******Official Star Citizen / Squadron 42 Thread******
- Thread starter Raumarik
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Think I must be heading for seven years now. IIRC release was only a couple of years away at the time.
Game development is 5% coming up with cool ideas, and 95% managing a team, executing and delivering. I have no doubt in their ability to come up with great ideas, but their execution and delivery has objectively lacking for a long time. A good dev team has a creative lead and a production lead who are equals, they are the yin and yang, if you get the balance wrong and production has all the power, you kill off the creativity, the other way, and you don't get a product finished, or you rush something compromised out the door.
Caporegime
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All i know is despite all the haters in this thread, this game has a huge player base already so they must be doing something right
Soldato
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Yeah, I am a hater. Wouldn't you be after paying for something 8 years ago and still not having it? 
Caporegime
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lol its yours now, just download the latest live build which is 3.9.1 and start flying and doing lots and lots of missionsYeah, I am a hater. Wouldn't you be after paying for something 8 years ago and still not having it?
Soldato
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I bought it for Squadron 42
Caporegime
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That's been bought by EA and coming out q4 2020 as predicted by CIG heheI bought it for Squadron 42
Labelling everyone as haters is neither clever nor a particularly helpful discussion. Many of us are backers just as much as you are. I have a significant investment in it so I would like it to succeed but I don't see any tangible progress on key gameplay loops and systems and at this point I've accepted it's not likely to see the light of day or at least not in any meaningful form.
In terms of gameplay loops where are:
Salvage - Was scheduled for 2018 then 2019 and again hyped it up at citcon last year to generate vulture sales and suggested Q2 this year when in fact all we got is a very early prototyping document.
Exploration - Nothing
Data running - Nothing
Medical - Nothing in apart from basic respawn beds
Repair - Nothing
Refuelling - Nothing
Bounty hunting capture mechanics - not implemented
VIP transport - Nothing
Trading - Basic implementation but limited due to lack of systems
FPS AI - Extremely basic implementation
Station and World AI routines - Barely implemented
Flight Combat AI - Regularly broken
Server Meshing - Nothing
More systems - Stanton has taken nearly 8 years assuming Crusader comes early next year. We've not seen an uptick in system generation but some are saying a lot has been done for SQ42 which is holding back PU release due to spoilers but I'm not convinced.
An extremely buggy alpha is not what people want and describing it as anything other than that is disingenuous. Missions are largely boilerplate and repetitive or broken.
i bought in when it was due its 2014 release date, at that point i still felt i was buying in way to early for a game not due for for a few years
but im still active within our org as much as i can be, but im very let down to think not one of my ships is in game yet
i used to play arena commander and star marine quite a lot, but they have both gone down hill due to server lag related issues
PTU i no longer bother to download, PU is buggy enough for me now, but my main issue is that iv owned it for so long and to still be seeing such low fps with no real heavy content in game is scary, tiny servers very little ai no meshing and no way to build a system that might run it better
i know people with lower spec machines getting higher fps and people with higher spec getting far less
if i dont get a solid 30+ then its not playable, tbf i wont play any other game if its below 70fps
the game has become too complex for its own good, they need to get the main tech completed, get the game out, add in new content as the years go on, like most games do, i feel like iv accepted a very buggy most content missing game as a finished product, then im sat waiting for the next season pass to drop for more content, tho the content of my expected new build gets delayed and delayed and delayed.....
yet altho iv spent more than i should have, im still buying ships and i love the buying and melting of ships part, the websites shop is really the only thing i play now, looking forward to November sales again as always lol
but im still active within our org as much as i can be, but im very let down to think not one of my ships is in game yet
i used to play arena commander and star marine quite a lot, but they have both gone down hill due to server lag related issues
PTU i no longer bother to download, PU is buggy enough for me now, but my main issue is that iv owned it for so long and to still be seeing such low fps with no real heavy content in game is scary, tiny servers very little ai no meshing and no way to build a system that might run it better
i know people with lower spec machines getting higher fps and people with higher spec getting far less
if i dont get a solid 30+ then its not playable, tbf i wont play any other game if its below 70fps
the game has become too complex for its own good, they need to get the main tech completed, get the game out, add in new content as the years go on, like most games do, i feel like iv accepted a very buggy most content missing game as a finished product, then im sat waiting for the next season pass to drop for more content, tho the content of my expected new build gets delayed and delayed and delayed.....
yet altho iv spent more than i should have, im still buying ships and i love the buying and melting of ships part, the websites shop is really the only thing i play now, looking forward to November sales again as always lol
I think the absolute first thing they need to do is get Squadron out the door...
That would not only free up significant dev resources, but if it’s half as good as they try to suggest it will be then it’ll also secure their financial future for quite a while.
That would not only free up significant dev resources, but if it’s half as good as they try to suggest it will be then it’ll also secure their financial future for quite a while.
Soldato
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"haters"? What are you, a 12 year old girl or something?
Jon many of us are fans of the project, keen for it to succeed but are getting very tired of the lack of tangible progress and failure to hit their own fluffy/goals especially when you consider that a large chunk of work is not being released to backers so that it's a big surprise later. We're all getting old, I backed this in my 30s and I'm now 45.. I don't have much to look forward to now the BBC license fee needs to be paid for by over 75s so would really like SC to be out by then.
im more interested to see theatres of war up and running, its would give us some actual gameplay to get us back into having fun outside of making up your own ideas in PU
they dont really need to release SQ42 to get more money, if they need cash they just make up a new ship and in rolls loads of money, every ship sale makes them millions, trouble is most of the long term backers have put a lot of money into it over the years and thats why we are getting disheartened by the lack of game play and speed of release
they want money put the caps back up for sale, they sell out in seconds, anything with decent limited numbers sells well, they even chucked the prices up on many ships and its not slowing down people buying them
why release the game when they can show you a picture of a ship and make millions from it, its almost in their interest to never release the game
they dont really need to release SQ42 to get more money, if they need cash they just make up a new ship and in rolls loads of money, every ship sale makes them millions, trouble is most of the long term backers have put a lot of money into it over the years and thats why we are getting disheartened by the lack of game play and speed of release
they want money put the caps back up for sale, they sell out in seconds, anything with decent limited numbers sells well, they even chucked the prices up on many ships and its not slowing down people buying them
why release the game when they can show you a picture of a ship and make millions from it, its almost in their interest to never release the game
Soldato
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It's hardly even a game, it's an ongoing business, that so clear. They've just skipped releasing the game and gone straight to monetising it via macro-transactions and whatever else their customers will happily throw money at. They know how people think these days, it's about what you can afford to buy and then flaunting it on the internet, they know people people like collecting things, so they sell them ships to buy at ridiculous prices, all at next to nothing cost to them.
They've no game to sell, and no need to sell it anyway, because there's more money in milking the herd and BS'ing them about the future through their insanely good marketing campaigns and bait and switch tactics, here's a ship you'll need for game loop x, game loop x is coming, oh sorry no it's not here's some more roadmap style garbage about it, and move on to the next hype train, sell mreo ships etc off the back off that hype train...and repeat.
They know how financially and emotionally invested the cult is now and they prey on that.
It's just modern day snake oil selling to rubes.
They've no game to sell, and no need to sell it anyway, because there's more money in milking the herd and BS'ing them about the future through their insanely good marketing campaigns and bait and switch tactics, here's a ship you'll need for game loop x, game loop x is coming, oh sorry no it's not here's some more roadmap style garbage about it, and move on to the next hype train, sell mreo ships etc off the back off that hype train...and repeat.
They know how financially and emotionally invested the cult is now and they prey on that.
It's just modern day snake oil selling to rubes.
Mmm, I agree they are making a lot of money that way but ultimately when you look at their finances (or at least last I saw, I haven’t been following recently) they are burning it at least as fast as they bring it in.
I don’t for one second think they will stop the money train, but a second source of income from squadron sales (if successful) would be a welcome diversification I’m sure.
That it would likely at least free up a portion of their best devs and allow them to give PU their full focus probably is more significant than the finances. They have after all said this year that SQ42 is their current focus and used that to explain some of the lack of progress in PU. I imagine some of them would continue to work on laying the groundwork for future episodes etc though.
You don’t need to tell me about being disheartened, I’m right there with you! I can’t remember exactly but I think I first backed in 2014 and I’ve thrown more than my fair share at them. I did add a little more earlier this year just to be able to do some shuffling and rearrange the fleet but they won’t see any more from me for the foreseeable. If SQ42 came out and rocked my socks it would be a welcome boost of confidence in their abilities to actually make a good game.
I don’t for one second think they will stop the money train, but a second source of income from squadron sales (if successful) would be a welcome diversification I’m sure.
That it would likely at least free up a portion of their best devs and allow them to give PU their full focus probably is more significant than the finances. They have after all said this year that SQ42 is their current focus and used that to explain some of the lack of progress in PU. I imagine some of them would continue to work on laying the groundwork for future episodes etc though.
You don’t need to tell me about being disheartened, I’m right there with you! I can’t remember exactly but I think I first backed in 2014 and I’ve thrown more than my fair share at them. I did add a little more earlier this year just to be able to do some shuffling and rearrange the fleet but they won’t see any more from me for the foreseeable. If SQ42 came out and rocked my socks it would be a welcome boost of confidence in their abilities to actually make a good game.
Has a lot of potential but the performance isn't there, it needs to be smooth stable 60 FPS minimum for the Battlefield / CoD type of game that it is and its nowhere near that performance last time it was tested.
Soldato
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Would they make much money from SQ42 as isn't it included in all the backer packages and promotions like that AMD one?
Can only guess really!
Not all backer packages no, they split the package a couple of years ago (which was one of crytek’s complaints in the lawsuit as it happens).
Back when they split, they had around 2 million backers... Let’s say by now they have 2.5ish million that have “preordered” S42 for the sake of argument (they currently have 2.7million backers last I saw, so assuming about 70% of these new backers have also bought S42).
If (if!!!!) they manage to actually make a very decent game they could theoretically manage to sell a couple more million if you compare to other extremely successful PC titles. If they go on to next gen consoles with SQ42 (which is now perhaps a viable option, it wasn’t back in 2012) they could sell more over the next few years too and also potentially hook some more interest over to star citizen on PC as a happy side effect.
Let’s say they hit it out the park and manage to sell another 2 million after release, at $60 a pop for the released game that’s a revenue of 120 million bucks, with no publisher to take a cut - would certainly give some breathing room. Even 1 million more copies (so for every 2.5ish interested people that already bought, there was 1 who decided to wait until there was a released game) 60 million bucks revenue would also not be too bad! Anecdotally I have zero friends that own it, and a few friends that like the idea of both games, but sensibly won’t buy until there’s actually a game. Consequently I think the ratio of 2.5 current backers to 1 potential backer is fairly easy to believe personally.
Of course you could also cheekily argue that a lot of people that “bought” years ago have aged since then, probably like me a lot of them have young kids and can’t game as much anymore! A whole new potential market that weren’t even 12 years old back when the Kickstarter launched are now available to exploit for more sales!
Ultimately we won’t know how well it’ll sell until they actually launch it, but any extra revenue from it being launched is better than nothing. I suspect the marketing power of having big names like Hamil etc will garner a lot of mainstream attention, they just have to not screw the game up. There is also the matter of the next chapters which are already planned but can’t launch, sell and profit from those until the first one is out the door.
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Soldato
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