm rooting for this game.

Basically early 2014. They made a prototype in 2013 for campaign purposes, but they started company and development in 2014.
Full production though started in late 2014, when they finally hired and trained substantial staff.

 

[epmode]

Basically space sim were very popular genre 15+ years ago, so all people that were playing those games then, now are over 30, so should have stable job.

Right. People today may not realize it but space sims were big money back in the day. EA set records by paying $10M for Wing Commander 4 back in 1996.

..and then the space sims disappeared. It was one of those cases where publishers decided that no one wanted to play a genre even if the fans didn't agree. The same thing happened with CRPGs. But unlike CRPGs, where the genre still existed in some form in modern titles, space sims were gone gone gone. There hasn't been a single good space sim backed by any significant money in over a decade!

So for people like me, who loved Wing Commander and TIE Fighter, seeing a company resurrect the genre with so much confidence was beautiful.

 

[Jinkies]

When did this project start?

I'm rooting for this game.

Technically 2011, but they have been ramping up the company ever since the crowdfunding campaign ended in 2012Q4. They didn't move into real office space until January 2013.

Today, the company consists of several studios all over the world, all working on different parts of Star Citizen. They just opened up the Germany studio, so you could say the project is still ramping up to full capacity.