Go to robertsspaceindustries.com create an account and download the client. It is about 28GB and ends March 20th.
Be prepared as it is an alpha-ass Alpha.
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Star Citizen's Crowdfunding reaches $110 Million
- Thread starter Dictator93
- Start date
Go to robertsspaceindustries.com create an account and download the client. It is about 28GB and ends March 20th.
Be prepared as it is an alpha-ass Alpha.
He doesn't say or imply it's buggier than it should be. He kind says it grew to be a larger project than he wanted to be a part of, which I get some folks aren't comfortable on a team that size I think a lot of old school PC devs especially feel that way, but that doesn't mean the game is a disaster or anything.
JSoup
Banned
Thanks, downloading now.
Considering I can fly a ship, engage in combat and complete objectives in the current build, while being immersed in one of the more if not most impressive engines I have ever seen to date that pushes hardware and graphics for the industry... I would hope that shows that it's definitely not a scam or vaporware. Not to mention that the team that is working on the game is active in keeping its supporters and citizens updated on what is going on as something very very positive.
-------
Now back to the point. Congrats SC!!!
Dash Kappei
Not actually that important
ThoseDeafMutes
Member
I wouldn't even be interested without single player.
KyanMehwulfe
Member
just curious, does the community have any financial oversight? e.g. independently audited income statements. obviously by no means required nor standard for crowdfunding, but this project ain't exactly standard either -- it's really setting new standards (both managerial but also financial) for crowdfunding. at a certain point, there may be room for initiative on transparency.
Of course not.
Zambayoshi
Member
Chris Roberts had a dream. A dream to create the best damn space sim ever made. It would be the ultimate game to end all games and contain every possible gameplay element, story beat, sci-fi actor and jpg ship known to man.
But seriously, I think there is more than a little Molyneux in Chris Roberts. He is full of ideas and possibilities, but tends to get stuck on detail instead of managing the bigger picture. This is why you've got some impressive tech and art out there for SC but the bigger picture is a little...empty (at least for now).
To directly answer your question, there are people who have been asking for a spiritual successor to Wing Commander for a while. SQ42 was (is) intended to be that.
At the end of the day there is nothing to stop Chris from taking whatever money remains and running. In terms of transparency though, at least Foundry 42 files accounts with Companies House in the UK. Not sure about any US-based company filing requirements.
https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/08703814/filing-history
The only thing Star Citizen has over No Man's Sky is the quality of the five objects they are currently able to render in Arena Commander. As for the scope, you don't get points for trying and wasting people's money in the process. It wasn't that hard for Club Penguin to accomplish, and as for No Man's Sky their persistent universe is everything Chris Roberts has "set out" to achieve minus the player count in a single instance. The scope argument really needs to stop being used as a crutch. World of Warcraft and Tera accomplished their goal of a persistent universe after four years in development. Why after four years CIG can't get out of alpha is beyond me. I don't mean to be overly cynical, but when major company squanders funds that were crowd sourced from the public then we have a problem. If it was from major investors, etc. then it would be a little different.
And just like that you reduce an important factor to nothing.
As for Club Penguin, I don't believe they were trying to accomplish a space simulator with multiple genres in it and a layered physics engine to hold the world together (yes this is hard and another important point).
The fact that NMS is randomly generated means it simply cannot compare directly to Star Citizen and is a strike against the persistent universe it offers. You won't say Daggerfall has comparable (or better) scope to something like Skyrim or Oblivion now would you, just because Daggerfall has a much larger world.
KyanMehwulfe
Member
just saw they have though in the case of failure.
(from the tos) "In the unlikely event that RSI is not able to deliver the Game and/or the pledge items, RSI agrees to post an audited cost accounting on the Website to fully explain the use of the amounts paid for Pledge Item Cost and the Game Cost."
which i would think is pretty nice though i dunno how standard that is for crowdsourcing which is why i'm curious.
I'm just worried about the sustainability of the development.
I can't help but to wonder how the $110,000,000 goes finishing the game. A good chunk of that goes to SQ42, remember. What if his MMO vision requires $200,000,000? Even the whaliest of whales will draw a line somewhere.
I backed for Squadron 42, which I'm sure to receive.
You must be a young chap.
It couldn't have sold so hard, to old school Wing Commander fans, without the promise of a campaign.
Well they stopped expanding the games scope at 65 million so I guess yeah, the game costing 300% of their expected budget is technically a risk.
I'm sorry, but that is an awfully silly thing to define a game by. There is much more to Star Citizen and No Man's Sky then the player count for a single instance. The point being that with Club Penguin is that with terms of networking they set out with what they were able to achieve. They even have an online economy where you sell clothes, etc. Arena Commander can't even pull off a single instance of matchmaking without being plagued by various connection issues. And this is a game that has been in development for 4 years, at the very least they should have that ironed out by now. Again, both NMS and SC feature procedural generation, economy & career choices. I fail to see the false comparison.
Admittedly I am not familiar with Daggerfall so I can't really say which has more scope, etc. I have only played Skyrim.
Honestly though I really would like to see Star Citizen succeed, not only so I can enjoy my crow dinner. But I would hate to see the project fall through.
A typical game with big scope takes approx 4 years to get made, an MMO takes longer. Usually the gameplay gets revealed when they are close to alpha state and from there on it's a year or two long journey to release, that's why it doesn't look like it takes a lot of time.
Star Citizen is a an MMO with big scope that people have known about since before the development even started. As such a lot of people think the developers are doing fuck all when this is all par for the course. The game has been in public eye since the start, ofcourse it will look like it's been in development forever.
It's right there in the first page, if you mean a breakdown of where they get their finances.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=198269225&postcount=41
No more silly than your reductionist argument really.
Star Citizen is a an MMO with big scope that people have known about since before the development even started. As such a lot of people think the developers are doing fuck all when this is all par for the course. The game has been in public eye since the start, ofcourse it will look like it's been in development forever.
It's right there in the first page, if you mean a breakdown of where they get their finances.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=198269225&postcount=41
No more silly than your reductionist argument really.
Dubbedinenglish
Banned
Honestly actual concern like this constantly gets washed behind that "vaporware" concern trolling. When it comes to the core gameplay they seem to lack common sense in basic design. Only after two years of using xml values to govern ship movement now they are using physics based through 3rd order control. Now though they are running into issues with the fact they are using aesthetically designed ships in a simulated world. They are having to defeat the physics to make the ships fly.
Also as you said the basic ship to ship combat is still very lacking and more resembling a shooter than a space sim. Why they cannot seem to devote the same resources to core gameplay as they do for technical systems is beyond me. Even the open wound of controller balance is still not being addressed logically where Robert's delusional mantra of "mouse for aiming and stick for flying" keeps the game in a continuous state of imbalance. There are plenty of actual red flags with how they are developing the game than the tired vaporware and scam complaints.
So its reductionist because they can't figure out their networking, among other issues? okay.gif
And again, I will 100% eat crow if I end up being wrong. It interesting was dialogue but I need some sleep.
JSoup
Banned
Ok, SO, game dumped me into some drab city, told me nothing and chugged harder than any game has for me since the 90s. And I still have no idea what this game is supposed to be about doing.
:/
Dubbedinenglish
Banned
Select universe, you are in the social area.
Don't think they will. This thing has been over hyped as fuck.
FreezerGeezer
Member
That is definitely a lot of money, great to see! Amazing to see the progress they have made the last 6 months, had some really enjoyable play sessions with friends already in the very limited alpha modules available.
I think the end result will be incredible but I doubt it will be able to live up to full hype. Some of it just seems impossible.
I think the end result will be incredible but I doubt it will be able to live up to full hype. Some of it just seems impossible.
DealWithIt
Member
This is a crazy amount of backers and a crazy amount of money. I hope it goes well because I'd like to buy and play the game someday.
If a thing like this tanks the lawsuits would be insane. Lots of people fighting over a little money. I wonder how much they've dumped into tangible assets? 110M is enough to fund a sizable company for a long time.
Right now the game is curved out at about $84/backer. I wonder how they are handling that amount of consumer investment and pressure?
If a thing like this tanks the lawsuits would be insane. Lots of people fighting over a little money. I wonder how much they've dumped into tangible assets? 110M is enough to fund a sizable company for a long time.
Right now the game is curved out at about $84/backer. I wonder how they are handling that amount of consumer investment and pressure?
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
This game also is a lot more complex, (that's not even counting the assets which are WAY higher quality than the assets of WoW and Tera), game development is not linear enough that we can say "x game took x amount of time to make, why is y taking so long" while absolutely ignoring what each game is doing on a technical level.
Wow what a nonsense.
The MAIN reason why Poland are go to location for satellite offices for many IT companies is because of almost 4 times lower salary requirement.
I also dont get whole CDPR vs CIG comparison. Completely different ways of handling development and completely different games.
---read thread further--
Omfg comparisons to NMS. What the hell? Why is every public SC thread such a mess? ;/
BudokaiMR2
Member
Well, until they actually succeed with any actual meaningful content I don't think we can really praise what basically amount to bullet points. Star Citizen really isn't doing much on a technical level at this point, outside of the incredible level of detail in the assets.
In my opinion, Star Citizen really needed to take a more linear approach to their content creation. Trying to create so many different types of gameplay simultaneously and hoping they all manage to fit together in a nice little package is going to bite them in the ass later.
It just is unless they really pull off a miracle.
It's one reason I am a lot more confident in Elite Dangerous in the long term. In a lot of ways they are going to end at a very similar point as far as content is concerned, however the way Elite Dangerous handles their development in a more incremental way gives me a lot more confidence in their ability to eventually create a nice complete package. I just hope they manage to actually get the flight model squared away before Squadron 42 hits.
I honestly don't know what to think of with NMS. I hope it turns out great, but am not as convinced as some people either way.
What the hell? Are You serious?
64bit coordinate system and local physics have never been done before.
Full motion animations with procedural blending that are not faked in FPP were never done before.
The ships are constructed in such a way that was never done before too.
---
They wont be in the similar point in the future. And going by the CIG updates, we'll get full planetary exploration before Elite, which is actually utterly surprising.
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
As the post above me clarifies there's many things this game is doing that many games have never attempted. There's nothing out of the ordinary in terms of how they're actually creating the game features. Features don't typically get worked on and polished one at a time, especially not with such huge teams. If Rockstar was just as open about the development of GTAV people years ago would've likely been saying the exact same things about it's development and that it'd never get done because of what they perceive as very slow development times due to inexperience/ignorance about game development.
LookAtMeGo
Member
Game looks fantastic. Thats a lot of monies. Hopefully I have a PC that can run it good by the time it comes out.
I don't want to get into the whole "they'll finish it" "no they won't" "feature creep" etc. debate, because I don't know anything about that.
This however? This is patently wrong. Star Citizen is doing things with scale, physical simulation (gameplay-relevant physical simulation), modular destruction etc. that no other game is attempting. On top of the incredible level of detail in the assets.
Iztok Mravlja
Banned
This was my experience also, and I'm looking forward to this game.
They aren't doing themselves any favours with this public alpha access, the game obviously has a long way to go.
I hope it turns out great, especially with VR.
CyberPunked
Member
There's too many people in this thread having opinions on things they blatantly know nothing about .
https://youtu.be/-yLTm8DZ8s4
Guys look ! It's obviously a vaporware !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BHPOZ2-rDk
I really wish people would inform themselves before posting what they consider facts.
Star Citizen really shows why developers prefer not to be open about their game's development. The ""mass"" does not understand at all how game development works and why it's not just a smooth sailing from start to end.
I guess we'll just have to bare with these kind of comments until it reaches 1.0. And then i'm sure people will still make a fuss about how SC is not the perfect ultimate game they imagined in their head.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BHPOZ2-rDk
I really wish people would inform themselves before posting what they consider facts.
Star Citizen really shows why developers prefer not to be open about their game's development. The ""mass"" does not understand at all how game development works and why it's not just a smooth sailing from start to end.
I guess we'll just have to bare with these kind of comments until it reaches 1.0. And then i'm sure people will still make a fuss about how SC is not the perfect ultimate game they imagined in their head.
Eolz
Member
Yep.
Seriously don't know how those posters got to such misinformation.
Not comparable to classical MMOs, nor No Man Sky.
Bananajama
Banned
I backed it for $20 at kickstarter
Delayed my proper new PC until it launched
Ahhhhh so looong
Delayed my proper new PC until it launched
Ahhhhh so looong
Dictator93
Member
Yeah!
I am happy to see this thread has had lots of people chiming in to help the curious wrap their heads around what SC is currently, and what it plans to be.
SQ42 seems to be a good place to jump in with a new pc / new components. Its time table is more static and will have easily definable requirements. Although, I am under the impression the game will only get heavier between now and then.
That article points out SC alpha's current state and what people may enjoy about it. A good link.
It's reductionist because you claimed NMS is essentially doing what SC is doing minus the things that makes SC unique.
That's sort of like claiming every shooter is same because you shoot.
foxuzamaki
Doesn't read OPs, especially not his own
Jesus Christ
DerZuhälter
Member
It's great that we getting a big bold game and all that, and I really hope Star Citizen turns out as the best thing since sliced breat, but I still think the entire kickstarter model with a huge amount of strechgoals is a terrible way to make games.
I pray to god that we keep as many publisher interested in developing AAA games as possible.
I pray to god that we keep as many publisher interested in developing AAA games as possible.
hobblygobbly
Member
What you say is true but just want to point out that EVE has a 64 bit coordinate system as well.
Nonetheless, CIG's success with having a local physics grid inside the ship itself is an achievement and hasn't been done to my knowledge before. They definitely have to solve technical hurdles when attempting something new that hasn't been done before, like other games have had to for its own hurdles. EVE for example had to solve many issues that hasn't been done by anyone else because they're the only ones attempting what they do and only they can solve it such as handling the size of battles EVE can create, even before it hits the time dilation system, it's still handling immense numbers and calculations for the mechanics at play that no other game has ever done before. That and having a single persistent game of its size where everyone is in the same shard was a technical achievement and still is the only game that does it to that scale.
SC is much in the same way I agree with different issues of their own that must be solved, which takes a lot of resources to do. Personally my only complaint I've had with SC ever is that core elements just don't feel nailed down, at the current state I still feel space flight/combat is sub par which should in my opinion be one of the things that is iterated the most on and proven to be fun, the current FPS system is another example of this, the shooting/FPS is not any good in comparison to many other games that do shooting, I feel they're doing so much that nothing seems to be iterated to the point that it's at a good point. SQ42 is due out this year and this is still unresolved, for a game about spaceships, the spaceship flight/combat is not there. Only gripe I've had really and want to see it resolved. Dog fighting in space just doesn't feel like it should be as an example of what I mean.
There's no way. I don't care what they've said, there's no way the full campaign is released in 2016.
Doesn't Elite already have planetary landing and exploration ?
Also what do you mean when you say ships are constructed differently? That they are modular and as such can be partially destroyed ?
Honestly Elite lacks the ship/crew aspect and I don't know if it will have any foot combat, these two are what makes Star Citizen so much more appealing to me.
Also their coders are godlike
Bubba_Sparks
Member
LOL! I wonder how many people who still post here were old enough to remember the hype behind Brute Force? Remember the Halo: Combat Evolved inspired menus? Man, what a throwback lol!
EDIT: Damn, Brute Force is 13 YEARS old!
ZombieSupaStar
Member
Hope it works out but man this is like Feature Creep: The Game.
I will have to feed this game a high end i7, high speed DDR4 memory and a souped up HBM2 powered GPU.
Also, people need to experience the SC universe with a pal/buddy as it adds to the amazing experience even more.
As it currently stands even the large Elite ships are basically a cockpit even if they're designed for human dimensions. The larger ships in Star Citizen are fully traversable by a human being.
In regard to destruction, the ships in SC have more fully realised physical damage models, where hull damage exposes the interior structure of the ship and some ships have parts that can be shot off.
AFAIK there are plans in elite to add first person modes eventually, but I'll suspect it will be modal, just like their planetary exploration.