# Star Citizen is the Future of PC Gaming, and it \[was\] Free to Play this week (Edit: No Longer Free) **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Tags:** video-games-e-games\ **Created:** [October 13, 2015, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528 "2015-10-13T06:29:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/21 "2015-10-13T19:17:53Z")
> [@Teuton](#): > > I’ll give them one thing - whilst you can pre-buy a bigger ship before the launch, all the ships are promised to be available in game with in-game cash, similar to the new Elite. > > And, frankly, I think the arrival of Elite has stolen Star Citizen’s thunder. Unless Star Citizen’s circumstances significantly change in the next couple of months, Elite’s expansion certainly will. Battle arenas and players participating in the actions of major political powers are already in. Ground-based combat and multiplayer crews are definitely coming. Wouldn’t be surprised if player-operated bases are planned for next year. ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/22 "2015-10-13T19:38:03Z")
> [@The\_Hamster\_King](#): > > I’ve been making games professionally for 20 years. My current job is unfucking fucked projects, so I’m very familiar with normal development chaos. > > As I said above, I have no facts to back this up. I don’t know anything about their development practices aside from tiny snippets I’ve read in the press. But my gut instinct is they’re in trouble: Premature focus on making things pretty. Potential micromanagement. Development spread across a large number of remote teams. Lots of money spent on high-priced voice talent. > > Also, what they’ve released so far doesn’t seem like the sort of thing that builds toward their MMO goal. 4-player games require a different server architecture than 32-player games, and 32-player games require a different server architecture than 1000-player games. Releasing a dog-fighting module for a small number of players actually hurts them in the long run because it locks them into a variety of decisions (server architecture, data packet structure, poly counts, physics simulation, control mechanics) that won’t scale up to a persistent world. It feels like stopgap to keep backers from freaking out instead of a natural step toward building the game they promised. > > The whole thing just smells wrong to me. Maybe they’re super-clever and I’m full of shit. If they do release an amazing game over the next two years I’ll be happy to come back to this thread and admit it. Well even if they do, that wouldn’t necessarily mean you were wrong about their situation today. I certainly don’t know either, and I agree that some of these decisions they’ve been making don’t seem conducive to the end game being what they’ve described ot the fans. I do hope it comes together eventually. I don’t think it will next year, I think 2-3 years is more likely. I would say you should offer them your services, except I know you work for Sony and you’d make it a PS4 exclusive ;p ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/23 "2015-10-13T19:39:33Z")
> [@Skywatcher](#): > > Unless Star Citizen’s circumstances significantly change in the next couple of months, Elite’s expansion certainly will. > > Battle arenas and players participating in the actions of major political powers are already in. Ground-based combat and multiplayer crews are definitely coming. Wouldn’t be surprised if player-operated bases are planned for next year. Wait what? Ground combat and multiplayer crews are coming to Elite? Haven’t checked in on that game since my flight stick broke a few months ago. This is news to me. I guess I’m going to have invest in a new one. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/24 "2015-10-13T19:50:38Z")
Yep. Elite: Dangerous: Horizons, the paid expansion coming in time for the holidays, will have vehicular ground combat and (ISTR) commander avatars. A recent newsletter featured an image of a multiplayer bridge, not sure if this will be part of Horizons or soon after. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/25 "2015-10-13T20:04:45Z")
I have taken out all links to the site. This is, without a doubt, spam. Helpful or not, it still falls under the definition of spam and also intends to further someone’s cause by bringing them in money and traffic. Don’t spam with those links again, **defenderofjustice** , or you will be banned. Only reason you’re not being banned as a spammer automatically is because some people think your info is/was helpful and it’s spawned some discussion. At this message board, though, that is clearly spam. I’m sure if someone really wants to know where they can register and use codes or pay for the stuff, they can easily find it via search engines. I’ve also taken the links out of others posts, don’t link to it, please…but I’ll leave this thread open for any further discussion. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/26 "2015-10-13T20:10:33Z")
According to [this](http://www.idigitaltimes.com/elite-dangerous-horizons-might-finally-fill-those-empty-seats-your-ship-473930), the steep cost of Horizons is actually for a group of four expansions. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/27 "2015-10-13T20:24:10Z")
> [@Kinthalis](#): > > I do hope it comes together eventually. I don’t think it will next year, I think 2-3 years is more likely. The question is, do they have the money to sustain themselves that long? If they were working for a deep-pocketed publisher, they would have a well to go back to. I’m not sure how long their donor base is willing to wait. They’re in a weird bind. If they show the public anything that doesn’t look amazing, they run the risk of turning off the crowdfunding tap. So there’s a built-in incentive to promise more and more and dig themselves into a deeper hole. > [@](#): > > I would say you should offer them your services, except I know you work for Sony and you’d make it a PS4 exclusive ;p 😃 ---
**Author:** ![MichaelEmouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/michaelemouse/32/101_2.png) [@MichaelEmouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelEmouse)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/28 "2015-10-13T20:46:26Z")
I’m sure Randy Pitchford will be there to buy the IP and finally release it for us. : ) > [@The\_Hamster\_King](#): > > Premature focus on making things pretty. Potential micromanagement. Development spread across a large number of remote teams. Lots of money spent on high-priced voice talent. What is the sequence their focus should have followed? ---
**Author:** ![Teuton](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/teuton/32/3864_2.png) [@Teuton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Teuton)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/29 "2015-10-13T20:49:56Z")
> [@Skywatcher](#): > > According to [this](http://www.idigitaltimes.com/elite-dangerous-horizons-might-finally-fill-those-empty-seats-your-ship-473930), the steep cost of Horizons is actually for a group of four expansions. It’s a bit of a hijack, since it’s about Elite and not Star Citizen, but I’m not terribly happy about being asked to pay again for stuff that was in the original crowdfund I bought into. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/30 "2015-10-13T21:03:05Z")
> [@Teuton](#): > > It’s a bit of a hijack, since it’s about Elite and not Star Citizen, but I’m not terribly happy about being asked to pay again for stuff that was in the original crowdfund I bought into. Pretty sure all Elite expansions are free for those who were in on the original beta. I bit the bullet and got the Season Pass, which is basically the same thing for those who weren’t in on the original beta. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/31 "2015-10-13T21:10:07Z")
That should have been _Lifetime_ Season Pass. Edit window closed. ---
**Author:** ![Teuton](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/teuton/32/3864_2.png) [@Teuton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Teuton)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/32 "2015-10-13T21:16:21Z")
> [@Skywatcher](#): > > Pretty sure all Elite expansions are free for those who were in on the original beta. If this is true (I was), then I would be less unhappy ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/33 "2015-10-13T21:27:47Z")
[Confirmed](https://support.frontier.co.uk/kb/faq.php?id=164): Alpha/Premium Beta backers also have the lifetime pass. Standard Beta backers do not. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/34 "2015-10-13T21:38:15Z")
Perhaps discussions of Elite should be taken [over here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=743800). ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/35 "2015-10-13T21:59:16Z")
> [@MichaelEmouse](#): > > What is the sequence their focus should have followed? 1. Create concept pieces to establish a visual target. 2. Create a crude set of gameplay assets for development and testing 3. Get the foundations of the engine sorted, particularly with regards to server/renderer/physics. This gives you a sense of polygon/texture/effects budgets. 4. Iterate on the game to make it fun to play. Use this information to iterate your gameplay assets. Do ships have distinctive silhouettes? Does your damage model look right in-game? 5. Execute a vertical slice. Build out a narrow bit of the game to high quality. Verify your previous assumptions. Get production metrics for asset production. Adjust scope accordingly. 6. Ramp up to full production. Hire a bunch of artists or bring an outsourcing house into the picture. Start building the game for real. If you start making final art too soon you find yourself throwing away a lot of work. If you start SELLING final art too soon you find yourself locked into decisions that hurt you when you try to get the game to actually play the way you want. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2015, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/36 "2015-10-13T22:29:58Z")
> [@Kinthalis](#): > > I think there’s also a weird backlash from the mainstream against a company and a game that didn’t go through the “Regular” publisher channels Seems that crowd funding doesn’t even raise an eyebrow these days. In fact, I’ve noticed a few games seem to be going that route when you’d think they could easily secure “traditional” funding today. [Divinity: Original Sin 2](http://www.polygon.com/2015/8/27/9214533/divinity-original-sin-2-kickstarter-earnings-funded-600k-day), for example. From the sound of it, the criticism about Star Citizen seems to be the enormous amount of money they’ve taken in but not really “justified” via results. Maybe that’s part of the sausage making process of video games but there’s also enough failed games that it’s legitimate to question it, especially as they continue to pass the hat for more funding via what may be virtual swampland. ---
**Author:** ![Mnemnosyne](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mnemnosyne/32/3347_2.png) [@Mnemnosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mnemnosyne)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2015, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/37 "2015-10-14T03:37:48Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > Seems that crowd funding doesn’t even raise an eyebrow these days. In fact, I’ve noticed a few games seem to be going that route when you’d think they could easily secure “traditional” funding today. [Divinity: Original Sin 2](http://www.polygon.com/2015/8/27/9214533/divinity-original-sin-2-kickstarter-earnings-funded-600k-day), for example. A proven studio using this kind of funding seems good to me in the sense that it gives them more freedom to make a good game. Especially if it’s a studio that’s proven itself able and willing to just deliver a good game even if it’s not perfect, and - this is important - even if it doesn’t deliver every little thing they promised. I funded Divinity: Original Sin, and some of the stretch goals that were reached weren’t delivered in the final game and have been completely cut; they’re never going to appear. While disappointing in a way, the fact is they proved that they will deliver a good game without torpedoing themselves trying to reach perfect by fulfilling unachievable promises. Sure, ideally they wouldn’t make these promises, but it’s not practical to never make such mistakes without being absurdly conservative on your projections of what you can achieve. There’s always going to be things you think are reasonable goals that turn out to be much more difficult for one reason or another, and successfully producing a finished game at all requires being willing to cut those things once they turn out to be impossible. This made me confident in funding Divinity: Original Sin 2. I know they will deliver a good game, and won’t get hung up on trying to deliver a perfect game. Now, to bring this around to the topic of Star Citizen, it seems very likely that their first project was way too ambitious. As far as I’m aware, this is the first game by the development studio; it was basically formed _to_ publish this game. They should have tried to release a few much smaller, solid, good games, so that they could establish the experience needed in order to know how to produce and actually release a game via crowdfunding, and then, as a proven studio, go on to crowdfund and release Star Citizen, and perhaps that would have been a good path to a good, or even great game. As it is, even if there’s no malfeasance going on (and rumors are full of potential malfeasance as far as where the money is going goes) they seem overwhelmed and unable to handle it. They’ve gotten into the perfect being the enemy of the good, where they keep coming up with awesome stuff that has to be included because it’s so awesome, and absolutely everything has to be done. ---
**Author:** ![PSXer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/48db29/32.png) [@PSXer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PSXer)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2015, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/38 "2015-10-14T03:40:33Z")
all I know about Star Citizen is the Something Awful threads making fun of it for how long it’s taken to develop and how they keep asking for more money ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2015, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/39 "2015-10-14T04:39:26Z")
> [@Mnemnosyne](#): > > As far as I’m aware, this is the first game by the development studio; it was basically formed _to_ publish this game… Chris Roberts has been basically making variations of this same game since the mid-90’s. So its not totally crazy to give him money and expect him to make a game out of it. But I think you’re right that stretch goals can kind of create a tread-mill effect for projects like this, where to meet the last goal the developers have to raise more money, and so then offer more stretch goals to do so. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Bravo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_bravo/32/493_2.png) [@Johnny\_Bravo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Bravo)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2015, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528/40 "2015-10-14T13:11:00Z")
> [@PSXer](#): > > all I know about Star Citizen is the Something Awful threads making fun of it for how long it’s taken to develop and how they keep asking for more money So I did some Googling and it turns out The Escapist ran [an extraordinarily damning article earlier this month about the game.](http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/features/14715-CIG-Employees-Talk-Star-Citizen-and-the-State-of-the-Company) They also put out an [equally interesting article](http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/14727-The-Escapist-Explains-Its-Star-Citizen-Sources-Vetting-and-Respo) talking about how they vetted their sources for that story. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-citizen-is-the-future-of-pc-gaming-and-it-was-free-to-play-this-week-edit-no-longer-free/734528.md?page=3)