2603

Well, the whole 2.0 is devoid of meaningful content, imho. It’s more a systems test.

2604

Yeah, there isn’t any NDA stuff at this point. You can say anything you like. As Ryan points out though, you want to go to port olisar for the “real” game. Arc Corp looks neat, but there isn’t anything to do there.

One thing that I’m happy about, is that not too long ago, we had folks saying about how the game was never going to come together, and how it was impossible, and how it was just some big ponsie scheme.

Now, it’s pretty clear that’s not the case. There is essentially no doubt in my mind at this point that the game is going to be in a playable state in the next few months. Now the complaints are about stuff like Robert’s professionalism. And that’s fine, but as someone who just wants to play the game I don’t really care about anything beyond the game.

2605

That’s basically been your opinion from the start. Playable is a very subjective term in games. Some of the sword of the stars 2 fans thought sots2 was playable at launch.

What I see here reminds me of that situation.

It looks tedious and more about animations and atmosphere. Akin to a 10k paint job on a Yugo.

2606

Yeah, there was nothing to do, but the scenery and the tech was very impressive. I thought that the attention to detail (the posters, the gun displays, the half-full glasses of wine on the bar counter top) was really well done. The varied environment types were fun as well: the retro bar, the shiny showroom, the workmanlike gun-shop, the grubby salvage yard, the ratty back-alleys. The only place that rang false was the “under construction” shopping mall which had fairly obviously just been strewn with loose ship parts (like endlessly-duplicated chairs) to make it look unfinished.

I couldn’t get up to the Port Olisar stuff – some authentication error or another. I may try later on.

2607

I largely agree with you Juan, it’s not the ricketyness of what’s on display at this stage that’s odd, it’s the fact that “under construction” stuff that wouldn’t normally be shown is in this case highlighted and scrutinized.

As a professional from another field (music biz, or was), I’m only too keenly aware how difficult it is to get anything “shipped” (we used to call it “get one away”). To actually start with nothing but an idea and get it into the form of something or other that people pay money for (and bear in mind, the game is going to be released to the general public at some point, it’s not intended just for Kickstarter folks)- to get it out the door, to get it “finished” in some sense, at least ready to be played by a punter, etc. - that’s actually pure gold. There are hundreds of people who can do good shit - good design, programming - and yeah, you want as many who do brilliant shit as possible on your team, but it’s all worth nothing without somebody who’s got the knack (despite appearances, sometimes - although that’s a tricky one, because appearances can be correct sometimes too, e.g. horror stories re. Brad McQuaid on Vanguard) of “getting one away.”

There are imponderables and intangibles that you can only really get a good feel for when you’re in the thick of it.

(Still, damn, that’s really cold calling out your interface team like that. Not nice at all.)

2608

“Playable state” is a pretty low bar to clear. You know what other games are in a playable state? Daikatana, Duke Nukem Forever, 90% of all early access alphas, and whatever that thing is the Star Citizen folks have already released. Arena Commander or whatever. As far as I know, the speculation isn’t that Star Citizen will never happen; it’s that it will suck because the developers have no idea what they’re doing.

-Tom

2609

“Server full, try again later.”

2610

10K nets you server priority.

2611

Heh, well, the speculation actually WAS that star citizen was never going to happen, and that CIG was going to be out of business by the end of the year.

It was a ridiculous claim, of course, but there it was.

2612

2015 ain’t over yet! ;P

2613

The dates change as they have XMas sales and dream up new jpegs to sell the whales, as well as now rejecting refunds, but it sounds like Q1 2016 is when they are projected to run out of money and will start at least downsizing the development teams to ebb the flow of cash spent.

2614

I don’t think anyone reasonable believes such a thing.

2615

Those who get their news from Derek Smart only probably do.

Wendelius

2616

Rock Paper Shotgun did a “review” of 2.0.

2617

Yeah I think the powers that be frown on the use of words like ‘bullshit’ around here, but I’m struggling to think of a useful synonym.

Maybe Smart or someone made some outlandish claim, everyone else has just said the obvious, that it’s an overfunded white elephant that will probably collapse under its own weight eventually and produce an average game at best. And that they will face significant financial issues once this ‘fountain of youth’ funding model of never ending pre orders reaches it’s end.

But there’s no point in talking to you about it, you have genuinely selective hearing regarding this matter.

2618

Did you just call bullshit on my stating that people made that absurd claim, where it was actually responded to by someone who then repeated the absurd claim? (Although with the totally awesome change that now CIG is going out of business in Q1 2016!)

I certainly am not suggesting that every critic of CIG made that ridiculous claim. Merely the most vocal.

Your idea that they got too much money and will somehow collapse as a result is an idea I guess.

Certainly Tom’s criticism is reasonable, in that he just thinks that certain decisions that CIG has made in their development are bad ones. But I guess we can wait and see, since it’s pretty clear that the game is in fact getting made at this point.

There isn’t going to be any epic lawsuit or anything, CIG is not on the verge of bankruptcy.

2619

You said THE SPECULATION, like there was a consensus. Talk about crawfishing.

Me? I will be very sad if they are able to get this farce of a funding cluster-fuck off the ground. I want this to be the Hiroshima and Nagasaki of future game development. A wasteland of fuckery that no one will ever want to re-create.

2620

I want a new PC space sim in the vein of Freelancer. I certainly wouldn’t wish for a game developer to go out of business, or for an ambitious title to never see the light of day.

2621

So you only agree with the development model that will give us “FIFA 2017: Shut up and take my money again for the same thing”, “Call of Duty 279: Cheatmania 278”, “Assassins Creed 12: Out of ideas” and “Battlefront 115: Bugfest 114”?

I want Star Citizen to succeed (and I’m not even interested in playing the genre) just so that ambitious PC game development is shown to be able to produce financial success again.

2622

I’d think any games software kickstarter should involve describing how they plan to manage the project.