Star Citizen - Chris Roberts, lots of spaceship porn, lots of promises

For that number of players getting together, it wouldn’t have mattered as much a few months ago. But the refactor to Gen 12 that’s nearing completion also optimises of the rendering thread to make much better use of multithreading.

The current servers are going to continue to struggle trying to manage the whole system when large numbers of players spread all over the system. That part is mostly dependant on server meshing, which is about to start testing.

However, I would be very surprised if the improvements in performance server side (cloud based) didn’t also help the servers cope in general. that’s a fair point.

The Gen 12 improvements and other recent changes to rendering allow 100 players to stand in one place in a giant ship and not have rendering die down to 1fps. The main source of issues in this test were player flashlights and ship lights bringing down the framerate (they are all handled dynamically). But most players there were getting 15-20fps and more once the ship took off and moved away from the other ships and large city.

That stuff wouldn’t have happened before they started rolling out the new rendering technology.

I think you are confusing desktop with cloud server. Ice Lake SP was released more than a year ago and while it was an improvement wasn’t that big a deal.

Now, if they’ve moved to Epyc that would potentially be a big improvement.

Server meshing is the real test. If they can pull it off, kudos to them – it’ll be the first true major technical achievement of the project. Most likely they’ll have to settle on a very limited form, whereby interactions across servers are limited in some way. Had they designed the game around these limitations, of course, it wouldn’t be an issue.

Shoulda, coulda, woulda. It’s clear they aren’t implementing the same game that was originally pitched and worked on. Planet landings, for instance, were going to be limited to a few mini zones you would land on in prerendered cut scenes. The design has expanded in all directions.

If they had had a clear vision of the final product 10 years ago, we would be in a much better place for sure. But they were never in a position to cater for a final design. And here we are.

We’ll know a lot more on server meshing in the coming months. Once the Evocati get their hands on it, information will leak.

They have known for at least 6-7 years, since 2015 or so when they were earning millions in pledges. “Server meshing” has been discussed since then as well. Do you ever consoider that maybe the problem is not scope expansion but rather that they can’t make it work?

Do I ever consider? How deliciously patronising. Not sure the cult allows that kind of line of thinking. Or something. :)

Server meshing has been a thing they’ve consistently said is right around the corner for years. It’s fucking bananas that such a foundational technical pillar of the type of game they are trying to make still isn’t in place in even a rudimentary fashion, as they keep pouring resources into systems that are supposed to exist on top of it.

But hey - more on server meshing in the coming months. :)

The new point patch is out. For a lot of players, one of the most notable changes will be the increased player cap to around 100 players per server (dynamically adjusted) up or down.

Oh, and a wipe. Small detail. :)

It’s a minor patch, mostly there to clean up persistent issues from 3.17.1, but it still brings a few interesting things, like new derelicts floating in space to explore. And new settlements.

Also, it introduces a new dynamic event where players storm and try and retake some platforms from the Nine Tails on Prison:

Youtube randomly recommended me this and now I can’t stop listening to Star Citizen soundtrack. It is so amazing damn. Hopefully SQ42 will actually come out and the soundtrack is used prominently there.

Pedro Macedo Camacho’s music is beautiful.

I love the way the Orison theme builds up too.

Hah I was trying to find this song too but forgot the name (thought it was Olisar but that ain’t it). Gorgeous.

Is this going to be a thing where only the richest people do well in the game and everyone else is just cannon fodder? How d you justify someone who spent $10,000 on a ship vs. me, who was an original kickstarter at $45? If you don’t want to spend real life money in the game are you going to be grossly limited vs. all the other people who forked out big bucks?

Nope. Not really. You can join an org, play with friends and purchase the exact same ships with in game money. It is neither a race or a PvP fest.

You will take more time to get the cool multi crew ships. But, you know what, I think you will enjoy the journey and appreciate them more than the people who already have them all in their hangar. A starter pack is enough to play.

While I don’t have a clue as to what the final economy will look like yet, you constantly see people going from a starter ship to owning a big fleet between each alpha wipe.

You are not alone in wondering. It’s a fairly common question. :)

Wow that’s good to hear :)

This is neat. Between bigger tasks, a few devs took their inspiration from the racing community in SC. One used an player mapped race through canyons and turned it into an industrial racing site. The other created something much more grounded.

Both look like great fun.

Well none of the extremely expensive ships are in the game so you would win.

This has probably already been asked and answered, so I’m sorry for being an asshole, but what’s the actual structure of Star Citizen at this point? The videos look pretty darn impressive, but I can’t tell if people are playing demos and vertical slices there, or whether it’s actually one big world that they can actually fly around in?

Can you fly from planet to planet and visit those huge cities? Is there an actual game there, like missions and stuff?

Haha, wow!

It sounds like Chris Roberts is inadvertently building the metaverse.

Yes, you can fly throughout the Stanton system, to its planets, moons, asteroid belts and space stations.

You can partake in space missions. Those can involve PvE or PvP ship fights, or finding derelicts in space, EVA’ing to them and boarding them to fight off pirates or retrieve data.

You can do delivery missions taking you from planet to moon to city.

You can mine in space or on the surface of planets. Then you can refine the ore you mined at refineries. Once refined, you can take that cargo to trading centres for profit, hoping you don’t meet pirates or crash your ship on the way.

You can go on cargo runs to make money, buying low and selling high. Again, those can be tense because of the value in your cargo hold.

You can carry smaller vehicles within your ship and bring them somewhere for whatever purpose you have in mind.

You can do ground missions involving exploring caves or bunkers. Recently, they also added settlements built around crashed ships. There you can fight off AI and/or loot gear.

You can be a flying doctor, responding to the emergency beacon of downed players to go revive them.

You can land pretty much anywhere you want on planets and moons. There are a few areas off limit (parts of cities are no fly zones).

All those activities allow you to buy gear and ships in game with the money you earn.

You can log off in your ship bed in space and respawn there next time you log in.

It’s only one system, but it’s called the PU because it’s a persistent universe. What you earn, you keep… until a wipe (which are very infrequent and usually follow major changes to the economy systems).

So no, those are not slices. Each server as 100 players flying, getting together, fighting each other and going on missions.

That being said: is it a game? No. It is and feels like an alpha. It’s still unoptimised. Bugs and crashes come and go. The gameplay is constantly being tweaked as the devs refine the systems.

There is no end game. And only 1 system still. You can spend dozens of hours exploring what’s there. But all it will get you is ships to fly in that one system.

So it feels incomplete and rightly so.

But the videos you see are exactly what the game is like within a persistent system.

Thanks for the detailed response! That kinda has me curious. I doubt my aging rig is up to the task, but I think I’ll check it out during the next trial :)

Say you’re flying from Planet A to visit an outpost on Planet Faraway, how many loading screens are there?

Zero.

Star Citizen is completely seamless. Once you have loaded the game, there isn’t a single loading screen. Going into your ship, taking up from the planet surface, quantum jumping, getting up from your pilot seat and wandering the ship while you travel, then entering atmosphere and landing on the ground somewhere else is all handled seamlessly. Even the lifts you take in game (to reach a landing pad or go up a floor) physically travel between the locations. They aren’t loading screens.