Star Citizen - The E.L.E.

[Motto]

The ship naming is a typical example of the money issue. They never stated if it would count for the whole spectrum of ships or just this model. So, first issue to test, are backers willing to pay for a unique ship name? If the answer is yes, then they will limit this unique name sale to this model and start selling unique names for every model. The next concept ship comes with a premium price if you want an unique name and they'll start backselling it for all available ships as well.

The thing is, the desperate money grabbing now is turning against them. Backers are pissed they have spent a lot of money and now have to face the possibility they can't use their wanted name because another backer has exclusive naming rights.

[Spunky Munkee]

Along that same line of thought I would think that they have pretty much saturated the market seeing as this is a sort of a niche game. Aside from that the game obviously has a bad reputation in the community. The crappy showing at the convention put a damper on new backer cash. If I never heard of this and then heard it's been in development for over 5 years and that buggy mess was the best they could show us I would keep my money in my pocket. So with that said, Roberts just went for the willing whales to pay once more to fill out their fleet as previously stated.

But to each his own. I don't care if die hard backers stick it out to the very end to get burned, they have earned whatever comes their way. I do mind seeing new people get sucked into this mess..

[Orgetorix]

Isn't true, in all areas of retail, that they could make more money selling more cheap things than fewer expensive things? Etc. etc.

You can choose for low margin, high volume or high margin, low volume. Now selling 100 Aurora's to new backers (after all those years of being around and all the news surrounding SC) or selling one 600i to an already heavily invested whale backer (SCF) makes for an easy choice. Especially if you have a lot of SCF whales.

Now, as explained before, the moment Chris starts to do stuff that could be explained as a sign that there is something amiss, this project will collapse. Chris has no choice but to maintain the illusion that everything is fine. That means going to Gamescom and doing a Shitizen Con and not pushing out a horrible 3.0 build. Only at the last possible moment he will do the things nessescary to survive, like downsizing on studio's and staff since he has no choice left. Making it public that he is out of money will not also make even the whale backers wonder, but it will also start backers wondering again about the concept sales, loans and the teaming up with partners like faceware. It will kill CIG. So, Chris goes on as if nothing is wrong simply because he has to. Stopping is Game Over.

This scam is coming to a stop real quick now. Because Chris can't act on the money issue, he has to keep up the current burning rate. Only by not replacing staff that has left en not renewing ending contracts he can stop the drain a little. But showing groupfoto's with half the staff from last year will raise questions as well. So he's fucked.

Simply put, he can't show his money problems because showing them will immediatly crash and burn CIG. That's why there are no direct visible signals of money problems. But if you look closely at their current behaviour, you can see them. And that's why the end is near. You just have to be willing to see the signs, and clearly you are not. As we already established.

And that's precisely the trap he's caught in. He can't show any weakness or the show immediately stops. He has to keep up the current cash burn to keep up the illusion of solvency. They already tried to switch back to a low margin, high volume marketing strategy. That's exactly what the referral contest was all about, and how well did that work out?

Whether the SC Culties want to admit it or not, SC has reached near 100% market saturation. The only way they could even have a chance of staving off the inevitable at this point would be to release the best game evar, right now.

A game so good, with a level of Fidelity so high that it brings everyone they've aliened back, and draws in hundreds of thousands of other players from across multiple genres. Of course after looking at the steaming pile that was Gamescon '17, who in their right mind thinks that such a possibility is even remotely possible? Even the Shitizens have to admit that a beta release is at the very least, two years away.

In closing they are left with nothing more to do then to continue to milk the Whales, which might also include money laundering entities. If you look at it in the right lighting, you can literally see the million poly-count :10bux: oozing out of the 600i, just to be sucked into the super massive black hole that CIG has become(edit: I should have said, "the super massive black hole that CIG always was, this was always a scam from the beginning).

 

[the_wolfmann]

I do mind seeing new people get sucked into this mess..

My thoughts exactly. It's about time honest but misinformed people stopped losing their hard-earned money over this cascading failure of a project.

I remember that back in the days around the Kickstarter campaign my interest was genuinely piqued. I was lucky I shared the Chris Roberts pitch video with one of my gamer friends, though. Somehow, without knowing any of CR's background, he pinned him as a compulsive liar that won't ship a single of the 2 games he's promoting. That was 2 years before Dr. Smart publicly stated the exact same thing. There is something eerie about CR being able to fool so many people. As I just admitted I almost fell for it too.

However, there is NO excuse for that to continue to happen! The ammount of wrongs about this project is reaching stupifying heights :siren: Noone aims to spread FUD to harm the project (i.e. to stop it from succeeding) rather than wanting to prevent people from unrighfully parting with their money.

What I find the most scary about this project is SC defenders (or outright shills) posting - mostly on reddit - how they hope that CIGs funding continues to boon throughout their various events. It's not enough that they've fallen deep under sunk cost fallacy and then wish others do too!?

Edit: Fixed Chris' name from Christ... What is it with his name lending itself easily to this religious icon. Could it be the relgious zeal of His believers?

[David-2]

The Q & A for the 600i is up, ...

I got this far:

Will it have room enough to carry an 85x instead of the Origin-branded rover?


Until the ship is fully built and implemented this is difficult to say with complete certainty, but the 85x has a much larger footprint than a Rover so we consider this unlikely to fit. While ships smaller than the Rover may technically “fit,” the lift is designed purely for a ground vehicle, so maneuvering a ship in there might prove risky in terms of causing damage to both vessels.

Gosh, I just can't wait to see the game mechanic for the interior damage caused to your 600i (and simultaneous external damage to your 85x) by dinging it with your smaller craft as you try to fly it into the cargo space.  Won't it be wonderful?

(As I was saying in my earlier post about "off-the-cuff bullshit" ... here's a prime example ...)

[Motto]

The proper response would have been "Hey, we just drew a picture of a nice looking ship and that's all there is to it. Stop asking idiotic things about it as if it will ever be an actual thing you can do something with. Moron. It's just meant to get more money out of your wallet, that's all. Idiot!"

But that probably wouldn't fly (pun intended) so well with the backers  :smuggo:

[dsmart]

This thread moves fast, I've bookmarked posts from this morning to register and reply to, that was 4 pages ago. Well hi. I'm new and I'm here to argue, but not to troll.

Oh? Why not? Sounds like you're on the wrong forum then; because all we do around here is troll and aggravate those guys who are pissed that people are saying bad stuff on the Internet about a game.

Apparently one doesn't get banned for that, which is nice.

Nope. Keep it clean, and you're fine. Rule of thumb: This isn't Reddit.

The thing is Derek states a lot of things. He backs them with facts.

He rarely does. It's a smidge of fact and a mountain of opinion and conjecture on top of it.

Well, you would have to do a lot better than that. You guys are quick to throw out these blanket statements without EVER coming up with ANY opposing FACTS to back up the statements you're countering. No wonder you guys never make it past a few posts with that OldSchoolCmdr guy who is actually more forgiving and more evidence driven than I am.

I go to great lengths to source the stuff I write. Sure, I don't always get it right, but who does? Even CIG can't get anything right, and instead of holding them accountable for the $158M train-wreck that we're all arguing about, you're more concerned about whether or not their biggest and most vocal critic, gets anything right. No wonder you guys have no "game". It's like Trump who is always going after the media, despite the fact that everything he complains about, can be cite sourced within minutes.

The funding tracker is bogus, that has been proven.

Got a source for that? I've found this, which isn't proof:

The funding chart, long suspected to be inaccurate, and which various sources have said they are willing to testify under oath as to how it’s being manipulated, is claimed by CIG to only track backer money. CIG also claimed that it doesn’t account for the monthly subscriptions which, hilariously enough, some backers are actually paying for. So taken at face value, if the chart doesn’t account for subscriptions, refunds, loans, and investor money, it stands to reason that this chart is clearly inaccurate and misleading. Which in turn makes it ripe for manipulation. It also means that, on the face of it, the project has less than the $145 million claimed to have come from backers.

http://dereksmart.com/2017/03/star-citizen-money-laundromat/

Do you know the difference between "opinion" and "fact". If you did, the quote above would be the last thing you should be bringing up.

Here's a FACT for you - and we've tested this many times. The funding chart does NOT take into account refunds. At all. And it never did.

Here's another one. We know for a FACT that there aren't 1.5M Star Citizens.

Even the base line for the funding chart, which never - ever - goes below a certain level, has been rumored to be maintained by the monthly subscriptions. This despite CIG (via Ben Lesnick and others) going on the record and saying that subs are not part of the funding chart.

The funding chart is FRAUDULENT and MISLEADING. It serves a SINGLE purpose only: To mislead backers and the public into thinking that there is public demand for the project. If you know anything about the law, then you should know that the above statement can get me sued. But here's the thing. Suing me means that CIG would have to prove to the court that the statement is false. I've been waiting since July 2015 for them to sue me over various statements I've made, and which would help me get to some pressing answers for backers. So far, nothing. I wonder why that is. Surely a multi-million corp funded by dreams and backers, which has NO money of its own to lose, would have taken some kind of action by now.

[dsmart]

This thread moves fast, I've bookmarked posts from this morning to register and reply to, that was 4 pages ago. Well hi. I'm new and I'm here to argue, but not to troll. Apparently one doesn't get banned for that, which is nice.

Hi Suzikuh, and welcome. I suggest that you start by reading the topics in bold first, starting at page 1 in everyone of them. This will give you a clear view of this forum, it's members and our take on Star Citizen. If you still feel you have new arguments to discuss with us, please join the table. I for one however, do not wish nor want to repeat the endless discussions we have had with Serenstupidity.

Please note that we here all convinced that Star Citizen has turned into a scam, that it can and will not be made and that the collapse of the whole thing is imminent. We are here to watch and discuss the when and how of said collapse, not a if. So trying to start yet another discussion that the if is questionable or that the how and when still lacks proof is pointless. Just so know.

So, ready to come in and join the hilarity that is Scam Shitizen?

Indeed. That's why unless there are new topics being brought up, nothing is gained by arguing the same points over and over. Those, we should just ignore en masse because they're just clutter designed to obfuscate and drown out the prior discussions of same.

Since these guys all parrot the same thing, all they have to do is click on Serendipity's profile and read his and the responses we've all given to him.

[dsmart]

:lol: I think the ATV segment on bugfixing needs relabelling as BurnUP
Derek Smart was right                                                              Derek Smart was right                                                              Derek Smart was right                                                              Derek Smart was right                                                              Derek Smart was right                                                              Derek Smart was right

I can't wait for the day when the best fit line becomes flat.

And, before anyone points out that this is normal for software development - we all understand this. It does prove that it's a buggy mess at the moment, perhaps one of the pitfalls of having a dev team split between 4 studios I might think.

What are the chances that, by the time the production schedule is released, 10 or 15 bugs might have suddenly been fixed to make the chart look better??

Hey, it's almost as if my sources were proven to be right (again) about 3.0. They said:

- 3.0 didn't "exist" back in Aug 2016 when Chris was promoting and touting it

- Because of the above, there is no way 3.0 could have been released by Dec 19th, 2016. The first 3.0 dev schedule of April 2017, proved the above to be true

- 3.0 was a disaster and that the schedule (which had an end of June release), was bogus. Subsequent dev schedules have proven above to be true

- 3.0 was a performance hog that that no way they show it at GC2017 in that state. Well, we've seen GC2017

- 3.0 was nowhere near ready for even an Aug 2016 release. The post- GC2017 schedule, and yesterday's burn down, have proven this to be true

- 3.0 needs at least 6 more months of work for it to be ready to release outside a dev environment. If they release 3.0 before year end, and it's in a shitty condition, then this statement would have proven to be true

And I have written about ALL of the above BEFORE they even happened. 07-29-2017, 07-08-2017, 05-26-2017

I need not even talk about SQ42 which those same sources have been right about since it's last showing back in Dec 2015. Like Star Marine, its still MIA.

Remember this GC2017 related Aug 18th post?

According to my sources, nobody quite knows what to do about GamesCom yet. And that was the same sentiment just last week!

They won't be doing any R&D demos this time apparently. But though my sources claim that rumors suggesting that streamers will be playing 2.6.3 during the show are false, one specific source has said that the goal is to live play sessions of 3.0 running in the same manner that they have done in the past. So far no word on whether or not streamers will be allowed to play it; either live during the show, or in closed sessions. Especially since it's still running at around 10 fps when you hit the moon. And that's on a LAN (which is what they will be running at the show).

So far, no word on SQ42.

Going from the GC2017 presentation disaster, it's easy to see why those very sources didn't even think that Chris would be crazy enough to show 3.0 at GC2017. But he did. You know why? Because these shows are planned, booked, and paid for MONTHS in advance. He had nothing to show besides 3.0 or SQ42. And in order to avoid the repeat of GC2016 and CC2016, that's why it he was left with no choice.

Oh but don't worry though, I tend to get these things wrong. All the time. At least according to our zealot friends over there.

[dsmart]

Feels like the disaster that is the 600i needs its own thread. CIG are running out of ideas now; they've pretty much sold the 'top tier' of every conceivable style of ship and thus cannot make a better/stronger/more powerful version yet to usurp those without pissing off ship buyers (an absolute no-no), there is no more roles they need ships to fill without creating more roles and thus introducing more feature creep at this stage which is already years behind schedule, yet they still need to sell a very expensive ship in order to stop the lights going out in the next 3 months. Thus the 600i was born; an expensive ship that does nothing other than be an inferior version of an expensive ship at a high price which exists purely to be an expensive ship that is expensive so that people who want to buy an expensive ship can.... 

The hilarity continues.

apparantly at the end of all of this is meant to be a game that is intended to be able to compete with behemoths of games of the likes of CoD, LoL, PUBG and DotA 2... I can't see it personally 

Yeah, but it's not P2W though. Stop spreading FUD  :argh:

[dsmart]

The Q & A for the 600i is up, and boy, even the cultists are not happy

The biq question is, did Chris take it too far with the fucked up presentation and yet another - expensive - concept ship sale? Are we already in the endgame now with Shitizen Con and the Anniversary and X-Mas Holiday events upon us? What options does he have left? Showing something of SQ42 and again a concept sale? Discounting on all ships (that'll go well)? What is there left to buy that hasn't been bought yet or that is worth buying?

Me thinks the endgame is way nearer than me thoughts....

The E.L.E. end game started in Q4/16 when the blew their scam load on GC2016 and CC2016. That smoke and mirrors move which netted them about $6M, was the Hail Mary that I said it would be. And hilariously, a year later, they haven't done anything worthy of the mistakes they made then.

I have no reason to believe that CC2017 or the holiday 2017 sales are going to make a difference to their bottom line. Yeah, will will make some money, but the ride is over. And given what we've seen of 3.0, even if they magically release it by year end - which they have no choice but to do - the disaster that it will be, is what's going to be the final nail.

Note, they haven't even patched 2.6.3 since April 2017. So there's that.

[dsmart]

Isn't true, in all areas of retail, that they could make more money selling more cheap things than fewer expensive things? If they were desperate for money they wouldn't have an expensive ship with no reason to buy it. They'd do loads more cheap aurora packages or shove the Idris on sale again.

 

I really do believe that you're just trolling. Nobody could be this dense or stupid. Repeatedly.

[dsmart]

:lol: I think the ATV segment on bugfixing needs relabelling as BurnUP

He is going on about how this field test helped him finding bugs, which would have shown up after release otherwise.

Then for what reason did backers pay for Alpha access?

And it wasn't a "field test". Those are their same employees playing the game. The same devs and QA people. Playing on a LAN. The same environment they have in their offices. What's different? The fact that it was played off-site.

It's bullshit. As usual.

[dsmart]

Yeah you're right about it being like a Ponzi scheme. I just expected the ELE to be some really catastopic single event (aka the K-T event that the analogy is about) rather than a series of ongoing mounting problems that is the current state of the project.

I'm basically waiting for the BOOM NEWS!

I thought maybe it was that they defaulted on the Coutts loan or something? Still nothing of that magnitude has happened yet. Signs and red flags are there.

An Extinction Level Event isn't - and never was - an event with a singular effect. It's gradual. You should read up on it. There is a reason that I coined the term back when I wrote an entire blog on it.

[dsmart]

This thread moves fast, I've bookmarked posts from this morning to register and reply to, that was 4 pages ago. Well hi. I'm new and I'm here to argue, but not to troll. Apparently one doesn't get banned for that, which is nice.

FYI, this person happens to be another /r/ds denizen, https://www.reddit.com/user/Luftwaffle1980. So try not to get trolled or engage in any strawman or circular arguments with him, seeing as his cohort, Serendipity, already got that covered.