FF to @
6:34 where they're now
doing a poll (backer access only) of their own roadmap. I kid you not.
This is an
absolute bombshell which cannot be ignored. It basically means that time and time again, whatever schedule and roadmap they've put up in order to appease backers and to keep money coming in, has been
pure and utter bullshit. Just as I've been saying for
YEARS now.
Also looking to release 3.1 despite the fact that right now, not
everything is completed.
Watch:
with alpha 3.1 just released to wider testing group in ptu and live release week away our dev teams and designers are looking ahead at alpha 3.2 features and content as part of this we evaluate where we are set priorities and make adjustments while also looking at quality of life issues in the current gameplay we thought it would be useful to get your input on what potential aspects are important to you as far as this goes so look for community poll tomorrow to help us with our roadmap
Then came this...
Hightlights:
11:36 // 3.0 was rushed out
12:36 // 8000 bug's fixed from 3.0 to 3.1
13:26 // 7 yrs later, it's still "early days"
16:20 // 3.2 scope reduction
21:32 // yup, 3.0 was rushed out
23:15 // progress has been slow; even with the number of people they have
29:55 // LOL!! Bind Culling didn't make it into 3.1. Not happy!
42:13 // we have a "full featured" game <--
54:08 // Arena Commander needs polish, but don't have workforce to do it; but will improve by year end
Gorf's take :
THE POLL - TEXT & SUBTEXTSThe Spectrum Poll is out and what a picture it paints. On the whole, it’s an uncharacteristically adroit decision that — maybe for the first time in CIG’s history of Community Relations — shows meaningful attempts at proactive engagement on fundamental development choices that matter. (Polling whales to get permission to scope creep doesn’t count as it was a foregone conclusion from the start.)
Chris has misallocated developer priorities for the entirety of the project in his compulsive hunt for the next buck. It’s been asset-centric in the extreme and always bent towards relentless monetization. It’s also seen the constant hijacking of developer hours for crunch binges so as to crank out new marketing demos to serve fundraising purposes to repeat the annual cycle.
The Poll suggests a different permission-seeking is underway. A pragmatic, pre-emptive one seeking to reduce the scale of their Road Map deliverables in 2018, because despite the dramatic deliverable reductions 3.0 already was forced to undergo in 2017, the revised 3.x plans that shook out from that are still too ambitious to realistically commit to.It only makes Chris’s Gamescom 2016 overpromising sins all the more egregious in hindsight, and suggests Roberts concocted that fictional roadmap completely without any consultation from his development team. At all. The poll also makes clear that
the core gameplay professions of the 2012 Space Sim pitch (Mining, Salvage, etc.) still have not commanded sufficient developer resources to be robust by Year 6. Textual bloviations scripted years back to convince the naive that professions were already architected do not constitute game design. It seems certain CIG’s efforts will, like Cargo, feel like a fidelitous execution of a Year 1 effort because no developer/game design was tasked with trying to flesh out a working prototype long ago. Why waste time fleshing out and perfecting the fundamentals when there are so many trivialities always commanding Roberts attention and so many monetization efforts more deserving of developer allocation?
I don’t mean to carp too much because on balance, it is a positive change and as one not rooting for the failure of CIG, I applaud it. It is not surprising at all to have heard Roberts talk about morale improvements coming about as a result of their latest efforts. What he did not say and probably can not say is that morale suffered because his priorities have been so misguided and his leadership so lacking...
Anyway, here is the Poll if it hasn’t already been posted...
Alpha 3.2 Feature Survey
As the team prepares to release the Alpha 3.1 patch of the Persistent Universe to a wider selection of backers, we wanted to take an opportunity to use what we’ve learned from this first quarterly release and reassess development priorities, with feedback from you, the players.
If you’ve been following along with our public Roadmap, the producers, directors, and leads have prioritized the introduction of major profession-based mechanics (like mining, salvage, and manual repair) into each quarterly release, along with improvements to gameplay features introduced in Alpha 3.0 and 3.1 (like quantum travel and service beacons.) While these mechanics have the potential to introduce new ways to play and expand the functionality of certain ships, they require extensive development resources and take time to fine-tune to make sure they balance with the other mechanics that already exist in the game.
Part of what we learned through this latest release cycle was that existing elements in the game weren’t getting adjustments and improvements that would improve usability and polish because the resources that would do this work were focusing on implementing the brand new mechanics on the Roadmap. As we feel like this has been short changing the current game experience, we’ve decided to adjust our efforts to dedicate some of our resources to improve and expand the existing features, while making sure that new profession-based mechanics are as polished and playable as possible. Basically, we want to ensure that what’s there is as refined and fun as it can be, before we add too much more.
That’s where you come in.
As we shuffle the features and mechanics, we wanted to know which features you are most excited about seeing implemented, improved and refined. Below you’ll find brief descriptions of the feature improvements on our schedule, we invite you to weigh in on which of these features you would rate as top three priorities to get into the game.
Feature Improvements
Quantum Linking
This feature gives players the ability to sync up with their friends when making quantum jumps. Aside from making grouped multi-ship travel possible, Quantum Linking also helps if you are interdicted, as the friends you brought along with you can help. This system will be used in tandem with AI or player-created missions through the service beacon, so the people hired to help will be linked to you when they jump.
Improved Interdiction
Work on this feature will create a variety of different interdiction scenarios for players, as well as provide the opportunity to trap other players and AI Non-Player Characters using a Quantum Jammer that can be added as a ship component or deployed in a self-powered buoy, like a mine.
Service Beacon Improvements
The Service Beacon will expand and evolve to include new contract types, additional filters, and more feedback precision. AI characters will be able to interface with the system so that they too will be able to request help and provide assistance to others, which will in turn increase both how much of this type of “immediate” content we can offer at any given time, as well as the likelihood that someone – whether player or Non-Player Character – will be drawn to respond to your calls for support.
First Tier of Guilds & Associations
We are going to create member associations within the Universe that give players different benefits. These will ultimately include the Bounty Hunter’s Guild, Merchant’s Guild, etc., but there will also be member\-based services, themed to fit different player types. For example, the United Wayfarers Club provides repair and refuel assistance for pilots broken down in space and also grants discounts for these services at CryAstro.
Party System
These improvements will improve the player’s ability to create groups, allowing you to team up with friends to join the same game instance and cooperate on jobs and missions.
Team Chat
Improvements to the team chat system that will polish communication between players and make the experience more robust and intuitive. Work on this system will also begin to factor in the incorporation of Spectrum into the game.
Economy/Shopping UI Experience
The feature includes the implementation of Shopping Kiosks in the stores and increased variation of available products, including ship items and weapons not physically available to display (or even buy) in stores.
Item 2.0 Ship Systems and Weapons
Feature work would include finalizing Item 2.0 functionality that, allows them to overheat, misfire and suffer critical failures based on factors such as increased wear or damage. It would also introduce deeper functionality to upgradeable items so new power plants, shields, coolers, stealth and comms/radar all make a marked difference to the ship’s performance based on how they are configured.
FPS AI Combat
The first stage of getting combat AI into the Persistent Universe. This would expand mission types by introducing the risk that an AI could be waiting to ambush you on a distant moon, or in a hulk drifting in space.
Select your highest priority, second highest priority and third highest priority. You can also select one profession-based mechanic (salvage, repair, refuel) that should be prioritized for 3.2, however, mining will still have the highest priority and you cannot vote on that decision
SomethingJones transcript of key parts
Star Citizen: Reverse the Verse LIVE - Alpha 3.2 Feature Survey w/ Chris Roberts
March 23rd, 2018
@07:50
Chris Roberts:
3.1 ah, is definitely performing better that 3.0 and ah, you know, that's going to continue on as we work on some of our more LONG TERM things we talked about, which, you know, OBJECT CONTAINER STREAMING will help with ah... sort of MEMORY... we've got ASYNCHRONOUS SPAWNING that we're getting CLOSER to have working PROPERLY
It's... it's... quite... COMPLICATED to get working because the game wasn't built... ah... it was just built to... create things on the main THREAD and it... it... so... you know people PROGRAM things assuming they can touch anything at any one time which you can't do when you're on, um... MULTIPLE THREADS ehm.
So... and it's SUCH a big codebase that it requires a lot to retrofit it and/or change things out, uh, REFACTOR them to be a NEW THING.
So all those will make like... so for instance if you PLAY and some AI spawn in there'll be a HITCH because they have to LOAD IN and there's a STALL on the main thread until things LOAD IN... but ah, LONG TERM that will go away because that will just sort of... they'll LOAD IN in the BACKGROUND when they're READY, the main thread will be NOTIFIED and BAM! They'll be TURNED ON so...
So wuh... so we're putting all these things in place and so I'm feeling really quite good about it, we've added ah... some NEW FEATURES like the SERVICE BEACON STUFF, ah... there's been a lot of the sort of UI IMPROVEMENT and POLISHES that I think people have noted and LITTLE THINGS like the, eh... you know... PROCEDURAL... GROUND... ah... so you know, sort of, ah...
...FOLLOWING, ah, you know... I've noticed quite a few people posting VIDEOS... I'm LIKING THAT, this is GOOD!
Aahh... and ah... we've tried to... ahm... work in, ah, some things to, ah... you know... IMPROVE ah, like INTERDICTION and stuff like that, ah... and... and... ah...
So GENERALLY it's going pretty well, this will be our first one and uh, we know we've gotta EARN the... the... the BELIEF or the TRUST of everyone ha-haha!
Uh, uhrr, uhmm... so you know we say we're doing QUARTERLIES we actually do QUARTERLIES, ehm, so... this one will be a GOOD STEP, the next one will be a GOOD STEP, ahm... but aahh... so it's GOING GOOD.
One of the reasons why we're doing this SHOW here is, ah... we... we've ah... you know... the best way to do this is as we've planned out a ROADMAP but obviously you just sort of check in where you're at, when you sort of get your RELEASE out, so like, OK...
THIS is what we're going to do for 3.2...
THIS is what we're going to do for 3.3...
...3.4...
All the THINGS that we want to... FIX or change that we didn't foresee when we first did this roadmap... ah, or you know, the things that we wanna address for QUALITY OF LIFE or things we could do in the game to make the gameplay right now feel BETTER... ah, because ultimately you know... I mean the AMOUNT of functionality in the game we have right now, if it all works together and works well, is more that a lot of released games.
I mean, you know... SEA OF THIEVES just came out and, you know, we have like MORE VARIETY OF MISSIONS, a HELL OF A LOT MORE SHIPS, a BUNCH MORE STUFF that you can do, and a LOT MORE AREA TO PLAY IN
But you know THEY spent a lot more time polishing some of their... their BASIC STUFF... I know people complain that they still want more FEATURES and that, cos gamers are generally like, 'I WANT MORE! I WANT MORE!' all the time... But I mean, we've been talking internally about, you know, Star Citizen is not a SPRINT it's a LONG... ha-haha! It's... It's... very... you know... it's more than a MARATHON you know, it's more like a WALK AROUND THE WORLD
Star Citizen: Reverse the Verse LIVE - Alpha 3.2 Feature Survey w/ Chris Roberts
March 23rd, 2018
@11:38
Chris Roberts:
If you look at 3.0 we put a VAST amount of things into it, but we didn't spend enough time making sure the BASE STUFF was working well, so what you had was a whole bunch of new FEATURES but a lot of stuff that used to work in 2.6 or before that ended up not being as good or being BROKEN... so we've been fixing a bunch of that in 3.1 but we've still got more to do, ah, so you know, we've got things that we wanna... ehh... ADDRESS and... you know... uhm, you know... HOW IT FEELS WHEN YOU FLY AROUND, we're not... we're not...
IFCS and the flight model still has a bunch of work we wanna do, ah, you know... the FEEL of FPS moving around, again, same stuff... so uh, eh... you know... it's a... uh... sort of... LONG TERM SLOG
@12:37
Chris Roberts:
So that's the phase we're at, this is what we'll do every single, ah... we sort of do it as we're coming up to the release, we're assessing it just to make sure all the teams are ALIGNED, ah, you know, our NEW PRODUCTION PROCESS is working REALLY WELL, we've, you know... we've FACTORED into a sort of much more sort of TEAM BASED AGILE SCRUM, ah... and... our sort of VELOCITY in terms of, ah... FIXES and ehh, ahh... and RESOLVING ISSUES is much much better, I mean we've... I think we've resolved something like 8,000, um... uh... uh... um... during... 3.1? I can't... quite... around... and then... and I think it was like 15,000 for the whole of 3.0 which was basically a year.
@13:27
Chris Roberts:
I think the team's working together, uhm... ah... cos we've really... we WORK to try to put everyone together like HERE'S THE PROGRAMMERS, HERE'S THE DESIGNERS, it's like... hey, you know, you're VEHICLE FEATURE TEAM ONE, you're VEHICLE FEATURE TEAM TWO, you're GAMEPLAY... TEAM
And you've got the DESIGNERS and the ENGINEERS and the ARTISTS and we're actually putting them all together.
And we're trying to CO-LOCATE people so the teams are sort of oriented in the various studios, we're not having them spread between timezones as much as we used to.
@16:25
Chris Roberts:
And we'll also get some feedback on some of the bigger LONGER TERM professions, what's INTERESTING or what's the MOST IMPORTANT to you guys, MINING's already been in progress, it's started at the beginning of this year, I know that in our roadmap it says SCHEDULED but it's already been IN PROGRESS. That should be changing in the next, uh... ehr... the... the next ROADMAP, I don't know if it'll be this Friday but the one afterwards.
But we've been working on that, there's a lot of infrastructure issues in terms of making sure the resources are mapped on the planets and we can persist them across the instances. And we can generate it and handle all the stuff. We're making very good progress on that, I think it's going to be a very cool, uh... FEATURE.
