4 ms·

I think the scam-ie-ness of it is more along the lines of predatory marketing. They sell ship concepts for a lot of money. And are only now getting into the re

I think the scam-ie-ness of it is more along the lines of predatory marketing. They sell ship concepts for a lot of money. And are only now getting into the real meat-and-potatoes of the critical development. Things like server meshing, and appropriate object culling server/client side. There are NO gameplay loops that don't involve a small variation of the following: Kill bounties / mine minerals / trade goods to earn money. Use money to buy ships. And even that is kinda bogus because your purchases may/may not persist between patches! Any PVP is completely optional and not really a real gameplay loop. Any group events are completely optional and not really a real gameplay loop. There are a few things you can do to speed up say mining loops by having a scout + cash maker(s). There is ZERO logistics. There is ZERO economy (8 years in and they finally created money transfers). Overall this is a project that has every incentive to keep developing forever and not deliver. Because of this they over-promised so so so much that it is almost impossible to meet these expectations. Also development has been... insanely slow. Took them 7 years before they gave you a mobile respawn point on some ships. Took them 8 years to get aiming even remotely okay. Took them 8 years and NPCs still can't glitch out and stop moving/acting. 8 years later and only the latest top notch PC can even attempt to get 30fps in this game, and even then, not in most areas. This has to be Fyre festival. The same thing happened there. "Just fund it, we'll figure it out." until... they couldn't figure it out. So they asked for more funding.

shostack 6y ago
I've put a lot of hours into Elite: Dangerous which arguably has many of the same critiques. I've also put a lot of hours into No Man's Sky. I have not purchased Star Citizen but I did have a free weekend where someone who owns one of the most expensive ships in the game gave my a virtual tour of the system on their drop dead stunning space yacht that Elite could only dream about. Atmospheric flight was a blast and the planets are gorgeous, especially compared to NMS and the lifeless husks of Elite. The city world was a whole nother level and I actually got lost in the bustling city. I sort of loved that we had enough time on the return jump to head down to the bar on his yacht (complete with ridiculously deeply modeled bottles behind the bar) to "have a drink" and chat while sitting and watching stars stream by like in Star Trek. Start Citizen has a lot that is wrong with it and the business side is a nightmare. But as an avid space geek, I'll be damned if they didn't break a new barrier for immersion with me. All I want now is a game that blends the flight and universe mechanics of Elite with the procedural generation of planets and some gameplay loops like NMS, but with the graphics and jaw droppingly beautiful graphics and immersive fine details of Start Citizen. In VR, with whatever Frankenstein of a machine could actually run it smoothly without melting.
ehnto 6y ago
They have already accepted investment. I think they will run out of money and get picked up by a publisher. The game and audience is just waiting there, publishers would be silly not to bump it over the line. I doubt it would never get released though.
- Tepix 6y ago
  According to the feature tracker mentioned elsewhere, the game is 27% complete, far from "bump it over the line". I guess you could postpone 60% of the outstanding features, get the game released and then work on add-ons with those features.
  - moogly 6y ago
    From what I can tell that's 27% of the _game systems_. Then they have the actual rest of the game to build with all the actual content. Planets, scenarios, dialogue, story (if there is one) etc. Oh, and also another game (Squadron 42).
    - ehnto 6y ago
      Which is frankly MIA most of the time, Squadron 42. The game content actually seems pretty quick to produce, given that it's been highly automated. They went from next to nothing to 20+ planets/moons with a mix of procedural and hand placed locations to visit in a short time frame. The technology means the artists basically paint the planets content in real time with brushes. Then the missions/social content is also a mix of hand written and procedurally generated content, eventually backed by an economic model that fuels the missions and NPC behavior. This all makes sense because it's an infinite open world, not a story game, but so far it plays pretty well. The "hero" landing zones seem to take the longest. My guess is they will launch with only a handful of the star systems and build from there.
  - silvester23 6y ago
    That's kind of what No Man's Sky did, isn't it? And apart from the initial backlash, it seems to be doing quite fine now, from what I hear.

shostack 6y ago

I've put a lot of hours into Elite: Dangerous which arguably has many of the same critiques. I've also put a lot of hours into No Man's Sky. I have not purchased Star Citizen but I did have a free weekend where someone who owns one of the most expensive ships in the game gave my a virtual tour of the system on their drop dead stunning space yacht that Elite could only dream about. Atmospheric flight was a blast and the planets are gorgeous, especially compared to NMS and the lifeless husks of Elite. The city world was a whole nother level and I actually got lost in the bustling city. I sort of loved that we had enough time on the return jump to head down to the bar on his yacht (complete with ridiculously deeply modeled bottles behind the bar) to "have a drink" and chat while sitting and watching stars stream by like in Star Trek. Start Citizen has a lot that is wrong with it and the business side is a nightmare. But as an avid space geek, I'll be damned if they didn't break a new barrier for immersion with me. All I want now is a game that blends the flight and universe mechanics of Elite with the procedural generation of planets and some gameplay loops like NMS, but with the graphics and jaw droppingly beautiful graphics and immersive fine details of Start Citizen. In VR, with whatever Frankenstein of a machine could actually run it smoothly without melting.

ehnto 6y ago

They have already accepted investment. I think they will run out of money and get picked up by a publisher. The game and audience is just waiting there, publishers would be silly not to bump it over the line. I doubt it would never get released though.

Tepix 6y ago
According to the feature tracker mentioned elsewhere, the game is 27% complete, far from "bump it over the line". I guess you could postpone 60% of the outstanding features, get the game released and then work on add-ons with those features.
- moogly 6y ago
  From what I can tell that's 27% of the _game systems_. Then they have the actual rest of the game to build with all the actual content. Planets, scenarios, dialogue, story (if there is one) etc. Oh, and also another game (Squadron 42).
  - ehnto 6y ago
    Which is frankly MIA most of the time, Squadron 42. The game content actually seems pretty quick to produce, given that it's been highly automated. They went from next to nothing to 20+ planets/moons with a mix of procedural and hand placed locations to visit in a short time frame. The technology means the artists basically paint the planets content in real time with brushes. Then the missions/social content is also a mix of hand written and procedurally generated content, eventually backed by an economic model that fuels the missions and NPC behavior. This all makes sense because it's an infinite open world, not a story game, but so far it plays pretty well. The "hero" landing zones seem to take the longest. My guess is they will launch with only a handful of the star systems and build from there.
- silvester23 6y ago
  That's kind of what No Man's Sky did, isn't it? And apart from the initial backlash, it seems to be doing quite fine now, from what I hear.