This is a question for someone that has been playing star citizen for a long time. How close are we to an actually playable game? How good is what they have built so far?
It looks like a game in alpha, very very buggy, very little content. I am amazed at the time it takes them to add stuff, with a budget of 65 million things should have been going steadily but every time there is an update they promise not much to start with and even then always cancel things.
Personally I am absolutely convinced it’s a scam, they have to improve the game for legal reason but do the bare minimum and focus more on adding new ship they can sell than actual gameplay feature.
The ships by themselves are works of art. And their main funding apparatus, so of course the put an inordinate amount of effort towards this.
The bugs are definitely a problem, though they are migrating the entire infrastructure at the moment into a highly available cluster that is intended to keep all players on a single persistent universe like Eve online.
The combat is pretty good, but much of the game breaks down because of poorly performing code/servers.
I think their current clusters accumulate a lot leaks that eventually degrade the experience.
I'd honestly be very curious what their internal architecture looks like in more detail.
In 10 years with that amount of money surely they could hire very talented people to manage development of server backend. The state in which the game is currently is a disgrace. It should be done or close to the end, not still at the beginning where you’re trying to make everything persistent. The infrastructure is what takes the most time and what you build first, like a house foundation. Instead they made the roof and the wall, sold them with lots of promise and now are working on foundations. I sure wouldn’t trust or buy from a such a contractor.
A lot of us did.
He's not a scammer, we know who he is, flaws and all.
The project might fail, though I don't think it will, but it really doesn't make sense that he would be running a scam.
He wants this game as much as anyone.
Technical mistakes and all that kind of stuff make sense and aligns much more with what I have seen over the course of my career.
I do agree that they could move faster on the backend infrastructure if they had the right talent, but they started off really small over 10 years ago. They basically bootstrapped all their knowledge and talent.
And in the end, there was no game.
The community overwhelmingly voted for the scope screep. Myself included.
They could freeze the features now, fix the bugs, and finish the content and it'd be the best space game ever.
But the vision is bigger than that for better or for worse.
I really do have a lot of fun with it right now when it's not bugging out. Which changes like the seasons.
That's twice or perhaps triple the amount of money and time spent on Grand Theft Auto V. A great game that consistently scores 9 or 10 out of 10 on every single list you find it.
I found it easier to believe that is a scam that to believe they will put out a game twice as good than GTA V.
They keep reworking everything over and over and over again.
And at this point why wouldn't they? Their customers have pretty much shown they'll continue to pay for all of that rework in perpetuity.
- In a broad sense GTA V has fewer gameplay features and smaller constructed playable areas: Star Citizen is a bigger game, it is natural that it is more expensive. Your comment doesn’t really refute the point that SC spends its money on mechanics and infrastructure (though it seems to me that they spend a stupid amount of money on cosmetics).
- Star Citizen has fancier graphics and more detailed assets - RDR2 is a more relevant comparison here and that game was $500m.
- The GTA V figure is for a single-player game and (on release) a fairly middling and empty online mode. It does not include ongoing development costs for GTA Online, which has grown substantially over the years. GTA V + Online would be a more appropriate comparison: the $750m for Star Citizen includes ships added in 2023, but the GTA figure doesn’t include cars in 2023.
I would add that the $2bn estimate for GTA VI is credible based on Take-Two’s financial reports.
I feel that comparison is flawed, seeing as most of that was for advertising.
If we go purely by development funds, one would have to combine GTA V [0], RDR2 [1] and Cyberpunk 2077's [2] budget.
That would still be $100 million short of the $750 million that RSI has as yet received purely for development. Add to that, you are comparing finished (albeit in the case of CP77 at launch at most feature complete, which is why I also included Phantom Liberty) titles to something that only approaches pre alpha state, considering it only has a limited number of core features implemented. How everything they intend to offer will interact with eachother can't even be tested and I have my personal reservations that once we get to that alpha stage, it will be smooth sailing.
I also feel that while one can argue that GTA V by itself may not have had the same amount of features and scope that have been promised with Star Citizen, I feel one equally can argue that the latter definitely will have less scope than the three named games combined, should there ever be a full release.
> the $750m for Star Citizen includes ships added in 2023, but the GTA figure doesn’t include cars in 2023
Yeah, but RSI intends to sell ships and expand the game beyond the initial full release, so I don't see how that changes things.
Fully admitting that I personally inherently dislike this approach to development. I feel that not having a somewhat fixed budget, no matter whether from the community, an investor, or (in the case of Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night) a mix of both, creates the inherent incentive to sell your most faithful supporters on an ever expanding vision, to the detriment of them, your development team, and your long-term reputation. I feel history has shown with cases such as Minecraft that a one-time sale during early development is far better at both keeping development focused and raining in overambition, as you are more interested in selling to new rather than existing customers, thus being incentivized to improve the experience for everyone by creating a finished, polished product.
I know that the community was asked each time about expansions and additional features, but emotional investment and the sunk cost fallacy always made that an unfair argument, in my opinion. Despite my misgivings, I also would not consider it a scam, at least not more so than any other (gacha or micro/macro transaction-laden) game that benefits from selling digital goods to players that dehumanizingly are called "whales". I do, however, consider this a reincarnation of DNF, the engine changes and consistent attempt to hit rapidly moving targets feels stricking, though mercifully, at least that didn't have seemingly infinite funding.
[0] estimated at $130 million to $150 million
[1] estimated at $170 million to $240 million
[2] estimated at $120 million to $140 million with an additional 275 million PLN (about $65 million) for Phantom Liberty and bug fixes
In 2015.
Though the incentive to release is definitely weaker due to them making so much money prior to official release.
I'm watching from a distance.
Supposedly, the single player Squadron 42 part of Star Citizen is feature complete, and if they can get that out of the door will be telling on what the MMO release would be like. Personally, I'm expecting Squadron 42 to be comparable to other releases that year, but better voice acting, more jank, PC only, and poor controller support. And given the focus on 'players making their own story', I'm expecting the MMO to suffer the same reception as Elite Dangerous with a shiny engine trying to hide tedious and repetitive game play (but many people like that, and it might remain a profitable niche game).
So, perhaps you (for example) will never, ever be interested in playing the game for anywhere near the amount of time that would justify the cost of entry, but for the specific space exploration / worldbuilding experience that Star Citizen provides, and for the people that want exactly that, it was and is a fantastic game.
I'm probably missing your point, but it sounds like you've answered your own question.