Star Citizen: Chris Robert`s new space sim (the Wing Commander guy)

[Markbnj]

It's fine to feel that way, and anyone else who does can sit back and wait for the final product before buying the game, but don't forget that without the early backers who were willing to put up hundreds (and some even thousands) of dollars there wouldn't even be a Star Citizen game.

I'm not at all convinced of the economic truth of this statement. We've had this discussion on the board before. The capital has to come from somewhere. If there are enough individual players out there willing to contribute then that would seem to imply there is enough of a market to interest investors.

But investors are a lot different from contributing enthusiasts. They usually want inconvenient stuff like equity, a shareholder agreement, a seat on the board, and yeah they often use that stuff to put pressure on management to deliver. Not sure that is a bad thing, frankly. But in any case they are investors, and they know the risk they are taking.

Kickstarter contributors get no equity, and have no influence over anything. All they can do is pay and wait. Dream investors, imo.

 

[Red Storm]

I'm not at all convinced of the economic truth of this statement. We've had this discussion on the board before. The capital has to come from somewhere. If there are enough individual players out there willing to contribute then that would seem to imply there is enough of a market to interest investors.

But investors are a lot different from contributing enthusiasts. They usually want inconvenient stuff like equity, a shareholder agreement, a seat on the board, and yeah they often use that stuff to put pressure on management to deliver. Not sure that is a bad thing, frankly. But in any case they are investors, and they know the risk they are taking.

Kickstarter contributors get no equity, and have no influence over anything. All they can do is pay and wait. Dream investors, imo.

Can't get any more proof than in real life. Where are all the AAA space sim games? There aren't any! Big name publishers have been ignoring the space genre for way too long. If anything maybe Star Citizen has shown them that there is a good deal of interest in space sim games, and maybe, just maybe they'll greenlight one of their own and all the anti-crowd funding people can go play that game.

You talk of Kickstarter contributing as if we don't know it going in. Where did it state I was getting an actual share ownership stake in the game? It didn't, I was willingly gifting money to them in the hopes that the game would be made, and I got exactly what I wanted. Dream investor not found.

 

[BoberFett]

N/M

 

[Markbnj]

Can't get any more proof than in real life. Where are all the AAA space sim games? There aren't any! Big name publishers have been ignoring the space genre for way too long. If anything maybe Star Citizen has shown them that there is a good deal of interest in space sim games, and maybe, just maybe they'll greenlight one of their own and all the anti-crowd funding people can go play that game.

You talk of Kickstarter contributing as if we don't know it going in. Where did it state I was getting an actual share ownership stake in the game? It didn't, I was willingly gifting money to them in the hopes that the game would be made, and I got exactly what I wanted. Dream investor not found.

There's no "as if" and I didn't imply that you knew or did not know anything going in. I simply stated that a horde of small stakeholders with no power would be preferable to real investors with power. I also did not make the assumption that his only alternative option for funding was "big publishers" although you're free to make that assumption if you like.

 

[ThinClient]

There are fantastic tools out today that weren't out not too long ago. Some of these tools, like ZBrush, have revolutionized television, movies, video gaming, and more. ZBrush allows the artist to, more or less, sculpt clay.

What used to take a week to do as recently as a few years ago can be done in less than a day now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZzKTb9rJUY

Check it out. That's a few hours work, most likely less than a day. It's not impractical to expect efficient work. Animating the model is a cinch. So is texturing it. Creating the model, to begin with, is the hard part.

Hell, Roberts isn't even creating his own game engine or anything. He's using CryEngine 4. He's already got a foundation to base the game on.

 

[BrightCandle]

There are fantastic tools out today that weren't out not too long ago. Some of these tools, like ZBrush, have revolutionized television, movies, video gaming, and more. ZBrush allows the artist to, more or less, sculpt clay.

What used to take a week to do as recently as a few years ago can be done in less than a day now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZzKTb9rJUY

Check it out. That's a few hours work, most likely less than a day. It's not impractical to expect efficient work. Animating the model is a cinch. So is texturing it. Creating the model, to begin with, is the hard part.

Hell, Roberts isn't even creating his own game engine or anything. He's using CryEngine 4. He's already got a foundation to base the game on.

So in esence your saying that they are being lazy, wasting their time and you could make the game faster? Well I suggest you do a kickstarter and fund your own project. If you can do it 5x faster than Chris Roberts and his team you could beat them to a Wing commander game, we could expect delivery in about 36 / 5 = 7.2 months. I will tell you what you have until July, we need to give you a couple of months to get that Kickstarter out of the way. I am really looking forward to playing this Star Citizen clone in 9 months time, its highly skilled individuals like yourself innovating the way to making better games faster that make the world a better place.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Back on topic
Does anyone else feel like a midget walking around the hanger? Seems like all the consoles, buttons and railings are over my head or shoulder level.

 

[rivethead]

Back on topic
Does anyone else feel like a midget walking around the hanger? Seems like all the consoles, buttons and railings are over my head or shoulder level.

Oh yeah. I got that "free" Freelancer poster in my hangar (the one we got for hitting the milestone last month) and it's like 10 feet above the floor. Who the hell would put a poster that high on a wall?

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Oh yeah. I got that "free" Freelancer poster in my hangar (the one we got for hitting the milestone last month) and it's like 10 feet above the floor. Who the hell would put a poster that high on a wall?

HAHA I got that poster too but I didn't notice the poster, it must have passed over my head.

 

[digitaldurandal]

Oh yeah. I got that "free" Freelancer poster in my hangar (the one we got for hitting the milestone last month) and it's like 10 feet above the floor. Who the hell would put a poster that high on a wall?

You have to keep your valuables out of reach from suspicious characters.

 

[bbhaag]

I just purchased a used GTX 560 ti and tried the arena commander out. What a difference a better card can make! My old GT430 could barely handle the hanger but the 560 makes quick work of the hanger and arena commander.

This was the first time since I purchased the game that I actually got to enjoy it with out it being a laggy mess. It is awesome!

 

[Worthington]

nice screenshot!

 

[BrightCandle]

nice screenshot!

Ouch on the flashing jaggies in the background. I hate that crawling jaggy effect sooo much.

 

[Worthington]

just good to see an Aurora out there. heh

 

[Fanatical Meat]

How do you make screen shots?

 

[rivethead]

just good to see an Aurora out there. heh

Are we still limited to the "Trainer" or can we fly any variant of Aurora (like my LN) now?

That's another reason I haven't purchased the $5 AC pass.....I want to get used to my own ship....not something else.

 

[Worthington]

Still just trainers I believe.. although who knows what will be announced during Citcon tonight.

 

[bbhaag]

nice screenshot!

Thanks! A little background on the shot. It's just the native res of my monitor(1920x1200) and the in game graphics set to high. I didn't bother going into the Nvidia control panel and force AA or anything like that.

How do you make screen shots?

I just push print screen on my keyboard and then alt+tab out of the game. Then I just open paint and paste the image. From there I just save the image and up it to photobucket.

Are we still limited to the "Trainer" or can we fly any variant of Aurora (like my LN) now?

That's another reason I haven't purchased the $5 AC pass.....I want to get used to my own ship....not something else.

Not sure on that. I didn't purchase an AC pass it just came with the game.

 

[ThinClient]

Thanks! A little background on the shot. It's just the native res of my monitor(1920x1200) and the in game graphics set to high. I didn't bother going into the Nvidia control panel and force AA or anything like that.

I just push print screen on my keyboard and then alt+tab out of the game. Then I just open paint and paste the image. From there I just save the image and up it to photobucket.

Not sure on that. I didn't purchase an AC pass it just came with the game.

Interesting note, speaking of your screenshot.

I like that you can print screenshots to clipboard like that in this game. I don't know why but some games result in a solid black box into mspaint or whatever when pasting a print-screen attempt.

I wonder if Roberts will have it changed to act this way upon beta or release. I'm not even sure if this is a condition that exists by default and must be programmed away or if it's intentional, but it's always disheartening to hit print screen to capture that awesome moment only to be let down when you paste a black box into MSPaint or something.

You might consider a program called Puush. It runs in your system tray and basically does all of this for you.

Ctrl+Shift+4 takes a screenshot, saves it, uploads it to the Puush image upload site, and automatically copies the direct image link to your clipboard.

There are a bunch of other key combinations to do various things faster than manually with relation to taking screenshots.

Ctrl+Shift+3 turns your mouse into a plus sign and allows you to resize a box anywhere on your screen to do the same task with, if you only want to screenshot a smaller portion of your screen instead of the entire desktop area.

 

[Rakehellion]

There are fantastic tools out today that weren't out not too long ago.

These tools came out of necessity, not as a luxury.

When cars were first invented, they were the fastest mode of transportation. Now it's the standard.

What used to take a week to do as recently as a few years ago can be done in less than a day now.

There are things that take a week now that didn't exist a few years ago.

You might have been able to get away with having 100 meshes in game in 2001, now maybe you need 5000.

 

[ThinClient]

These tools came out of necessity, not as a luxury.

When cars were first invented, they were the fastest mode of transportation. Now it's the standard.

Entirely irrelevant information.

There are things that take a week now that didn't exist a few years ago.

You might have been able to get away with having 100 meshes in game in 2001, now maybe you need 5000.

Right, and polygon counts as high as 15,000 for main characters in games that feature a small number of characters / items on screen at a time. Do you have a point to make? 🙂

What do we even know about CryEngine 4, anyway?

 

[Udgnim]

Star Citizen twitch stream showing a planet landing into a city and walking around the landing area

my graphics card is crying

talking about additional modules in 2015

conclusion, too much feature creep

 

[Red Storm]

Star Citizen twitch stream showing a planet landing into a city and walking around the landing area

my graphics card is crying

talking about additional modules in 2015

conclusion, too much feature creep

Development isn't going to stop when the game launches. They're going to continue working on things post-release to add into the game to keep it fresh and active.

 

[Artorias]

This game is going to use Mantle right? I guess the engine should have some good optimization then, it could scale really well with many systems.

 

[Fallen Kell]

Development isn't going to stop when the game launches. They're going to continue working on things post-release to add into the game to keep it fresh and active.

Yeah. One of those is procedural generation of space/planet surfaces, so as someone explores it for the first time, it gets created.