Citizen-Con 2015 (Star Citizen)

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Xyebane

Disembodied Floating Skull
Feb 28, 2009
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CrystalShadow said:
Why not compare a house built 30 years ago that has people living in it with one that has been under construction for a week and doesn't have walls yet while you're at it.
This house is terrible! It has no roof, and half the walls are missing!
Worst house ever!

I mean, seriously, I can believe Star Citizen may not end up being that good, but that's just...
So out of touch with the reality of game development, it's kind of scary.
As someone who used to build houses, your analogy either sucks or disproves your argument. In time from breaking ground to turning over the keys, if you took a house at the half way point it would have a roof and floors, insulation etc. You could go into it and walk around and envision how the final house would be and the exterior would be mostly done. A very large part (time wise) of building the house goes into finishing which are the finer details in the interior to make sure everything is shiny and pretty.

If Star Citizen is a house, and we say we broke ground in 2012 then it wouldn't be finished until 2030 at the current state of the game. That or it would never pass building inspections.

Then again, like i said before maybe your analogy just sucks.
 

DefunctTheory

Not So Defunct Now
Mar 30, 2010
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Maxsin said:
The Escapist?s? really who are they? 2005?
No, the Escapist is an online magazine/nerd journal/entertainment website. It is, in fact, not a fixed point in time in the past, nor the name for a particularly interesting planetary/solar rotation.

Maxsin said:
that's nothing, this little internet trashcan will be gone in another 7 years or less, Chris Roberts has 25 years be hide him and counting.
Strictly speaking, Chris Roberts has about 17-18 years in the gaming industry (Noncontinuous).

Maxsin said:
If your Mom taught you anything, that should have been that we are looked at by the company you keep, you buddy have a bunch of mud slinging internet hiding nothings.
Escapist contributors, like most journalist, publish their names and roughly where they live. I hardly call that hiding. Unless your referring to the users, in which case, I tell you what, I'll give you my social security number and address if you give me yours.

Maxsin said:
I look at the stuff on this forum and this site and its all trash, these people and you have tried to make a living off the coat tails of everyone else, good or bad.
You are aware that this is technically how all news/information based companies function yes?

Maxsin said:
I myself cant wait to see the fall of all trash sites like this and will have a party when it happens
I doubt that. You seem to have a pretty tight schedule - are you sure you can pull yourself off Cloud Imperium's lap for long enough to throw a proper celebration?

And yes, I know, low hanging fruit and all that.
 

scotth266

Wait when did I get a sub
Jan 10, 2009
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Why does an early-access game need a convention?

Why is an early-access game hiring such big-name actors when they don't seem to even have half their gameplay stuff done?

It all just doesn't feel right to me. I hope that I'm wrong (if only because it would be great to see the dreams of Star Citizen become reality) but I have some severe doubts about the project, and until the game is released in full those doubts will remain.
 

isotope

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Oct 11, 2015
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Laughing Man said:
Not with standing the bluster and rumour about the funds, the stupid costs of buying in to the game or the fact that they are so confident that they can go ahead and hire 20, so called, AAA actors, the game itself looks like total and utter arse.

- The graphics are fine but they aren't the blow me away wow they were when the first ship videos started to appear.
- The space combat looks shite, the weapons and ships seem to lack any weight or impact when they fire on an enemy and my god the amount of engagement time with enemies is beyond dull.
- The same issue can be levelled at the FPS combat, fire gun at target and when impact variable hits a certain pre set target watch as target falls over, literally no apparent weight or reaction from the NPCs being shot and that to that a horrible looking character movement.
- I remember this game being herald as have uber realistic physics for ship flight and then I watch some large multi person ship using the in game physics to do a landing, you could see the second the player stopped pushing the down button the ship literally stopped on a dime it was fucking pathetic.

The game just looks crap, it's always looked crap. I've watched any number of let's play videos on this game and they all suffer from the same thing, boring, unengaging and a feature that looks half arsed and half finished. Surely that should be their biggest problem?

How so, well let me clarify, I loved the X Wing games, The Tie Fighter games, I logged a stupid amount of hours on Tachyon The Fringe so this game should be raising a flag for me and it just does not, it looks rubbish.
LOL I know right? Who still makes ars looking pre-alpha releases these days?
Unfortunately there's still a lot of very bad early access games out there.
This is the one that cracks me up the most: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qv6OcTO1ASs
ROTFL XD
 

Michael Navas

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Oct 16, 2015
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AccursedTheory said:
The Witcher 3 cost between 70-87 million dollars to make, including advertising. Assuming they started work on it the day after they released Witcher 2 (Unlikely), it took them about 4 years to complete it. Using that money and 4 years, they built a new engine from the ground up and created one of the largest and most detailed open worlds found in modern gaming (If not the largest). They used 19 'no name' voice actors for primary characters, and 81 voice actors to fill in for lesser characters. They did all this in a country where you can get more bang for your buck, because the cost of living and salaries are lower - specifically, the average polish developer makes 20% of what US developers get.

Star Citizen has 92 million dollars as of last count, for a game that's initial cost was supposed to be 22 million. Their running cost are substantially higher (Office space, power cost, employee cost). And this is what their promising.

-MASSIVE Single Player Campaign
-MASSIVE multiplayer universe (100+ systems)
-Ship Module
-First person Module
-Flight Chair Support
-Integrated tablet functionality (Active)
-Professional Motion Capture (Developer built own mocap studio)
-Full Orchestra Soundtrack
-Professional sound studio (Developer built own sound studio)
-Oculus Rift (3d Glasses) support
-Professional 'Behind the Scenes' documentary
-Space Stations management system
-Mobile Facial Capture System
-Procedural Generation System (Not available for initial release)
-Three complete fictional languages created by actual linguist
-20 A list (Or more realistically, 'known') voice+mocap actors. Unspecified amount of 'no name' actors\
-Pet system

CD Projekt Red Employees - 230
Cloud Imperium Games Employees - 300+ (Internal and contracted)
Ok, what?! If this is true, that is the biggest red flag yet. And since even the defenders haven't tried denying it, in spite of precedent for clinging to any straw avalable, I gotta believe it is accurate.

Christ! This means CIG, an unproven company still getting their bearings has LESS money to do MORE than CD Project Red, a proven company so experienced that their hair must be collectively white from breathing Witcher fumes at this point. How can anyone defend that as in any way normal or acceptable, above skepticism? How?! If that isn't backing of Smart's educated guesses I don't know what is. By Witcher 3 precedent, CIG needs to produce a literal miracle to reach its goals.

However, in the interest of fairness, there will always be revolutions. Brilliant people who manage to do more with less than earlier precedent would indicate possible. Ultima Underworld or No Man's Sky come to mind. Since crowdfunding is all about faith, having trust in someone to revolutionize is reasonable. Acceptable.

Problem is just that CIG hasn't shown its backers anything to justify such faith in miraculous revolutions. To justify the kind of certainty the SC brigade has shown these last few weeks. No Man's Sky did show us that, or at least told us early on how it planned on achieving what they want, with every update since proving them more true.

As for the defense that SC just needs more time, time costs money. If CD Project Red used its 90 millions in 4 years under considerably cheaper circumstances, there is no rational reason to think CIG has money left 3 years in to reach its goals. Which in turn casts a very dark shadow over their motives for additional crowdfunding.

If the quoted facts are accurate, then sorry fanboys, you are defending a miracle. And I who thought Roberts' unwillingess to put this issue to rest on Smart's dime was alarming.
 

Laughing Man

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Oct 10, 2008
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And they are still slowly improving. Are they generations ahead of the curve? No, because we want the game to come out this century. They're still pretty damn nice graphics though, and a lot of the time its the little things like the dynamic damage models that make the difference.
The problem is that was the big selling point of the game, or at least the point they were focusing on with all the walking round the hanger looking at the ship you just paid stupid money for. Yes it looked nice but what happens when your biggest selling factor starts to fade and all you are left with are a bunch of half arsed unengaging modules that one day you may link in to a complete game?

Long engagement times is, believe it or not, a feature. People don't want to play Call of Duty where its see someone 2 seconds later you're dead. That's boring, and it doesn't work at all in the Persistent Universe where death is meant to be a semi-serious thing. So engagements take longer, and its harder to kill things. This is actually as designed and a well loved feature. Many would actually see the engagements take even longer to complete. The game is not meant to be a twitch one.
Tachyon The Fringe had this feature, it was more than possible to end up in a face to face battle that lasted a good length of time due to pilot skill weapon set up and energy management of shields and systems. The thing is it also rewarded pilots that had skill, that took a chance with their setup, using a Pegasus with dual Sols and a decent pilot you could blast in at full speed hit enemies and kill them on a single pass, from what I've seen you get none of that risk / reward, every engagement looks long drawn out and boring.

If the combat in SC is as you describe then I can tell you exactly how combat will go, you'll get two folks who will face off, when the guy loosing sees he's loosing he'll run (use the hyper jump or whatever it's called in SC) to get the fuck out of there and save his ass. That means that all combat will start by each player trying to take out the other players jump engines / drive just so that they know their opponent won't run when the shit hit's the fan. Boring. Twitch kills kept me on the edge of my seat, knowing a skilled opponent who was willing to risk shield for fire power could kill me with a well placed shot forced me to fly better and develop my skill and ship set ups.

That is because the IFCS system was activated. Its an automatic stability control sort of deal, much like we have in airplanes today, that will try to correct your movements to match the settings you have on the throttle, and minimise drift. Aka: You fire thrusters to go down, and your throttle is at 0, and the IFCS corrects and fires retro thrusters to stop you a second later.
and it is piss poorly implemented in this game, you literally see the second the pilot lets go of the keyboard command, the ship stops dead, no rebound, no fight back no sign of a system trying to control momentum it just stops utterly dead, you want to see a game with space craft that has a stability control system that works as I would expect it to work, look at KSPs SAS module. A system that on the fly reacts differently depending on ships size, mass, location of RCS thrusters and mass distribution, an active system that fights to control stability and you can see it working. I mean you can justify SCs system as a pilot stability enhancement but it makes the ship movement look dead and uninvolved, which given that this game was being sold on it's realistic space physics is not the direction you want to be going.

Why not compare a house built 30 years ago that has people living in it with one that has been under construction for a week and doesn't have walls yet while you're at it.
This house is terrible! It has no roof, and half the walls are missing!
Worst house ever!
Oh no no no, how about I compare it to something a bit more similar, KSP or Prison Architect or Factorio two years ago, two games that took only two videos to convince me they were fun and involving and one game that I signed up to around a year ago after just reading about the concept and watching one video. They had GAMEPLAY that would be developed and built on with developers who had a focus on what they wanted to achieve rather than a list of ideas loosely held together by a collection of very mediocre looking 'modules'. If SC just chose one aspect of the game, and focused development on it, just one then fine but it seems they are incapable of doing that. Every big new release seems to be about how they have added something new to the game without really working on what they have and the problem is none of what they have just now looks engaging or fun and given that it's an ALPHA and the purpose is to get people to buy in to how fun the game is going to be it just doesn't work for me.

Now I may be wrong, the game may suddenly come together and be the truly amazing game that the developers claim it will be, that somewhere the tedious uninvolved gameplay they have now suddenly starts to work but having bought in to the Alphas of three other games, games that had fun from the start, that looked fun from the start and had developers who seemed to be focused on what direction they were taking their game, I'll hold my breath in regards to SCs future prospects.
 

Qizx

Executor
Feb 21, 2011
458
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GrumpyPirate said:
The Almighty Aardvark said:
GrumpyPirate said:
Nine people were used as sources for the article, seven were verified as employees, the two that weren't were just used to corroborate information given by the others. Everyone said pretty much the same thing. I'm not saying that it's ironclad proof of anything, particularly since a lot of it was employee's views on how money was being spent, but it is a far cry from heresay and rumors.

Also note that it was updated with Chris Robert's responses, which I think was a very professional way to handle the situation.

In any case, I think there's been enough going on to be at least somewhat worried about the game, even before the article. Ridiculously expensive macrotransactions, missing deadlines, trying to silently rewrite their eula so that nobody gets refunds, etc...
Not a single person gave his or her name -SNIP-.
Except my understanding was they gave substantial proof they were employees. I thought some of them even DID give their names to The Escapist but requested their names not be published. So yeah that's not really an argument against it.
 

BigM

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Oct 9, 2015
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Isn't it cool how if anyone says anything against SC or CR, it brings out the attack dogs! They attack for a game that isn't even made yet, you have to admit it is amazing! I don't put a lot into anything DS says but it is also amazing the employee's from The Escapist article sure says the exact same stuff DS said. So I guess it is true DS did talk to employee's that told him the same things, amazing.

AMAZING!
 

Corralis

New member
Nov 12, 2009
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Michael Navas said:
AccursedTheory said:
The Witcher 3 cost between 70-87 million dollars to make, including advertising. Assuming they started work on it the day after they released Witcher 2 (Unlikely), it took them about 4 years to complete it. Using that money and 4 years, they built a new engine from the ground up and created one of the largest and most detailed open worlds found in modern gaming (If not the largest). They used 19 'no name' voice actors for primary characters, and 81 voice actors to fill in for lesser characters. They did all this in a country where you can get more bang for your buck, because the cost of living and salaries are lower - specifically, the average polish developer makes 20% of what US developers get.

Star Citizen has 92 million dollars as of last count, for a game that's initial cost was supposed to be 22 million. Their running cost are substantially higher (Office space, power cost, employee cost). And this is what their promising.

-MASSIVE Single Player Campaign
-MASSIVE multiplayer universe (100+ systems)
-Ship Module
-First person Module
-Flight Chair Support
-Integrated tablet functionality (Active)
-Professional Motion Capture (Developer built own mocap studio)
-Full Orchestra Soundtrack
-Professional sound studio (Developer built own sound studio)
-Oculus Rift (3d Glasses) support
-Professional 'Behind the Scenes' documentary
-Space Stations management system
-Mobile Facial Capture System
-Procedural Generation System (Not available for initial release)
-Three complete fictional languages created by actual linguist
-20 A list (Or more realistically, 'known') voice+mocap actors. Unspecified amount of 'no name' actors\
-Pet system

CD Projekt Red Employees - 230
Cloud Imperium Games Employees - 300+ (Internal and contracted)
Ok, what?! If this is true, that is the biggest red flag yet. And since even the defenders haven't tried denying it, in spite of precedent for clinging to any straw avalable, I gotta believe it is accurate.

Christ! This means CIG, an unproven company still getting their bearings has LESS money to do MORE than CD Project Red, a proven company so experienced that their hair must be collectively white from breathing Witcher fumes at this point. How can anyone defend that as in any way normal or acceptable, above skepticism? How?! If that isn't backing of Smart's educated guesses I don't know what is. By Witcher 3 precedent, CIG needs to produce a literal miracle to reach its goals.

However, in the interest of fairness, there will always be revolutions. Brilliant people who manage to do more with less than earlier precedent would indicate possible. Ultima Underworld or No Man's Sky come to mind. Since crowdfunding is all about faith, having trust in someone to revolutionize is reasonable. Acceptable.

Problem is just that CIG hasn't shown its backers anything to justify such faith in miraculous revolutions. To justify the kind of certainty the SC brigade has shown these last few weeks. No Man's Sky did show us that, or at least told us early on how it planned on achieving what they want, with every update since proving them more true.

As for the defense that SC just needs more time, time costs money. If CD Project Red used its 90 millions in 4 years under considerably cheaper circumstances, there is no rational reason to think CIG has money left 3 years in to reach its goals. Which in turn casts a very dark shadow over their motives for additional crowdfunding.

If the quoted facts are accurate, then sorry fanboys, you are defending a miracle. And I who thought Roberts' unwillingess to put this issue to rest on Smart's dime was alarming.
Well I don't think you'll find anyone defending this point because no one (bar a few people in Chris' inner circle) actually knows how much money they have left. Derek Smart has no idea, the ex-employees from The Escapist's article certainly have no idea and nor do we, the backers.

I'll have to make some assumptions here but I'm gonna go ahead and guess that Chris hasn't taken all the money raised and hidden it under his bed. It has to have gone into a bank and when it does it earns interest, any sane person knows this.

A simple check of the funding section on the Star Citizen website shows that in the last 7 months, the game has raised about $15-16 million. Someone above posted that staff costs would set them back around $1.7 million per month (assuming everyone got paid $80k per month which they just don't) which would come out at around $12 million over that same 7 month period. Now add on building costs and electricity and equipment and all that other stuff then maybe you get close to $15 million but I highly doubt it.

If Chris has got $20 million sitting in a bank (he did say he had a healthy reserve of cash) then that is earning $2 million a month in interest alone and that's if he's not investing it which if he is would be closer to $4-$6 million per month in interest. Plus he's recently talked about tax incentives and other methods of raising cash so seriously, don't worry about money, this game will be made unless stupid people start throwing law suits at him that he has to defend.

I would hazard a guess that counting all other funding (interest, tax breaks, etc...) then this game has probably raised closer to $120-$150 million and it's still earning $30-$50k a day on it's worst days (in the last week at hasn't earned less than $100k per day).
 

Corralis

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Nov 12, 2009
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BigM said:
Isn't it cool how if anyone says anything against SC or CR, it brings out the attack dogs! They attack for a game that isn't even made yet, you have to admit it is amazing! I don't put a lot into anything DS says but it is also amazing the employee's from The Escapist article sure says the exact same stuff DS said. So I guess it is true DS did talk to employee's that told him the same things, amazing.

AMAZING!
Maybe we feel we have to defend this 'game that isn't even made yet' because people are complaining about the game not being very good when it is in ALPHA. Now I don't think that blindly defending Star Citizen is a good thing to do, I have watched the game grow with interest and I defend it when people say stuff like 'The flight controls are crap', 'The graphics are crap', 'The FPS looks like crap'. Well I actually think that the game looks amazing and has far better graphics than any game currently on the market and I respond to people who lay hate on the game because IT'S IN ALPHA!!!!

For some reason I genuinly think I have to at least attempt to correct some peoples belief's regarding Star Citizen and I actually don't like having to do it but it angers me when I hear stuff like this because the game IS IN ALPHA!!!!

All the stuff people complain about can be argued away by saying those 3 little words.

Ahh one more time, why not... IT'S IN ALPHA!!!!!
 

DefunctTheory

Not So Defunct Now
Mar 30, 2010
6,438
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Maxsin said:
@AccursedTheory @sonofliber @Michael Navas @Laughing Man @Qizx
Did they replace English course with Twitter tutorials in your middle school? If you would like to learn a language, I can help you type something legible to your Senator and local Representative to try and sort that out.

Maxsin said:
what's funny is you lame excuse for journalist talk about something you know nothing about
We are not journalist, though I can forgive you for your mistake. I suppose compared to what your used to, we all do seem to be professional writers. Word smiths, if you will.

Maxsin said:
The people paying are happy so what do you care?
If you're all happy, why do you care what WE think?

Maxsin said:
oh maybe because you cant pay or be apart of something cool?
I've sunk about 75-100 dollars into Star Citizen actually, but that was about 40 module promises ago. Here's my ship, two years ago, when I actually believed in this project.


Maxsin said:
Broke azz journalist writing internet trash LMAO@U
I understand why you'd type LMAO@U, but azz? You realize this is a big boy site, for big boys who use big boy words. Ass - See?

Maxsin said:
in fact I am to busy to write pages and pages of trash that you all seem to have time for.
I seriously doubt you have enough words to fill pages and pages.

Maxsin said:
so who is it that has no life?
Dead people, presumably. Unless you're the religious type.

Maxsin said:
Hmm what should I buy now, maybe a new ship. why? because I can.
Of course you can. It's a free country where you live (Presumably).

Maxsin said:
Hell I would have never heard about this trash site if it wasn't for Star Citizen LMAO. So there you go , COAT TAILS LOL
Considering the fact you seem unaware of at least 60% of the punctuation made available to you by the English language, your ignorance is hardly surprising.

Maxsin said:
pss just to beat some of you trash trolls to the punch, I do not write for a living as you can tell, I have a real job.
Most of us don't write for a living either. I'm suddenly certain you're too young to understand what a forum is. Truly, discussions with an unlimited character count are a dying breed.

Maxsin said:
So if anyone goes off at how bad this is,, this one is for you =P
I suppose by your standards, I was a novelist before my balls dropped.

Maxsin said:
have fun cutting and pasting every word in to your next post, look forward to reading it.... LMMA
Actually, its just a button press, highlight, and delete. And its no trouble - My familiarity with the English language and keyboards has let me finish this in three minutes.

This was fun. Post again!
 

DefunctTheory

Not So Defunct Now
Mar 30, 2010
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Corralis said:
If Chris has got $20 million sitting in a bank (he did say he had a healthy reserve of cash) then that is earning $2 million a month in interest alone and that's if he's not investing it which if he is would be closer to $4-$6 million per month in interest.
Out of curiosity, what bank is offering 10% interest a month? Can you source that? That's significantly higher then a fairly successful stock portfolio based on high risk, high reward stocks.
 

Michael Navas

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Oct 16, 2015
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@Corralis:

Even assuming your estimates are correct, that is just side-stepping the issue. The question is not one of bankruptcy, any more than it would be for CDPR when they have GOG as backup. The question is one of morality and viability. If Witcher 3 precedent says 90 million can't reasonably pay for SC, with your main defense being that continued backing will see it to shore anyway, that means Roberts has overextended himself, any way you slice it. He promised SC regardless of additional backing.

Imagine a public statement reflecting these circumstances: "Um, I know we were supposed to deliver the game for 22 million, and you gave us 90. We are super grateful, but turns out that won't be enough either. Sorry, real sorry! We weren't as conservative as we should have been. Please continue to donate so we can reach shore anyway". In clear text, that means if backing and microtransactions stopped tomorrow, SC would not get made as promised. Roberts would have failed to live up to his end, squadrering ridiculous amounts of money in the process.

You can't tell me that is above board or defensible, just cause people keep pouring money in to save the project. That it doesn't validate Smart on several points.


As an aside, given that those 90 million are a miracle unto themselves, expecting backing to continue unabated for at least a year more on top, doesn't really sound like any less of one.
 

Corralis

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Nov 12, 2009
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AccursedTheory said:
Corralis said:
If Chris has got $20 million sitting in a bank (he did say he had a healthy reserve of cash) then that is earning $2 million a month in interest alone and that's if he's not investing it which if he is would be closer to $4-$6 million per month in interest.
Out of curiosity, what bank is offering 10% interest a month? Can you source that? That's significantly higher then a fairly successful stock portfolio based on high risk, high reward stocks.
With high risk stocks you could probably see as much as 15 to 18% on your investment but you would have to be either super lucky with your investments or very good at playing the market, I highly doubt Chris would risk investing the funds but 4 to 6% interest would still net him $1 million a month.

The point I was trying to make is that over the course of the game development, they will have received a lot more than the nearly $93 million raised.

Also in the worst case scenario he can get investor funding to complete the project. Remember he already got $20 million right at the start of the campaign assuming he could get $2 million in crowd-funding. Imagine how much he could get now he has raised $93 million?
 

DefunctTheory

Not So Defunct Now
Mar 30, 2010
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Corralis said:
AccursedTheory said:
Corralis said:
If Chris has got $20 million sitting in a bank (he did say he had a healthy reserve of cash) then that is earning $2 million a month in interest alone and that's if he's not investing it which if he is would be closer to $4-$6 million per month in interest.
Out of curiosity, what bank is offering 10% interest a month? Can you source that? That's significantly higher then a fairly successful stock portfolio based on high risk, high reward stocks.
With high risk stocks you could probably see as much as 15 to 18% on your investment but you would have to be either super lucky with your investments or very good at playing the market, I highly doubt Chris would risk investing the funds but 4 to 6% interest would still net him $1 million a month.

The point I was trying to make is that over the course of the game development, they will have received a lot more than the nearly $93 million raised.

Also in the worst case scenario he can get investor funding to complete the project. Remember he already got $20 million right at the start of the campaign assuming he could get $2 million in crowd-funding. Imagine how much he could get now he has raised $93 million?
Oh, so you were just throwing bullshit numbers around.

I just wanted to clarify that.

Now, it is quite possible he is making money from investments. The hell if I know. But it would be helpful if everyone would use reasonable numbers that are we can source.

I checked, and I am unable to find company specific interest rates. However, it seems that 1 million dollars, invested in a bank, takes just shy of 20 years to double.

EDIT: Getting a 20 million dollar loan seems to undercut some of Chris Robert's promises (That he'll have full control) and remember - This is now a 100% crowd funded game. A huge amount of the money Cloud Imperium is going to make off Star Citizen has already been made. The people who want the game already have it. Especially if they do, amazingly, keep to their promise of no more ship buying and such.
 

Corralis

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Nov 12, 2009
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Michael Navas said:
@Corralis:

Even assuming your estimates are correct, that is just side-stepping the issue. The question is not one of bankruptcy, any more than it would be for CDPR when they have GOG as backup. The question is one of morality and viability. If Witcher 3 precedent says 90 million can't reasonably pay for SC, with your main defense being that continued backing will see it to shore anyway, that means Roberts has overextended himself, any way you slice it. He promised SC regardless of additional backing.

Imagine a public statement reflecting these circumstances: "Um, I know we were supposed to deliver the game for 22 million, and you gave us 90. We are super grateful, but turns out that won't be enough either. Sorry, real sorry! We weren't as conservative as we should have been. Please continue to donate so we can reach shore anyway". In clear text, that means if backing and microtransactions stopped tomorrow, SC would not get made as promised. Roberts would have failed to live up to his end, squadrering ridiculous amounts of money in the process.

You can't tell me that is above board or defensible. That it doesn't validate Smart on several points.
It's all guess work though isn't it? Your using an example of a game made in Poland, why don't you take a game made in America as that gives you a better idea as the staff costs would be roughly the same.

Destiny cost a reported $500 million to make.
GTA V cost $270 million to make.

Now that is not indicitive of Star Citizen for this one simple reason, CIG are not paying anyone to market their game. We are doing that for them.

Does that make me worried that Star Citizen simply can't be made without reaching $500 million in crowd-funding? No, not really. This game is super close to being finished and in our hands (the latest Citizen-Con video should prove that to you) and by the end of 2016 I think the game will be fully released (and that's a conservative estimate). So that means that there is 14 months left of development time. Using the numbers above at $1.7 million per month for staff costs and (ahh this realy is just a guess) $5 million in other costs that comes in at $28.8 million left. Now if Star Citizen continues to raise just $50k per day (which it very rarely drops below) then in that time it will have earned $21,250,000. So as long as Chris has $7.5 milion tucked away somewhere (pretty sure he will have far more than that), I'm not concerned.
 

Corralis

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AccursedTheory said:
Corralis said:
AccursedTheory said:
Corralis said:
If Chris has got $20 million sitting in a bank (he did say he had a healthy reserve of cash) then that is earning $2 million a month in interest alone and that's if he's not investing it which if he is would be closer to $4-$6 million per month in interest.
Out of curiosity, what bank is offering 10% interest a month? Can you source that? That's significantly higher then a fairly successful stock portfolio based on high risk, high reward stocks.
With high risk stocks you could probably see as much as 15 to 18% on your investment but you would have to be either super lucky with your investments or very good at playing the market, I highly doubt Chris would risk investing the funds but 4 to 6% interest would still net him $1 million a month.

The point I was trying to make is that over the course of the game development, they will have received a lot more than the nearly $93 million raised.

Also in the worst case scenario he can get investor funding to complete the project. Remember he already got $20 million right at the start of the campaign assuming he could get $2 million in crowd-funding. Imagine how much he could get now he has raised $93 million?
Oh, so you were just throwing bullshit numbers around.

I just wanted to clarify that.

Now, it is quite possible he is making money from investments. The hell if I know. But it would be helpful if everyone would use reasonable numbers that are we can source.

I checked, and I am unable to find company specific interest rates. However, it seems that 1 million dollars, invested in a bank, takes just shy of 20 years to double. So, if they do have 20 milli

EDIT: Getting a 20 million dollar loan seems to undercut some of Chris Robert's promises (That he'll have full control) and remember - This is now a 100% crowd funded game. A huge amount of the money Cloud Imperium is going to make off Star Citizen has already been made. The people who want the game already have it. Especially if they do, amazingly, keep to their promise of no more ship buying and such.
Yea I was just throwing bull shit numbers around, because as I mentioned in my above post, no one other than a few key personel have access to Star Citizens financial records.

I would have thought that most reasonable people would be quite happy (in the worst case scenario) if Chris has to go to an investor to finish this game. Considering the only other alternative(in the worst case scenario) would be that the game gets scrapped and everyone loses their money.

As for your other point that Chris has already got all the money he is ever going to get, I don't think that's accurate. I think that there are a hell of a lot of people watching this game and waiting before it is released before they will buy it and I think that there are probably a lot more who don't even know it exists. 3 years into production and the 1 millionth backer only recently found out about the game, how many more people like him are out there?
 

Tharaxis

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@ Corralis, be aware that a percentage interest rating on an investment is an annualized rate. Therefore even if they were to get a whopping 20% return on lets say $20 million (therefore $4 million), that would only be $4 million across 12 months, or about $330K p/m, still not a bad sum, but not nearly the kind of growth rate you were expecting - and that's at an unrealistic 20%. More likely interest rates could be between 7 and 12% depending on risk.

Personally I feel that CIG has sufficient funds (and will continue to gain funds for the foreseeable future) to be able to complete Squadron 42 and get a first stab at the persistent universe. A lot of the *really* expensive components required by SQ42 have already been invested in (mocap, actors, tech, etc.) and are unlikely to incur sufficiently more cost than they already have.

The biggest problem with this whole situation is that people who have not even the simplest clue as to how software development works in the real world (outside of their assumptions of "how it should be") are making grandiose/wild claims about whether the project is being handled correctly, how far along it is vs. how far along it should be, how it's not fun and it's buggy (yeah, well, shocker, it's alpha software).

Worse yet, some people (who themselves are in the industry) who should (and do) know *far* better than they are letting on about the process of developing software, including the challenges, highs and lows, and how things such as scope and budget fluctuate over the life of a product long before it hits market (or often even public consciousness), are repeating these things as well and are pretending that these aren't natural processes, often hidden away from the public, which take place during a product's lifecycle.

Keep in mind, when marketing starts advertising a AAA game to you and that game is still a year out, not only has it been in development for anywhere between 2 - 5 years, but at that stage it's still BUGGY (sometimes barely playable and wildly incomplete). You only get to experience that year of carefully curated information being given to you, you never find out about how many times features were added and cut, or how many times there were budget issues or concerns, or how bad the game sucked 4 weeks ago but now it's playable oh but now it's broken again. With crowdfunded games, you are seeing a lot (but perhaps not all) of that process.
 

Corralis

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Nov 12, 2009
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Tharaxis said:
@ Corralis, be aware that a percentage interest rating on an investment is an annualized rate. Therefore even if they were to get a whopping 20% return on lets say $20 million (therefore $4 million), that would only be $4 million across 12 months, or about $330K p/m, still not a bad sum, but not nearly the kind of growth rate you were expecting - and that's at an unrealistic 20%. More likely interest rates could be between 7 and 12% depending on risk.

Personally I feel that CIG has sufficient funds (and will continue to gain funds for the foreseeable future) to be able to complete Squadron 42 and get a first stab at the persistent universe. A lot of the *really* expensive components required by SQ42 have already been invested in (mocap, actors, tech, etc.) and are unlikely to incur sufficiently more cost than they already have.

The biggest problem with this whole situation is that people who have not even the simplest clue as to how software development works in the real world (outside of their assumptions of "how it should be") are making grandiose/wild claims about whether the project is being handled correctly, how far along it is vs. how far along it should be, how it's not fun and it's buggy (yeah, well, shocker, it's alpha software).

Worse yet, some people (who themselves are in the industry) who should (and do) know *far* better than they are letting on about the process of developing software, including the challenges, highs and lows, and how things such as scope and budget fluctuate over the life of a product long before it hits market (or often even public consciousness), are repeating these things as well and are pretending that these are natural processes, often hidden away from the public, which take place during a product's lifecycle.

Keep in mind, when marketing starts advertising a AAA game to you and that game is still a year out, not only has it been in development for anywhere between 2 - 5 years, but at that stage it's still BUGGY (sometimes barely playable and wildly incomplete). You only get to experience that year of carefully curated information being given to you, you never find out about how many times features were added and cut, or how many times there were budget issues or concerns, or how bad the game sucked 4 weeks ago but now it's playable oh but now it's broken again. With crowdfunded games, you are seeing a lot (but perhaps not all) of that process.
Yea I pretty much said all that (with a lot less detail) in an above post. I think my words were 'If this were a normal game made by a AAA publisher, no one would even know of this games existance because it isn't ready to announce yet'.
 

sonofliber

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AccursedTheory said:
maxsin Chan wisdom
Don't you mess with maxsin Chan, he has issues you know? ( from his post looks like a shit ton of them) but that doesn't mean his post aren't filled with knowledge and love. you should feel bad, (do you think a normal person would write like that? Holy crap no, this is caused by years of psychological and emotional shunning from his loved ones) this is the only way he knows how to express himself from the basement of his neglecting parents, so don't hate maxsin chan but learn to accept his ways and love him like the special puppy he is