Star Citizen and the triumphant, record-smashing return of Chris Roberts

Behind the scenes of the studio that's raised $50 million from 500,000 backers.

Read the whole story

 

[Benzyl]

I am very excited about Star Citizen. I have purchased a copy of the game, improved ship, access to the beta and some other accessories for about $130. The cost of the game + ship doesn't bother me, but the issue of pay to win really does cause me issues. Robert's has stated that there will not be a pay to win capability in the game, but if customers can buy ship, insurance and credits (this is the current proposed situation) then the advantages of dropping hundreds of dollars in the game is unavoidable. RSI has stated that ships will always be purchasable via game earned credits, so you can always save up for a ship without increasing your real money investment, but the question is how much does a ship cost in playing time. Looking at my purchase, the ship by itself was about $50 when you remove the other items that were included with the bundle. Will it take an average player a week to earn enough credits for that ship, or a month or 6 months. If the grind to get better equipment is lengthy, you are encouraging people to pay money to skip the grind, but that will quickly result in a pay to win environment. We don't know what the cost of things will be or what the average rate of credits per hour play will be, but if this is not balanced well people will get grumpy fast.

 

[Dietz]

Count me in as a post release sale, if it reviews well. I've done the pre-pay thing once on a game (MWO), and barely play it at all these days. I'm not gonna do that again.
I have a Thrustmaster Warthog all set up for this game, when it comes out.
Please don't suck.

 

[Anomnomnymous Cowhead]

JPan[/url]"b66askk]Playing a space Sim with a mouse simply sucks. By far not as immersion and the core game play sucks so you need to make up for it with gimmicks.

Unfortunately you will not get millions of people to buy a joystick again so you have to target the game for a mouse. And then it will suck.

I have a 3DConnexion Space Pilot for SolidWorks modeling. I would love to try it on a Space Flight game.

 

[pokrface]

Azethoth666[/url]":w1jjbg8s]Why is Homeworld not mentioned. No you cannot personally dogfight an individual ship, but there is the overall strategic game which provided just as much of an awesome space combat simulator. It seems weird to ignore this other smash hit from the 90's.

Homeworld and its sequels are in the RTS genre. The Homeworld games have absolutely nothing to do with space combat simulators like Wing Commander (which are essentially flight simulators set in space). Totally different gameplay. They're as different from Wing Commander as Command and Conquer is from Call of Duty.

 

[liono]

this article is counting chickens before they are hatched. i'll buy it once the game goes live, that way i'm not left holding the bag after the hookers and blow are dried up.

 

[Evil_Merlin]

Kyuu[/url]":3g72z3ox]

Roonski[/url]":3g72z3ox]I'm a bit nervous that they are trying to build a state-of-the-art MMORPG but there doesn't *seem* to be anybody on the team with the experience of that - more just experienced people from the earlier games. They will have amibitions and ideas, but building successful MMORPGs seems to require some very hard-won skills that they probably won't have. It almost seems like the only route to success is to have several failed MMORPGs first.

Have I missed anyone/anything?

I'm quite certain I saw that they had hired somebody from Blizzard who previously worked on World of Warcraft for quite a long time. I can't recall his name but I'm 100% sure of this.

So yeah, I'm pretty sure they're aware of the need for expertise in the MMO (*not* MMORPG) area. But also, it's not a bad thing for the team to not be overloaded with people from existing MMOs, since none of them are of the same genre or offer the same kind of experience that Star Citizen is going for.

http://massively.joystiq.com/2014/05/13 ... -mayberry/

 

[Dragon7]

Benzyl[/url]":1nloesmc]I am very excited about Star Citizen. I have purchased a copy of the game, improved ship, access to the beta and some other accessories for about $130. The cost of the game + ship doesn't bother me, but the issue of pay to win really does cause me issues. Robert's has stated that there will not be a pay to win capability in the game, but if customers can buy ship, insurance and credits (this is the current proposed situation) then the advantages of dropping hundreds of dollars in the game is unavoidable. RSI has stated that ships will always be purchasable via game earned credits, so you can always save up for a ship without increasing your real money investment, but the question is how much does a ship cost in playing time. Looking at my purchase, the ship by itself was about $50 when you remove the other items that were included with the bundle. Will it take an average player a week to earn enough credits for that ship, or a month or 6 months. If the grind to get better equipment is lengthy, you are encouraging people to pay money to skip the grind, but that will quickly result in a pay to win environment. We don't know what the cost of things will be or what the average rate of credits per hour play will be, but if this is not balanced well people will get grumpy fast.

I understand your concerns, but I believe I can help alleviate some of your concerns here.

In regards to the P2W issue.
Your comment about the current proposed situation are completely off base.(Not intended as a harsh comment)
Is been said many times that ships currently on sale will not be sold for real money after release, only ingame money, and they will have a very limited hard cap for how much you can purchase every day/week/month.
So dropping hundreds of dollars on the game as you say will be a lengthy process.
Source: https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm ... 17-Million

In regards to play time to get things ingame, it has been said that it will take around 60-70 hours of playtime to be able to afford a Constellation ship.
It will not be the weeks or Months as you are worried about, unless you want something ultra rare or hard to come by items.
That should give you a point of reference for how long it will take to get something.
I don't have a source for this, but there is a thread on the forums right now discussing it.
https://forums.robertsspaceindustries.c ... ris#latest

I hope this helps clear up some of your concerns
If you have further concerns or questions I recommend you visit their website, and if necessary make use of their "Question and Answers" forums, where you can post your questions and have the community help you find the answers to those questions.
The community is very friendly and willing to help anyone who asks as long as you are polite and respectful(which should really be a given).

 

[Dragon7]

Vash63[/url]":3ou2i8l0]

I-ku-u[/url]":3ou2i8l0]Given that the bulk of the work going into a large game like this is platform agnostic, it boggles the mind that a project with such lofty goals is only "considering" Linux and Mac versions.

I'm fairly sure Chris said at GDC that he was doing Linux. Mac is unknown as the hardware and drivers are more rockey... Does it even support GL 4.3/4.4? Pretty sure CryEngine requires one of the two for its upcoming Linux port.

The reason they are only "considering" Linux and Mac support is quite simply because the Cryengine, which is the game engine, does not have support for it yet.
So please don't bash CIG for this, if you want to bash someone bash Crytek who are the ones who should port the engine.
However Crytek has from what I understand begun work on a Linux port of the engine, so its possible a Linux version is not far off.

 

[Saribro]

Dragon7[/url]":25ry8pxv]it has been said that it will take around 60-70 hours of playtime to be able to afford a Constellation ship.
It will not be the weeks or Months as you are worried about

Unless playing the game is your day-job, 60-70 hours of playtime IS several weeks or months.

 

[BrerBear]

Wing Commander was designed and produced primarily by then 22-year-old Roberts, and it would go on to spawn four direct sequels, a highly regarded spin-off series (the Privateer games), several tie-in games, and even a jet-based flight simulator (Strike Commander).

And a movie.

I'm guessing you intentionally "forgot" about that

 

[Dragon7]

Roonski[/url]":38bktene]I'm a bit nervous that they are trying to build a state-of-the-art MMORPG but there doesn't *seem* to be anybody on the team with the experience of that - more just experienced people from the earlier games. They will have amibitions and ideas, but building successful MMORPGs seems to require some very hard-won skills that they probably won't have. It almost seems like the only route to success is to have several failed MMORPGs first.

Have I missed anyone/anything?

Well try to think of it this way.
Someone, somewhere, sometime had to make the very first MMO(not MMORPG), they didn't have the luxury of drawing on the experience of those who came before, because they were the first.
So they had to learn everything as they go as there was nobody who could help them make a good MMO.

So why must these people have developers on their staff who has experience in the field, just because there are people who has experience?
What is it that makes you think that they cannot build a successful MMO without the experience of someone who has done it before?

I'm not saying they should not use people who has experience in the field, only that concerns about them not having experience in the field might be pointless.
These are all industry veterans, with years(decades) of experience in making games.
Whether its a single player game or an MMO, I think when it comes right down to it, the work they have do is not really that different.

 

[Beckerjr]

Tallon[/url]":23b7pnyc]Are there any indications as to whether the game will deliver the promised scope and depth?

Nope. That's the dirty little secret nobody seems to be willing to bring up. It's all about the hype so far. This game has ballooned far beyond its original scope and there is zero proof this team can deliver on it. I hope they can but I see this game quite possibly taking a big dive and never being able to deliver.

 

[Dragon7]

Saribro[/url]":t7tuxrpg]

Dragon7[/url]":t7tuxrpg]it has been said that it will take around 60-70 hours of playtime to be able to afford a Constellation ship.
It will not be the weeks or Months as you are worried about

Unless playing the game is your day-job, 60-70 hours of playtime IS several weeks or months.

Months is a stretch, unless you only play for a few minutes each day
You would have play for less then 1.5 hours on average each day for it to take months.
If you play an average of 3 hours each day that equals a little over 23 days of playtime, thats close to a month.
Increase that to 7 hours and you are down to 10 days.
Thats for the constellation, the largest non capital ship, this time will of course vary depending on what ship you want.

But the point here is that its not supposed to be easy to get everything, you have to actually do some work to get it, this isn't some super casual MMO game where you can do and get almost everything in a mater of days.
Far too many games today practically hands the player everything on a silver platter almost from the start of the game, the intention here is that you are not supposed to get anything you want within just a few hours of playtime like so many other games do today, you actually have to work for what you want.

However you also have to take into consideration that you can buy credits which will help shorten that time, by how much I don't know.
Not to mention that all of this are currently up in the air and still very much subject to change.

But if people are looking for some super casual game like most modern MMOs, then I will just say that this is not the game for them, here you have to be willing and able to actually put some work into getting what you want.
I know it may sounds harsh, but its how the game is being designed.

 

[Dragon7]

Dietz[/url]":1g3toef6]Count me in as a post release sale, if it reviews well. I've done the pre-pay thing once on a game (MWO), and barely play it at all these days. I'm not gonna do that again.
I have a Thrustmaster Warthog all set up for this game, when it comes out.
Please don't suck.

I can understand your reluctance, I was part of the MWO debacle myself, I gave up on the game already in beta, and have barely thought about the game, much less played it since.
But I believe that much of the reason for the MWO crap was due to the publisher pushing them to do things for the sake of profits, as is far too common these days.

That said, its of course your choice if you want to chip in with SC or not.
Fortunately it don't cost anything to follow the development so you can still do that and participate in discussion about the game, which I hope you will do, and I hope you will pick up a copy of the game once its released.

 

[Demonantis]

Unfortunately it is impossible to talk about this game without bringing up the funding strategy. With the rabid purchasing of digital game assets by a section of the backers for this game. I fear that Chris is going to make it obscenely challenging to get the different ships to assuage their complaints. The worst thing he has done is the limited time and limited number offers making them a premium object that people speculate and profit off of. If he was really trying to fund raise, these tactics should not have been considered. I hope in the private servers you can just tweak the game to be what you want it to be and not have to deal with that psychological warfare on a persons wallet that non-subscription MMOs have become.

 

[pokrface]

BrerBear[/url]":2j2xezhp]

Wing Commander was designed and produced primarily by then 22-year-old Roberts, and it would go on to spawn four direct sequels, a highly regarded spin-off series (the Privateer games), several tie-in games, and even a jet-based flight simulator (Strike Commander).

And a movie.

I'm guessing you intentionally "forgot" about that

Things We Do Not Ever Do:

1) Cross the streams
2) Go to Ravenholm
3) Talk about the Wing Commander movie

 

[Ravensroke]

Pokrface[/url]":1mosgsog]

BrerBear[/url]":1mosgsog]

Wing Commander was designed and produced primarily by then 22-year-old Roberts, and it would go on to spawn four direct sequels, a highly regarded spin-off series (the Privateer games), several tie-in games, and even a jet-based flight simulator (Strike Commander).

And a movie.

I'm guessing you intentionally "forgot" about that

Things We Do Not Ever Do:

1) Cross the streams
2) Go to Ravenholm
3) Talk about the Wing Commander movie

TBH the Wing Commander movie wasn't any worse than your average 'B' sci-fi flick. (It just wasn't as good as fans wanted it to be)

 

[vnangia]

"Take me out to the black"

*sob*

 

[ricbach229]

Ravensroke[/url]":3ebwjapm]

Pokrface[/url]":3ebwjapm]

BrerBear[/url]":3ebwjapm]

Wing Commander was designed and produced primarily by then 22-year-old Roberts, and it would go on to spawn four direct sequels, a highly regarded spin-off series (the Privateer games), several tie-in games, and even a jet-based flight simulator (Strike Commander).

And a movie.

I'm guessing you intentionally "forgot" about that

Things We Do Not Ever Do:

1) Cross the streams
2) Go to Ravenholm
3) Talk about the Wing Commander movie

TBH the Wing Commander movie wasn't any worse than your average 'B' sci-fi flick. (It just wasn't as good as fans wanted it to be)

I wasn't as offended by it as some fans seem to be but I never understood why they had to create an entire new mythology for the movie. Or why that damn "feel the space while you type coordinates" was recycled by BSG. Seems like they could have made it Top Gun in space and it'd have been great.

 

[TheColinous]

vnangia[/url]":2lns0wr2]"Take me out to the black"

*sob*

I was playing Elite Dangerous Beta, and I was flying around looking at everything and drooling.

Then this came on my playlist:

Linky

*sob*

 

[KeillRandor]

CppThis[/url]":29ikb8jt]

If you haven't already, give X3: Terran Conflict a spin. Joystick action, hardcore economics, did I mention it's available without any DRM? Do make sure you're running the very latest version as developer Egosoft has a long history of horrendous launches followed by 1-2 years of bugfixes and new content.

The problem with X3TC is that out of the box it's pretty basic, with not that much going for it - combat wise, especially.

Thankfully, there's a load of stuff (mods/scripts/extra ships) available for it that can bring it up to scratch, with a little bit of effort.

The one thing I REALLY like about X3TC, is that it can SCALE up in a way no other space-flight game I've played ever has - though the default is still pretty much WW2 dogfighting-in-space, (though with spaceship controls), (similar to what Elite Dangerous/Star Citizen seem to offer?) - and so I'm currently modding it myself to increase the scale of the map/weapons/sensors etc. atm., with additional work on relative ship speeds.

(The X3TC universe is made up out of space sectors connected by jump gates, and the basic map size is usually about 30-50km between opposite gates - my map increases that to at least 100km, if not more, though atm, all I've done is add sectors to the default map, (to the maximum of 480), not replace/alter those that are already there.)

I can't be doing without my Star Wars ship collection, either

 

[althaz]

CppThis[/url]":fzbbd7ui]

JPan[/url]":fzbbd7ui]I miss tie fighter so much. Compared with it games of today are for idiots. You had to keep track of so many things. My theory why space Sims died is because they stopped using joysticks. Playing a space Sim with a mouse simply sucks. By far not as immersion and the core game play sucks so you need to make up for it with gimmicks.

Unfortunately you will not get millions of people to buy a joystick again so you have to target the game for a mouse. And then it will suck.

If you haven't already, give X3: Terran Conflict a spin. Joystick action, hardcore economics, did I mention it's available without any DRM? Do make sure you're running the very latest version as developer Egosoft has a long history of horrendous launches followed by 1-2 years of bugfixes and new content.

The combat doesn't hold a candle to any game in the X-wing/TIE Fighter series. It's a totally different game with a totally different focus.

 

[zero21983]

"We believe there are millions of folks waiting to pay for the game after it launches"

Yeah, I am actually one of them. However, I've considered pre-purchasing it several times. I find their website hard to understand what I'm purchasing. I was hoping this article would give some insight into that. From what I understand there is NOT going to be a monthly subscription fee. Have they given any indication if the pre-purchase prices are cheaper than what it will sell for after launch? Then this article said something that confused me: "Star Citizen backers can purchase in-game ships". Does that imply that post-release sales won't include a ship? Or that you'll have to earn a ship some other way? I doubt it, but I just want to be sure.

I guess right now I don't see any urgency to pre-purchase the game. Obviously, I would be missing access to the beta content right now, but I'm not overly concerned with that. That's why I'm wondering about any possible changes to prices and I'm looking for any other reason that I'm not aware of that might cause me to go ahead and put down my money now.

Great, well-written article, BTW.

 

[Deleted member 1]

Saribro[/url]":kzjxwury]

Dragon7[/url]":kzjxwury]it has been said that it will take around 60-70 hours of playtime to be able to afford a Constellation ship.
It will not be the weeks or Months as you are worried about

Unless playing the game is your day-job, 60-70 hours of playtime IS several weeks or months.

Pfft. 3 to 4 hours on weeknights, 8 hours on Friday night, 16 hours on Saturday and Sunday each, you'll be there in no time. After the divorce papers are signed, you'll have still more time!

 

[Midnitte]

Looking forward to this game (and Elite: Dangerous), but I can't help but feel reluctant to purchase it since you have to buy each ship. I don't exactly want to buy each gun in Call of Duty (though who knows, that might be less expensive given the price of the season pass).

 

[SergeiEsenin]

eco_nl[/url]":289jhpyp]

Pokrface[/url]":289jhpyp]

Stargrazer[/url]":289jhpyp]I picked Flint.

Just saying...

I remember reading (and it may have been long enough ago that it was in an actual printed gaming magazine) that the number of players who chose Flint over Rachel was incredibly low—like less than ten percent.

Wow, statistical anomaly about to happen here. But I went with Flint, even though it did mean no missiles for a bit.
Jennifer MacDonald>>>Ginger Lynn (although I realize there's no accounting for taste)

C'mon, the sight of Ginger Lynn in those coveralls--knowing every detail of what was under them, and what she could really do with that wrench--was a high point of that game. That said, the whole game was quite an experience when it debuted; I hadn't played it in many years though, so was delighted to find a fan-made movie of the cutscenes with a little bit of play footage tying it together.

 

[pokrface]

Midnitte[/url]":3sqr9vtv]Looking forward to this game (and Elite: Dangerous), but I can't help but feel reluctant to purchase it since you have to buy each ship. I don't exactly want to buy each gun in Call of Duty (though who knows, that might be less expensive given the price of the season pass).

Well, you can buy the in-game, too. According to Eric Peterson, they're not planning to ever put you in a spot where you have to pay cash for a ship.

 

[heftysmurf]

In the picture with the pile of board games is a less obvious "COSMOS" by Carl Sagan. That speaks volumes to me.

Maybe I'll consider donating too.

 

[Midnitte]

Pokrface[/url]":1ghnb350]

Midnitte[/url]":1ghnb350]Looking forward to this game (and Elite: Dangerous), but I can't help but feel reluctant to purchase it since you have to buy each ship. I don't exactly want to buy each gun in Call of Duty (though who knows, that might be less expensive given the price of the season pass).

Well, you can buy the in-game, too. According to Eric Peterson, they're not planning to ever put you in a spot where you have to pay cash for a ship.

That is reassuring, so it'll work like Plex in some fashion?

 

[Vipre77]

Anomnomnymous Cowhead[/url]":2flq0usu]

JPan[/url]":2flq0usu]Playing a space Sim with a mouse simply sucks. By far not as immersion and the core game play sucks so you need to make up for it with gimmicks.

Unfortunately you will not get millions of people to buy a joystick again so you have to target the game for a mouse. And then it will suck.

I have a 3DConnexion Space Pilot for SolidWorks modeling. I would love to try it on a Space Flight game.

I've got an old SpaceOrb 360 which was the gaming version of the Space Pilot devices. Imagine the ball grafted onto a game pad instead of a joystick or a d-pad. They were notorious for breaking because they'd get manhandled in the heat of an intense game. Mine survived. I got it free with Forsaken back in the 90's. Still works, but there's no drivers for anything beyond Win 98 that I've ever found. I don't think drivers ever made it out for XP or anything later but I could be wrong. It's a serial device, not USB. That controller was by far the best thing I ever used for Descent and Descent II. Circle strafing while flying in 3D space was a nearly impossible maneuver to pull with any other controller. I never tried this controller on other types of games like flight sims, but it was killer on FPS games like Forsaken and Descent.

Re: The article, Chris Roberts is a name I haven't heard in a long time. Wing Commander II and Strike Commander are two of my most favorite PC games from the 90's. Would looooove to see a new Strike Commander game. The Ace Combat games from Tri-Ace on Playstation 2, 3, etc. have felt like the spiritual successors to Strike Commander, but it's been a while since we've had a good Ace Combat game. The last 1-2 AC games have been pretty meh.

 

[pokrface]

Vipre77[/url]":3belwsfo]I've got an old SpaceOrb 360 which was the gaming version of the Space Pilot devices.

Oh, man, I splurged on one of those back in the day, hoping it would make me a Descent god. Unfortunately, it was just never as easy and intuitive to use as I'd hoped. What I recall as being the biggest problem was isolating input to a single axis or along a single vector—trying to yaw would always introduce some pitch or roll, or trying to push straight down to slide down would also introduce some lateral motion. Plus, there just wasn't a perfect place to grab the sphere like with a joystick.

It was cool, but never really worked well for me. Ended up selling it (and I wouldn't be able to use it today anyway, since it was a serial port device).

 

[Boskone]

If this had been almost anyone other than Chris Roberts, I'd've said "Neat. I'll keep an eye on this."

But he's got a habit of saying "Fuck reasonable, I'm gonna do something wild.", then doing it. So I threw money at him.

Now I just need to decide if I dislike my Saitek X52 enough to buy something else; it was apparently designed for hands that maxed out 2-3cm smaller than mine.

 

[Evil_Merlin]

Back in the day, when I used to work for MediaOne, installing cable modems, I went to do an install in Bedford MA.

I was working on the guys computer and noticed a LOT of space combat sims (this was the late 1990's), and I asked about them.

Ended up he was an engineer at SpaceTec IMC. The guys what invented the SpaceOrb 360. We chatted for about an hour and he showed me the device.

As I walked out, install complete he handed me a HUGE cardboard box, complete with 10 SpaceOrb 360's.

If I'm not mistaken, I sold most of them here on Ars back in the day.

 

[Evil_Merlin]

Boskone[/url]":1epckly0]If this had been almost anyone other than Chris Roberts, I'd've said "Neat. I'll keep an eye on this."

But he's got a habit of saying "Fuck reasonable, I'm gonna do something wild.", then doing it. So I threw money at him.

Now I just need to decide if I dislike my Saitek X52 enough to buy something else; it was apparently designed for hands that maxed out 2-3cm smaller than mine.

I JUST swapped out my Logitech G940's for the Saitek X-55.

I miss the ForceFeedback, but the X-55 is simply a better stick and throttle. Plus I don't have my floor cluttered by the rudder pedals.

I'll move them back in when I'm doing my standard flight sims.

 

[SergeiEsenin]

Pokrface[/url]":1s2ypvi5]

Vipre77[/url]":1s2ypvi5]I've got an old SpaceOrb 360 which was the gaming version of the Space Pilot devices.

Oh, man, I splurged on one of those back in the day, hoping it would make me a Descent god. Unfortunately, it was just never as easy and intuitive to use as I'd hoped. What I recall as being the biggest problem was isolating input to a single axis or along a single vector—trying to yaw would always introduce some pitch or roll, or trying to push straight down to slide down would also introduce some lateral motion. Plus, there just wasn't a perfect place to grab the sphere like with a joystick.

It was cool, but never really worked well for me. Ended up selling it (and I wouldn't be able to use it today anyway, since it was a serial port device).

Just checked it out on Wikipedia to see what this device looked like, and according to the article someone's built an Arduino board to turn them into USB-compatible devices. So if anyone still has one around and is feeling nostalgic...

Personally, I always loved playing around with devices like that in-store but playing PC games with a gamepad was always too much trouble for my lazy keyboarding self. I had a serial Gravis pad of some sort that came as a store-bundled freebie with an AWE64 soundcard, and gave up on it pretty quickly. That said, I'm the only guy I know who preferred playing PC games with old Microsoft or Logitech trackballs (the kind with the big center ball, not thumb or small trackballs) instead of proper mice, so my take on gaming controllers is always suspect.

 

[Eldorito]

zero21983[/url]":1zht0s07]

I guess right now I don't see any urgency to pre-purchase the game. Obviously, I would be missing access to the beta content right now, but I'm not overly concerned with that. That's why I'm wondering about any possible changes to prices and I'm looking for any other reason that I'm not aware of that might cause me to go ahead and put down my money now.

Great, well-written article, BTW.

Personally, I'm holding out for the GMG/Steam/Origin/Amazon/Whoever preorder with bonuses right before the game comes out. It'll give time to evaluate (just because it's Chris Roberts doesn't mean instant success. Huge, ambitious projects tend to bring Daikatana to mind) and likely will throw in a discount. Or just buy afterwards and sink in money if it's necessay.

Because short of World of Warcraft, there's barely ever been a game that there was a monetary benefit to preordering. Even just buying out someone's online account afterwards would probably be cheaper.

edit: Also just noticed this in the article - "We’re hoping to design a system that allows for missions that look customized, but are actually composed of atomic elements. That’ll fill up the universe." - isn't it a little worrying that we're into year 3 of development and they haven't designed a mission system?

 

[Dos101]

I-ku-u[/url]":smxa8gzr]Given that the bulk of the work going into a large game like this is platform agnostic, it boggles the mind that a project with such lofty goals is only "considering" Linux and Mac versions.

As others have said, CGI have looked at doing at Linux port, but the main obstacle so far has been that the CryEngine doesn't support Linux or OSX. That being said, it's not without reason that CGI would focus on where the majority of the market is, Windows. Can't really fault them for going after the biggest user base (overwhelmingly in this case).

 

[althaz]

Dragon7[/url]":17odswgx]In regards to play time to get things ingame, it has been said that it will take around 60-70 hours of playtime to be able to afford a Constellation ship.
It will not be the weeks or Months as you are worried about, unless you want something ultra rare or hard to come by items.

60-70 hours is 4-5 months for the average gamer. If it takes that long then unless the ships are crazy expensive, you'd be mad not to buy them instead of grinding for months on end.

 

[Mortus]

Between this and Elite: Dangerous...oh, and No Man's Sky...it'll be a great couple of years for space sim folk.

 

[nathematics]

I don't like them giving the ships away to backers on principle. Starting out with a puny ship and working your way up is kind of the main point of these types of game. Why should people be paying to skip over content?

I like that missions might separate you from the other players.

Really, I'm not super thrilled about the MMO aspect. I suppose it might diminish the player's ability to make sweeping changes over the universe. But it's not just that; I think it can ruin the immersion. The other players are likely not going to behave like they belong in the game universe. They will be focused on stats, use internet slang, will draw penises if given the power, etc. They will not be giving me their in game back story about which planet they grew up on and things like that. The single player may be cool, but it doesn't sound like it's the sandbox game I'm looking for - one that lets met side with different factions and travel around freely.

But, it still could be a really cool game. I might buy it after it comes out.