Star Citizen’s Squadron 42 shows off a cinematic trailer

[HiFlyer 9,358]

21 minutes ago, Paraffin said:

But In case we need any reminder of what Roberts does at the helm, remember this box office turkey he directed?

I kind of liked the film... I just think he didn't have the budget to do what he wanted, so everything ended up kind of truncated, especially the flop of a "climactic" battle at the end that should have concluded it all in an crescendo, but was instead an anticlimax.

And yes it was cliche, but it was his cliche.

[HiFlyer 9,358]

 

[HiFlyer 9,358]

Geeeeeezzzz! https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-10-13-six-years-later-star-citizen-is-still-raking-it-in

Quote

 

Star Citizen has been in development for six years and it still doesn't have a release date - but the money keeps flooding on in.

The space PC game, which has so far raised nearly $200m, recently held CitizenCon, a gathering of fans and developers for all things Star Citizen.

Off the back of that, the release of a new update, a flashy new trailer and the sale of some new spaceships, developer Cloud Imperium Games saw $379,254 flow into its coffers in just one day.

The following day, on the 11th October, CIG brought in around $320,000. And yesterday, 12th October, around $200,000 came in. Based on this trajectory, by the end of this week, around $1m will have been made.

This marks a giant jump in revenue for the Star Citizen norm. Each day this week prior to the 10th, the game pulled in around $21,000.

One of the things that's unique about Star Citizen is it makes public its revenue, which it's still calling crowdfunding, on its website, so you can see how much money is being made on a monthly, weekly, daily and even hourly basis.

Star Citizen makes the bulk of its money from the sale of virtual spaceships, some of which you can fly now, some you can't. At CitizenCon, CIG released a new spaceship available for a limited time only. The Valkyrie 2948 Liberator edition is only available until 14th October, and it costs £264. There's a bundle with the ship and a raft of extras, including lifetime insurance, for £536.

Some ships are considered so special you can't just buy it, you have to register your interest first. One of these is the Kraken, an enormous capital ship with enough room for 10 players that was revealed this week. Here's the in-universe explanation (when it comes to Star Citizen, pretty much everything's in-universe):

"Interested in commanding a flying fortress and redefining freedom? The Kraken is poised to take the stars by storm, but due to high demand, an extreme and unique production process, and specialized materials, Drake anticipates a limited quality of hulls will be available. Use the form below to register your interest in adding a Kraken to your fleet and changing the universe for the better."

"We offer pledge ships to help fund Star Citizen's development," CIG explains. "The funding received from events such as this allows us to include deeper features in the Star Citizen world. These ships will be obtainable in the final universe, and they are not required to start the game."

Star Citizen is a controversial project and its trials and tribulations are well documented. Still, there are enough people still willing to invest even now, six years after the project launched and with no release date in sight, that hundreds of thousands of pounds are made in just a single day. Fans, clearly, get it. Everyone else? Well, it's a bit of a head-scratcher.

 

 

[ShawnG 1,823]

2 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

Nah. There's no such thing as a new story, only creative ways of combining old snippets in possibly unique ways. Star Wars was more about Flash Gordon than anything, and Roberts ran with the concept of Spachips as WW2 fighter planes, stirred in a desperate battle against the odds, added the emerging possibilities of computer technology that had just become feasible at the time (along with many other elements) and viola.

When Squadron 42 was first announced, I and I think many other space-sim fans were deep into Freespace as resurrected by various modders, and was pretty much looking for more of the same, just with updated technology, for a genre that seemed to have been forgotten.

Squadron 42 promises exactly what Chris roberts is famous for, and exactly what I think a lot of us wanted and threw money at him to create, a rousing romp against the kilrathi.... or Kizinti, or Klingons (lottsa K's) or whoever the slobbering cannon fodder it is we are supposed to blow the hell up this time.

Most of the rest is gravy, and worrying feature-creep.

I don't even want Star Citizen. I want Squadron 42.

Nice voice acting, and the 3d characters that were not technically available for the wing commander films... er.... games, is exactly what the man has been aiming for forever. I think he only did films because the vision he had wasn't yet possible any other way.

Now it is, and he's following the vision he had from the beginning, which I can't really fault him for.

I can blame him for wasting time in what seems to be a bit of a bait and switch, promising us Squadron 42 then going way out into left field with the rest of this word not allowed and spending people's money like water.

Agreed, backers of this thing aren't interested in a unique storyline.  If there was one, I doubt they would have raised 100k.  much like rock audiences aren't interested in watching their favorite 70's rock gods go all jazz fusion on them.  They want the wing commander guy to make the greatest wing commander of all time.

 

I will disagree that Squadron 42 is what most signed up for,  it certainly isn't what I and just about every other backer I talk to signed up for.  The Open universe space MMO is the selling point.  I'm excited for it, and I HATE MMO's.  I've probably spent more time just in the Alpha dogfighting arena than I have in Elite Dangerous and the X series games combined.  

 

But, to throw this into the flight sim context... what if a major flight sim developer crowd funded 200 million bucks to make the ultimate flight sim.  you'd want them to make something marginally better and release it quick, or would you want them to kick out the jams?

 

 

[Paraffin 2,197]

15 hours ago, ShawnG said:

But, to throw this into the flight sim context... what if a major flight sim developer crowd funded 200 million bucks to make the ultimate flight sim.  you'd want them to make something marginally better and release it quick, or would you want them to kick out the jams?

I'd want that hypothetical developer to spend the 200 million on air-side operations, primarily the cockpit experience, and whatever ground support operations would help with immersion like ATC. Sure, take whatever time is required, but don't let feature creep kill the dream.

Instead, what SC is doing is the equivalent of a flight sim where massive amounts of money are being spent on modeling the interior of airport buildings, complete with food vendors, and then you can rent a car and drive around the city and hang out for beers at a neighborhood pub. 

SC-as-flight sim would also have the users spending incredible amounts of money for CAD file images of whatever Boeing and Airbus have in mind for future commercial aircraft, not anything you could fly right now. 🙂 

That's actually the part of SC that I think is the least defensible, because it has nothing to do with "taking your time" to build a good product. It's just fleecing the users, and brings up all sorts of questions about pay-to-play balance in a competitive MMO environment. I can't think of a good analogy with flight sims, unless there is a virtual airline somewhere that allows buying the better planes for cash. There is disparity in what people own and fly in the FSEconomy game, but it's a result of spending many hours of flight time to earn and maintain the more expensive planes.

Edited October 14, 2018 by Paraffin
typo

[ShawnG 1,823]

5 hours ago, Paraffin said:

I'd want that hypothetical developer to spend the 200 million on air-side operations, primarily the cockpit experience, and whatever ground support operations would help with immersion like ATC. Sure, take whatever time is required, but don't let feature creep kill the dream.

Instead, what SC is doing is the equivalent of a flight sim where massive amounts of money are being spent on modeling the interior of airport buildings, complete with food vendors, and then you can rent a car and drive around the city and hang out for beers at a neighborhood pub. 

 

The main issue is that what YOU want out of the development doesn't require 200 million dollars.  given that they have 200 million dollars, it behooves them to do more than just a top notch space flight game.  now granted all the other stuff might not have any attraction for you specifically, but it does have attraction for other people who have backed the project, quite a few of whom do not ever want to actually pilot a ship in the game, they are more into the social/fps/multicrew/stealth stuff.

 

Just like flightsim.  I actually look at "the cockpit experience" as an important, but secondary feature in my flight simming.  I use flight sim as a way to explore a virtual earth via all my scenery addons, and to enjoy the immersive aspects as well.  I do like learning about flight, and aircraft systems and flying realistically as well, but if you headed up a project which was the most hardcore aircraft procedural simulator possible, and neglected the other things I wouldn't buy it, and I wouldn't back it.  Just being honest.

 

Also, lets be honest, If there was a drive down to the pub option in flight sim, we'd all be there.  🙂

 

As for how I feel about Star Citizen?  I backed them for about 65 bucks in 2014.  I don't have any regrets about it.  I've probably gotten my moneys worth, just in dogfighting with my buddies in the earliest alphas (I haven't even logged on in over a year or so)  I'm interested in this, I like the ambition of it, and I really really want them to succeed.  It's possible that nothing would be able to live up to the expectations generated by the development so far, and crowd funding is very much a double edged sword in that regard.  But the game they wan't to build IS a game I want to play, I'm glad that someone is trying to do it, and even if it becomes a glorious failure, I'd take that over just another Wing Commander rehash for my money.

 

The "pay to win" angle has been hashed to death for years, and I don't have anything new to say there, but if the ships in the full game are freely earnable with in game currency once released, I have few problems with their funding strategy, other than to say that if anyone goes and buys all the ships available now, they are a fool.  It must also be said that they would be a fool who still has paid WAY less money than most of us flight simmers have...

[n4gix 4,947]

The chief problem I see is that Star Citizen is trying to replicate the ever expanding universe, which frankly is an impossible task.

[Christopher Low 5,353]

I did not even know about Squadron 42 until Devon started this thread!

[HiFlyer 9,358]

LOL! I wonder how much this costed: 😋

 

[ShawnG 1,823]

ROFL  that's great.

[Paraffin 2,197]

That face tracking tech is impressive. The only MMO I've ever spent time in, was World of Warcraft for a few years with my wife, and that was enough. That tech would have both added and detracted from the experience, big time. All we had back then was dancing emotes.

Remind me again about how this game is about flying starships? 🤣