3.3.5 is coming...

[albert]

I'm in no rush to try this version again.

We struggled to get everyone in the same party and to then be able to see each other's character. Once we were all together on the same ship it went OK. We sought landing permission at our destination planet but before Albert could dock ... the bay doors closed! On a subsequent request they opened again but Albert was a bit too keen to get in before they possibly closed on us again. Mayhem ensued.

It's buggy/glitchy but is very pretty and the promise of an exceptional multiplayer environment is most obviously present.

Before you dismiss the opportunity to try this again OB, go on alone and complete a few missions. They're good fun, particularly the ones where you go to a ruined station and collect a prize or repair something. It's even better in a group of 2 as one can watch your back whilst you complete.

[smilodon]

Agree with OB, it's nice to fly around  for a while, but is still bug ridden and ultimately there's very little to do. What missions can be taken are a lottery to complete as often the mission is bugged or an NPC won't react to allow the mission to complete or continue. With a limited amount of gaming time there are many, many games I enjoy playing now, rather than struggling with an Alpha stage tech demo. Also as games improve I don't think the graphic are really all that amazing when compared with a lot of other modern games. Yes they look sumptuous but so do a lot of other games coming out now. Cyberpunk 2077 looks equally as good as SC (better IMHO) and seems to be getting ready for a 2019 launch. In 'x' number of years when Star Citizen launches I wonder if it will look very special at all.

Penfold, I stand to be corrected but your Freelancer seems to be part of your game package I'm not sure if it can be exchanged without losing access to Squadron 42 and Star Citizen.

When you 'exchange' the Freelancer you convert it into store credits. You can then spend the credit on a new ship/s. However you will have exchanged your two game packages as well (Squadron 42 (single player game) and Star Citizen (multiplayer game). So in effect you no longer have access to the actual single player game (when it launches) and the multiplayer game now. You will have to spend some of your credit getting these packages back. The price of the base games went up some years ago so you will effectively waste some credits buying them back. It used to be about £30-40 for both games. Now they are that price each. A new game package comes with a single seater starter ship as part of the deal. But you then probably won't have much cash left to replace the Freelancer with anything useful.

You can 'upgrade' the Freelancer to something more expensive rather than 'exchanging' it and keep all the extras. Upgrades take the game packages with them. That's up to you but I'd be wary of giving any more money to Star Citizen and frankly the Freelancer is a very decent ship for messing about in the Alpha, doing little cargo runs, exploring etc. Personally I'd stick with it.

[Penfold]

Ahh thanks. That's makes it a lot clearer. Thanks for the heads-up
Appreciated.

[albert]

I had a brief discussion about progress in SC with Gal and Sith after our jolly the other night.

I’m inclined to agree that an Alpha is not the time to add content such as detailed missions or quality of life functionality. It’s all about delivering a stable MVP that can be built upon. I believe they are close to that and adding content is a formality afterwards.

Developing a story line and incorporating new missions can easily be brought in on top of a stable platform. A dev team need to focus on priorities and just because the backer community doesn’t get all they want initially, this focus ultimately delivers more quality in the medium term.

I also feel many of the community don’t own the right spec of PC to properly appreciate the quality of visuals and character innovations.

[sulky_uk]

i spun up SC for the first time since 2016 the other night and partook in the picture opportunity.

Thoughts from me

I spent £40 odd on a ship in i think was Jan 14, i was hoping that the game would be finished by now, i certainly didn't expect it to still be in beta now. I thought that the group mechanics didn't work very well, ppl appeared offline when online, and some couldn't join our instance. the controls were very un-intuitive, it would be nice to have a tool tip thing pop up to tell you what things did, rather than guess.

the glitches were comical, i would have expected while in a ship you couldn't fall out of it into warp, well some did and died. even galactic emporium got that right!!

i must admit the gfx were great, but a nice game doesn't make a good game, think ill wait another year or so.....

[Obsydian]

I’d like to put the record straight and correct a few erroneous comments I’ve seen made:

It's been in development for 5 years...
The game has been in development for nearly 6 years now (not 5 or, as the demented DS often states depending upon the phase of the moon, 7 or .  So why is it not “done” yet?  The average AAA game takes approx. 7 years to make, and often those 7 years aren’t enough, and the developer is forced to ship an incomplete and/or buggy game at the behest of the publisher, and then has to release patch after patch to ‘finish’ the game.  E.g. Team Fortress 2 took 9 years to make!  And that’s with a limited number of players, on very small maps, using cartoon-quality graphics, and it does only one thing: FPS.  By that yard stick, if it takes another 3 years to finish Star Citizen, it still would have only taken the same amount of time as Team Fortress 2, and yet will be a much more varied game.
The other point that people often forget is that as of 6 years ago CIG didn’t exist.  Most AAA games take 7 years to develop, but frequently that’s by an established studio, complete with teams of employees already in place, and usually assets from a previous incarnation of the next game to draw from (CoD, I’m looking at you), but CIG had none of that.  They started with about 6 people coding on second-hand machines in someone’s dining room!  They had to hire new people, rent new premises, buy equipment, etc. before they could even get started on the real development, and then have to build on that over the next 5 years, expanding as the scope of the game expanded.  In short, they had to build a studio at the same time as trying to build not one, but two games, involving developing technology that has never been been used in gaming before!  So to be where we are with the development after just 6 years is actually bloody impressive, if you ask me.
 
300 employees - what are they doing?
CIG now employs over 500 people (not 300), across 4 studios in 3 countries.  What are they all doing?  Well, the complete list would be too long, but as a flavour:

• Ship concept artists.
• Ship designers.
• Ship 3D artists.
• Ship animation programmers.
• weapon concept artists.
• Weapon designers.
• Weapon 3D artists.
• Weapon animation programmers.
• Gameplay programmers.
• Clothing concept artists.
• Clothing 3D designers.
• UI designers.
• UI programmers.
• VFX programmers.
• Sound programmers.
• Character animators.
• Rigging.
• Animation and mo-cap teams.
• Physics programmers.
• Biome designers.
• Network engineers.
• Tools programmers.
• Lore writers.
• QA Testers.
• Etc.

From the beginning, CIG pledged to develop the game in an open forum, warts and all â€" we get to see a game developed from the ground up and take shape gradually over the years.  On the RSI forums back in 2013, when everyone was bleating on about the game coming out in 2014, I said that based on the scope of the game as I understood it back then, it was unlikely to be finished by 2016, and that 2018 was a more reasonable target.  I got slated for it.  But most of those people don’t have 35+ years experience of development like I did.  Game development often involves many twists and turns, and it is extremely common for development to change tack as it goes, dropping features once thought mandatory, introducing features that were thought impossible, or even starting the development all over again from the scratch, not just once or twice, but sometimes more!  Watching “the sausage being made” isn’t necessarily pleasant, and many people are not suited to that â€" and I would recommend that those people buy the game, don’t install it, and wait until it goes live before playing.  Basically, anyone who complains about the amount of time it has taken for CIG to get to this point really doesn’t understand game development, and needs to uninstall the game, go and play something else, and come back once it’s ready.
 
It should be better than this, it's in beta after all.
The game is currently in ALPHA (Chris Roberts frequently refers to it as pre-alpha), not Beta.  Alpha is where features are still being added to the game, beta is where the game is “feature complete” but not yet content complete.  Most of the content will be added during beta â€" again, this is very common in game development, and players tend not to get invites to play the game until beta, by which time most, if not all, of the features are already present.  Currently we are at the stage where features are still being designed, coded and added, but some content is being added and used as a test-bed for the features.  It’s the reason we’re still limited to just the one system and one planet right now â€" they have to get those working properly before expanding, but once that expansion starts, it will be very quick.  Again, if you don’t understand this then you need to step back and wait at least for beta.  In my opinion, I believe we’re looking at going into beta some time in 2020, with a go live somewhere around 2022 â€" so if you don’t have the stomach for it, wait until then before trying the game again.
 

Lack of content?  Nothing to do?  Seriously?
Since 3.0 â€" so basically the last 12 months â€" we’ve had:

• A new planet, a major industrial city and 7 moons to explore.
• Several “truck stops” to explore, refuel and repair at.
• Mining on planets, moons and space.
• Buying and selling of commodities.
• Courier missions.
• Combat missions.
• AI in FPS and Space
• Quantum Interdictions.
• FOIP
• VOIP
• 4 driveable ground vehicles.
• 3 driveable hover bikes.
• At least 6 new flyable ships.
• Reworks of 2 lines of ships.
• New ship weapons.
• New FPS weapons.
• New clothing.
• Renting and buying of ships in game (no need to buy any with real money from now on).

Yes, it’s a glitch-fest, it’s bug-ridden, there are crashes and things that don’t work…but that’s because it’s ALPHA…it is NOT a completed game!  But that’s not to say you can’t have some fun with it.
 
So, in closing, I guess I would like to ask that we discuss the game’s shortcomings as they stand now, refrain as far as possible from simply being negative, and try to promote a positive message about where the game is going.

[TeaLeaf]

I hope people will not be offended, but I took the admin liberty of editing this thread to put it back on track, as think we lost the will to live at some point.

Play nice, be happy and enjoy. :cheers::dmw:

[albert]

@Obsydian, well put Sir!

[Obsydian]

@Obsydian, well put Sir!

Don't thank me - thank TeaLeaf - he did all the editing!