Quite true. The point however is that they do not appear to be simply stringing the backers along. There are reasons for the delay....
Shirley you jest. Or are you talking purely in terms of why there are delays? Because, by all accounts, most of what they have been doing is specifically stringing backers along.
CIG has only reached a similar size in the past couple of years. They've had to essentially write or heavily modify their own tools. They've done so while engaging in a fairly large PR campaign...videos and conventions included.
That's all largely irrelevant because they are the creators of their own problems. There is no hand-waving that away. Just because they are having problems, doesn't mean it's somehow a plausible excuse for where they are. And the people doing the PR campaign, have nothing to do with development. So I don't see how that even factors into anything. We're not talking about an indie shop whereby, someone like me writes code, talks to media, writes up dev posts, go through marketing periods etc. So the PR bears no relevance to the dev work being done.
We cannot expect the same speed of development as seen with other teams.
Nobody cares. And that's not what the issue is about. Backers expected the games. Back in Nov 2014; and with an 18 (!) month delay period. Both have come and gone.
Nobody was looking at the development and thinking that because they're not as big or as experienced as other teams, that they couldn't pull this off, let alone in any meaningful period of time. That's a very silly argument to make, let alone commit to writing.
To wit: They have raised almost $140 (!) million and still somehow can't make an FPS component with an engine designed specifically for making FPS games. And to think they were asking for only $5 million.
So had they folded back in 2014, the excuse would have been that they needed more money for the vision; but since they didn't have it, they couldn't deliver it.
What most people aren't even willing to consider here is, what would have happened if the money had dried up by Dec 2014 when they had
only raised $40 million? Clearly Vision 2.0 hadn't changed by that point; and even with $40 million the best they had was the rubbish and buggy pre-Alpha 2.0.
I'm not concluding their work on their toolsets is finished. As you point out, their planet generator is still v1 and while their engine has been heavily modified, there is still work to be done on it.
At the same time, the toolkit they have appears workable. The engine has been heavily modified*. A lot of the necessary work has been done.
Granted, a lot of that work likely shouldn't have been necessary but still, it appears to be well in hand.
Explain to me, with cited sources,
how you arrived at that conclusion. Especially seeing the state that 2.5 is in, the fact that - as I type this - 2.6 isn't faring any better, and 3.0 is still pipe dream. Notably the fact that there is nothing in either 2.5 or 2.6 that points to ANY of what you said above.
* I
wrote about that here based on what Brian Chambers said.
The question I am curious about is whether CIG can continue funding the game for the next three or so years. Is development going to continue?
Now maybe CIG has spent more money than people suspect. Maybe their expenses are greater than assumed.
But if their funding keeps up...can they continue to develop the game? Yes.
That's what financials are for. When you consider that in 2015 alone, a single studio (F42)
burned through over $20 million - almost half of the entire 2015 funding, coupled with the fact that with neither of the two games completed, and at the current studio levels they are going to be operating in the Red if they can't raise over $30 million a year, you have your answer.
And that's why they are still trying to raise funds. If the funding - at the current level - stops, they simply can't finish the game. Do you really believe that somehow they have money in reserves to do that? Not to mention the fact that even with all that money, that studio still has debts (!).
Given enough money to keep their developers developing, is there any technical issue they could not solve? Probably not.
Sorry, but no that's not how that works. Not in ECON-101, not in GAMEDEV-101. Throwing money at a problem isn't a solution. Clearly this has already been proven by the mere fact that they asked for $5 million for the games; then got $140 million - and still aren't even 15% of the way there. Heck, even 4.0 which croberts says is coming in Q4/17, isn't even 25% of the game promised. And that was when 3.0 was coming in Dec 2016. By all accounts, one would expect to see 3.0 in Q4/17 because they have no choice now but to focus on shipping SQ42 in the first part of 2017.
The biggest issue, aside from wasteful spending an wanton incompetence, is that they don't have a SINGLE person at ANY of the studios who has ANY experience building large games, let alone one of this scope. And when you're stuck in R&D, as well as learning process, the result is precisely where the project is atm.
You've pointed out a number of problems and issues with the game, CIG and CR. They strike me as reasonable issues that need to be dealt with.
They can't be dealt with because the project is headed by someone who, while his family and buddies are getting rich, is driving the project into the ground.
Are they
making a game? Yes, of course they are. That's not the issue. The issue is that due to all the mistakes, wasted time and resources etc, they have now hit the wall whereby there is no longer the money required to
complete the game. There is no way they are going to have another 2-3 years, and another $100 million to make the game. Back when I said that, with the right talent, the vision 2.0 game would cost about $150 million, I was actually being conservative. Here we are. And anyone who thinks that SQ42 is going to generate the funds needed to keep it going, in concert with backer money from Star Citizen, is a fool who isn't paying attention.
But you also keep saying that CIG can't deliver the promised game. They've admitted that. That they've shown little progress to date. Which is true...but also understandable. That they keep missing release dates....which is true but which is also about the worst they've done. That the crowdfunding has issues...true.
Right. Which goes back to paying $100 for a $10 box without a lid.
So....given the need to modify the engine and create their tools and their continued change of direction as their vision expanded and changed, is the progress we've seen to date "reasonable"? I'd say it slow....but reasonable.
Sorry, but after a year and $30 million, if all they have to show for it are bug fixes, a glorified shop for buying pants, a new base, and some ships (from previous years) made flyable - that's not progress when you consider the scope of work that's still left to be done. Then they went and
resurrected Star Marine of all things. It's just filler because without it, their 2016 performance looks even worse. And from what I've seen and played of 2.6, it's going to be quite evident that even with $140 million, all they could come up with was a cookie-cutter FPS component that is no better than any of the many FPS games you can find on Steam Early Access. Heck, anyone who has even played something like Angels Fall First, can attest to that specific point of fact.
