Star Citizen passes 141 million dollar mark...

141 million dollars!!!!

What the heck is the hold up?

What are they doing with all that money?

And why don't I have something worth playing?

with that kind of money they could have designed a toilet seat for NASA by now

They just finished 4 years of development (kickstarter ended Nov2012). A normal AAA game takes 4 years to develop and a normal MMO takes about 6 years. So they have 2 more years to deliver before you should be worried.

3.0 is supposed to release in the next few months. That will be a full system with planetside landing on 5 planets and 7 stations plus 30+ points of interest. That will be the first time the game will be "playable" in any form close to the final game IMO.

There comes a point where more money has diminished effect. It's not a linear relationship

I didn't get on board this one, because I had been burned too many times before.

I hope SC will be great. But, from the amount of money that has been dumped into it and the relative lack of apparent progress, I can't honestly conceive how it will not be somewhere between a bit of a letdown and a massive disappointment.

But I bet Chris Roberts has a nice jet.

I dont think he has a jet. But he did buy a multi million dollar house!

Personally, I think there has been a tremendous amount of progress and the state of the game in alpha version 2.6 is very enjoyable. CIG has accomplished some amazing things. Yes, the dream is big and still has a long way to go, but if they realize a quarter of what they are setting out to do, the end product will still be revolutionary in my opinion. You can jump in with a starter ship package for as little as $30. Its a small investment to explore an already impressive universe. I was a skeptic until build 2.0 was released. Since then, each successive build has wowed me.

I just don't see this project as a giant scam. The proof is already there to see that this game is headed toward greatness.

Just my .02.

I too have high hopes for this one. Admittedly, I have invested a bit more than one might consider healthy, but I will no longer buy anything else till I see marked progress. I also have not really dived much into 2.6, though noticed the Space Marine module is now up. I ventured once into it, shooting my own team because they were not wearing the same armor as I selected......bad mistake. I also noticed the change of the hangar array and seems that needs some work still, as I cannot find but only a few of my fleet available as an option to place in that selected hangar.

So, I too sincerely hope and think this will indeed be a serious game changer for the genre. My hope is they can stay focused on what is currently out and refine it versus developing additional systems to explore or pillage.

I thought I bought into an E:D beater,not a damn FPS. In my opinion they should have given us the space sim part first then done the rest. I have zero interest in a FPS. I mean I may not have read the road map for this game,maybe the FPS part was always planned,I'm just getting impatient,I want to play this thing before I end up in a nursing home...

LMAO! Too funny Chucky! I think they are dabbling all over the place to make it a one stop place to go to fulfill too many genre's. Great idea and concept, but losing focus on polishing what's already out.

Interesting, I haven't heard that there was much to explore...but I haven't checked on its progress for some time now I guess.

I hope your faith is justified. If it turns out to be anything like he hoped, I'll happily sign onboard at some point.

I can't say if the approach to development is the most efficient, but I don't think focusing on space flight and leaving the FPS component out initially would have been feasible. THE FPS part of the game is so critical and it is something that really sets SC apart from the rest of the herd.

In SC, you meet with other players at a starport. Board a multi-crew vessel together and work as a team in piloting the ship to a destination. You may stop someplace in space and EVA, or you may land on a planet and exit the craft in a rover, or assault a target on foot. The possibilities are virtually limitless and in my opinion, it is coming together beautifully, its just taking a lot longer than CIG first anticipated and there have been some hiccups along the way. However, now, with all the funds they have raised and an extremely talented team of over 300 developers in multinational offices, I think they have reached a good rhythm.

Stryker...in the hangers now, you have to find a node that can load the right class of ship. So if you are attempting to load a class 4 ship, like a Constellation, from a class 3 node, the class 4 ship won't show up in your list. Check that out...it may be the reason why you're not seeing some of your ships.

I agree. The FPS part IS the game. Its about the people in the ships not the ships. If they only focuses on the space combat part it wouldnt have been successful IMO. People dont just want a ship game. There are plenty of those. They want a game where you are the person in the ship.

I did indeed try that, as it was similar when the setup was done via the web page. I've got a few very large ships and even tried the industrial hangar, but only saw smaller ships available. I think I tried three of the four last time I updated and checked out Space Marines. I will give it a whirl this weekend to see if I can pull up the larger vessels. I sorta liked the old way better, because I could then see what exactly I could fit in each hangar. However, I am certain the new way provides better interactivity with the servers and prevents you from having to log out to change your set up.

Thanks for the info Grunt. I'll post if I cannot find my larger vessels.

Agree with your overall assessment, but disagree with the methodology of how they are implementing. I just think it should have been released as a mostly complete stand alone module, then integrate new stuff later. I fear they spread themselves too thinly and not fully flush out the existing issues before incorporating newer stuff. I personally would like the option to explore in a single player capacity if desired, or have a group effort in conquering or being conquered in MMO style.

I'm enjoying playing the Alpha builds and I'm looking forward to what's next. I'm really looking forward to 3.0 where the patcher gets updated so I don't have to download the entire game everytime. Slow connection and a data cap are the only thing available in my area. Almost every time I log into Crusader, I get to help someone out by doing a rescue mission or playing taxi or just showing them around the starfarer wrecks. It's different users from session to session, so it rarely turns out the same. Just started purposely building a crimestat, so I'm still having fun with it.

I honestly signed up for Squadron 42, not the sandbox universe. I want the spirital heir to Wing Commander.

It is coming out first (hopefully this year). They are incredibly tight lipped about it though. They have almost all the assets done and the missions done they are mostly waiting on engine fixes and an AI that isnt dirt stupid.

I think at $120 million they stopped making the game and started trying to build real spaceships.

+1000000

They've obviously got the talent to make the game beautiful; now we need to see if they can deliver fun.

What they have is already fun but it's got technical flaws that make it unplayable except for the really dedicated.

Once they get trackir back online and get their new netcode fixed and 3.0 full system online it might be worth playing.

I think I read that trackir support is back in the next patch (2.6.2)

Does SC still have the "Interactive Mode" ship control scheme available?

They stated that they think they found a work around for why they took it out but not that they would do anything to re implement it. (afaik)

This is probably the quote you are thinking of.



That is to say they have it working but someone else clarified to say that if they cant get the helmet to move with the head there is no point since a lot of the helmets have very tight visions. So they may or may not include it in 2.6.2.

They took it out initially because people were using the 6dof to clip their head through the helmets and or ships in order to get an unfair advantage. So unless they fix the helmet moving bug I dont see them putting it back in but I'd love to be wrong on that.

Ah, thats a bummer and yes, that was the quote I had seen.

I remember thinking as they had used the words "Hopefully this isn't too difficult to fix and I'll try and prod the right people" that essentially it would be a fairly straight forward fix, but I fear you may be correct...nothing is ever as straight forward as it may sound, especially in game development!

Yeah, I feel the same as others here and would have like to see a lot more emphasis on making the new Wing Commander first and less of that monster feature creep of trying to do everything (including passengers mini bar mini games and other questionable features).

And I really don't agree with the answer that I read so often on the star citizen sub-reddit which is to say that the game has only been in development for 4 years therefore it's normal that we haven't seen a detailed trailer of SQ42 (and I buy even less into the argument of saying that there's no trailer not to spoil SQ42 story - we get very useful trailers on story heavy games all the time and it's easy to make one that doesn't spoil everything. Heck we get trailers for movies and people know how to handle that without revealing too much of the story... Come on).

The thing that frustrates me even more is when Star Citizen die hard fans tell others "you don't know anything about AAA game development". Well, I happen to have very close family at the head of AAA studio funded 20 years ago. Yes, most of their games took 3-5 years to develop. Do you know how early on they need to get their first important milestone which consists in demonstrating what a level would look like from both the graphical and gameplay point of view? That kicks in after just one year - that's the case even for games where they built a brand new cutting edge graphic engine (100% made in the studio), had to have the mocap done for that level etc - basically what I've been waiting to see for SQ42 for years, what was promised for Citizen con late last year and failed to appear because of fundamental systems not working. These sort of demos are needed early on because they demonstrate that the team is able to build on a solid ground. Why aren't we able to see that more than 4 years in for Star Citizen? Personally I think that project has got some really serious issues. I'm hoping that what we'll get out of it is some sort of experiment which explores new things albeit being clunky and buggy as hell - that would be some interesting progress and be worth backing. But I'm far from convinced that SQ42 and Star Citizen can still be polished experiences and a great games. We'll see (I don't wish them to fail, quite the contrary, but I find it hard to see this project as anything else than being in big trouble at this stage).

Everything you say they should have they do have. Their verticle slice (which is the first playable level etc) has been done for a while and if you tour their studio they show it to you but they make you sign a NDA.

They are on year 4 of about a 6 year development and the first part of the first year was spent almost entirely on setting up the studios.

Supposedly the thing holding up SQ42 is an issue with the AI because they just rebuild the way everything interacts with everything else which completely broke their AI system. With that said they did promise the SQ42 trailer/first playable level demo last year and dropped the ball. Im still royally pissed at them for it.

But it is what it is. Work on the MMO isnt holding up work on SQ42 and if they would have worked only on SQ42 we would still be in exactly the same place they just would have used a smaller studio group to get the same work done. They have multiple studios working on different aspect of the game all across the world. The work they do on their concept ships for their stupid LTI presale #%&*$#, which abhorrent at this late stage of the game, does not hold up any aspect of the other studios developing the game because they have a whole team dedicated to just concepting. Those people would just be working somewhere else if they stopped doing the concept sales. It wouldn't make anything else come faster. That is how their whole studio is set up. Cutting out the MMO wont make SQ42 appear faster and vice versa. Its entirely different groups working on different content

I've stepped way way way back in the past year. I got excited for citcon last year because they promised the sq42 crap and then didnt even mention it. So now im just in standby mode. I check in on the reddit ever patch or so to see if it's playable but its not yet. (or it is playable but there just isnt enough content to justifying spending any time on it.)

If they have that vertical slice and show it under NDA, I would really think that it would be a better idea at that late stage to actually show it - this is supposed to operate as the most open development after all. I don't think it would hurt. If anything I've always been impressed by how much was achieved in those 1 year milestones I mentioned (which I only got to see early under confidentiality, and I'm talking about a AAA studio operating for major publishers), and in most cases they (ie that studio, not SC) actually showed them months later to the public (one of them even became DLC after release - the amazing thing is that while it was done 1 year in, it did manage to be just as good as a DLC that would have been developed later). So I don't get why SC devs are not doing that.

And for SQ42, you've got to add the fact that they have an amazing cast. Show us a vertical slice which includes demonstrating some dialogues where we get to see Mark Hamill, show us a briefing, a take off and some really cool scripted mission and even if some aspects look clunky it can only do good and generate good publicity.

Anyway, I can relate to what you're saying in terms of stepping back. I did the same thing, didn't touch SC for a while but got hopeful that we would at least see great SQ42 footage last year. I wasn't impressed when they didn't and since then I've been back to thinking we'll have to wait for late 2017 until we actually hear important news. 3.0 would probably mean I'd go back and try that. But really I'd like to see SQ42, and it doesn't look like we're going to play it this year.

I agree and I dont know why they dont show it all off. I think they have been burned pretty badly by several groups for showing off things that were not in a finished state. It's one of those damned if you do damned if you dont things. Their new approach is pretty much full lockdown which is kind of BS considering, as you say, this is supposed to be the most open development of all time (its not).

We were supposed to have SQ42 released 4thQ 2016 then 1stQ 2017... now they are just silent on it lol.

I'll just wait and see. I have faith they'll release a good game (what they have released sofar is pretty good IMO) but when will they finally release it? who knows. Release dates are their weakest strength IMO.

Yes, I'm still hoping that they'll release something that will feel a bit like what the original Operation Flashpoint felt like (and well, even Arma 3 still had that clunky feeling), something that really offers a lot of freedom but might feel clunkier than other games (ie if you want to 1st person fighting, space combat, planetside vehicles etc you're not going to have the best mechanisms and gameplay for all of these things compared to other more specialised games - that's alright in my opinion). I wouldn't be surprised if we will still be at risk of having our ship fly off in a glitchy way when we exit it even after release for example. I also think that the planet side stuff will probably end up being shallow and a bit gimmicky (it's just too much stuff for one game), but that's alright too. My main concern is still that the studio gets stuck for too long trying to manage the feature creep and the resulting imperfections so that it reaches release when core things are still buggy. We're not there yet because they do have plenty of funding, but they should really be focusing on crossing the finish line - and that might well be their focus anyway, at least I sure hope so.

I got my refund on this a while back, but I still have high hopes for it and follow the news, if they only manage to do just a portion of what they promise it's going to kick butt.

So much about this defies comparison with the development of other AAA games. They're building the company at the same time as the games. And just the fact that it's 100% crowd funded means Chris Roberts couldn't know his budget going in. Nobody would have predicted that it would raise the money it has. I really hope to see an interview after launch where someone ask him, "had you known from the start you'd have $200m, what would you have done differently?"

He's obviously made the decision to try to deliver games commensurate with the budget. They've spent money and time doing R&D to include features from the start that wouldn't easily be added as post-launch features had they released the games with their Kickstarter goals. That said, the frustrations of people who backed early and wanted simpler games more quickly are perfectly understandable and reasonable.

It's still a first-person experience where each character will operate a particular crew station if that's what you mean.

No, I'm referring to one of the optional controller schemes for ship flight control. Interactive Mode basically had you controlling the ship's flight by pointing your cursor at the enemy target, and your ship followed your cursor by reorienting itself. It was reviled by a number of early supporters as being contrary to the spirit of what we were led to expect for dog fighting in space, etc., and provided an unfair advantage to mouse users (in the eyes of many) as opposed to a proper VJoy implementation for mouse use. Basically, it was viewed by a number of people as not maintaining the controller parity that was promised early on.

I stopped making regular visits to the SC forums some time ago. A recent quick visit leads me to suspect that IM is still in the game.

Right. It's still in the game and it's not going away. Though CIG is employing mechanics in an attempt to achieve some semblance of parity between control schemes. For example, Interactive Mode mouse control combined with gimballed turrets allows for easier aming. But removing the gimbal generally allows you to mount one size larger gun giving Relative Mode joystick users more firepower. Relative Mode also has access to ESP, a limited form of aim assist.

Roger that, and thanks for the info. It sounds like the same situation as when I lost interest.

They have play balanced it a LOT better than the initial release. It's not really a bonus to do combat with mouse/keyboard anymore.

The joy of being wrong.

TrackIR is confirmed working in 2.6.2 by default with no hacks or bypasses.