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[Pepboy]

Mate just relax, you don't need to fight tooth and nail on the Internet to win a victory. I can definitely see both sides of the coin when discussing Star Citizen and I'm not even a backer or past backer. It is clear the development for this game is huge, and expectations need to be in check or else you'll be disappointed. That isn't to say that backers and spectators should just take everything without critique, no game is ever free of critique at whatever interval of its development cycle. I just see your posts and you lash out so quickly when you really don't need to, let people quabble and say stupid shit, it is the Internet after all.

Outlandish complaints and arguments will always be present, hell they are present even after launch despite a game being successful or not. We can see from this demo slice that Star Citizen has something at least, and whether that something is meaningful to backers and onlookers time will tell. It is clearly so, so far off from being released in any true playable state with an actual gameplay loop one considers "normal" but that's just the joys of development.

Also, this whole argument of when development truly started is silly. Development for this game began when they finished their Kickstarter campaign, potentially even before then with concepts and ideas thrown around. Saying development has only been "truly" happening for the last two years is stupid, development is inclusive of everything and is not able to be cherry picked to suit an argument. Was their original release date foolish? Yes, it was considering what they are doing, but I'm happy to see it coming along with the development time as a whole taken into consideration.

My only true complaints about this demo was how "slow" everything felt, which is easily animation tweaks to solve. Getting into a chair, selecting modules to interact with, the sheer absurdity on how many modules you needed to interact with to get something working and the spaceship floatiness were all apparently in need of tuning to be much, much faster. Outside of that I was mighty impressed, the Idris blowing up was astonishingly awesome and I am very keen to get a true MMO world out of this game.

When? Well who knows. No one but CIG can answer that question as development fluctuates. Backing a project with such a bold concept should have given you an idea that this isn't a game that can be pushed out like typical AAA CoD or FIFA, it takes time and lots of manpower. Will it come out? Of course so, I don't doubt it would but I'm hopeful next year we will have some more solid gameplay loops with how 3.0 seems to be revamping quite a lot of backend to ensure easier development.

Another interesting point is that even if one said "full development didn't start until 2014' or "many games take 5 years". Based on recent evidence, the full game (1.0) isn't going to be released until well after another 3-5 years. Unless they just do a rush job if funding dries up.

They'll be lucky to get 3.0 this year and 3.1 next. Not to mention content creation for 100 systems, and the unreleased SQ42. So it's not like the release is right around the corner or even anytime soon. So projecting forward, it seems clear this game will have a very lengthy dev cycle, probably over 10 years by some measures. Very, very few games that have 10+ year dev cycles end up great... But very few games get budgets of 160m. So maybe it's going to work out, I certainly hope so.

 

[Skade]

Next big thing they need to do for that face tech is capture head movement and work that into some character leaning. Having all the characters speak while heads are held perfectly still put a damper on things.

Erm... I think we saw this in the bar when the showed it first (with Melissa constantly interrupting Chris by keeping up with the script).

Edit ! Here, towards the 31min mark : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCtdyNFwQWo

 

[Cartho]

The problem with SC's development, for me, lies with the management. The whole project has become totally out of control with more and more being added when they should be focusing on getting the real core game working and supremely enjoyable.

I'm going to give you a complex analogy here which I hope I can make as clear as it is in my head.

Imagine you're going to build a hotel. You raise funds from investors by convincing them of your vision for the project (i.e SC's kickstarter). You have some extra goals like an indoor pool and a rooftop bar which aren't essential but which will be nice to have if you get the money (i.e stretch goals). The pitch goes well, you get all the money you wanted, even for the stretch goals, from your investors. You start building, giving your investors a fairly vague date about when it might be finished. They're fine with that as they believe in your ambitious vision and know you can't rush things like this.

However as time goes on, you get more ideas. You want a wind machine on the rooftop terrace to ruffle people's hair so they can take impressive photos. You want individually monogrammed crystal glasses in every single room. These things cost money, more money than you had originally planned, so you start selling extras to your investors, like personalised beach loungers and other such status symbols.

Trouble is, you're now past many of the original target dates that you gave when you started the project. Sure, bits of the hotel are working. You can sleep in the bedrooms now, though there are no maids yet and the power goes off at random. They've got STUNNING WALLPAPER THOUGH. BEAUTIFUL. You can eat dinner in the restaurant too, but only if you go into the kitchen and cook it yourself.

Now, your investors could be getting irritated. They still believe in you, but they're starting to get worried that things which you said would be ready aren't. Basic things like consistent electricity in the rooms and hot water in the showers. They would also like to be able to walk from their room to the pool without having to leave through a back door and run through a building site to get there. It's a lush pool though. Gorgeous.

Still, you've made great progress on those engraved crystal glasses. They're going to look fabulous once the restaurant has a roof and lights and stuff. Oh and now, the half built ruin that is the rooftop terrace has a cool little robot who greets each guest with a cheery smile and jovial remark.

Who cares if the hotel isn't finished and you're continually missing deadlines set by your increasingly irritated investors who want to stay in the hotel? You can't rush art and this hotel is going to be bloody fabulous once you've got that 800 square foot, ruby encrusted glass ceiling to go over the tennis courts, which you haven't actually built yet but that will happen at some point further down the line.

Many of these issues could be resolved by getting a project manager who knows what they're doing and is able to say "no, we'll do that extra stuff later, let's get the thing finished properly first".

 

[Phoenixazure]

The problem with SC's development, for me, lies with the management. The whole project has become totally out of control with more and more being added when they should be focusing on getting the real core game working and supremely enjoyable.

I'm going to give you a complex analogy here which I hope I can make as clear as it is in my head.

Imagine you're going to build a hotel. You raise funds from investors by convincing them of your vision for the project (i.e SC's kickstarter). You have some extra goals like an indoor pool and a rooftop bar which aren't essential but which will be nice to have if you get the money (i.e stretch goals). The pitch goes well, you get all the money you wanted, even for the stretch goals, from your investors. You start building, giving your investors a fairly vague date about when it might be finished. They're fine with that as they believe in your ambitious vision and know you can't rush things like this.

However as time goes on, you get more ideas. You want a wind machine on the rooftop terrace to ruffle people's hair so they can take impressive photos. You want individually monogrammed crystal glasses in every single room. These things cost money, more money than you had originally planned, so you start selling extras to your investors, like personalised beach loungers and other such status symbols.

Trouble is, you're now past many of the original target dates that you gave when you started the project. Sure, bits of the hotel are working. You can sleep in the bedrooms now, though there are no maids yet and the power goes off at random. They've got STUNNING WALLPAPER THOUGH. BEAUTIFUL. You can eat dinner in the restaurant too, but only if you go into the kitchen and cook it yourself.

Now, your investors could be getting irritated. They still believe in you, but they're starting to get worried that things which you said would be ready aren't. Basic things like consistent electricity in the rooms and hot water in the showers. They would also like to be able to walk from their room to the pool without having to leave through a back door and run through a building site to get there. It's a lush pool though. Gorgeous.

Still, you've made great progress on those engraved crystal glasses. They're going to look fabulous once the restaurant has a roof and lights and stuff. Oh and now, the half built ruin that is the rooftop terrace has a cool little robot who greets each guest with a cheery smile and jovial remark.

Who cares if the hotel isn't finished and you're continually missing deadlines set by your increasingly irritated investors who want to stay in the hotel? You can't rush art and this hotel is going to be bloody fabulous once you've got that 800 square foot, ruby encrusted glass ceiling to go over the tennis courts, which you haven't actually built yet but that will happen at some point further down the line.

Many of these issues could be resolved by getting a project manager who knows what they're doing and is able to say "no, we'll do that extra stuff later, let's get the thing finished properly first".

I agree. I know a counter argument will be that they have other modelers, artists designers that can work on other things whilst testing is going on. A good project manager would have to be creative and reassign the staff accordingly. I wonder that's what they meant in one of the videos a few weeks ago saying that they are on the 3.0 branch.

 

[Spuck-uk]

Wrong question. What or who is holding SC back would be more appropriate.



Dev talent isn't as much the issue as management.

The graphics artists working on this are shit hot, absolutely first class, which is why static pictures or pre-rendered sequences look really nice. Not wild about the art direction, but it's a solid B.

The issue is clearly top down. Chris is blatantly not capable of a project this size, and from what we've seen of the last year, his brother doesn't seem much better.

 

[iHaunter]

The graphics artists working on this are shit hot, absolutely first class, which is why static pictures or pre-rendered sequences look really nice. Not wild about the art direction, but it's a solid B.

The issue is clearly top down. Chris is blatantly not capable of a project this size, and from what we've seen of the last year, his brother doesn't seem much better.

People say that, but there's only so much you can do with art + graphics without have 10 FPS the entire time.

If you want a game with giant capital ship battles and 100 ships on a screen, you can't have 20k ultrasampled textures/ultra flashy blinding explosions.

You can only do so much without breaking the FPS bank. I think they're doing a great job.

 

[Raticus79]

Erm... I think we saw this in the bar when the showed it first (with Melissa constantly interrupting Chris by keeping up with the script).

Edit ! Here, towards the 31min mark : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCtdyNFwQWo

Oh nice, guess they just didn't have it in the parts I saw. I just skipped around a bit since I still haven't had a chance to watch the whole thing.

The problem with SC's development, for me, lies with the management. The whole project has become totally out of control with more and more being added when they should be focusing on getting the real core game working and supremely enjoyable.

I'm going to give you a complex analogy here which I hope I can make as clear as it is in my head.

Imagine you're going to build a hotel. You raise funds from investors by convincing them of your vision for the project (i.e SC's kickstarter). You have some extra goals like an indoor pool and a rooftop bar which aren't essential but which will be nice to have if you get the money (i.e stretch goals). The pitch goes well, you get all the money you wanted, even for the stretch goals, from your investors. You start building, giving your investors a fairly vague date about when it might be finished. They're fine with that as they believe in your ambitious vision and know you can't rush things like this.

However as time goes on, you get more ideas. You want a wind machine on the rooftop terrace to ruffle people's hair so they can take impressive photos. You want individually monogrammed crystal glasses in every single room. These things cost money, more money than you had originally planned, so you start selling extras to your investors, like personalised beach loungers and other such status symbols.

Trouble is, you're now past many of the original target dates that you gave when you started the project. Sure, bits of the hotel are working. You can sleep in the bedrooms now, though there are no maids yet and the power goes off at random. They've got STUNNING WALLPAPER THOUGH. BEAUTIFUL. You can eat dinner in the restaurant too, but only if you go into the kitchen and cook it yourself.

Now, your investors could be getting irritated. They still believe in you, but they're starting to get worried that things which you said would be ready aren't. Basic things like consistent electricity in the rooms and hot water in the showers. They would also like to be able to walk from their room to the pool without having to leave through a back door and run through a building site to get there. It's a lush pool though. Gorgeous.

Still, you've made great progress on those engraved crystal glasses. They're going to look fabulous once the restaurant has a roof and lights and stuff. Oh and now, the half built ruin that is the rooftop terrace has a cool little robot who greets each guest with a cheery smile and jovial remark.

Who cares if the hotel isn't finished and you're continually missing deadlines set by your increasingly irritated investors who want to stay in the hotel? You can't rush art and this hotel is going to be bloody fabulous once you've got that 800 square foot, ruby encrusted glass ceiling to go over the tennis courts, which you haven't actually built yet but that will happen at some point further down the line.

Many of these issues could be resolved by getting a project manager who knows what they're doing and is able to say "no, we'll do that extra stuff later, let's get the thing finished properly first".

Yeah, this is pretty accurate. They've foregone prototyping things in favour of building things to final quality one at a time, but that runs into problems when the definition of final quality keeps changing. At least that kind of change has slowed down recently, so it seems like that's relatively settled and they're moving on to build up core mechanics like trading.

 

[TDLink]

I have been really optimistic about Star Citizen in general and one day, even if it's 10 years from now, I hope to be able to play that vision.

However, the gamescom presentation was a disaster. Not just because there were janky bugs all over the place, but because it seems they've made virtually no progress since they showed a nearly-identical demo a year ago. They changed the asteroid a bit but otherwise it's the same station, with the same singular quest giver (apparently only one of two in the planned release). This time they drove a buggy into a ship instead of a Drake Dragonfly... but that's a really minor difference. In fact, the demo last year showed -way- better than this one.

3.0 was originally stated to be out -last- year. That was the plan, publicly. It's been continually delayed since then and it doesn't look like it's releasing soon at all. It can't with some of those bugs that were on display. I would not be surprised at all now if this pushes to 2018.

What annoys me is they've used resources on cool but non-essential tech like the FOIP instead of polishing and releasing this mini-version of their total vision which they've been promising for over a year now.

I don't think Star Citizen is a scam in any way. I do think it's being extremely mismanaged and things are not being prioritized correctly.

I know there's a lot of ardent defenders here and I want to be clear: I'm not hating on this game. I want it to succeed. But, the state of the game as demonstrated is inexcusable.

Just what have they been doing for the last year? The progress is not very apparent. Maybe they've been focusing on the mythical Squadron 42? I would love that, but anything new on that has been MIA for like 2 years so I'm not holding my breath. And even if they have been working on other things apart from 3.0, they really should have been focusing on getting this out the door first since it's the proof of concept of their entire larger vision.

 

[gschmidl]

I don't think Star Citizen is a scam in any way. I do think it's being extremely mismanaged and things are not being prioritized correctly.

...

Just what have they been doing for the last year? The progress is not very apparent. Maybe they've been focusing on the mythical Squadron 42? I would love that, but anything new on that has been MIA for like 2 years so I'm not holding my breath.

Yeah, they really need to finish this. It's the thing I backed for, I don't give a shit about the open universe stuff at all.

 

[UpDownLeftRight]

Yeah, they really need to finish this. It's the thing I backed for, I don't give a shit about the open universe stuff at all.

Lots of people did back for the open universe stuff though so it would be silly to prioritise certain backers over others. Also they still need to have the majority of the mechanics down to finish either anyway.

 

[staticneuron]

Yeah, this is pretty accurate. They've foregone prototyping things in favour of building things to final quality one at a time, but that runs into problems when the definition of final quality keeps changing. At least that kind of change has slowed down recently, so it seems like that's relatively settled and they're moving on to build up core mechanics like trading.

The don't have final quality version of most things. They are working on either version 1 of important features or version 2.

They are working on tools and tech so they can bring us what was promised in a timely manner in the future.

So as looking at what happened with Destiny 1, it is important to get that step over. While it seems that people are now hoping on core, that is really easy to point out yet it is nebulous and undefined by detractors.

What features do you think are not necessary that you feel can be added later without breaking entire game or introducing the massive amount of bugs they had to fix and that included restructuring of how items worked, naming conventions and trees. All due to the fact that it was impossible to know the issues before hand... if the tech didn't exist.

That is what I would like to know. I am curious. Please, those that have their finger on the root of issue, please name us the features you feel are important and those that can be ignored. let us see how many agree.

Just what have they been doing for the last year? The progress is not very apparent.

Well, they basically have shown us every week of every month. They condensed in monthly reports in case you cannot be bothered. But if the confusion is still there let me help you a bit further.

Global Progress watch <- for feature and completion dates (spreadsheet)


Monthly studio reports for 2017:

January
February
March
April
May
June
July

What annoys me is they've used resources on cool but non-essential tech like the FOIP instead of polishing and releasing this mini-version of their total vision which they've been promising for over a year now.

They have been working on the game for a year now as I provided with information above. FOIP tech is made by third party so they didn't waste resources on it.

EDIT: As a side note this is an emblematic problem with thread. People are labeled as "Defenders" as if they are spouting some insane theory while we are just providing information that has been out in the open for quite some time. We have people who will talk about mismanagement, lack of funds, the buggy state of alpha, scope increase, what may or may not happen. But the vast majority of these are either speculation, misinformation, or guesses. The amount of time information has been repeated in this thread and links posted, and open knowledge given has been absurd, yet oddly enough some of the same talking points get brought up ad-nausem. This has been referred to as an echo chamber by some but at that could be simply because the same detractors or the same uniformed posters regurgitate talking points. No one is here to convince you to support the game. All people have tried to do is clear up misinformation. But it is obvious how this is going to play out because of so many that are less interested in discussing but pushing a particular view out as if it is fact.

 

[TDLink]

The don't have final quality version of most things. They are working on either version 1 of important features or version 2.

They are working on tools and tech so they can bring us what was promised in a timely manner in the future.

So as looking at what happened with Destiny 1, it is important to get that step over. While it seems that people are now hoping on core, that is really easy to point out yet it is nebulous and undefined by detractors.

What features do you think are not necessary that you feel can be added later without breaking entire game or introducing the massive amount of bugs they had to fix and that included restructuring of how items worked, naming conventions and trees. All due to the fact that it was impossible to know the issues before hand... if the tech didn't exist.

That is what I would like to know. I am curious. Please, those that have their finger on the root of issue, please name us the features you feel are important and those that can be ignored. let us see how many agree.



Well, they basically have shown us every week of every month. They condensed in monthly reports in case you cannot be bothered. But if the confusion is still there let me help you a bit further.

Global Progress watch <- for feature and completion dates (spreadsheet)


Monthly studio reports for 2017:

January
February
March
April
May
June
July



They have been working on the game for a year now as I provided with information above. FOIP tech is made by third party so they didn't waste resources on it.

Yes I am aware they have -actually- been working on it. But the progress seems to be very slow and not clearly demonstrable.

This demo was extremely close to the demo the year prior. Their progress should be further along. There has been a clear prioritization of aesthetic/cosmetic features over core mechanical and gameplay loop features -- as demonstrated by those detailed updates.

 

[staticneuron]

Yes I am aware they have -actually- been working on it. But the progress seems to be very slow and not clearly demonstrable.

This demo was extremely close to the demo the year prior. Their progress should be further along. There has been a clear prioritization of aesthetic/cosmetic features over core mechanical and gameplay loop features -- as demonstrated by those detailed updates.

Item 2.0 is cosmetic?
Mission givers, branches and subsumption?
Ports, Landing zones truck stops?
Mobiglass enhancement?
Cargo implementation?
Kiosk and market implementation?
Full Persistence?

The sheer volume of things you can do and was demonstrated makes this more than just a little false. That is incredibly false.

Exactly what can you do in the current version of SC that is comparable to what they have shown?

I think this is pretty clear what you are trying to say when you look at the reports and spreadsheet and your take away is that is all cosmetic. They showed a small example, one that they admittedly didn't have subsumption, they landing zone was on a place holder planet. They have had to create content and make sure it was cohesive. they made it so other players can give out missions. Using last years demo to state everything was finished or fully working is disingenuous at best given scale of content in 3.0.

 

[TDLink]

Item 2.0 is cosmetic?
Atmospheric exit and reentry?
Mission givers, branches and subsumption?
Ports, Landing zones truck stops?
Mobiglass enhancement?
Cargo implementation?
Kiosk and market implementation?
Full Persistance?

The sheer volume of things you can do and was demonstrated makes this more than just a little false. That is incredibly false.

Exactly what can you do in the current version of SC that is comparable to what they have shown?

I'm not saying these features are in the current version. I am saying all these features were already demonstrated in the demo last year, except I believe Cargo implementation. You're right, people can not currently log in and play with this stuff in 2.6. But most of this 3.0 content was shown and expected -last year- and they didn't demonstrate they were closer to bringing that playable build to backers.

 

[staticneuron]

I'm not saying these features are in the current version. I am saying all these features were already demonstrated in the demo last year, except I believe Cargo implementation. You're right, people can not currently log in and play with this stuff in 2.6. But most of this 3.0 content was shown and expected -last year- and they didn't demonstrate they were closer to bringing that playable build to backers.

Subsumption was not in there in last presentation and Chris specifically stated that during the presentation. Meaning that was a fixed mission. Item 2.0 was shown off but doesn't mean it was implemented across every ship vehicle or item. Full persistence was not demonstrated in last years nor this years presentation. Mobi wasn't shown at that level. They showed grabby hands but again not across every ship. The thing about this is they have kept use informed of what they were doing content wise. It is in the reports. The "I don't know" what they were working on point of view is countered by looking at reports. They clearly stated they were working on it during presentation, let us know about the setbacks and resolution they had to do and the amount of things that broke and needed to be fixed.

 

[TDLink]

I think this is pretty clear what you are trying to say when you look at the reports and spreadsheet and your take away is that is all cosmetic. They showed a small example, one that they admittedly didn't have subsumption, they landing zone was on a place holder planet. They have had to create content and make sure it was cohesive. they made it so other players can give out missions. Using last years demo to state everything was finished or fully working is disingenuous at best given scale of content in 3.0.

I'm not trying to troll nor do I think it's inaccurate to say they have been focusing on cosmetic and minor features. The majority of those monthly updates focus on the implementation of new environment art, equipment, weapons, ships and/or resdesigns/enhancements of those things.

That stuff is all great for a game that is already out, or even just further in development. But they really need to get the core/basics done first. And they aren't there. It's -very- cart before the horse.

I'm also not trying to say everything in last year's demo was finished. Clearly it wasn't. Clearly it still isn't. That's more my point though... in the year since that demo these features have shown some improvement but very little. And a 3.0 release date is still impossible to pin down despite originally being promised for last year.

Subsumption was not in there in last presentation and Chris specifically stated that during the presentation. Meaning that was a fixed mission. Item 2.0 was shown off but doesn't mean it was implemented across every ship vehicle or item. Full persistence was not demonstrated in last years nor this years presentation. Mobi wasn't shown at that level. They showed grabby hands but again not across every ship. The thing about this is they have kept use informed of what they were doing content wise. It is in the reports. The "I don't know" what they were working on point of view is countered by looking at reports. They clearly stated they were working on it during presentation, let us know about the setbacks and resolution they had to do and the amount of things that broke and needed to be fixed.

The "I don't know" was dramatic hyperbole on my part. My point, again, is that while yes they have been doing things they are minor incremental things and not really addressing the core gameplay.

An easy example of this is that after one year there only being one additional quest NPC apart from Eckhart is a puzzling lack of progress. Yes, there is another... but only one other.

Yes the mobiglass is being enhanced further... but is that really essential to prioritize over getting the core mechanics and gameplay loop up and running? I don't think it is.

 

[iHaunter]

To everyone whining about FOIP, they used a third-party studio.

I do agree that they should've picked one or the either, SC or SQ42 to do first.

But FOIP means nothing and is pretty neat.

 

[staticneuron]

I'm not trying to troll nor do I think it's inaccurate to say they have been focusing on cosmetic and minor features. The majority of those monthly updates focus on the implementation of new environment art, equipment, weapons, ships and/or resdesigns/enhancements of those things.

That stuff is all great for a game that is already out, or even just further in development. But they really need to get the core/basics done first. And they aren't there. It's -very- cart before the horse.

I'm also not trying to say everything in last year's demo was finished. Clearly it wasn't. Clearly it still isn't. That's more my point though... in the year since that demo these features have shown some improvement but very little. And a 3.0 release date is still impossible to pin down despite originally being promised for last year.



The "I don't know" was dramatic hyperbole on my part. My point, again, is that while yes they have been doing things they are minor incremental things and not really addressing the core gameplay.

An easy example of this is that after one year there only being one additional quest NPC apart from Eckhart is a puzzling lack of progress. Yes, there is another... but only one other.

Yes the mobiglass is being enhanced further... but is that really essential to prioritize over getting the core mechanics and gameplay loop up and running? I don't think it is.

Everything I pointed out was core. Eckhart is not the only way you can get missions, you will get them many ways and they also added Ruto. Mobiglass the showed of provided interaction with world, important readouts for environment including atmosphere makeup and density, also helps manages missions (player created or NPC), purchasing items, ship load outs, character load outs, communication and more. If that is not core I don't know what you are referring to when talk about core mechanics. And getting mobiglass up wasn't in detriment to the mission system nor givers. This is just as false as the idea that people who work on ship pipeline effect mission givers or tool development. These features are broken into teams and are worked on separately.

They weren't able to show all the branching missions but they talked about the missions on gamescom floor. The current version 2.6 has like 26 missions max. Because of mission subsumption it is branching and exponentially larger amount due to variations according to Brian Chambers.

here are some links to interviews explaining core gameplay mechanics

https://www.reddit.com/r/starcitize..._from_the_gamescom_showfloor_including_brian/

https://relay.sc/transcript/gamescom-day-2-live-show-notes-erin-chris-roberts


https://relay.sc/transcript/gamescom-2017-gamescom-2017-presentation-summary


At this point it is really seeming like you are judging what has been done based off of scripted demo videos and do not know of the functionality of the items you are currently contesting. For someone claiming to not try to hate on game, you are putting forth some very skewed and illogical points.

 

[lefty1117]

I wonder when the press is going to start getting on them.

 

[~Cross~]

I wonder when the press is going to start getting on them.

Every interview they give out has to have the condition of "when is x coming out" being explicitly blocked off. As far as I know the whole Answer the Call 2017 thing is still on the website when just about everyone that knows about the game has pretty much accepted that its not coming out this year. No one has asked about the release date since early in the year.

It should be obvious by now whether or not its going to come out, but marketing rules everything at CIG.

 

[HowZatOZ]

Every interview they give out has to have the condition of "when is x coming out" being explicitly blocked off. As far as I know the whole Answer the Call 2017 thing is still on the website when just about everyone that knows about the game has pretty much accepted that its not coming out this year. No one has asked about the release date since early in the year.

It should be obvious by now whether or not its going to come out, but marketing rules everything at CIG.

It is understandable from a development point of not wanting to give an exact timeframe, doing so limits scope and it puts pressure on getting something out. That in turn puts the potential of severe bugs up which no one wants to endure and in turn even more pressure.

Despite saying that it is good to communicate with your backers, which CiG are indeed doing well enough. Look I think the demo was decent. It was just a vertical slice and very "Ubisoft" with the comms but it did showcase what to expect in 3.0. The depth was lacking but I feel that if they showed someone doing 20 missions it would have been extra boring, instead showing some mechanics and a bit of "dogfighting" was enough.

Did it showcase where the game is at? Kind of. It felt like from the demo that if 3.0 came out tomorrow all I'd be able to do is talk to that guy to get this crate mission, go to the hangar and fly out to this other planet, land, get crate and load it up. On the way there might(?) be NPC pirates, but those were controlled by players so I'm not sure if there will be or not.

I've noticed now with No Man's Sky, EVE and Elite that demoing a space game is bloody hard. It is so easy to create a demo of systems but to actually make it interesting is the difficult part because these games rely on the player's imagination. Take Elite, I watched early demos of the game and it looked like hot trash for mechanics, yet when I actually got the game I found just flying simply pure bliss and my hook for the game.

In other words, development takes time, dates are going to be broken but I believe they'll deliver something. What that something is we don't know, but 3.0 looks to be adding in some substantial systems to help create better workflow so hopefully that translates to quicker development.

 

[Aselith]

Man, those poor people up there for that Gamescom demo. That was very awkward when it broke.

 

[Cabbagehead]

Man, those poor people up there for that Gamescom demo. That was very awkward when it broke.

For sure...but that's what might happen when you do something live and currently in development. In a traditional situation. You would have a far more polished vertical slice demo to show. But that's not really an option given the nature of the project.

Hey. While the conference certainly didn't went down as expected, I wanted to clarify some things (which seem a bit unclear to some posters):
- the faceware stuff shown by Sean Tracy and the players were indeed done on a regular webcam (laptop or classic logitech/MS branded mid range ones). It works well given the hardware and has no (or nearly no) impact on game performance.
- the planet shown on the gamescom showfloor and during the conference demo is the same and has nearly a really thin atmosphere, hence the flight model not looking as different as some might expect. You'll still feel some changes when you'll fly there, just not as much as if it was on a Earth-like planet for example.
- the rover problem wasn't so much a vehicle issue than a pilot one. The Idris player decided to land on a hill for some reason (when there was flat ground nearby) and stayed there instead of taking off and landing again at a different position. The rover pilot should have never tried to force their way onto the ramp when it would have never worked at this angle. Shame.

And please, while it wasn't as bad as last december's livestream, it didn't went well (mainly due to the crash). That said, no need to go into the usual shitposting either. There's legit criticism to give without lying and following dumb arguments made by a certain person out there.

Thanks for the insight. Hope the CIG community/marketing facing folks communicates this soon to the backers. Lots of misconceptions out there.

 

[Aselith]

For sure...but that's what might happen when you do something live and currently in development. In a traditional situation. You would have a far more polished vertical slice demo to show. But that's not really an option given the nature of the project.

Of course but we're still allowed to feel bad for people stuck in an awkward moment.

 

[RadioactiveLobster]

So perhaps this has been answered before but when the demo broke and they had to restart it from the beginning, why did they have to go through the comms call to the other person again?

That was supposedly just a test of the feature to another player. If they were powering through that part of the demo to get back to where the game crashed, why re do that call?

If it's another person flying that ship for you to meet up on, there is no need to redo the Mobiglass call. They know the game crashed, they know where to meet you. There is no reason to re do the call with the shitty scripted voice chat lines unless the entire thing was scripted in such a way that it HAD to happen in that order for other things to work properly which kinda means the demo was way more scripted than they made it out to be.

 

[Aselith]

So perhaps this has been answered before but when the demo broke and they had to restart it from the beginning, why did they have to go through the comms call to the other person again?

That was supposedly just a test of the feature to another player. If they were powering through that part of the demo to get back to where the game crashed, why re do that call?

If it's another person flying that ship for you to meet up on, there is no need to redo the Mobiglass call. They know the game crashed, they know where to meet you. There is no reason to re do the call with the shitty scripted voice chat lines unless the entire thing was scripted in such a way that it HAD to happen in that order for other things to work properly which kinda means the demo was way more scripted than they made it out to be.

They truncated a lot of it but often you have a predefined path so that you know things aren't going to fuck up. They were probably worried about it breaking again if they skipped too much.

 

[masterkajo]

...
Just what have they been doing for the last year? The progress is not very apparent. Maybe they've been focusing on the mythical Squadron 42? I would love that, but anything new on that has been MIA for like 2 years so I'm not holding my breath. And even if they have been working on other things apart from 3.0, they really should have been focusing on getting this out the door first since it's the proof of concept of their entire larger vision.

I know that it really seems like almost nothing has changed. But working in software engineering myself I can see that they made a lot of progress, mainly because it was working less perfectly.
The thing is, for last year they "cheated" a lot and build something to work just for this one presentation. Think of it like they build a nice house front which looks cool when watching it from the front (our view) but wouldn't be thicker that a few inches when looked at from the side. What they did during the last year, was bascially building that building now including a cellar and everyting. From the front it looks almost the same, maybe less finished even, while in reality it is a house (allthough not yet totally finished).

 

[Cabbagehead]

Of course but we're still allowed to feel bad for people stuck in an awkward moment.

They knew the risk. But yeah it was awkward.

 

[Mister_Bubbles]

What disappoints me is that this has been the way of Star Citizen streams since Day 1. The fact that by now RSI haven't either a) found a way to get their shit together in time for presentations or b) accepted it isn't within their scope to pull off an effective live stream, is crazy to me.

They should stick to what they're good at - pre-constructed videos and cinematics - scale back the scope of their convention appearances and let the players just get their hands on the game at the new build releases, because whatever benefit it is they think they're getting from having a reputation for continuously janky, cringeworthy live demos, I don't think it's worth it.

 

[staticneuron]

What disappoints me is that this has been the way of Star Citizen streams since Day 1. The fact that by now RSI haven't either a) found a way to get their shit together in time for presentations or b) accepted it isn't within their scope to pull off an effective live stream, is crazy to me.

They should stick to what they're good at - pre-constructed videos and cinematics - scale back the scope of their convention appearances and let the players just get their hands on the game at the new build releases, because whatever benefit it is they think they're getting from having a reputation for continuously janky, cringeworthy live demos, I don't think it's worth it.

What alot of backers are seeing is representative of what they can get. WIP. If CiG went the Ubisoft route and posted target renders they would get skewered for not meeting expectations and then they would get attacked again for wasting money on that presentation. If they had a stable version of 3.0 it would be in evocati or PTU. And we wouldn't need to see a canned presentation.

The demonstration is to show WIP not to be untruthful. People seem to want it both ways though and that is impossible. But when companies show CG cutscenes or target renders they catch some flack. As a backer I prefer seeing what they have down the pipe that is realistically being worked on instead of getting footage of something that may not ever be achieved.

 

[Cabbagehead]

What disappoints me is that this has been the way of Star Citizen streams since Day 1. The fact that by now RSI haven't either a) found a way to get their shit together in time for presentations or b) accepted it isn't within their scope to pull off an effective live stream, is crazy to me.

The live stream was fine (Other then some cringe banter). Furthermore the possibility of there being issues with the demo or it being janky, is common sense. As that's due to it being a unfinished product, you know WIP. Doesn't really matter how many run through's of the build you do, your not going to find all the potential bugs that could pop up and as CR stated. The crashes and bugs that they faced were new one's but expected and he prefaced that before the event even started. Still you can't account for everything playing things live.

Plus it's not like any other studio is going to put their balls out like that, yet that's how CIG does things to not sugarcoat shit . Also a majority of the community/backers understand the state of the current game and love the effort and progress on display. I for one would hate if they didn't do live and switch to pre-recorded shit. The expectations and misinformation out there is already bad enough. I mean if you like all the pre-rendered, highly choreographed demos you get at E3 or Gamescom. Then maybe sticking to Ubisoft and other traditional studio's is what you really want since that experience is all about putting their products in the most positive light. Even though it's tailored in a certain way on purpose and usually doesn't represent the finally product much at all. Thus creating a false sense of scope or gameplay or graphical quality. So yes there's benefits to them doing live demos, warts and all, it makes it clear that the work they've been doing is real progress, played in real-time and it's not fluff set pieces for the sake of it.

None of the location's (from what i saw) in that demo was pre-made just for that showcase like with the Homestead demo.

 

[Zambayoshi]

The demo made me think of this, but replace Homer with a smiling Chris Roberts.

Chris is more interested in having air horns that play La Cucaracha than having a basic car that works properly.

 

[Cabbagehead]

snip

An you're more interested in trolling and shit posting in this thread then worrying about living your life and posting in threads that you actual care about.

 

[HowZatOZ]

An you're more interested in trolling and shit posting in this thread then worrying about living your life and posting in threads that you actual care about.

Hah wow you actually aren't wrong, his post history is something.

 

[Starbuck2907]

In a world where bullshots (killzone, watch dogs) are common at press events, I prefer what they did warts and all.

 

[Cabbagehead]

Hah wow you actually aren't wrong, his post history is something.

Yeah i know. These are the type of folks i'm talking about.

 

[Mister_Bubbles]

What alot of backers are seeing is representative of what they can get. WIP. If CiG went the Ubisoft route and posted target renders they would get skewered for not meeting expectations and then they would get attacked again for wasting money on that presentation. If they had a stable version of 3.0 it would be in evocati or PTU. And we wouldn't need to see a canned presentation.

The demonstration is to show WIP not to be untruthful. People seem to want it both ways though and that is impossible. But when companies show CG cutscenes or target renders they catch some flack. As a backer I prefer seeing what they have down the pipe that is realistically being worked on instead of getting footage of something that may not ever be achieved.

Sure, but CIG have a choice of when to show these 'work in progress' builds. When you get right down to it, the reason for these presentations is to promote the game (in this particular instance, aspects of the game that are supposed to be given to players shortly). If the build is not in a state where they can even reliably show stable gameplay, and are having to patch and update live on the show floor, then it's clearly not ready and they shouldn't be doing promotional events with it.

There are plenty of ways to follow the game and see what is in the pipeline - around the verse, the monthly report videos, etc. Star Citizen is the most open game development process in history I think it's fair to say, but if CIG are in a position where they can't even put together a professional demo for a major games convention I think they need to accept that in their marketing strategy and focus on the pre-made documentary videos and in-game cinematic vids that they do so well.

 

[Spuck-uk]

People say that, but there's only so much you can do with art + graphics without have 10 FPS the entire time.

If you want a game with giant capital ship battles and 100 ships on a screen, you can't have 20k ultrasampled textures/ultra flashy blinding explosions.

You can only do so much without breaking the FPS bank. I think they're doing a great job.

On of the bad design decisions is they seem to be trying to avoid 'faking' anything graphically, when that's very often the best way to get good results and keep framerate reasonable.

 

[Spuck-uk]

In a world where bullshots (killzone, watch dogs) are common at press events, I prefer what they did warts and all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0ODCGHPbrU

This was shown multiple times at their presentation, and is entirely pre-rendered. (You can tell, because it isnt 7 frames per second huehue)

 

[Cabbagehead]

When you get right down to it, the reason for these presentations is to promote the game
.

If this was the only truth. Then it wouldn't be a backer only presentation in person.

They stream live for the rest that can't get tickets or travel to these events. It's not just because their trying to promote the game. They did that just fine on the show room floor at Gamescom.

they can't even put together a professional demo for a major games convention

It wasn't FOR the major convention at all. The CIG event is separate from Games-com space at a Threatre and it's always been for the backers, backers that paid to be in on the open development side of things, so CIG doesn't feel the need to do "professional demo's" and just do live demo's. I mean this isn't a E3 press conference and they aren't owned by a publisher. Plus they showed this demo in their own private booth for the media at Gamescom but other then that. It's not really all about looking polished at this stage, while they continue to work on it. So really there's no NEED to do anything related to sticking to or accepting something you perceive to be an out and out problem. When it's the route they think suits the game in it's current state.

Plus like any demo showcase they do many, many run through's but since it's apart of a live branch. Something that is scheduled to get released soon. Meaning a lot of bugs and blockers are still underneath the surface and it would be a waste of time to cobble something else together to present something "clean". That doesn't represent the truth of the product like so many other studio's like doing to sell a future IP that won't be seen for years. This project is not about that.

 

[Megalo]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0ODCGHPbrU

This was shown multiple times at their presentation, and is entirely pre-rendered. (You can tell, because it isnt 7 frames per second huehue)

You sure are trying hard.

Game runs fine when it doesn't have to deal with multiplayer, it's old news.
Plus this trailer really is nothing fancy, so I don't know what's your point.

 

[Spuck-uk]

You sure are trying hard.

Game runs fine when it doesn't have to deal with multiplayer, it's old news.
Plus this trailer really is nothing fancy, so I don't know what's your point.

It's really no effort at all, tonnes of fail from Gamescon

 

[anothertech]

That gamescom showing was pretty bad. Not sure what the actual state of the game is after that.

 

[CSJ]

.... it would be a waste of time to cobble something else together to present something "clean". That doesn't represent the truth of the product like so many other studio's like doing to sell a future IP that won't be seen for years. This project is not about that.

It's not about the truth here.
Yes, a lot of devs showcase a fake product but this is different, showing a run where it doesn't crash to avoid wasting peoples time, coming off as unprofessional and tardy vs showing what your current product CAN DO when it doesn't crash would be better. I mean we're all under the assumption retail won't crash so often right? There's no bending of the truth.

Every time they do demos it's probably the worst I've ever seen in a decade, audio issues, feedback, comms issues between the demonstration team and chris himself; list goes on.

I've actually been part of demonstrating a few games live, but they were classed as final products with ongoing updates; it's very much the same. Spend a few days running through a plan, repeating it so everyone is on the same page, aggressors play act to make it look cool and not end the demo in a few seconds killing the main players and ending the demonstration and then piss yourself when you're playing it to a live world audience. The comms chatter is just to fill the air, while nothing as cringy as this or ubisoft demo's you've got to keep it clean and professional.

Other times you record one so you show exactly what you want, of the actual product at the time when it has ongoing and intermittent issues.

 

[HowZatOZ]

Yeah i know. These are the type of folks i'm talking about.

Oh those people I definitely support just ignoring outright, they add nothing to a proper discussion and simply seek to troll. What I don't want is ignoring true criticism, that needs to be properly encouraged, with facts backing up said criticism if possible.

 

[Megalo]

It's really no effort at all, tonnes of fail from Gamescon

What a joy that must be for you

 

[Zambayoshi]

Oh those people I definitely support just ignoring outright, they add nothing to a proper discussion and simply seek to troll. What I don't want is ignoring true criticism, that needs to be properly encouraged, with facts backing up said criticism if possible.

I made a tongue-in-cheek comment, the essence of which was that Chris cares more for bells and whistles than a properly functioning game.

Liquid physics, mobiglas and face over IP... or allowing a rover to drive up a ramp without falling apart... (and Chris referred to driving up that ramp as "pushing it").

 

[Alexander DeLarge]

I wonder how much they're saving for CitizenCon. I really do hope this is the weakest showing of the game they ever do because showing the same locations (that were supposed to be released by the end of 2016) wasn't a good idea.

 

[elyetis]

I wonder how much they're saving for CitizenCon. I really do hope this is the weakest showing of the game they ever do because showing the same locations (that were supposed to be released by the end of 2016) wasn't a good idea.

I liked that, it's actually what I asked for there :

TBH I expect people to be more critical of this showing considering their shenanigans last year regarding the fabled S42 vertical slice that never was. Healthy skepticism is warranted and I thing CiG should definitely feel heat if they are under-delivering again with the Gamescom presentation being another shoddy 3.0 demo.

I wouldn't see under-delivering at Gamescom a bad thing per say.
I don't think showing something they might be unable to get into our hand by Gamescom 2018 would be better. "Don't promise the moon..." and all that, well in CiG case it would be "don't promise a planet if you can only deliver a moon". ( yeah I know using the word promise might trigger some people )

Imho they made their bed when they decided against the SQ42 vertical slice last year, now they should stay true to the idea and avoid those "faked"/vertical slice presentation for Star Citizen too. Just show where they are at, not where they hope to be at some unknow time in the future.

But somehow it was unreasonable for me to say that at the time. But to my absolute surprise ( not ) it wasn't anymore once that's what CiG actually did.

 

[UpDownLeftRight]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0ODCGHPbrU

This was shown multiple times at their presentation, and is entirely pre-rendered. (You can tell, because it isnt 7 frames per second huehue)

Holy shit they released a CGI trailer! Fucking sue them, that's illegal in this industry.

Spoiler

Your shitposting was boring before but it's growing real tiresome.