Cloud Imperium has been working on Star Citizen since 2011, which has already raised more than $600 million. When will its final version be released?
  • GreenMario@lemm.eeEnglish
    1315·
    2 年前

    Anybody still putting money into this is a sucker. For 50mil they should have had some game out and ready

    Fuck, the entire time SC was worked on we had Elite Dangerous get funded, released expanded and crash and burned. No man’s sky launched from being “Sean Lied People Died” to the biggest redemption story in gaming and Starfield went from a twinkle in Todd Howards eye to complete. Two Everspace games. Rebel Galaxy 1&2. X4!! Fuck me.

    • Th4tGuyII@kbin.social
      381·
      2 年前

      Exactly. Star Citizen has been in development so long that not only have other developers already had the chance to jump in ahead of them, the genre’s brimming with games now!
      They had such an advantage going into this, how do you fuck up a golden ticket so badly??

      • buddhabound@lemmy.worldEnglish
        522·
        2 年前

        They’ve made $600M. How is that fucking up a golden ticket? They’ve all been getting paid well for years. The people who spent money are the ones who don’t have a finished game. That probably doesn’t matter to the people who’ve paid off a large chunk of their mortgages in the meantime.

        • Th4tGuyII@kbin.social
          2·
          2 年前

          Sure, they’ve got money from all the good will they’re soaking up, but at some point that good will and money will dry up…

          If/when they finally do release a game, it’s now got to not just compare to a whole full genre of games, it’s got to be better than them in order to get that good will back.

          • JokeDeity@lemm.eeEnglish
            6·
            2 年前

            It’s been this long and people are still donating, they have no reason to change course.

          • JJROKCZ@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            2 年前

            Who cares about good will? If they release and people get pissed at the finished product then “shutter” the studio, take everyone to a “new” studio and work on another game with the experience and cash you got from SC

    • state_electrician@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
      23·
      2 年前

      Since backing SC I’ve met my wife, got married and had three children. Two of which are already going to school. It’s crazy how much you can accomplish in 13 years. I wonder if the game will be done before my oldest turns 18.

    • chaogomu@kbin.social
      14·
      2 年前

      What happened to Elite Dangerous? I used to play quite a bit before I had to move and ended up on horrible internet. I’ve finally got good internet but haven’t gotten back into it yet.

        • Kecessa@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          6·
          2 年前

          Wait… They actually made logging out something you need to do in order to complete objectives?

          • Jerkface@lemmy.worldEnglish
            4·
            2 年前

            It’s my point of view that they created so much friction in the gameplay loop that players generally prefer logging to get their materials or whatever they need, and FDev’s policy is “sure, whatever,” because then they don’t have to improve the gameplay.

            • Kecessa@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              1·
              2 年前

              Wow… I played just long enough to buy a Dolphin, never got out of the first few systems, it was before Beyond’s release and I found the loop to be boring after about 15h…

      • Kecessa@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        13·
        2 年前

        One thing the others didn’t mention: They released a multilayer expansion, if you try to play in co-op the game crashes, they announced they wouldn’t fix the issue so they basically wasted resources on developing a game mode that doesn’t work and still made it a selling point.

        Fuck em.

      • Zectivi@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        11·
        2 年前

        Last I played, the arc was humans attempted firing a weapon targeting Thargoids and it failed. Thargoids got mad and attacked human systems in the bubble.

        There was also some unhappiness around their spacelegs expansion and the subsequent end of development for console versions. I stopped playing since then not because of any problems but because I got into other games.

        • GreenMario@lemm.eeEnglish
          1·
          2 年前

          I was on Xbox (where my friends were). Once Odyssey flopped they cancelled any new updates to the console versions and after a couple of years haven’t No Man Sky’d Odyssey yet.

      • Maestro@kbin.social
        6·
        2 年前

        A shit update, bad handling by the devs and complete refusal to listen to the player base. So, the things that usually plague big games.

  • NOT_RICK@lemmy.worldEnglish
    482·
    2 年前

    That number is mind boggling. I can’t believe how much some are willing to spend on this “game”.

    • Poopmeister@lemm.eeEnglish
      8·
      2 年前

      Idiot here. Put in 40€. Skeptical before I put in the money. But I liked the vision and had some friends that liked the game. Played for maybe 40 hours. Had a lot of fun with it. And a bit less fun when it crashed right in a mission. That was 3 years ago. Haven’t touched it since. Maybe I’ll get into it again to check it out. But no hopes for it being completed

      • bomberesque1@lemm.eeEnglish
        101·
        2 年前

        Of I understand you right that’s 1 € per hour. If you enjoyed those hours then that’s a pretty good return. Enjoy

      • merc@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        5·
        2 年前

        The first (and last) time I put in money was in the crowdfunding days. In fact, I did it so early they weren’t even using Kickstarter for funding.

        Even though the current alpha is very buggy, I also more than got my money’s worth over the many, many years. I really would like to see the game get finished. But, what’s already there is really impressive.

        The game has missed every possible deadline, and there’s every chance it will never be finished. But, the one comforting fact is that it’s missing the deadlines because they’re being too ambitious. Like, they redid the game engine to use 64 bit precision instead of 32 bit because they want it to be possible to drop a wrench at some random spot on the surface of a planet, and have another player fly across the solar system, go to the right spot, and see a wrench sitting there.

        I wouldn’t put any more money in today, but I’m still glad I helped fund the game, and because I’ve been able to keep from adding more money, I actually consider my money well spent.

  • WintLizard@sopuli.xyzEnglish
    401·
    2 年前

    Is this article written by AI? It has all sorts of strange errors and repeated words. Like the sentence at the end of this paragraph. I know it is popular to call out everything as AI right now but this article is suspicous.

    • notleigh@aussie.zoneEnglish
      6·
      2 年前

      Came in to criticise the writing too. Got AI or at least bad translation vibes. Really hard to follow.

    • Omega_Jimes@lemmy.caEnglish
      6·
      2 年前

      There is a wierd amount of generative-learning articles on game/tech Lemmy. I keep seeing these articles from publications that I’ve never heard of and I get excited because “Oo new people in the space” then halfway through the article I feel duped.

  • Chaotic Entropy@feddit.ukEnglish
    302·
    2 年前

    If you need $600m to make a genre defining game over the course of decades, maybe it isn’t worth it.

    • worldofgeese@lemmy.worldEnglish
      912·
      2 年前

      Freelancer, to this day, remains one of my all-time favorite games for capturing the magic of space exploration. If Freelancer was born from this dude’s mind, I will happily wait for Star Citizen.

      • Blu@sopuli.xyzEnglish
        16·
        2 年前

        Freelancer had to be pried from his control because he couldn’t meet even the least ambitious deadlines. Chris Roberts hasn’t managed a successful project from start to finish in over 20 years.

        • i_stole_ur_taco@lemmy.caEnglish
          42·
          2 年前

          Hasn’t he been working on Star Citizen for at least 20 years? I remember backing the original cash grab when I still had all my hair.

          • Talaraine@kbin.social
            4·
            2 年前

            Kickstarter was like… 2011 or 2012, so just over a decade. I know because that’s 50 bucks I’m never gonna get back, but at least it was worth less back then xD

      • bfg9k@lemmy.worldEnglish
        71·
        2 年前

        Entire human beings have been born and have grown up in the time it has taken to get it to this point.

        At some point you need to lock the scope and actually finish it.

        • Cypher@lemmy.worldEnglish
          31·
          2 年前

          11 years old is a concerning definition of “grown up”.

          Do you need a seat?

  • TheBlue22@lemmy.worldEnglish
    263·
    2 年前

    This game won’t ever come out. At this point, the devs just steal money and see how much they can get away with.

  • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    232·
    2 年前

    Likewise, there is a subscription model that allows you to maintain access to the title and is divided into two types: Centurion (€12.22 per month or €134 per year) and Imperator (€24.44 per month or €268 per year). The Imperator offers, unlike the Centurion, exclusive events and an allocation of in-game money per month to rent ships and weapons.

    Some pretty sloppy work here. The subscription options have nothing to do with playing the game; it’s a buy once product with no subscription system at all. The Centurion and Imperator subscriptions are better thought of as a kind of “backstage pass”, they mostly just give you patreon style content and extra in game flair items. Are they worth the money? Unless you’re a die hard fan, absolutely not. But it’s not like you have to pay up “maintain access” as the article puts it.

  • Pratai@lemmy.caEnglish
    221·
    2 年前

    It’s because its grift. They’re cashing in on it through donations. If it releases, that stops.

    • chaogomu@kbin.social
      167·
      2 年前

      Not a grift.

      A grift implies that someone is making bank off of it.

      No, Chris Roberts is instead burning money by having devs do work, then redo work to add in some last minute shit that he thought of, then repeat until the feature creep completely overtakes their lives. It’s the Chris Roberts way.

      Work is being done on the game, but remember that treading water is also a lot of work.

      • Rottcodd@kbin.social
        7·
        2 年前

        Chris Roberts

        This is and always has been the biggest issue.

        Hell - if Microsoft hadn’t given him the boot when they bought out Digital Anvil, it’s entirely possible that he’d still be working on Freelancer.

      • P03 Locke@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
        5·
        2 年前

        A grift implies that someone is making bank off of it.

        Chris Roberts and the rest of the exec team are making bank off of it.

  • Pika@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    17·
    2 年前

    I supported it but, I stopped playing, not enough to do. Graphics are insane but, little to no actual content aside from ships that you need to pay real money for. The constant dB resets prevent me from ever really grinding the game, what’s the point of it will just reset next major update. I personally think the game is going to flop due to this.

    • Conyak@lemmy.tfEnglish
      3·
      2 年前

      I haven’t played the game but is it true that the ships cost real money? Do you also have to pay for the base game?

      • root@aussie.zoneEnglish
        5·
        2 年前

        You purchase the base game which comes with a starter ship. In the game, you can do missions or do cargo trading to earn in-game money which you can use to buy ships.

        You can absolutely use real world cash to purchase additional ships, which funds the development of the game. You don’t have to if you don’t want to. Almost all the ships can be purchased with in-game currency.

        The main plus point for purchasing ships with real money is they are acvound bound and will stay with you after a database reset.

        • Seudo@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          2 年前

          So the devs are insentivised to keep it in a perpetual alpha stage, wiping users game progress every couple months.

          • root@aussie.zoneEnglish
            2·
            2 年前

            Well, not all the gameplay loops have been fully fleshed out yet which is why it is still in the alpha stage. Database resets happen as festures are added.

            I don’t know if i will go so far as to say they are incentivised to keep it in alpha.

    • sic_1@feddit.deEnglish
      2·
      2 年前

      Same for me. Although I really enjoy just low flying on the planets and enjoy the scenery but what made me quit is the insane amount of bugs. Sometimes it’s nigh impossible to even get from the down area to the ship it out of the hangar. Once it’s running, it’s incredible but the lack of reliability is just to frustrating.

    • all-knight-party@kbin.cafe
      2·
      2 年前

      I don’t think it’s possible for the game to flop anymore if we’re going off money made. In terms of them making money after they fully “release”, well… I don’t know if it will ever actually “release”.

  • Pxtl@lemmy.caEnglish
    17·
    2 年前

    I mean who would ever suspect that the man who wrote and directed the Wing Commander movie could be incompetent?

  • magnetosphere@kbin.social
    16·
    2 年前

    Woah. I got Gary Oldman confused with Alan Rickman. Rickman died back in 2016… and the article STILL made sense.

    That alone makes me think they’ve spent way too long on the goddam game.

  • Meldrik@lemmy.wtfEnglish
    14·
    2 年前

    When are we gonna get the single player version of Star Citizen (Squadron 42) with Mark Hamill??