As Star Citizen turns eight years old, the single-player campaign still sounds a long way off
Star Citizen's single-player campaign, Squadron 42 is still in development, Cloud Imperium Games has insisted, but don'…
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Failure to launch: As Star Citizen turns eight years old, the single-player campaign still sounds a long way off
- Thread starter Kenzodielocke
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www.eurogamer.net
I remember that I got a code for Star Citizen with a high end AMD graphics card I bought 5 years ago for a free ship (and access to the full game basically) and I am pretty sure that once the game gets released that GPU will actually be below minimum requirements to run this game.
I can't believe it has been this long.
I can't believe it has been this long.
I was in my final year of Secondary School when this was announced. Backed it straight away, seemed like a dream game!
Since then, I've gone through Sixth Form, University and now I've got a job.
I refunded my account ages ago, my faith in this campaign coming out within the next couple of years is slim, to say the least.
Since then, I've gone through Sixth Form, University and now I've got a job.
I refunded my account ages ago, my faith in this campaign coming out within the next couple of years is slim, to say the least.
The end of the article says there's a SQ42 show out today. Really interested to see what is shown.
I have a feeling we will be "celebrating" 10 years of Star Citizen and will be close to the same as where we are now. Like there just does not seem to be any traction on this outside of some modules that are released and then forgotten about.
Wasn't it a roadmap for the roadmap they wanted to release ? (something crazy like that, maybe even one level deeper)
edit:
damn...
Yeah, Chris Roberts was famous for it (bloat and costs explosion)... but damn if i ever thought he'd try to make a mass effect out of a Wing Commander game
Last edited:
Was it? I'm only casually following it. I wonder if this project has producers and what their job is like. What's their success rate of hitting internal goals, stuff like that.
Yeah
Star Citizen Developer Publishes a Roadmap...for a Roadmap - ExtremeTech
Cloud Imperium Games knows that some of Star Citizens' fans are unhappy with the pace of development. After five months, they've provided an updated roadmap for when they'll actually publish an updated roadmap. There are no dates on the roadmap for the roadmap, either.
www.extremetech.com
I also am very very casually (like... once a year) following the thing for, just ... i don't know... maybe because i am a light masochist. That and to check if my account has not been terminated or stolen.
CIG said:
I don't understand the purpose of a single player campaign for this game, never have. People are gonna play it once, why spend the resources when you're so clearly spread thin. Why not make them Multiplayer missions or something? Combine it into one mode, one game. Obviously its too late now but I think this should've happened years ago. Seems like such a big waste, the interesting parts of the game will be the persistent universe.
The kickstarter happened when there was a drought of single player story-heavy space combat flight sims. If i signed up immediately was because of this promise of bringing a new generation game in the genre.
If the game was multiplayer only, i think it would not have gathered enough momentum. At least it would not have had me or about 20 of my acquaintances (none of us got it for the multiplayer thing, it's just a side freebee). Side note: we are all old people, in our 40s, whom grew up with these old combat flight sims, so a specific demographic.
Worth noting that they released a teaser for today's (saturday) first episode of "The Briefing Room", where every quarter they'll talk (or at least try to) about development of Squadron 42 and how it's going it greater detail.
The teaser is just a flyby of a location in the campaign.
Also, list of events for the anniversary
The teaser is just a flyby of a location in the campaign.
Also, list of events for the anniversary
Star Citizen Birthday 2020 - Roberts Space Industries | Follow the development of Star Citizen and Squadron 42
Roberts Space Industries is the official go-to website for all news about Star Citizen and Squadron 42. It also hosts the online store for game items and merch, as well as all the community tools used by our fans.
robertsspaceindustries.com
This is absolutely false. It's only being developed for PC. Anything regarding console ports will be talked about when the game is considered released.
It is not absolutely false. You may not believe me but I know which developer was approached about working on this for PS5.
Reading the responses in full is not reassuring. It reads like a game after its first public debut. So many references to future plans for updates and tool creation before actually getting to the work.
How do you envision NPC crew gameplay?
First steps are building out the player functionality to those roles (Captain, Engineer, etc) similar to pilots and turret gunners. We currently have some of those AI functions, like flying the ship, but we would still need to build the "glue" for AI, like what they do off duty. The capt/owner of the ship will need a way to set what roles he wants the NPCs to do. The Capt will also need a way to interface with the AI to tell them what they want them to do, like fly to a set location or attack a certain target.
We are still planning to allow players to take remote control of the NPCs.
SQ42 is currently 6 years behind its original delivery target ... Given the massive uncertainty on the progress of SQ42 within the community, do you feel as though you have been meeting this objective?
Tomorrow we'll be launching the inaugural episode of the "The Briefing Room" a show focused just on Squadron 42, which we are planning to do every quarter (3 months) until Squadron 42 releases, where we will address some of this.
We haven't been happy with how effectively we've been showing progress on Squadron 42, as we felt the previous format didn't do a good job of all in communicating just how much work is going on. The new roadmap format which we've been working towards and on since we announced we would be changing it up will do a much better job in show what people are working on at any given time as opposed to just focusing on deliverable features. I briefly discussed our thinking in https://robertsspaceindustries.com/...atmospheric-room-system-4-years-later/3366441
Squadron 42 is a tricky project to communicate on as we really don't want to give the experience and story away which can make updating on certain content or features challenging.
We DO give regular updates on Squadron 42, even though we haven't updated the Squadron 42 Roadmap since the beginning of this year with the monthly reports. The most recent one was earlier this week https://mailchi.mp/cloudimperiumgames/squadron-42-update-143128. We also occasionally have content or feature updates on things that will be in Squadron, as we did with the new Vanduul ships in the Inside Star Citizen Episode: Enemy Mine
We also communicate way more than any other developer or publisher than I am aware of in terms of work and progress on Star Citizen, which is the game "The Pledge" was referring to; We have multiple video shows per week, lore updates, developers regularly engage in the forums, have a weekly newsletter and well as regular monthly reports.
I don't think the issue is whether we treat our community with respect, as that is core tenet of the entire company, or lack of communication; it's different people want communication in different forms; some want in depth long talky videos, some want just the sizzle videos with pretty graphics. Some people want huge technical treatises on server meshing and others just want the ELI5 version and finally a lot of people just want to know when a feature or the game will be done.
And I think that's the crux of the issue; it's impossible to please all the people all the time, and with a project as complicated as Star Citizen or even Squadron 42 it's impossible to have iron clad dates due to the huge amount of ongoing R&D.
So yes, I do feel like we have been meeting "The Pledge".
Does that mean we can't improve?
No, we can always improve, and if you follow CIG and Star Citizen close enough you will notice that we are always trying new things and tweaking existing processes both in our development approach and structure in how we communicate and share information with all of you. The new Roadmap will be part of this, as will the Briefing Room.
There are currently 95 systems, 324 planets, 74 moons, 50 space stations, and 76 asteroid formations in lore. ... That all said it's still hundreds of planets, moons, asteroid belts, and hero zones that you have to go. Even working at pumping out 10 systems a year it'd take you 9 years from tomorrow to get that all out. So without commenting on tools, what realistically is your plan here?
We are not ready to go full bore on all of the systems. We are building up the tools, knowledge, and people power to be able to deliver the systems quicker.
Can't talk about tools? That is what allows us to build faster and faster as they get refined! That is how we have adjusted building a moon in year to building one in 2 weeks. We have the same goals for Space stations.
A lot of time and work goes into building up the asset packs. Once we have the assets built we can put locations and planets together fairly quick. Putting gameplay hooks into the locations will take time to place and make locations feel special. Obviously the quality and detail level of the solar systems that were initially planned in the very beginning of crowd funding has drastically changed over production of SC. Once we realized the detail level that we could go into with the planets and the landing zones, we wanted to push the limit of fidelity. Comparing SC to the Privateer/Freelancer systems, you are getting exponential amount of gameplay and detail on each planet and moon.
We are trying to build up the team to deliver solar systems in one drop vs the iterative approach that we are currently doing in Stanton.
Death of a Spaceman(https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/engineering/12879-Death-Of-A-Spaceman) was written way back in February 2013. ... While this is probably currently undergoing a design rework, could you tell us what you know to be different now
Later this month there is going to be a Calling All Devs episode on "Death of a Spaceman" with myself and Richard Tyer, Core Gameplay Director (which includes the Actor teams), where we'll go into the current plans, which you' start to see the results of mid next year as we begin to bring in Medical gameplay. So watch for that as we'll go into the current design which is ready for implementation.
Can you elaborate on the current thinking on how base building is supposed to work?
We have some pretty exciting plans on the base building / player settlement front. One of the fall outs of iCache, which we've been working on for full persistence of state and location of all dynamic objects in the universe of Star Citizen, is that recording and restoring a building you've just constructed is really no different to remembering where you dropped your coffee cup on some distant planet, or which shelf you placed it on in your hab.
Basically, iCache will enable us to allow all of you to settle the stars!
When we first came up with the concept of player built outposts and land claims iCache hadn't been technically designed, but now we have a system that will have a much higher degree of fidelity in remembering where each building or component is and what state it is in. So rather than just dropping down a singular Outpost, you'll be able to place down various structures and connect them to things like power generators, turrets, resource collectors, hydroponic domes and so on.
In parallel with this we've been working on tools to build settlements or homestead both for our artists / designers (more of a RTS god like view) and players (a first person view).
With this we've been rethinking how the Pioneer will work to make her more flexible rather than just spitting out a pre-fabricated outpost we want her to me more of a mobile fabrication facility that would be near your building site. With a Pioneer you'll be able build these structures without having to ship in the component parts as long as you have a supply of raw materials. You don't need a Pioneer to build a homestead but if you want to build a decent settlement, or you want to build something relatively quickly as opposed to having to fly in prefabricated components from major landing zones you will want to have a Pioneer, or have a friend or someone that is willing to lend their services to you.
We're very excited about the gameplay that all of this will provide and can't wait to see what kind of player settlements sprout up over the huge amount of land area the game has. We will need iCache in and working well before we will see this in the game, so expect to see some updates on this later next year.
So what's the deal with Theatres of War?
Currently being worked on and tested, ideally Sean and Rich will give an update to everyone once it is ready for everyone to play.
What is the plan for computers and the blades? Currently we only know about using blades for turret automating and slaving, do you have any other ideas currently for what blades could be used for?
Here is some things that have been discussed that are being thought of for hardware (new blade) or software (loaded on computer or blade), these would be types of ideas that we would bring online over time:
We need some Planetary Nav Mesh work done, we have a fair amount of it completed. Then once that is done we can start to implement it into missions or random encounters. When that is done AI will be able to transition from Ship to Surface smoothly. This will also open us for building creatures (space cow or larger animals) or boids (very small creatures..frogs, birds) to add extra life.
Has there been any progress on the plans for data running and hacking?
It hasn't been forgotten, personally it is one of the professions I'm looking forward to the most, we just have some higher priority work that needs to be completed first. We are focused on delivering big physical cargo first.
Last year at Citizen Con we saw NPC moving between physics grids and walking out of the Valkyrie. What is the current status of this?
We currently have a few bugs that we need to work out, that will allow AI to path between ships, planetary surfaces, and man made locations.
Are rivers planned?
Yes
What are the plans to make those systemic missions less repetitive and more engaging ?
Doing what we call mission modifiers and leveraging our unique locations.
Take a basic mission of delivering a cargo crate from an outpost to a space station.
Add in one or multiple of these basic modifiers:
-FPS AI that want that crate
-Ship AI that want that crate
-A cargo crate that is volatile
-Pick up is in a hostile location
-Drop off is in a hostile location
-List can go on and on.
How do you envision NPC crew gameplay?
First steps are building out the player functionality to those roles (Captain, Engineer, etc) similar to pilots and turret gunners. We currently have some of those AI functions, like flying the ship, but we would still need to build the "glue" for AI, like what they do off duty. The capt/owner of the ship will need a way to set what roles he wants the NPCs to do. The Capt will also need a way to interface with the AI to tell them what they want them to do, like fly to a set location or attack a certain target.
We are still planning to allow players to take remote control of the NPCs.
SQ42 is currently 6 years behind its original delivery target ... Given the massive uncertainty on the progress of SQ42 within the community, do you feel as though you have been meeting this objective?
Tomorrow we'll be launching the inaugural episode of the "The Briefing Room" a show focused just on Squadron 42, which we are planning to do every quarter (3 months) until Squadron 42 releases, where we will address some of this.
We haven't been happy with how effectively we've been showing progress on Squadron 42, as we felt the previous format didn't do a good job of all in communicating just how much work is going on. The new roadmap format which we've been working towards and on since we announced we would be changing it up will do a much better job in show what people are working on at any given time as opposed to just focusing on deliverable features. I briefly discussed our thinking in https://robertsspaceindustries.com/...atmospheric-room-system-4-years-later/3366441
Squadron 42 is a tricky project to communicate on as we really don't want to give the experience and story away which can make updating on certain content or features challenging.
We DO give regular updates on Squadron 42, even though we haven't updated the Squadron 42 Roadmap since the beginning of this year with the monthly reports. The most recent one was earlier this week https://mailchi.mp/cloudimperiumgames/squadron-42-update-143128. We also occasionally have content or feature updates on things that will be in Squadron, as we did with the new Vanduul ships in the Inside Star Citizen Episode: Enemy Mine
We also communicate way more than any other developer or publisher than I am aware of in terms of work and progress on Star Citizen, which is the game "The Pledge" was referring to; We have multiple video shows per week, lore updates, developers regularly engage in the forums, have a weekly newsletter and well as regular monthly reports.
I don't think the issue is whether we treat our community with respect, as that is core tenet of the entire company, or lack of communication; it's different people want communication in different forms; some want in depth long talky videos, some want just the sizzle videos with pretty graphics. Some people want huge technical treatises on server meshing and others just want the ELI5 version and finally a lot of people just want to know when a feature or the game will be done.
And I think that's the crux of the issue; it's impossible to please all the people all the time, and with a project as complicated as Star Citizen or even Squadron 42 it's impossible to have iron clad dates due to the huge amount of ongoing R&D.
So yes, I do feel like we have been meeting "The Pledge".
Does that mean we can't improve?
No, we can always improve, and if you follow CIG and Star Citizen close enough you will notice that we are always trying new things and tweaking existing processes both in our development approach and structure in how we communicate and share information with all of you. The new Roadmap will be part of this, as will the Briefing Room.
There are currently 95 systems, 324 planets, 74 moons, 50 space stations, and 76 asteroid formations in lore. ... That all said it's still hundreds of planets, moons, asteroid belts, and hero zones that you have to go. Even working at pumping out 10 systems a year it'd take you 9 years from tomorrow to get that all out. So without commenting on tools, what realistically is your plan here?
We are not ready to go full bore on all of the systems. We are building up the tools, knowledge, and people power to be able to deliver the systems quicker.
Can't talk about tools? That is what allows us to build faster and faster as they get refined! That is how we have adjusted building a moon in year to building one in 2 weeks. We have the same goals for Space stations.
A lot of time and work goes into building up the asset packs. Once we have the assets built we can put locations and planets together fairly quick. Putting gameplay hooks into the locations will take time to place and make locations feel special. Obviously the quality and detail level of the solar systems that were initially planned in the very beginning of crowd funding has drastically changed over production of SC. Once we realized the detail level that we could go into with the planets and the landing zones, we wanted to push the limit of fidelity. Comparing SC to the Privateer/Freelancer systems, you are getting exponential amount of gameplay and detail on each planet and moon.
We are trying to build up the team to deliver solar systems in one drop vs the iterative approach that we are currently doing in Stanton.
Death of a Spaceman(https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/engineering/12879-Death-Of-A-Spaceman) was written way back in February 2013. ... While this is probably currently undergoing a design rework, could you tell us what you know to be different now
Later this month there is going to be a Calling All Devs episode on "Death of a Spaceman" with myself and Richard Tyer, Core Gameplay Director (which includes the Actor teams), where we'll go into the current plans, which you' start to see the results of mid next year as we begin to bring in Medical gameplay. So watch for that as we'll go into the current design which is ready for implementation.
Can you elaborate on the current thinking on how base building is supposed to work?
We have some pretty exciting plans on the base building / player settlement front. One of the fall outs of iCache, which we've been working on for full persistence of state and location of all dynamic objects in the universe of Star Citizen, is that recording and restoring a building you've just constructed is really no different to remembering where you dropped your coffee cup on some distant planet, or which shelf you placed it on in your hab.
Basically, iCache will enable us to allow all of you to settle the stars!
When we first came up with the concept of player built outposts and land claims iCache hadn't been technically designed, but now we have a system that will have a much higher degree of fidelity in remembering where each building or component is and what state it is in. So rather than just dropping down a singular Outpost, you'll be able to place down various structures and connect them to things like power generators, turrets, resource collectors, hydroponic domes and so on.
In parallel with this we've been working on tools to build settlements or homestead both for our artists / designers (more of a RTS god like view) and players (a first person view).
With this we've been rethinking how the Pioneer will work to make her more flexible rather than just spitting out a pre-fabricated outpost we want her to me more of a mobile fabrication facility that would be near your building site. With a Pioneer you'll be able build these structures without having to ship in the component parts as long as you have a supply of raw materials. You don't need a Pioneer to build a homestead but if you want to build a decent settlement, or you want to build something relatively quickly as opposed to having to fly in prefabricated components from major landing zones you will want to have a Pioneer, or have a friend or someone that is willing to lend their services to you.
We're very excited about the gameplay that all of this will provide and can't wait to see what kind of player settlements sprout up over the huge amount of land area the game has. We will need iCache in and working well before we will see this in the game, so expect to see some updates on this later next year.
So what's the deal with Theatres of War?
Currently being worked on and tested, ideally Sean and Rich will give an update to everyone once it is ready for everyone to play.
What is the plan for computers and the blades? Currently we only know about using blades for turret automating and slaving, do you have any other ideas currently for what blades could be used for?
Here is some things that have been discussed that are being thought of for hardware (new blade) or software (loaded on computer or blade), these would be types of ideas that we would bring online over time:
- Missile Defense System (Combat) - Automatically fires correct countermeasures to avoid being hit by missiles
- Encryption/Decryption Blade (Data Runner) - Able to keep data encrypted to prevent theft and also provides the means to attempt to decrypt data.
- Emissions Controller (Combat) - Allows the pilot to set strict limits on emission production, providing additional warnings and shutting down unnecessary systems automatically.
- Offensive E-War Blade (Combat) - Enhances existing offensive e-war capability, could speed up or strengthen offensive programs/viruses or offer new ones to run.
- Defensive E-War Blade (Combat) - Enhances existing defensive e-war capability, grants further protection and reduces potency of offensive programs.
- Mining Blade (Mining) - Speeds up mining scans and provides additional information (pinpointing pockets of ore, mineral density etc.)
- Salvage Database (Salvaging) - Speeds up scanning wrecks and provides additional information (pinpoints valuable ship items, shows materials contained within wrecks etc.)
- Criminal Database (Bounty Hunter) - Provides a list of known criminals or unlawful activity and the ability to accept bounties to track them down and bring them to justice.
- "Hit List" (Pirate) - Similar to the criminal database but to be used by criminals. Bad people can view and accept contracts to take care of people.
- Enhanced Route Navigation (Trade / Exploration) - Essentially enhanced starmap/navigation options. Lets the pilot know how dangerous the route is that they are taking, enables them to pick routes based on speed, safety or avoiding certain areas.
- Trade Database (Trade) - Allows traders to view buy/sell prices in different places in the universe while on the move, rather than having to be at a trade station.
- Shield Management Blade (Combat) - Provides advanced shield control options to allow finer control.
- Stellar Charting System (Exploration / General) - Makes it easier to discover jump points if/when they move elsewhere, possibly also makes jump travel easier.
- Item Lock Blade (Combat) - Further enhances the targeting system to allow the pilot to lock onto specific parts of the ship, so they are able to take out individual systems.
- Cargo Manifest Masker (Smuggling) - Disguises the items in your cargo manifest to allow you to hide contraband from initial ship scans.
- Internal Security System (Larger ships) - Provides internal ship info, positions of lifeforms aboard the ship and the ability to lock/unlock individual doors.
- Drone Management Blade (Larger ships) - Allows ships to control on-board drones
We need some Planetary Nav Mesh work done, we have a fair amount of it completed. Then once that is done we can start to implement it into missions or random encounters. When that is done AI will be able to transition from Ship to Surface smoothly. This will also open us for building creatures (space cow or larger animals) or boids (very small creatures..frogs, birds) to add extra life.
Has there been any progress on the plans for data running and hacking?
It hasn't been forgotten, personally it is one of the professions I'm looking forward to the most, we just have some higher priority work that needs to be completed first. We are focused on delivering big physical cargo first.
Last year at Citizen Con we saw NPC moving between physics grids and walking out of the Valkyrie. What is the current status of this?
We currently have a few bugs that we need to work out, that will allow AI to path between ships, planetary surfaces, and man made locations.
Are rivers planned?
Yes
What are the plans to make those systemic missions less repetitive and more engaging ?
Doing what we call mission modifiers and leveraging our unique locations.
Take a basic mission of delivering a cargo crate from an outpost to a space station.
Add in one or multiple of these basic modifiers:
-FPS AI that want that crate
-Ship AI that want that crate
-A cargo crate that is volatile
-Pick up is in a hostile location
-Drop off is in a hostile location
-List can go on and on.
Incredible how time flies. My son was born the day this was announced. In the meantime I've watched him grow up, go through school, get a degree, marry, and have kids of his own.
this is so weird. how are they able to lock down all the cutscenes and stuff like that this early if the single player campaign is still years away and the project is constantly changing?
They should rename it: Road Map Commander.
Buy ships and we'll give you amazing quarterly development updates!
Buy ships and we'll give you amazing quarterly development updates!
lmao yeah i want an answer. did chris roberts just film all those cutscenes so he could reconnect with all these hollywood actors?
Man, I was so excited for this game back when it was announced. Since then though, I've gotten married, had a kid, adopted four cats and one dog, and bought a house. I'll still check it out if it's ever released, but there's no way I can put a lot of time into this game anymore.
Horseshit, as if game devs haven't ever figured out a way to show progress in singleplayer games without spoiling them before. This is the worst kind of cop out, on the level of some two-bit indie Kickstarter apologetic.
9 years and $300 million on and they're still in pre-production mode and under-staffed. Monumental incompetence is the only charitable explanation.
I wonder if it's actual incompetence or malice. They're getting $100k+ daily on a promise of a game, wouldn't you try to milk those people for as long as you could?
As mentioned, incompetence is the only way to paint this in an even slightly well-meaning light. I've talked about this in a previous SC thread, but the monetization and frankly fraudulent marketing practices surrounding this game really are indistinguishable from a ponzi scheme, ignorant at best and criminally predatory at worst.