Why would you complete a game when you can make a constant stream of income and increase that income stream with announcements and drip feeds.
Look at this madness https://robertsspaceindustries.com/funding-goals
64th million has finally allowed for the technology of having pets added to the game
It’s called Store Citizen for a reason.
Scam Citizen
Star Citizen sounds right up my alley in terms of game content and play, but I will never touch it due to the business model they’ve chosen.
All I want is a space pirate game that doesn’t require me to quit my job and dedicate my life to it in order to acquire a good enough ship to actually be competitive.
That, or a street racing MMO with realistic physics and a true-to-life level of customization and tuning, that has a map the size of small country. Like The Crew except no arcade physics and more than 5 players in a server. And also not shit.
Somebody, please make one of these two games already. I need this so badly in my lifetime before I die.
You want that online? If you’re okay with single player, the first one does exist: Check out the X series of games, the latest one is X:4 Foundations.
Idk about racing lmao
My dream is to make or at least be a part of the former
It is very hard
I’ve genuinely been sat in meetings that got derailed for 30 minutes so that the placement of objects that players are likely never to interact with could be discussed in detail. There’s just no actual focus on getting the game done.
We have a saying here that translates to something like this: “perfect is the enemy of done”. Getting lost in details like this will always delay things a ton.
Also called bikeshedding.
Is anyone really surprised?
I do think they will at least release Squadron 42, but the main game is never coming out.
I’m pretty sure Chris Roberts views Squadron 42 as the main game.
I honestly don’t even think they’ll get that far. I mean they’ve announced it now, yet again, for a 2026 release date…two years from now. they’ve been doing this for the past decade. “It’ll release in 2016” then it’s “Squadron 42 coming 2018” and so on and so forth. Mark my words we’ll get to 2026 and at their little convention they have to further milk their userbase of money they’ll announce Squadron 42 for 2028 but please, user, they need more backers and as a reward for backing you’ll get a fancy ship you’ll never get to keep.
and here I was thinking they always planned to finish the game in about 16 to 30 years.
sorry I meant durrrr
Why would there be? Seems to work really well this way. Just keep milking the idiots of their money.
The actual news is that the money is starting to run dry
And this CitCon didn’t do anything to stem that tide if true.
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Like, obviously?
i like to speak in question marks? good? im not being sarcastic?
Your comprehension issues are a you problem
?
That was my concern long ago when I entered the game.
The problem is, CIG have financially incentivised themselves, knowingly or not, to never finish the game.
Being alpha game means you can wipe everything again and again. And they do! One thing they do not touch, however, are ships purchased with real world money. And players do buy those ships in order to not start the game from scratch over and over again, and pay a lot for it, in hundreds and often thousands of dollars!
Upon release, on the other hand, no wipes are planned, and this means one thing: revenue will absolutely plummet as players just buy ships for in-game currency instead of actual cash. Releasing the game now is a suicide move, as CIG won’t be able to blatantly extort players for their money anymore.
Not to mention that they also incentivise players to spend real-world money by having their website have a secret club for whales (I think you need to spend either $1K or $5K in order to have the button appear) to spend even more money then they did to even gain access originally.
Edit: clarity and conciseness: added “originally” to the end of the last sentence.
Yes, if you spend over $1k on the game you gain access to beta-testing etc.
And the most scary part? Plenty of people do spend this much money - I know many Carrack owners, for example, and this ship costed, when I remember it, $1200. Yes, very real $1200 for an in-game ship, and there’s plenty of buyers.
Heck, I know a person in Ukraine - not a high-income country by any standards, GDP per capita sitting at ~$5000, vs ~$85000 in the US - who spent about $6000 on the game by hiding huge portion of his income from his family for years. And this is not an exceptional case.
Squadron 42 is feature complete and is in optimization and polish phase. 30-40 hour campaign. It looks amazing. This was released this weekend, played live not prerecorded.
They claimed it was feature complete in 2023. And now they claim it is two years away from release. You really think polish and optimization takes three years? Of course, they’ve claimed it is just two years away every year since 2016.
They are lying to you.
Lol, one of us certainly has been lied to. Your last point is blatantly false, your first is based on your guess about how AAA game design works. Maybe it does take 3 years with a game this big, I don’t know. I’ll trust the many, many game devs who actually play the game and roll their eyes at comments like yours.
I’ve actually played the game, bought it and have no regrets. Hundreds of hours, new friends, new experiences. You passively absorbed the groupthink. I don’t care if it ever finishes, I’ve gotten more than enough fun per dollar out this game already. Cry about it if you want, just do it quietly.
I’ve played the game since 2015 when all we could do was walk around a hanger. When it comes to where SQ42 is at, we are being lied to about where it is. Them saying at Citcon that SQ42 is just 2 more years away is a dead giveaway that they are absolutely no where near a release, and the 2026 year is pure fiction. Like I said, they’ve been saying 2 years away since 2016.
I remember that one hangar! Oh nostalgia. You should try it again there’s a game there now.
They haven’t been saying two years away every since since 2016. It’s a running joke that they say it every year, but it’s not actually happening. That one in 2016 made everyone facepalm, even employees. Chris Robert’s is pathalogically optimistic about a lot of things, lol. Even in the Star Citizen community, we make fun of that sort of thing. We paid for Star Citizen early access, we have Star Citizen early access. If we get Squadron 42 as well, great! If not, it’s not that big a deal. Disappointing, but the world will go on.
I think they believe their times when we say them. The scope of things said after the 2 years thing in 2016 increased by quite a bit when their funding had another boom. They aren’t intentional lies so much as just being wrong an feature creep making dust of previous plans. But they have a lot more to show now than they did before, it is being made in good faith. It’s just had a slow start to build the studio from nothing and a lot of budget increases.
It’s definitely got a Duke Nukem Forever type problem. We will see a finished game one day, but the development has seen a lot of design changes partway through. We’ll see if we end up with a mess, but we will end up with something, I believe. And again, if not, it’s still just a videogame. We’ll live.
You’ve played Squadron 42???
They released the game to the public this weekend? That is amazing.
Ohh, they didn’t? This is still not available? The FPS spin off that isn’t even the main game? They said it was played live but don’t show anyone playing it live? They just made more promises, the thing they are still doing after 700 million dollars and more than a decade has passed?
Okay then.
“didn’t show anyone playing it live.” Uh. Clive was literally playing on stage during the showcase. Complete with yearly CTD and all.
I’m all for shitting on CIGs trash practices, but you don’t need to lie to get there.
I’m just working off the video linked above. No video of the player, no commentary, no indication a person was actively playing it.
If they actually played it live, well bully for them. One point goes to star citizen.
The video is a redo from the guy who did it live at Citizen Con, because the demo crashed when they were onstage.
Okay, so they got the game “somewhat working” live? Well, that’s something I guess.
I guess that explains why the commentor above posted a pre-recorded video instead of the actual live video that undermines his argument that the game is nearly done.
I posted that video because it was the first one I found, it’s not a grand conspiracy to trick you, jesus. Get over yourself. Watch the actual live one then, I don’t care. Still looks like a fun game.
You sound like MAGAs discussing immigration under a Fox News post. Circle jerk of hate based on misinformation, but trying to talk reason to people who love to hate the thing they hate and don’t want to stop is not going to work. Keep on believing gaming journalists from disreputable tabloids who invent controversy for clicks. The engagement on Star Citizen hate posts is massive compared to others. Hating Star Citizen is directly more profitable for these sites. There is no oversight on truthfulness in gaming news.
CitizenCon was this weekend. There has been an uptick in hit pieces posted this week. That isn’t a coincidence. You are being being primed to react negatively to the content that will be posted from it.
No, it’s not an FPS. It’s 99% a space sim like Wing Commander with a few FPS parts. It is a full AAA game, maximum fidelity, 30-40 hour campaign. You don’t even know what you’re talking about. You could actually watch the video you have so many opinions about, but oh that’s right, it’s a conspiracy if it’s good.
I have hundreds of hours in Star Citizen and have enjoyed them all. That’s not very much compared to many, many others. They are growing in players and revenue for 10 years. That doesn’t happen to bad games. They release massive updates every quarter. They just bought a new campus in Manchester so they can hire more devs, on top of the existing thousand. It’s a genuinely fun game, right now, enjoyed by many. You don’t have to be one of them, but your tinfoil hat nonsense is just vitriolic skepticism from reading these tabloids, not critical thinking.
We’re out there, flying around, having a great time wanting y’all to join our space shenanigans. Just try it the next free-fly with an open mind. Even if you tried it before, try it now, it is improving every quarter, it’s a different beast now than a few years ago.
Man, when you have to compare someone to literal fascists because they don’t trust your untrustworthy videogame company, you have a problem.
I’m not, I’m calling them capitalist, investor run businesses, which they are. Inventing controversy is an ancient, reliable way to make money.
I’m calling star citizen haters a bunch of gullible cynics. There’s an emotional element in people’s need to hate star citizen. I think they’ve just been burned so much, any time something cool is promised, they automatically assume the worst. If Star Citizen delivers, it would be very, very cool and the hate is proportional. I’m having a great time in Star Citizen with a whole bunch of people right now. Anything else is just noise, be it promises from the devs or internet articles or salty people who can’t just ignore this game if they don’t like it like an adult.
They’re harpooning whales left and right, this isn’t some irrational difference of opinion.
So? A bunch a rich people voluntarily funding game development isn’t some moral failing, it means they don’t have to act like EA and Ubisoft to make a AAA game and I can get in for a good price. Attracting capitalist investors, as is traditional, is genuinely much worse. I paid $45 and have access to all the same content as the whales. I have hundreds of hours in game. If someone stupidly spends their life savings on pretend spaceships and regrets it, it’s not on Star Citizen.
It’s not like everyone has been tricked for ten years, we know what we buy when we buy it.
they don’t have to act like EA and Ubisoft to make a AAA game.
EA and ubisoft are shitting and pissing their pants with rage and jealousy because their own user base isn’t gullible enough to do that to.
Every comment in these posts seems to be either “StarCitizen killed my family and dishonored my temple” or “can’t believe people let SC kill their family and dishonor their temple.”
Same old hate without real substance.
Oh but you don’t understand, this game is taking a long time to finish. That’s totally worth aaaaallll these circle jerk posts and vitriolic responses. It’s like ten holocausts wrapped in a 9/11. Also, some rich people voluntarily gave them money. That’s evil because reasons. Also, a not rich person spent all of their life savings on pretend space ships an regretted it. That’s the games fault though, also because reasons.
Everyone has to know how much they hate Star Citizen. It’s vital to engage with every article and post about a game they don’t play or like because that’s how kind, normal, mature, not weird people act. They hate other games too and generally ignore them, but this one feels good to hate loudly and publicly beyond any other game, so it must be true. It’s not weird at all to bully people for having fun because the internet says their game is taking a long time.
The fact that riling people up by spreading misinformation makes tabloids money is not relevant to the situation. The people playing the game are wrong about their own experiences. The internet can never be wrong, the hive mind is always correct.
Chris can shut up the haters just fine by finishing the game.
Why do you need to publicly hate at all? These people are enjoying a toy they aren’t supposed to so now everyone has to hear your feelings on it? Y’all are nuts. Ignore the game if you don’t like it like you do with every other game you don’t like.
The haters can silence themselves by shutting up and touching grass. It’s a videogame, not a genocide.
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yeah they been grifting so long thats all they care about anymore
And then, compare it to No Man’s Sky, who gave us lofty expectations, failed to deliver on launch, but actually kept with it despite no new revenue flowing into the game from existing buyers. And now we have something incredible. We have a universe that is unfathomably large. We have multiplayer, we have all sorts of events and quests. Freighters! You can piece together your own ships now.
I hope we can eventually build space stations or pilot Capital Ships. No Man’s Sky came out in 2016. In 8 years it has done far more than SC has done with far less of a budget.
Do I wish we could have everything that Roberts promised? Sure. But I also have a bridge to sell that you can at least walk over.
Also to be fair (and critical), while Sean lied to both Sony and us about the state of the game-
They also probably did have most of everything they promised at one point, then the Christmas Flood happened. That’s when the lies started and but those lies were likely more for Sony rather than us, as it’s entirely possible Sony would have outright cancelled the game if they’d known how much was actually lost in the flood.
Instead they released what they could in the time they had left then just kept plugging away at it post release.
the christmas flood ?
IIRC their office flooded, destroying equipment and much of the game’s development with it.
alright
NMS certainly evolved a lot, but I wouldn’t call it incredible. Also, despite the game universe being absurdly large, you can see everything there is to see visiting less than 20 star systems
All the daily quicksilver quests are a fucking chore, too.
Yeah no shit
Do people just not know who and what Chris Roberts is?
This is what he’s done throughout his career - the only thing that’s notable about Star Citizen really is the scale of it and thus the opportunities he has to find ever more things to obsessively tinker with.
It’s entirely possible that if Microsoft hadn’t bought out Digital Anvil and given him the boot, this wouldn’t even be Star Citizen - it would be Freelancer, coming into its 25th year of delays.
I mean, some people called this back in fucking 2012, but the dreamers bought into his vision. He’s always been real great about vision and lofty ambitions, but shit on execution. He sells dreams, but doesn’t know how to finish anything. Every project he was attached to that executed on deliverables, was due to control being outside of his purview and accountability enforced.
I don’t, what else has he procrastinated on?
the wing commander series was famous for inflated development costs, freelancer was repeatedly delayed and eventually released like five years after it’s announcement, and since then… he’s been working on star citizen
Keep in mind Freelancer was released after Microsoft acquired Roberts’ company, kicked him out of a leadership role, and drastically slashed the scope.
Star Citizen is what happens when there is nobody above Roberts to say no, and now after years plenty of people under him with an interest in keeping the development churning.
Probably the same needs to happen here but I don’t see how it could happen in this occasion.
Chris Roberts is still rich, and could probably retire right now without worrying about anything. He could tank the company, and he wouldn’t care.
When has any really rich person ever gone “you know what? I actually have enough now…”?
Wozniak is probably the most famous example. He recognized the corrupting nature of money, decided he had enough, and stopped to live in comfort and occasionally work towards causes he finds important
Lots of people have done the same… But if they’re rich and still chasing after money? They’ll never stop
I guess Notch as well. Sold Minecraft for an obscene amount of money and got into indefensible right wing views instead.
I heard he got better after leaving twitter for years and coming back.
That’s the majority of them, but ragebait articles aren’t written about them, so you have no idea who they are.
Don’t be so easily manipulated by media.
MySpace guy comes to mind.
How could you forget about your first and only friend Tom?
Well no shit. He figured out that as long as you never “release” a finished game, you’re not going to be blamed for “bugs” while still collecting money on in-game purchases.
There’s a reason he made sure that the in-game store was perfected and ready to go long before the game was anywhere near completed. It’s been the plan ever since he and his team realized that the ultimate scope was likely out of their reach.
If massive universe sums like that were technically feasible all of the other studios would have done it. They were overly ambitious and didn’t understand the limits
I mean Elite Dangerous is right there, finished, playable and fun.
And it first released a decade ago already (in a couple months)
And is a mathematical model 1:1 scale of our galaxy.
…that sounda awful, surely there is journey skipping?
Nope, it’s real time travel with no FTL. The reason it’s “finished” is that it takes hundreds of real life years to get anywhere, so they have plenty of time to populate the world’s before the first players arrive.
Genius
No Man’s Sky too
Yeaaah, but they pulled the exact same thing Star Citizen did initially. They overpromised and underdelivered heavily. It took them years to get where it is now.
In terms of immersion I think they’ve done a great job. Played during a free weekend. But they need to aim for a gameplay loop, polish, and release. Not this feature creep mentality
