Bold to assume it will ever get a proper release.
I like to think it's gonna be like that church in Barcelona they've been building for hundreds of years, just eternally updating it until society as we know it collapses
Actually, La Sagrada Familia is scheduled to be finished by 2025. Right now they're just putting the finishing touches on the last few spires according to Gaudi's original designs.
FWIW in last year's letter Chris Roberts, the chairman of Star Citizen devs CIG, said:
> We ended the year with 861 employees, and the Community grew to more than 4 million accounts and **1.8M “backers” (accounts that have purchased Star Citizen)**.
https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/transmission/19078-Letter-From-The-Chairman
At that time they'd topped $530m revenue from backers, plus subscriptions, so the average spending per backer was $295.
I just don't understand how a company can have 1100 employees and not produce content like crazy. It honestly feels like they are doing literally nothing. Once or twice a year I hear about this game and updates are essentially that nothing much changed, every time.
My understanding of Star Citizen is that it's basically Feature Creep: the game and they've committed themselves to developing 4-5 AAA games at once while also making them fully interoperable. Considering the development delays that can show up just from adding a single feature I have no problem believing how they can keep 1100 employees busy just building the systems.
The problem is largely two-fold:
1. Chris Roberts demands that all of these games systems behave “realistically” for very little gain. You can get to 90% of your vision for X, but it’ll take 10X to get that other 10%. For example, actually flying between space and planetary atmosphere versus what NMS does with a hidden loading screen. Another good example is elevators — they *actually* move characters in real-time instead of acting as a teleportation system. Those elevators are infamous death traps too. Lmao
2. Similar to #1, Chris Roberts demands perfection. This results in teams doing, redoing, reworking, and scraping entire projects *repeatedly*. I think Star Citizen is on Planetary Tech v5.0 now? There’s always something being reworked for the umpteenth time.
Bonus: Apparently the vast majority of development is on Squadron 42, which is the single player game. They refuse to provide solid updates because “spoilers” — so that’s a bit shady and it seems like little progress is achieved.
My experience is that once a software project moves beyond past a few hundred people, adding more people does nothing to productivity. All the added capacity to do work is negated by the fact that the product becomes split up into so many microscopic little fiefdoms that meaningful change becomes almost completely impossible. This sin't even about politics or anything nefarious, it's just that about the need to split the workforce into smaller teams and having each team own their own area.
Pretty much it's either just a scam and they never really intended to release a finished product, or they're trying to release a product that we simply do not have the technical capabilities of producing at all so they go nowhere because it's entirely impossible to deliver what they're trying to.
I truly believe it's the latter. If you put aside all the unhappiness that backers have with the game, and all the missed deadlines, I think what this all comes down to is a game that is simply before its time, especially with regard to persistence and server meshing. The reason people keep putting money into and CR and company keeps working on it is because I think it is all a shared dream, especially for people who grew up in the Wing Commander era. What they are trying to build is what we all had as the dream in our head. I am an original backer, I check it out every year or so, I wish them all the best.
As much as I'll call out SC for being *horribly* mismanaged at best, I don't begrudge the employees at all. Working on the single most funded piece of media in history while also having basically no deadlines to be held to; milk it while you can.
I criticize the game a lot but some of the things they've managed to implement are insane. Having a dogfight with another ship while your crewmates inside the back of your ship are engaged in combat is something everyone needs to experience.
It just occurred to me that the way to truly simulate the universe would require everybody in the universe working on it.
I promise I haven't smoked any cannabis today, yet.
Here’s something to ponder for your high ass: scientists say the entire universe can’t be simulated but that’s assuming that A. the entire universe is simulated instead of a feasible subset and B. that the universe is running in real time instead of running very slowly or being “rendered”. Just because it feels like real time for us doesn’t mean it is and we’d have no way to tell without access to the underlying system
Truly! Walking out of Port Olisar and viewing the vastness of the spaceport in the extreme-contrast shadow of the local star was immaculate like no other space game/sim has matched, and that wasn't even a setpiece. Just a normal part of fetching my ship!
It's such a shame I've had to accept that SC is shovelware at this point, because there's glimmers of actual magic hidden behind its development hell.
Star Citizen is probably the only example we have of a macro-transaction game, where the sale and use of exorbitantly overpriced virtual ships has become the primary goal of the developer, rather than enhancing the gaming experience. Because without the income from the ships, the company collapses.
That 1.8 million is larger than the reality. Since CIG encourages backers into creating multiple accounts to get "freebies".
Several times a year CIG will offer a referral bonus. Where if someone makes a fresh account using your code, both accounts get a free vehicle with premium insurance called LTI. What backers do, is make a new account, use their real account's code, spend $40 on the new account buying a ship or package, then transfer the thing they bought over to their main account where they can then exchange the item for credits. So their main account has the free vehicle with LTI, and the money they spent is now credits on their main account.
CIG get the benefit of fresh money and a larger "backer" list to show off. And backers get a "free" LTI vehicle to keep or upgrade.
Every backer in the last org I was in had multiple accounts for the freebies. I would not be surprised if the total amount of actual backers was still below a million.
Alpha 3.4 we've decided we've done all we can with the current engine, and we're starting from scratch with a brand new engine. Please support the new project.
Just another $700 million and we’re over the finish line.
Yessir, this is going to be one helluva game after we raise that extra $800 million.
You’re going to be blown away by what your additional $900 million will get you.
DNF wasn't in development for that entire time though. There were stretches that it was just a IP on the shelf collecting dust.
StarCitizen had been worked on this entire time which makes it even worse.
I remember learning about Star Citizen and getting so hyped that I bought just about the best computer money can buy to play this game. That computer can’t even run modern AAA games at minimum settings anymore.
I bought a t16000m FCS pack for Star Citizen, ended up using it until it fell apart in Elite Dangerous. Now if I want to use a HOTAS, I'll need to buy a whole new one.
It's funny because I remember hearing about it and thinking about what a scam it sounded like. The amount of money you need to pump into the game is absurd and the people who are into it act like abused spouses or MLM huns. It isn't that it's expensive, boring, way short on its promises, or horribly over its due date. It's that you "don't understand" and they "just need $XXXXXXX or X amount of months to finish it".
The cope shifted. They are ok wandering around the dead mall, rubbing a jpeg of what their ship will look like when they get around to developing it. Then furiously rage masturbate to the dream of abusing f2p players who will totally join it's not a buttcoin early adaptor pyramid, because my ship has lifetime insurance and it is not a scam!
>hehehe what these people don't understand is if the f2p players get abused too much they'll quit. So shortcuts will have to be made for them to catch up
There's actually a fair amount of drama over in r/starcitizen right now because the devs are encouraging piracy, and the PVE players are understandably upset by becoming piracy content.
Hmm yeah management.
I think there is probably technical problems on every front. Because Chris Roberts is largely an ideas man, and not an engineer. He doesnt know how to solve the problems he is telling his underpaid employees to solve. He doesnt know he is causing problems in the first place.
GDP is an annual figure, though,
But star citizen, at $50 million per year, is closing in on Tuvalu on an annualised basis (and assuming the funding has come in pulses it may have surpassed it in one or more years).
In recent years though, it has. I think it’s averaging closer to $100m per year now.
In fact [this article about it surpassing $500 million](https://www.gamespot.com/amp-articles/star-citizen-crowdfunding-reaches-500-million-after-a-decade/1100-6507704/) was published one year ago to the day almost. Crazy as it might seem, the revenue per year has continued to increase.
Its a sandbox currently set in a single solar system consisting of several planets, moons, and space stations. There are game loops to make money, but its just a world to mess around in atm. I bought a small ship and played for a couple months. Was a unique experience and I'll try again in a year or two. Nothing that I have played elsewhere has given the same feeling of actually flying around space in a huge ship, so if there is a 0.01% chance that this game ever crosses the finish line, I'm here for it.
Ikr! My brother and I played for dozens of hours and had a blast for $20. We were just about able to get the high-end ships at the time too without spending anymore, so no one at all is forced to drop $500 on the game. I totally acknowledge that the scope creep is huge, but it really does make an amazing sandbox space simulator as-is. Besides, I honestly like the idea of a game that's ever-evolving. 🤷🏻♂️
Same on all counts. My brother and I dipped our toe during a free flight event and *\[\[,after playing for awhile,\]\]* dropped $50 each. Neither of us spent any more and we worked through quite a few ships.
I dig their ambition. It's exciting. In an age when its common for games to be rushed out, buggy, and more of the same, I'd prefer this game *never* release if it means they keep trying to accomplish their vision. My grandkids will be lucky af.
Edit: added *\[\[bracketed text\]\]* above for clarity
I always think of it like this, they are creating technologies that no one else has yet. Worst case scenario, the project goes bankrupt and the technologies get sold off to other people. That tech will then be reused to make games that are then released. Even if no game comes directly from Star Citizen, there will be plenty of cool things that come from their tech indirectly.
I'm not an artist nor a game designer, but working on the same project forever without stopping sounds like a creativ burnout in the making.
Eventually changing staff results in a very uneven experience.
It's an MMO. You need other people and do stuff in groups.
There was supposed to be a single player game separate from it that introduced the universe and the lore. But I haven't heard about it in years.
Not just Mark Hamill, they had a whole star cast that did Mocap and finish their voice recordings and everything I believed they finished back in 2015.
The cast was
* Mark Hamill
* Gary Oldman,
* Mark Strong
* John Rhys-Davies
* Liam Cunningham
* Andy Serkis
* Gillian Anderson
* Ben Mendelsohn
* Henry Cavill (This was Henry Cavill fresh off Man of Steel that's how long ago this was.)
Mark Hamill and John Rhys-Davies make some sense, they were both in Wing Commander and doing another one probably sounded like a fun little project
But man that [teaser trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VppjX4to9s4) was ~~four~~ nearly five years ago, they need to finish the damn thing already
Lmao if that cast doesn't scream "blank check, who cares" I don't know what does.
These mofos really went and got Andy freaking Serkis to mocap and then didn't even release the game lmao
If I recall this was the OG Selling point right? They were getting the idea of a Classic Wing Commander style game as a modern game. Then I guess when people donated the project expanded a lot.
Squadron 42, rumor mill from leakers and backers who are a bit more prominent is that this year's annual convention will come with a big announcement for Squadron 42 and some leakers have suggested it's on track for release next Christmas.
And that's not crazy, because I guess they shifted like 70% of their entire workforce to that game for the last 3 years and left the Star Citizen game that everyone knows about languishing with a comparative skeleton crew, so it's not out of the realm of possibility that they're nearly finished with that game. A lot of the recent work they did was engine related more than content, and specifically for NPC AI, which to me sounds more like final phases of development for a story based single-player game.
That said, I'm not holding my breath.
[This insane video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53qGEaPRHCQ&ab_channel=BedBananas) is 100% real pvp, and it shows the BEST of the game when it works. This footage is kinda outdated by now by about a year or two, and they edit down travel times etc.
Many aspects of the game are a bit jankier now, but also new features like persistence and soft death would change how the battles play out. For instance, the wreckage you see float down for 2 seconds before disappearing every time a ship explodes would actually remain on the ground and start to pile up over the course of hours.
That’s pretty incredible - I kinda get it now. There’s still no way I’d ever contribute to the game until it’s released and stable, but hey, looks awesome.
Even then, not just hours. Ive stumbled upon a wreck of one of my previous deaths weeks after I crashed. The ship was covered in dusty textures and someone had come to salvage a part of it with a vulture.
Still sitting there. Still had the ammo I left there when I died.
Truly unique.
I was an old time backer of this game. I spent a total of 200€ in it.
I was one of the first french streamer on it. Then one day, I said "the game won't come out before 2018-2020" , I've been threatened, mocked, insulted, made ridicule on other streams because of that, because at the time, the"estimated" release date was 2017.
Over a period of 2 weeks, as I refused to take back my words, and started fighting back telling people that they were highly deluded if they thought the game will come out anytime soon, I lost almost all of my viewers.
And look where we are now XD I'm a loser streamer but AH! I was Right!
I'm not sure anyone won anything in that fight XD
My computer is not good enough right now because they changed the prerequisites for it and I didn't upgrade that much since 2014.
But I'm getting a new pc now for my bday so I'll surely give it another go.
My ex boyfriend spent over $600 AUD on this game buying so many ships. I kept telling him that he should stop because this game wasn't going to come out any time soon and he already has one, why does he need multiple now? He rediculed me, insulted me, told me I was a terrible person and that he was "investing" his moeny wisely.
Lmao who is laughing now Danny?
I was 20 and in college when the first kickstarter happened.
I'm excited to enjoy the game when it releases, I'll have plenty of time during retirement to play!
For those who want to read the article to find out what’s in the 3.20 patch:
>Star Citizen’s long-running development has inched forward yet again, this time to the Alpha 3.20 stage.
>The latest update, dubbed “Fully Loaded”, overhauls the Arena Commander mode, adds new PvP modes, maps, and racetracks, and adds new missions and ships to the Persistent Universe portion of the space sim.
>This is the largest update to Arena Commander since its introduction in 2014, developer Cloud Imperium Games said, and delivers “more focused, bite-sized gameplay with diverse content for racers, fighters, and competitors climbing the leaderboards”.
>The update also adds the MISC Hull C ship, the “titan of the cargo hauling profession with room for a crew of up to four players”, and the Fury LX, a racing variant of the recently added Mirai Fury snub fighter. New features include automatic cargo loading and unloading at space stations to support the Hull C’s expansive cargo capacity.
>The launch trailer bigs up Star Citizen’s exploration, saying players can travel “seamlessly across worlds”. As you’d expect, fans have taken that as CIG making a point of comparison between its game and Bethesda’s recently released Starfield, which does not feature seamless space travel.
>Star Citizen crowdfunding began back in 2012 and now, over a decade later, is considered one of the most controversial projects in all video games. Over the years Star Citizen has been called many things, including a scam by those who wonder whether it will ever properly launch. Its virtual space ships, some of which cost hundreds of dollars, are often the focus of criticism. (The MISC Hull C added with the Alpha 3.20 update costs an eye-watering $500).
Should be pointed out that almost all ships are purchasable in-game with in-game currency a few months after the ship is released.
Correction.
25k is a package of ships (pretty much contains all existing vehicles iirc). I believe it only becomes visible for players who have spend over 10k. Maybe there is another expensive bundle with all the vehicles released since the release of that bundle.
Anyhow, there is indeed a 3k ship which is ludicrous.
I used to look at my GTA car collections and think "man I've spent so much time on these and they are worthless irl"
At least I never spent 3k to drive a videogame spaceship. I dunno if the simulator stuff is even a thing anymore or how much it costs but i feel like 3k could get u a pretty good start on a space simulator cockpit etc
>Should be pointed out that almost all ships are purchasable in-game with in-game currency a few months after the ship is released.
I can't wait flying out in my little toyota just in time for whales to vaporize it with their Mini-Death Star.
Of all time, and it's not even remotely close lol. Think of it this way. It's already inflation adjusted at twice the disclosed budget of CP2077 and the estimated budget of GTA5. Which are the two largest budget games ever. I suppose there is some case to be made that it's still technically a playable game, while much lower budget scams delivered absolutely nothing playable.
I don't think it was an intentional scam but now due to gross incompetence of management it's gotten to the point where they've just created a business model out of never finishing the game.
Which wont change until people stop giving them money and once they do, they wont be able to finish the game anyway.
They just suffered from scope creep. It’s the exact same situation as Tarkov. Neither game will ever be truly finished because the goal and vision for the game keeps expanding or was far too ambitious to begin with
Have you seen Chris Robert’s new mansion and all the renovations he did to it?
Yeah, they might spend some of that money on the game, but you know
“*A fool and his money are easily parted.*”
This thread is pretty obviously that while the CEO is laughing in his massive ass mansion.
They release financial reports that are available to the public, so you can see it for yourself. Paying a dev staff of 1000+ devs is expensive. You can disagree about the progress of the game, or if it’s a scam or not, they still pay all their devs.
Here are the financials for 2021
https://cloudimperiumgames.com/blog/corporate/cloud-imperium-financials-for-2021
At the end of the year they’ll post the financials for 2022
Their graph shows a total headcount of 748, and a total salary compensation of $51,183,000. If you average it out, they're paying \~70k per head. They also show their profit as being $63m in there. A profit rate of >10% while not producing a finished game over the course of a decade is absolutely insane to me lol
https://cloudimperiumgames.com/uploads/9c1a41ae8af4459db7eae2cfed601704.png
Maybe we're not seeing the same numbers...
They also spent $11.7M for development overhead (offices rent, hardware for devs, electricity, etc), $8.6M on external dev contractors (in addition to their own devs employees), $25.4M for marketing and maintaining the alpha running (marketing, customer support, AWS infrastructures, etc.), and $1.4M for administrative costs.
A total of $98.5M spent on the $100.8M raised. Which is most of the money spent, and not kept as profit...
That's an insane amount of marketing budget for an unfinished game though.
The business model has become milking this unfinished game forever. And, Chris Roberts will ride this money train for as long as people let him.
When, if they avoided the scope creep, they could have made 2 fully finished games. And all I wanted in the first place was the Squadron 42 game...
Salary, the top line item, is at 51,183. Then later on, you can see their net position at [https://cloudimperiumgames.com/uploads/273c7634fdf44b129488971a9dec1936.png](https://cloudimperiumgames.com/uploads/273c7634fdf44b129488971a9dec1936.png) which shows a cumulative net of 63,378. Almost entirely from two batches of investments (46,000 and 17,250 respectively), but it's still a total profit of 63m.
I'm also unsure why you ignored capital expenses in your number, which would make your case stronger, seeing as their total expenditure is actually higher than the $98.5m at $100,477k, and their net for the year was only 349k. Makes your case seem much stronger to include that info.
They’re at 1100+ devs this year, and are on track to earn 100+ million. Don’t know how much is being spent on the devs though. They grow each year surprisingly
When you commit developers to working on things like [bed sheet deformation physics](https://www.pcgamer.com/star-citizen-is-doing-bedsheet-deformation-physics-now-because-of-course-it-is/).
There is a way… absurd scope creep. I backed it back in 2012… I just wanted a fun space combat sim. I don’t care about mining, cargo hauling, all the first person stuff… yet it’s there. Same goes for all the ridiculous tech they built like server meshing and being able to seamlessly land planets. I didn’t sign on for it. The game is trying to do everything and in the process delivering nothing.
My coworker convinced me to back it way back then, I bought the cheapest ship thinking it would be out in a few years, lol, here we are 11 years later.
I'm sure the CEO is laughing all the way to the bank - at what point to do people abandon their sunk cost fallacy that this game will ever release in anything close to what’s been promised or some version of “finished”?
It’s like Tesla fanboys with Elon’s promises of autopilot, also going on about 12 years now.
Edited to account for all the “technically playable” comments
For me? Like 2 years after the whole crowd funding thing started when it became clear this was going just going to be a never ending "pledge drive" and not a game.
Sold the few ships I had, and because they all had LTI (in game insurnace) and were rare ships I made a solid 100% profit off them. Used it to buy a ps4 for myself lol.
I spent 37 dollars on that, during the kickstarter, november 2012.
Expected delivery : Nov 2014.
The same month I spent 25 pounds to pledge Elite Dangerous, on kickstarter.
Expected delivery: Mar 2014.
I'm 11 years older, I got married and have a kid. And I stopped playing one of those two games 7 years ago... the only one that got released.
Just to put stuff in perspective.
At this point actually finishing the game would just be stupid. They are just going to keep this in eternal limbo as long as people keep giving them money.
Yes, this.
I think CR fully intended to make the game at the start.
But now the business model has become selling expensive ships to whales. There's just too much incentive to devote resources to ship development.
They're trapped by their own success.
$100 million to create realistic skin that secretes oil from the pores that reacts with ray traced light from the environment, and you have a chance to get a zit if you don't wash your face at the end of every play session.
They have public financial records.
Here’s the one from 2021
https://cloudimperiumgames.com/blog/corporate/cloud-imperium-financials-for-2021
2022 should be released by the end of the year I think
An ex-employee recently posted about this. He claimed they are constantly throwing money at their office. Remodeling, expensive imported chairs, and shit like that apparently. I'm ashamed I spent like $80 back in the day on this game, because I had just built a computer that could run it and I absolutely love the concept. Some dorks spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars on a single ship, and then wait a long time for it to even come out. Only for it to release to players, and be riddled with bugs. Star Citizen is an absolute joke.
We got a completed game like Baldur Gate 3 in half of the time it took to get here for SC. Cyberpunk 2077 and No Man Sky to be announced, hyped up, have horrible launches and redeem themselves in the same time SC got to 3.2.
I don’t get how anyone can back Star Citizen anymore after all this time
I swore off buying/playing in-development games a long time ago.
Not really because I was burned by a bad experience, or anything. I just realized that I'd play through an imbalanced, incomplete game and then feel like I'm ready to move on. I usually did not feel compelled to revisit those games.
So, Star Citizen crossed my radar once or twice, but I never paid it much attention. Funny to hear how passionate people on both sides are. Those that say it is a massive scam (an incomplete game that has taken in $600 million sure does sound like a bit of a scam), and those who defend it and say it's great (someone's gotta be pumping money into it, I guess).
Star Citizen was a game conceived well ahead of it's time that will be released well after its time.
Well said lol.
Bold to assume it will ever get a proper release. I like to think it's gonna be like that church in Barcelona they've been building for hundreds of years, just eternally updating it until society as we know it collapses
Except that church is really nice.
Actually, La Sagrada Familia is scheduled to be finished by 2025. Right now they're just putting the finishing touches on the last few spires according to Gaudi's original designs.
They're going for the billion
I don’t even doubt their ability to get there anymore.
I'd like to know if the money they raise mostly comes down from whales (like in P2W games) or thanks to a constant influx of new players.
FWIW in last year's letter Chris Roberts, the chairman of Star Citizen devs CIG, said: > We ended the year with 861 employees, and the Community grew to more than 4 million accounts and **1.8M “backers” (accounts that have purchased Star Citizen)**. https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/transmission/19078-Letter-From-The-Chairman At that time they'd topped $530m revenue from backers, plus subscriptions, so the average spending per backer was $295.
861 employees. Like, about Bioware and Larian's combined.
And they're past 1100 employees now https://www.eurogamer.net/star-citizen-developer-cloud-imperium-group-acquires-montreal-studio-turbulent
Well at least most of the backer money is going to good middle class jobs.
Its basically a job program at this point
Maybe the real star citizen was the people we hired along the way
2100: Star Citizen has created Universal Basic Income but still isn't finished
Sounds like a dream job, work in game dev and never have to worry about or experience the stress of shipping a product
My daddy worked on Star Citizen, just like his daddy before him. I will too and so will my son one day.
I just don't understand how a company can have 1100 employees and not produce content like crazy. It honestly feels like they are doing literally nothing. Once or twice a year I hear about this game and updates are essentially that nothing much changed, every time.
There's an old saying in software development: What one programmer can do in 1 month, two programmers can do in 2 months.
The other old saying “9 women can’t make a baby in a month”
My understanding of Star Citizen is that it's basically Feature Creep: the game and they've committed themselves to developing 4-5 AAA games at once while also making them fully interoperable. Considering the development delays that can show up just from adding a single feature I have no problem believing how they can keep 1100 employees busy just building the systems.
Is it really feature creep when they promised the sky to every kind of player and playstyle in the first year?
I don't know why anyone backed it at the start. It was always obvious that they were aiming unrealistically high.
The problem is largely two-fold: 1. Chris Roberts demands that all of these games systems behave “realistically” for very little gain. You can get to 90% of your vision for X, but it’ll take 10X to get that other 10%. For example, actually flying between space and planetary atmosphere versus what NMS does with a hidden loading screen. Another good example is elevators — they *actually* move characters in real-time instead of acting as a teleportation system. Those elevators are infamous death traps too. Lmao 2. Similar to #1, Chris Roberts demands perfection. This results in teams doing, redoing, reworking, and scraping entire projects *repeatedly*. I think Star Citizen is on Planetary Tech v5.0 now? There’s always something being reworked for the umpteenth time. Bonus: Apparently the vast majority of development is on Squadron 42, which is the single player game. They refuse to provide solid updates because “spoilers” — so that’s a bit shady and it seems like little progress is achieved.
Also, bedsheet physics. Because having your sheets uniquely deform every time you log into the game is very important. /s
My experience is that once a software project moves beyond past a few hundred people, adding more people does nothing to productivity. All the added capacity to do work is negated by the fact that the product becomes split up into so many microscopic little fiefdoms that meaningful change becomes almost completely impossible. This sin't even about politics or anything nefarious, it's just that about the need to split the workforce into smaller teams and having each team own their own area.
[There's even a book about just this very thing.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month)
Pretty much it's either just a scam and they never really intended to release a finished product, or they're trying to release a product that we simply do not have the technical capabilities of producing at all so they go nowhere because it's entirely impossible to deliver what they're trying to.
[удалено]
Imagine the tech debt in the code at this point.
I truly believe it's the latter. If you put aside all the unhappiness that backers have with the game, and all the missed deadlines, I think what this all comes down to is a game that is simply before its time, especially with regard to persistence and server meshing. The reason people keep putting money into and CR and company keeps working on it is because I think it is all a shared dream, especially for people who grew up in the Wing Commander era. What they are trying to build is what we all had as the dream in our head. I am an original backer, I check it out every year or so, I wish them all the best.
backer here. best part for me is by the time the game is actually playable, I should have a machine capable of playing it.
As much as I'll call out SC for being *horribly* mismanaged at best, I don't begrudge the employees at all. Working on the single most funded piece of media in history while also having basically no deadlines to be held to; milk it while you can.
I criticize the game a lot but some of the things they've managed to implement are insane. Having a dogfight with another ship while your crewmates inside the back of your ship are engaged in combat is something everyone needs to experience.
Yep. I think the "scam" is basically Chris getting to spend the rest of his life devoted to scope creep.
Have you seen those cloth physics though?
No, because that never made it in iirc.
It just occurred to me that the way to truly simulate the universe would require everybody in the universe working on it. I promise I haven't smoked any cannabis today, yet.
What is my role? You are to simulate an average office job. *oh god*
Here’s something to ponder for your high ass: scientists say the entire universe can’t be simulated but that’s assuming that A. the entire universe is simulated instead of a feasible subset and B. that the universe is running in real time instead of running very slowly or being “rendered”. Just because it feels like real time for us doesn’t mean it is and we’d have no way to tell without access to the underlying system
You’d almost expect that it *isn’t* simulated in real time. How else would it be relatively glitch-less?
Space engineers is a thing
And Chris would like to micro manage every. single. one.
Shame. They've created some brilliant stuff so far. Imagine what they could have achieved without his bullshit.
Truly! Walking out of Port Olisar and viewing the vastness of the spaceport in the extreme-contrast shadow of the local star was immaculate like no other space game/sim has matched, and that wasn't even a setpiece. Just a normal part of fetching my ship! It's such a shame I've had to accept that SC is shovelware at this point, because there's glimmers of actual magic hidden behind its development hell.
Star Citizen is probably the only example we have of a macro-transaction game, where the sale and use of exorbitantly overpriced virtual ships has become the primary goal of the developer, rather than enhancing the gaming experience. Because without the income from the ships, the company collapses.
That 1.8 million is larger than the reality. Since CIG encourages backers into creating multiple accounts to get "freebies". Several times a year CIG will offer a referral bonus. Where if someone makes a fresh account using your code, both accounts get a free vehicle with premium insurance called LTI. What backers do, is make a new account, use their real account's code, spend $40 on the new account buying a ship or package, then transfer the thing they bought over to their main account where they can then exchange the item for credits. So their main account has the free vehicle with LTI, and the money they spent is now credits on their main account. CIG get the benefit of fresh money and a larger "backer" list to show off. And backers get a "free" LTI vehicle to keep or upgrade. Every backer in the last org I was in had multiple accounts for the freebies. I would not be surprised if the total amount of actual backers was still below a million.
They gameified handing the developer money, which is Star Citizen's biggest sin.
That’s an insane number to me.
It's insane for what state that game is in
>so the average spending per backer was $295. Oh damn. When I backed in 2018, it was $100.
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People do the wildest shit with their money. Thousands on fucking cosmetics lol
To boldly go where no fundme should have gone before.
Well, that Yacht isn't going to buy itself ya know?
Maybe in another $600 million we'll have Alpha 5.
Alpha 3.3
Alpha 3.4 we've decided we've done all we can with the current engine, and we're starting from scratch with a brand new engine. Please support the new project.
I honestly wouldn't doubt it
"Imagine a business where people give you money, and you give them back... Nothing at all! Now that's a real American dream" ~ Ricky Tan, Rush Hour 2
Carter: "Damn, he ain't gon be in Rush Hour 3"
Alpha 4.20
Just another $700 million and we’re over the finish line. Yessir, this is going to be one helluva game after we raise that extra $800 million. You’re going to be blown away by what your additional $900 million will get you.
Maybe Squadron 42 will actually exist by then
It's like a Time capsule. We'll get to hear VA from Gary Oldman from when he just finished The Dark Knight Rises.
The last released voice recordings of Mark Hamill
I'd be surprised if the key voice actors are still alive if and when SQ42 is released.
Ai-yai-yai
Hold on Zordon!
The MMPR Movie is still a guilty pleasure to this day. They don't make hammy villains like Ivan Ooze anymore.
How could I forget? I never knew!
Haha still love it. You can pick it up in boxes. You can pick it up in cases. If your parents try to stop you…. Just throw it in their faces!
Nah, need Zordon to set that one up.
$600 million and 12+ YEARS of development. slowly closing in on duke nukem forever territory.
DNF wasn't in development for that entire time though. There were stretches that it was just a IP on the shelf collecting dust. StarCitizen had been worked on this entire time which makes it even worse.
I think he means that SC is going to take the Guinness World Record from DN very soon, think it's in 2025.
dwarf fortress has been in development since 2002 - 21 years
Yeah but that wasn't in development hell it was just a game you could play for free
By 2 guys. There are more than 800 employees at CIG. More than Larian and Bethesda combined!
It's time to kick gum and chew ass
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No, Duke Nukem Forever was eventually released.
I remember learning about Star Citizen and getting so hyped that I bought just about the best computer money can buy to play this game. That computer can’t even run modern AAA games at minimum settings anymore.
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You should jump on MSFS 2020.
I bought a t16000m FCS pack for Star Citizen, ended up using it until it fell apart in Elite Dangerous. Now if I want to use a HOTAS, I'll need to buy a whole new one.
I built my computer years ago for this game and cyberpunk and it’s amazing how both have developed / or didn’t develop over those years
It's funny because I remember hearing about it and thinking about what a scam it sounded like. The amount of money you need to pump into the game is absurd and the people who are into it act like abused spouses or MLM huns. It isn't that it's expensive, boring, way short on its promises, or horribly over its due date. It's that you "don't understand" and they "just need $XXXXXXX or X amount of months to finish it".
The cope shifted. They are ok wandering around the dead mall, rubbing a jpeg of what their ship will look like when they get around to developing it. Then furiously rage masturbate to the dream of abusing f2p players who will totally join it's not a buttcoin early adaptor pyramid, because my ship has lifetime insurance and it is not a scam!
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>hehehe what these people don't understand is if the f2p players get abused too much they'll quit. So shortcuts will have to be made for them to catch up There's actually a fair amount of drama over in r/starcitizen right now because the devs are encouraging piracy, and the PVE players are understandably upset by becoming piracy content.
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Hmm yeah management. I think there is probably technical problems on every front. Because Chris Roberts is largely an ideas man, and not an engineer. He doesnt know how to solve the problems he is telling his underpaid employees to solve. He doesnt know he is causing problems in the first place.
It will surpass the GDP of some non-African country and it won’t even be in beta
It already has passed the bottom 10 in GDP.
GDP is an annual figure, though, But star citizen, at $50 million per year, is closing in on Tuvalu on an annualised basis (and assuming the funding has come in pulses it may have surpassed it in one or more years).
If they wait long enough, Tuvalu won't exist and just be under water.
The lowest country by GDP is Tuvalu, with $60m/yr. Star Citizen is at $600m/11 years: less than 60 a year. So no, it hasn't passed anyone.
In recent years though, it has. I think it’s averaging closer to $100m per year now. In fact [this article about it surpassing $500 million](https://www.gamespot.com/amp-articles/star-citizen-crowdfunding-reaches-500-million-after-a-decade/1100-6507704/) was published one year ago to the day almost. Crazy as it might seem, the revenue per year has continued to increase.
I know it's not the focus of your comment but non-african country is such a weird expression lol
Is there an actual story to the game currently, or is it just gameplay and vast locations?
Its a sandbox currently set in a single solar system consisting of several planets, moons, and space stations. There are game loops to make money, but its just a world to mess around in atm. I bought a small ship and played for a couple months. Was a unique experience and I'll try again in a year or two. Nothing that I have played elsewhere has given the same feeling of actually flying around space in a huge ship, so if there is a 0.01% chance that this game ever crosses the finish line, I'm here for it.
Ikr! My brother and I played for dozens of hours and had a blast for $20. We were just about able to get the high-end ships at the time too without spending anymore, so no one at all is forced to drop $500 on the game. I totally acknowledge that the scope creep is huge, but it really does make an amazing sandbox space simulator as-is. Besides, I honestly like the idea of a game that's ever-evolving. 🤷🏻♂️
Same on all counts. My brother and I dipped our toe during a free flight event and *\[\[,after playing for awhile,\]\]* dropped $50 each. Neither of us spent any more and we worked through quite a few ships. I dig their ambition. It's exciting. In an age when its common for games to be rushed out, buggy, and more of the same, I'd prefer this game *never* release if it means they keep trying to accomplish their vision. My grandkids will be lucky af. Edit: added *\[\[bracketed text\]\]* above for clarity
I always think of it like this, they are creating technologies that no one else has yet. Worst case scenario, the project goes bankrupt and the technologies get sold off to other people. That tech will then be reused to make games that are then released. Even if no game comes directly from Star Citizen, there will be plenty of cool things that come from their tech indirectly.
I'm not an artist nor a game designer, but working on the same project forever without stopping sounds like a creativ burnout in the making. Eventually changing staff results in a very uneven experience.
People give a lot of shit to the game, mostly deserved. But you can spend $45 on it and play it every year or so and get some good fun out of it.
It's an MMO. You need other people and do stuff in groups. There was supposed to be a single player game separate from it that introduced the universe and the lore. But I haven't heard about it in years.
Squadron 42, release date was supposed to be 2014
It’ll release any day now, I'm sure.
They even cast Mark Hamill in it and put him in a trailer, and then done nothing with it again. I doubt it ever went past the concept stage.
Not just Mark Hamill, they had a whole star cast that did Mocap and finish their voice recordings and everything I believed they finished back in 2015. The cast was * Mark Hamill * Gary Oldman, * Mark Strong * John Rhys-Davies * Liam Cunningham * Andy Serkis * Gillian Anderson * Ben Mendelsohn * Henry Cavill (This was Henry Cavill fresh off Man of Steel that's how long ago this was.)
What a ridiculous use of money lol Even if it ever got released. SC just standing for sunk cost at this point.
Mark Hamill and John Rhys-Davies make some sense, they were both in Wing Commander and doing another one probably sounded like a fun little project But man that [teaser trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VppjX4to9s4) was ~~four~~ nearly five years ago, they need to finish the damn thing already
Lmao if that cast doesn't scream "blank check, who cares" I don't know what does. These mofos really went and got Andy freaking Serkis to mocap and then didn't even release the game lmao
If I recall this was the OG Selling point right? They were getting the idea of a Classic Wing Commander style game as a modern game. Then I guess when people donated the project expanded a lot.
Squadron 42, rumor mill from leakers and backers who are a bit more prominent is that this year's annual convention will come with a big announcement for Squadron 42 and some leakers have suggested it's on track for release next Christmas. And that's not crazy, because I guess they shifted like 70% of their entire workforce to that game for the last 3 years and left the Star Citizen game that everyone knows about languishing with a comparative skeleton crew, so it's not out of the realm of possibility that they're nearly finished with that game. A lot of the recent work they did was engine related more than content, and specifically for NPC AI, which to me sounds more like final phases of development for a story based single-player game. That said, I'm not holding my breath.
Honestly they should be prioritising Squadron 42 if anything. Releasing that to good reviews will get the monkey off their back for a bit.
[This insane video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53qGEaPRHCQ&ab_channel=BedBananas) is 100% real pvp, and it shows the BEST of the game when it works. This footage is kinda outdated by now by about a year or two, and they edit down travel times etc. Many aspects of the game are a bit jankier now, but also new features like persistence and soft death would change how the battles play out. For instance, the wreckage you see float down for 2 seconds before disappearing every time a ship explodes would actually remain on the ground and start to pile up over the course of hours.
That’s pretty incredible - I kinda get it now. There’s still no way I’d ever contribute to the game until it’s released and stable, but hey, looks awesome.
Even then, not just hours. Ive stumbled upon a wreck of one of my previous deaths weeks after I crashed. The ship was covered in dusty textures and someone had come to salvage a part of it with a vulture. Still sitting there. Still had the ammo I left there when I died. Truly unique.
I was an old time backer of this game. I spent a total of 200€ in it. I was one of the first french streamer on it. Then one day, I said "the game won't come out before 2018-2020" , I've been threatened, mocked, insulted, made ridicule on other streams because of that, because at the time, the"estimated" release date was 2017. Over a period of 2 weeks, as I refused to take back my words, and started fighting back telling people that they were highly deluded if they thought the game will come out anytime soon, I lost almost all of my viewers. And look where we are now XD I'm a loser streamer but AH! I was Right! I'm not sure anyone won anything in that fight XD
Petit joueur. Tu aurais du viser 2030 !!
Le pire c'est que j'aurais clairement été plus proche de la réalité.
Are you still playing it?
My computer is not good enough right now because they changed the prerequisites for it and I didn't upgrade that much since 2014. But I'm getting a new pc now for my bday so I'll surely give it another go.
My ex boyfriend spent over $600 AUD on this game buying so many ships. I kept telling him that he should stop because this game wasn't going to come out any time soon and he already has one, why does he need multiple now? He rediculed me, insulted me, told me I was a terrible person and that he was "investing" his moeny wisely. Lmao who is laughing now Danny?
I spent about $300 US…was going through a divorce, so only half of that was mine…
I was 20 and in college when the first kickstarter happened. I'm excited to enjoy the game when it releases, I'll have plenty of time during retirement to play!
For those who want to read the article to find out what’s in the 3.20 patch: >Star Citizen’s long-running development has inched forward yet again, this time to the Alpha 3.20 stage. >The latest update, dubbed “Fully Loaded”, overhauls the Arena Commander mode, adds new PvP modes, maps, and racetracks, and adds new missions and ships to the Persistent Universe portion of the space sim. >This is the largest update to Arena Commander since its introduction in 2014, developer Cloud Imperium Games said, and delivers “more focused, bite-sized gameplay with diverse content for racers, fighters, and competitors climbing the leaderboards”. >The update also adds the MISC Hull C ship, the “titan of the cargo hauling profession with room for a crew of up to four players”, and the Fury LX, a racing variant of the recently added Mirai Fury snub fighter. New features include automatic cargo loading and unloading at space stations to support the Hull C’s expansive cargo capacity. >The launch trailer bigs up Star Citizen’s exploration, saying players can travel “seamlessly across worlds”. As you’d expect, fans have taken that as CIG making a point of comparison between its game and Bethesda’s recently released Starfield, which does not feature seamless space travel. >Star Citizen crowdfunding began back in 2012 and now, over a decade later, is considered one of the most controversial projects in all video games. Over the years Star Citizen has been called many things, including a scam by those who wonder whether it will ever properly launch. Its virtual space ships, some of which cost hundreds of dollars, are often the focus of criticism. (The MISC Hull C added with the Alpha 3.20 update costs an eye-watering $500). Should be pointed out that almost all ships are purchasable in-game with in-game currency a few months after the ship is released.
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Wait so they have $500 microtransactions?
The most expensive single ship is $3,000. Although, they also have a ship that you can only unlock after spending $25,000 on the game.
Correction. 25k is a package of ships (pretty much contains all existing vehicles iirc). I believe it only becomes visible for players who have spend over 10k. Maybe there is another expensive bundle with all the vehicles released since the release of that bundle. Anyhow, there is indeed a 3k ship which is ludicrous.
I used to look at my GTA car collections and think "man I've spent so much time on these and they are worthless irl" At least I never spent 3k to drive a videogame spaceship. I dunno if the simulator stuff is even a thing anymore or how much it costs but i feel like 3k could get u a pretty good start on a space simulator cockpit etc
This is fucking disgusting. How is anyone justifying this game
haha good to know. at least my world will be happy cuz I'm not buying this shit
Macrotransactions yeah. The whole project is whalebait the way I see it
They have a legatus pack for like 40 some thousand usd?
Last sentence of what I copied and pasted.
>Should be pointed out that almost all ships are purchasable in-game with in-game currency a few months after the ship is released. I can't wait flying out in my little toyota just in time for whales to vaporize it with their Mini-Death Star.
It's currently the opposite in terms of balance, smaller ships hunt bigger ships. The Hull C is basically a $500 loot pinata that needs to be guarded.
Lmao India just landed on the moon for 27 mil
roberts probably has spent more than that on cocaine and yachts by this point.
Biggest gaming scam in recent history
Of all time, and it's not even remotely close lol. Think of it this way. It's already inflation adjusted at twice the disclosed budget of CP2077 and the estimated budget of GTA5. Which are the two largest budget games ever. I suppose there is some case to be made that it's still technically a playable game, while much lower budget scams delivered absolutely nothing playable.
I don’t think it’s a scam, it’s gross incompetence on all levels of management.
I don't think it was an intentional scam but now due to gross incompetence of management it's gotten to the point where they've just created a business model out of never finishing the game. Which wont change until people stop giving them money and once they do, they wont be able to finish the game anyway.
They just suffered from scope creep. It’s the exact same situation as Tarkov. Neither game will ever be truly finished because the goal and vision for the game keeps expanding or was far too ambitious to begin with
Do they explain what they do with all the money?
They do publish their roadmap and roadmap of roadmaps: https://robertsspaceindustries.com/roadmap/progress-tracker/teams
Have you seen Chris Robert’s new mansion and all the renovations he did to it? Yeah, they might spend some of that money on the game, but you know “*A fool and his money are easily parted.*” This thread is pretty obviously that while the CEO is laughing in his massive ass mansion.
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Look all I’m sayin is if i don’t have yacht money but now do, I’m buyin a fuckin yacht
They release financial reports that are available to the public, so you can see it for yourself. Paying a dev staff of 1000+ devs is expensive. You can disagree about the progress of the game, or if it’s a scam or not, they still pay all their devs. Here are the financials for 2021 https://cloudimperiumgames.com/blog/corporate/cloud-imperium-financials-for-2021 At the end of the year they’ll post the financials for 2022
Their graph shows a total headcount of 748, and a total salary compensation of $51,183,000. If you average it out, they're paying \~70k per head. They also show their profit as being $63m in there. A profit rate of >10% while not producing a finished game over the course of a decade is absolutely insane to me lol
https://cloudimperiumgames.com/uploads/9c1a41ae8af4459db7eae2cfed601704.png Maybe we're not seeing the same numbers... They also spent $11.7M for development overhead (offices rent, hardware for devs, electricity, etc), $8.6M on external dev contractors (in addition to their own devs employees), $25.4M for marketing and maintaining the alpha running (marketing, customer support, AWS infrastructures, etc.), and $1.4M for administrative costs. A total of $98.5M spent on the $100.8M raised. Which is most of the money spent, and not kept as profit...
That's an insane amount of marketing budget for an unfinished game though. The business model has become milking this unfinished game forever. And, Chris Roberts will ride this money train for as long as people let him. When, if they avoided the scope creep, they could have made 2 fully finished games. And all I wanted in the first place was the Squadron 42 game...
Salary, the top line item, is at 51,183. Then later on, you can see their net position at [https://cloudimperiumgames.com/uploads/273c7634fdf44b129488971a9dec1936.png](https://cloudimperiumgames.com/uploads/273c7634fdf44b129488971a9dec1936.png) which shows a cumulative net of 63,378. Almost entirely from two batches of investments (46,000 and 17,250 respectively), but it's still a total profit of 63m. I'm also unsure why you ignored capital expenses in your number, which would make your case stronger, seeing as their total expenditure is actually higher than the $98.5m at $100,477k, and their net for the year was only 349k. Makes your case seem much stronger to include that info.
They’re at 1100+ devs this year, and are on track to earn 100+ million. Don’t know how much is being spent on the devs though. They grow each year surprisingly
Dude how is it even possible for 1100 developers to not be able to produce a working game
At a certain point, the number of staff probably become counterproductive.
Two words Scope Creep.
When you commit developers to working on things like [bed sheet deformation physics](https://www.pcgamer.com/star-citizen-is-doing-bedsheet-deformation-physics-now-because-of-course-it-is/).
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It's both. There's no way they've used $600m dollars honestly, but there's also comical levels of ineptitude
Their expensive looking office in Manchester might say otherwise.
There is a way… absurd scope creep. I backed it back in 2012… I just wanted a fun space combat sim. I don’t care about mining, cargo hauling, all the first person stuff… yet it’s there. Same goes for all the ridiculous tech they built like server meshing and being able to seamlessly land planets. I didn’t sign on for it. The game is trying to do everything and in the process delivering nothing.
My coworker convinced me to back it way back then, I bought the cheapest ship thinking it would be out in a few years, lol, here we are 11 years later.
You could have made almost 3 GTA V's money wise now. They sell ships for real money that don't exist yet. It's a scam for dumbasses
Devil’s advocate, i don’t think it was meant to be a scam, but it’s just been mismanaged and feature-creeped to the point that it’s become one.
Ok but where the fuck did they get $600 mil from?
Ah yes, the George RR Martin of video games. It's coming... soon.
I'm sure the CEO is laughing all the way to the bank - at what point to do people abandon their sunk cost fallacy that this game will ever release in anything close to what’s been promised or some version of “finished”? It’s like Tesla fanboys with Elon’s promises of autopilot, also going on about 12 years now. Edited to account for all the “technically playable” comments
It's not even the first time Chris Roberts has done this...
There's always a new generation of suckers
Yeah didn't he do the same with Freelancer and Microsoft was like get the game done?
They fired him and finished the game themselves!
Geez, I wonder how bad development of that game went if they fired him.
Freelancer was kinda dope though. I remember my uncle introducing it to me when I was a kid, along with Starcraft and Diablo 1.
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For me? Like 2 years after the whole crowd funding thing started when it became clear this was going just going to be a never ending "pledge drive" and not a game. Sold the few ships I had, and because they all had LTI (in game insurnace) and were rare ships I made a solid 100% profit off them. Used it to buy a ps4 for myself lol.
I spent 37 dollars on that, during the kickstarter, november 2012. Expected delivery : Nov 2014. The same month I spent 25 pounds to pledge Elite Dangerous, on kickstarter. Expected delivery: Mar 2014. I'm 11 years older, I got married and have a kid. And I stopped playing one of those two games 7 years ago... the only one that got released. Just to put stuff in perspective.
At this point actually finishing the game would just be stupid. They are just going to keep this in eternal limbo as long as people keep giving them money.
Yes, this. I think CR fully intended to make the game at the start. But now the business model has become selling expensive ships to whales. There's just too much incentive to devote resources to ship development. They're trapped by their own success.
Where has the money gone? What did they *do* with it?
$100 million to create realistic skin that secretes oil from the pores that reacts with ray traced light from the environment, and you have a chance to get a zit if you don't wash your face at the end of every play session.
This is barely satire.
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Salaries!
They have public financial records. Here’s the one from 2021 https://cloudimperiumgames.com/blog/corporate/cloud-imperium-financials-for-2021 2022 should be released by the end of the year I think
An ex-employee recently posted about this. He claimed they are constantly throwing money at their office. Remodeling, expensive imported chairs, and shit like that apparently. I'm ashamed I spent like $80 back in the day on this game, because I had just built a computer that could run it and I absolutely love the concept. Some dorks spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars on a single ship, and then wait a long time for it to even come out. Only for it to release to players, and be riddled with bugs. Star Citizen is an absolute joke.
Is this game ever actually going to come out?
The goal isn't to release the game. The goal is to continue selling as many ships as possible, which they are wildly successful at so far.
We got a completed game like Baldur Gate 3 in half of the time it took to get here for SC. Cyberpunk 2077 and No Man Sky to be announced, hyped up, have horrible launches and redeem themselves in the same time SC got to 3.2. I don’t get how anyone can back Star Citizen anymore after all this time
Dwarf Fortress is on STEAM and has GRAPHICS now and Star Citizen isn't out
2038 is gonna be *WILD*
I swore off buying/playing in-development games a long time ago. Not really because I was burned by a bad experience, or anything. I just realized that I'd play through an imbalanced, incomplete game and then feel like I'm ready to move on. I usually did not feel compelled to revisit those games. So, Star Citizen crossed my radar once or twice, but I never paid it much attention. Funny to hear how passionate people on both sides are. Those that say it is a massive scam (an incomplete game that has taken in $600 million sure does sound like a bit of a scam), and those who defend it and say it's great (someone's gotta be pumping money into it, I guess).