******Official Star Citizen / Squadron 42 Thread******

[MikeTheNative]

They have used the excuse of there's no point optimising/bug fixing too much until certain features in the game. I do kind of see their point in some regards.
Whether they will start polishing it up when (or if) sever meshing get's done of they decide to invent another massive feature that takes more years to implement is anyone's guess though.

 

[jonneymendoza]

They have used the excuse of there's no point optimising/bug fixing too much until certain features in the game. I do kind of see their point in some regards.
Whether they will start polishing it up when (or if) sever meshing get's done of they decide to invent another massive feature that takes more years to implement is anyone's guess though.

I am not sure if there is another massive core tech that needs doing after SM, gen 12 and PES is done

 

[Curlyriff]

Well in the monthly report Chris used Beta once Server meshing is in. So yeah, don't know but there is huge amounts of core tech for flight, aero, room system, components, physical damage missing.

 

[jonneymendoza]

Well in the monthly report Chris used Beta once Server meshing is in. So yeah, don't know but there is huge amounts of core tech for flight, aero, room system, components, physical damage missing.

flight is pretty much there? what core teh does flight need?
Room sysems have been worked on since last year and a bit. Its looking good and could come in 3.18 or close to that patch.

components? You mean stripping out components manually? The core tech for that was icache but now PES.

Physical damage they are working on now and its part of salvaging and PES.

Many of the stuff you mentioned are not really core tech but core features that were blocked due to icache/PES.

 

[humbug]

I am not sure if there is another massive core tech that needs doing after SM, gen 12 and PES is done

No, PES is the critical part of Server Meshing, Tier 1 at least, Static Server Meshing, that's what is needed to get a small increase of player counts and more importantly all the other star systems.

Beyond that the letter talks about R&D'ing Dynamic Server Meshing, that's what is needed to get the player count up from maybe 100 to thousands.

I think so far as the game goes Static Server Meshing is all that's needed to complete the game, Dynamic Server Meshing turns it in to an MMO, but its not needed for any of the promised game mechanics and 100 star systems if you like.

 

[MoNkeE]

Squeezed half an hour in or so last night, few impressions:

1) world building is fantastic, spawning in your hab, having to navigate the world by signage, requesting your ship to be moved to a hanger then getting an elevator to the hanger. However, whilst this is good, it does become tedious when having to run through this every time you die etc..

2) this game gives me a “VR-like” experience without the VR. Remember the first time you used your actual hands to open a drawer in VR? This game gives you that feeling when you catch an elevator to the hanger, walk up to your ship, open the hatch, climb in to your seat and power it up for the first time. That’s a really impressive level of immersion that very few games manage to capture.

3) UI is rather unintuitive, and “it makes sense when you learn it” doesn’t detract from that.

4) I fought some NPCs in “Wheeler’s” on Lyria. The voice acting for these guys is terrible, and details like that totally drag you back from the AAA game you feel in other aspects.

5) my first planetary landing happened at 600mph. My second planetary landing was successful. Upon looting my SMG back from the (suspiciously intact) remains of my first corpse, I was unable to actually interact with my inventory slots at all. So whilst I could loot my SMG back, I was unable to remove the SMG magazines in my backpack to reload.

I’m going to persist with the game as it does seem ambitious, and I enjoy seeing ambition in a game. From what I’ve seen so far, it does strike me as a ridiculously deep tech demo more than a functional game. I can’t see another 12 months of work seeing them smooth out the game experience AND deliver on all the new technologies and content they’re claiming to. Performance wise I’m hitting just over 60fps with a i7 10700 and 3080 Ti - yet most the time, utilisation for either is 60% or lower.

 

[bigmike20vt]

12 months? For S42 maybe.......... but for Star Citizen.......... My money is on late 2024, but probably 2025 or even beyond before release.

So long as they keep on raking in buckets of money there isnt even an incentive to get it out of the door. Once it is out then the dreams of what may be will hit the reality of what is actually achievable, so it is in CIGs interest to keep it in alpha for as long as possible imo.

Last I heard VR is back on the discussion board again. . if they manage to add that in i am confident i will get my monies worth out of the game regardless of how close to the "vision" the game ultimately ends up being. For now it looks amazing but limited (the 100 planetary systems seems a looooooooooooooooooooooooong way away. Time will tell.

(as for the 1000 player instances... I am unconvinced but to be fair i really could not give a hoot if that does get chopped.... heck, i would take well made npcs over multiplayer every single time (with bonus points thrown in if i could take my character into a mates instance and have some very low player count coop gameplay to earn some coin)

 

[jonneymendoza]

Squeezed half an hour in or so last night, few impressions:

1) world building is fantastic, spawning in your hab, having to navigate the world by signage, requesting your ship to be moved to a hanger then getting an elevator to the hanger. However, whilst this is good, it does become tedious when having to run through this every time you die etc..

2) this game gives me a “VR-like” experience without the VR. Remember the first time you used your actual hands to open a drawer in VR? This game gives you that feeling when you catch an elevator to the hanger, walk up to your ship, open the hatch, climb in to your seat and power it up for the first time. That’s a really impressive level of immersion that very few games manage to capture.

3) UI is rather unintuitive, and “it makes sense when you learn it” doesn’t detract from that.

4) I fought some NPCs in “Wheeler’s” on Lyria. The voice acting for these guys is terrible, and details like that totally drag you back from the AAA game you feel in other aspects.

5) my first planetary landing happened at 600mph. My second planetary landing was successful. Upon looting my SMG back from the (suspiciously intact) remains of my first corpse, I was unable to actually interact with my inventory slots at all. So whilst I could loot my SMG back, I was unable to remove the SMG magazines in my backpack to reload.

I’m going to persist with the game as it does seem ambitious, and I enjoy seeing ambition in a game. From what I’ve seen so far, it does strike me as a ridiculously deep tech demo more than a functional game. I can’t see another 12 months of work seeing them smooth out the game experience AND deliver on all the new technologies and content they’re claiming to. Performance wise I’m hitting just over 60fps with a i7 10700 and 3080 Ti - yet most the time, utilisation for either is 60% or lower.

Regarding point 1, you can set your spawn point to one of the orbiting stations . Just go to one of those stations and go to the medical clinic and into the regen kiosk console and set your regen spawn point there.

 

[Curlyriff]

flight is pretty much there? what core teh does flight need?
Room sysems have been worked on since last year and a bit. Its looking good and could come in 3.18 or close to that patch.

components? You mean stripping out components manually? The core tech for that was icache but now PES.

Physical damage they are working on now and its part of salvaging and PES.

Many of the stuff you mentioned are not really core tech but core features that were blocked due to icache/PES.

- Flight they haven't even fixed all the thruster sides out, not got VTOL working proper, haven't got aero sorted (they want to add all the flaps etc to actually work as expected)
- Room system has basics and does function but until it is live, in game, has the fire system, decompression elements etc all working it is all theoretical in testing to some degree at moment
- Yeah aware that it is but what I mean with components is that half are not created/design yet, fuel hasn't been physicalised fully yet (even with the new fuelling mechanic), it is still significant work to get the components fully sorted. Of course then now have till October to sort this so shall see how that goes
- Physical damage hasn't been worked on at all for it. They are using a hitpoint system still for it. They have not physicalised all the materials to give their weight, tensile strength, hardness, toughness, yield strength, elongation, fatigue strength, corrosion, plasticity, malleability and creep properties to all their materials in game which is what they have said they would do. So no physicalised damage is possible till that is in.

 

[humbug]

12 months? For S42 maybe.......... but for Star Citizen.......... My money is on late 2024, but probably 2025 or even beyond before release.

So long as they keep on raking in buckets of money there isnt even an incentive to get it out of the door. Once it is out then the dreams of what may be will hit the reality of what is actually achievable, so it is in CIGs interest to keep it in alpha for as long as possible imo.

Last I heard VR is back on the discussion board again. . if they manage to add that in i am confident i will get my monies worth out of the game regardless of how close to the "vision" the game ultimately ends up being. For now it looks amazing but limited (the 100 planetary systems seems a looooooooooooooooooooooooong way away. Time will tell.

(as for the 1000 player instances... I am unconvinced but to be fair i really could not give a hoot if that does get chopped.... heck, i would take well made npcs over multiplayer every single time (with bonus points thrown in if i could take my character into a mates instance and have some very low player count coop gameplay to earn some coin)

IMO "100 Star Systems" is not the qualifier for a released Star Citizen, a few will do, Stanton, Pyro, Nyx, Odin, that's a colossal amount of content but it does not mean adding the rest will stop, i think a released Star Citizen would be polished with all its game mechanics and those 4 systems, the rest can be added later.

 

[humbug]

Pyro, this video was made by a fan.

 

[humbug]

I should add Pyro, Nyx and Odin are built and just about ready to go, we are waiting on Server Meshing, testing for the critical part of that starts in about 3 weeks.

 

[bigmike20vt]

I should add Pyro, Nyx and Odin are built and just about ready to go, we are waiting on Server Meshing, testing for the critical part of that starts in about 3 weeks.

well it would get me playing if it gets to a stable point where my progress is safe from wiping (I have bought an entry level package and working my way to something nice, then losing it whilst others keep their bought wit hcash ships would be enough to make me quit) and where the basic game loops are in place............ BUT whilst I fully expect some new content to come online after the game is launched, I think hypothetically IF the game launched with only 5% of the roadmapped systems in game, then the odds of it ever actually getting to 100 would be slim to, practically none.

IF the game launches with under half of the roadmapped systems in the game I think the negative press they would get would be damaging...... which is another reason why imo it is in their interests to delay launching as long as possible - so long as they are still raking it in.

 

[MikeTheNative]

I could see them deciding to go 'live service' route, so official release is before all planned content is in the game. IMO they can get away with some systems missing that were promised.

 

[bigmike20vt]

I could see them deciding to go 'live service' route to official release is before all planned content is in the game. IMO they can get away with systems missing probably that were promised.

So long as they dont go near subs, and the content which was laid out does not become paid extras over and above what i paid for my package...... I would be ok with that personally.

BUT, I dont do subs and generally do not buy games when it is obvious they will get paid expansions unless it is bargain bin prices. I have plenty of games so usually wait until definitive editions come out, or if available i buy game/season passes*** which get me the full content of the game as it releases

*** I realise that the meaning of a season pass has changed since they 1st came about and as such I actually do not buy them any more either unless they are clear that it will cover ALL content for a game....

 

[humbug]

well it would get me playing if it gets to a stable point where my progress is safe from wiping (I have bought an entry level package and working my way to something nice, then losing it whilst others keep their bought wit hcash ships would be enough to make me quit) and where the basic game loops are in place............ BUT whilst I fully expect some new content to come online after the game is launched, I think hypothetically IF the game launched with only 5% of the roadmapped systems in game, then the odds of it ever actually getting to 100 would be slim to, practically none.

IF the game launches with under half of the roadmapped systems in the game I think the negative press they would get would be damaging...... which is another reason why imo it is in their interests to delay launching as long as possible - so long as they are still raking it in.

Some press are always going to be negative because they have already gone down the road of repeatedly saying "Star Citizen will never happen" They said transitioning from space to planet without load screens was impossible, did they write a follow up to say i was wrong? No, instead they just moved on to the next thing to hate on.

As for Star Systems, its not that difficult to get to 100, not all have to be these vast enormously complex environments, Pyro and Nyx are not like Stanton, they have a lot of stuff but its not multiple worlds with huge explorable cities.

As i see it there will only be one, two or maybe three Stanton like systems, maybe 20 or 30 Pyro / Nyx like systems and the rest a bit like our own system minus earth with a few outposts and points of interests.

With the tools they have now if they wanted to build Stanton again from scratch they could do it in a few months, most of Stanton's moons have actually been redone 3X over as they improved tech.

Have you played Elite Dangerous? 18 Billion Star Systems, you know how they did that? They have about a dozen seed planets which are copied billions of times by a procedural engine, sometimes they have different coloured textures.

Star Citizen has infinitely more unique verity in its single star system than through the whole of ED's 18 Billion, which are all just baron rocks, size is not necessarily good, i would rather just have 10 systems, if they are all completely unique.

 

[MoNkeE]

Yeah I think there’s an element of CIG making promises before really considering feasibility, and then the (mostly critics) community unreasonably holding them to these promises. I get nobody wants broken promises, and this may have been the reason people bought the game… but even with the amount of words described above, the game would still have a huge scope and deliver enough content.

 

[bigmike20vt]

I have lost more of my life than I care to mention playing various iterations of the elite franchise. both games have their strengths. one of the things I love about elite dangerous (and the others too) is the scale of it. I see your point about the limits of procedural generation but I guess most of space probably IS samey. I love the stellar forge however and it's realistic orbital mechanics etc. I wish they had invested the same amount of money that SC team are doing.
Elite has lost its way imo. I have my opinions where it has gone wrong but that would be derailing on this thread. It's scale however for me is a positive not a negative.

David Braben and Ian Bell made the most influential game in my life... but I have spent a lot of time in Chris Roberts' games as well over the years. I hope to play both

 

[humbug]

Yeah I think there’s an element of CIG making promises before really considering feasibility, and then the (mostly critics) community unreasonably holding them to these promises. I get nobody wants broken promises, and this may have been the reason people bought the game… but even with the amount of words described above, the game would still have a huge scope and deliver enough content.

CIG are certainly guilty of that, perhaps not deliberately because they are trying to work towards it.

I think the one thing that is very questionable is thousands in a single instance, a few games do that, Planet Side 2 for example, EVE Online, but these are very different games, they are not a first person persistent universe. I think for what Star Citizen is a true MMO is going to be damned near impossible.
CIG have as much admitted this, while also saying they will try.

I would add something about the no loadscreens thing, this really matters for what Star Citizen is, i'll try to explain this best i can, it has full and fully functional ship interiors, ok great you might say but there is more to the game play that brings, this would be pointless if you had loadscreens, if you're piloting a ship that had 20 of your mates in the back doing their own thing you cannot have a loadscreen, you cannot load in to another part of the game if everyone you're taking with you is doing their own thing.
This is why the goal right from day one was "No loadscreens"

Now you might understand the real reason Elite Dangerous Odyssey didn't get ship interiors, everytime you move somewhere at a distance there is a loadscreen, the atmosphere burn to the planet is a loadscreen, therefore no truly dynamic multicrewing, so no need for ship interiors.

 

[bigmike20vt]

Yeah I think there’s an element of CIG making promises before really considering feasibility, and then the (mostly critics) community unreasonably holding them to these promises. I get nobody wants broken promises, and this may have been the reason people bought the game… but even with the amount of words described above, the game would still have a huge scope and deliver enough content.

I disagree about the community being unreasonable for trying to hold developers to their pitch (not just CIG but any).
Old school developers made a game using either their own money or publishers / what ever. they made a game and we bought it or not.

However nowadays we are asked to take a leap of faith, to pay our money and all we have to go on is the pitch. I am not a developer it is not for me to know what is reasonable and what is impossible... but the developers ARE. they should have an idea about what is feasible and what is not. Yes things can change..... I accept that but I am talking small things. if a developer cannot be expected to get in the ballpark of what their pitch is, then they should not be asking for our money imo.
also if there is going to be a major design change in a project from the initial pitch then imo people should be offered a refund as they will no longer be getting the project they backed. (not talking legally necessarily but morally).

I am not talking CIG specifically here btw. Frontier did a bait and switch at the 11th HR on Elite optionally running offline . initially they didn't want to offer refunds. the relented eventually. Not an issue for me but a huge problem for those who only backed because of playing offline.

I really like Peter moleneux and I do not believe he is a fraud deliberately..... but he is a dreamer and he hugely over promises. creative people like that are valuable but they absolutely should not be front men for projects when trying to get money because they basically come accross as snake oil shills.