Star Citizen – Year Four
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@Kristoffer
“Regarding this entire inventory lists, I find that rather petty to be honest. Yes, CIG said all money would go to game development, but questioning their choice of lamps as too expensive? Really? How’s that any different than the gargantuan Orc statue outside Blizzard’s HQ in Irvine which has the same purpose – “we have money!”. If you follow the money trail it all comes from the people playing their games and monthly subscribing to them, it’s no different. We give CIG money to make a game the same way we pay Blizzard to play the games they’ve made. Who here gets do decide what can be labeled as going to “game development”? I mean, coders need coffee – so why not bring in the best coffee machine? Designers need light, why not buy the best lamp? It’s just petty so sit on the sidelines looking at every frame from their offices and putting price tags on their inventory and it really should be beneath this entire argument.”
That kind of argument comes often with the SC defenders while it’s entirely false. CIG is playing with OUR money ,not with some traditional investors’s.
Blizzard had earn its money by selling games and had never asked from crowd in the first place . I don’t recall Blizzard having a gigantic statue or AAA studios back in the days when they were developing warcraft 1 and were an unkonwn tiny company . CIG is at step 0 while Blizzard, EA, ID, etc etc are at step 100 with hundreds of millions of dollars they can do whatever they want with. CIG wants to play at step 100 while they can’t afford, and yet they’re paying for high-end studios and stuff.
So if you are fine with CIG spending YOUR and MY money on unecessary stuff, cool for you, but I’m not fine with it here.Again you can’t compare an healthy company like Blizzard that grew up all by itself ,with a crowd-funded company that has no back-up story and that is fragile by its very nature. They can have 10000 orc or jim raynor statues, who cares, they haven’t beg money from the crowd to achieve that.
Why not bring in the best cofee or lamp ? Maybe because bringing in just the standard cofee or lamp should not affect whatsoever the workers efficiency? Maybe because having standard and comon stuff means >>> more money on dev? And as Mr.Smart said, crowd-funded project has to 100% put the money into development. High-end furnitures are not required within a game development cursus. Hmm at my job I don’t remember having a 100000$$ cofee machine, the simple standard one is quite nice enough and do some nice cofee.
Hey Guys,
Sorry for the delayed response but I have been Christmas shopping lol.
@MDrake
JPEGS – I understand that they haven’t delivered but I mean, its crowdfunding. I didn’t pay money expecting any ship….I paid money because I had some fond childhood memories of playing wing commander with my Dad and remembering how cool that game was at the time. So I funded it because I had some background with Chris Roberts and the game and while it says I will get a ship….I never expect anything with crowdfunding…I donated some money to a project I had a genuine belief in, which is really what crowd funding is all about. That’s why I can’t really understand why so many people are spending large sums of money and then crying later that they don’t have their ship. Its really a donation. Now they are obligated to deliver what they promised according to the ToS but I mean the common understanding here is that this is a donation.
I haven’t made a decision on my refund either way yet…I’m just a little frustrated at how long its taking.
Furniture – I do tend to think that this is a little petty. There is a very strong case for airplane/ spaceship furniture because that creates a creative environment for the psyche. And this game is all about creativity. When an artist surrounds himself with a project…it spurs creative momentum….I have seen this happen first hand (my old friend is an artist). Inspiration can strike from any direction.
The Lawsuit – I am totally not looking for intimate details on the lawsuit, I know how the process works. I am simply looking for confirmation that a lawsuit has been filed. That tells me that someone has something…so far I don’t think Derek has filed yet though. Until that happens…I really don’t have anything solid to go off of to make a judgement either way.
2.0 – I have been playing baby PU for the last few days and I have to say I am pleasantly surprised. I was expecting way less given the recent huge delays. My confidence really wavered with their decision to hand FPS over to Illfonic and watching that whole thing erupt into a mushroom cloud of suck. But I have to say that I see some real progress on the game with this latest release. Also, it appears they are switching over to a rapid deployment strategy now that the stream has been unified so that makes me feel a little better as well. The flip side of that coin is that it does look like they are still two years out from a total and completed PU with the 30-40 discoverable star systems and all. Although, I don’t really remember how many landing zones will be with each system if any. But that two year estimate was based on when the dev streams were all separate.
I think for now I am going to just tread carefully and keep a watchful eye on things. I definitely don’t think CIG is at risk of bankruptcy or “collapsing” as Derek puts it but I tend to be more patient than most. I want to see how well they learn from their mistakes. Plus SQ42 looks like it will be a kick ass game. It will be interesting to see if they can deliver it in 2016.
@ xionicshockwave
We’re all having fun in some way.
If you got into SC out of donation or charity, that is your choice and opinion. I bought in, contributed, pledged, preordered for a product, by an advertised timeframe, with additional advertisement for that timeframe… especially since I was there to see the fully funded $23 million mark. I pledged way before the $23, let alone 20 million marks. I have full LTI on everything at their original lower or lowest prices. I’ve been here to watch CIG remind that LTI is ending, ending soon, ends very soon, buy your Freelancer or Constellation and extras for variants to get your LTI… Oh, CIG is bringing back LTI for all new concepts…
It’s called bait and switch sales tactics. Also, donations don’t get charged VAT, only purchases.
As for your refund, well, CIG has outright begun denying refunds. The discussion has moved here. Basically, the General Discussion forum. You missed any chance, and it doesn’t sound like you’re a large backer. You don’t have much to lose.
I really don’t understand how it is “petty” to call out CIG for spending public money. They have not released a product, they have not made any actual profit. If you want to go farther, the FTC already forbids the use of crowdfunded money for stuff not directly related to the project.
CIG will continue making enough money from white knights and whales to keep going till February, and likely till March 2016. They have secretly fired staff to cut costs.
I definitely understand your frustration and you are right to be frustrated. All I am saying is that its a buyer beware thing with crowd funding. You might get promised something but the whole idea behind crowd funding is to donate to something you believe in….not to buy a product or service.
CIG promised things by a certain date and they failed to deliver, which is a problem definitely. However, this doesn’t really mean that the game will never get made, ever. It just means (like all games) that the official release is delayed. Just about every big publisher has experienced delays up to two years (sometimes way more). I’m just a little salty about the horrendous community management and engagement. If CR can take a serious step back and say “Look guys because we expanded the scope of the PU, we will just have to release the game when its ready”. Ubisoft recently did this with The Division. Time and time again they said to the players “we’ll release the game when it’s ready”. And even they made the mistake of hyping up The Division way too soon or didn’t anticipate the reaction they would get.
Regarding their solvency….I really doubt they would be moving into a bigger studio and hiring people in pretty much every studio if they were running into money problems so unless you have something concrete outside of your own personal guesswork you won’t convince me of money problems.
Playing the baby PU has given me a little hope based on the progress I have seen so far. As long as they get their act together with community engagement and interaction I think they can probably restore some lost confidence by continuing to deliver the game (albeit very slowly). And hopefully there will be no more Illfonic fuck ups as development continues.
@ xionicshockwave
Asking or hoping that CR steps back and admits to feature creep, and needs a lot more time… if that happens, it’ll be too late. I don’t know if you are aware of CR’s history, but he has a history of too much scope creep, and he did kill his company Digital Anvil with it. Ran out of money making Freelancer, and Microsoft bought him out under the condition he would only be a creative consultant.
Star Citizen is a Freelancer 2.0 and instead of Microsoft losing a huge amount of money, it will be the customers.
I don’t have much of an interest in convincing you that CIG has money problems or worse. I do enjoy typing stuff though. Free speech typing is a nice feeling. In the end, you are here because of what Derek Smart has said, done, or will do. Only Derek can entertain, or convince you that something is wrong.
I am having a lot of fun learning what CR did on his stream today. I couldn’t believe it, but CR really is “amazing.”
If you really think that someone (least of all me) is trying to convince you, or anyone of anything, then you’re misinformed.
The purpose of my entire campaign since July, is to get people to think, and take a long hard look at this project and its potential for failure.
During that time, a lot has happened because a lot of people did just that: think
And it was a lot more than was being done before my first July blog.
What you believe is up to you. Your opinions are yours to make.
But know this, the Federal (FTC) rules for crowd-funding are clear and not open to interpretation. In that the money raised should be used specifically for the purpose it was intended. Buying expensive furniture, paying an out of scale salary to key people etc are all cause for concern. Especially since a completed project is yet to be delivered.
I do not – for one second – believe that this project, as pitched, will ever see the light of day. All the warning signs are there. How people choose to interpret those signs, is entirely up to them.
The discussion of the Star Citizen ToS first appeared in my Interstellar Pirates and The Long Con blogs. I needed a link directly to this, hence this post.
Everyone knows by now that since the release of the shoddy v2.0, they’re now claiming that it is substantial update, so they’re refusing refunds.
Below are all the different ToS revisions since the start of this project.
12-09-13 // Original from RSI website pre-Kickstarter
12-10-18 // Kickstarter ToS which would be active from 12-10-18 to 12-11-19
13-08-13 // v1.0
13-08-29 // v1.1
15-02-01 // v1.2
NOTE: If you pledged on Kickstart, then you are subject to their ToS, as well as the RSI ToS which was active after the campaign ended and you had to access their site to create your citizen account.
According to their ToS v1.1 of 08/29/13 they said if they failed to deliver within 12 months of Nov 2014 (the original Kickstarter estimated delivery date), they would issue refunds. At the time, this non-delivery period would kick in during Nov 2015.
IV. Charges & Billing
“RSI agrees to use its good faith business efforts to deliver to you the pledge items and the Game on or before the estimated delivery date. However, you acknowledge and agree that delivery as of such date is not a promise by RSI since unforeseen events may extend the development and/or production time. Accordingly, you agree that any unearned portion of the deposit shall not be refundable until and unless RSI has failed to deliver the pledge items and/or the Game to you within 12 months after the estimated delivery date.”Since that time, having already i) missed the Nov 2014 delivery date and ii) embarked on the increased scope (aka “vision 2.0”), thus extending the delivery date for the project, they surreptitiously made another changed in ToS v1.2 of 02/01/15(which remains the current one). The previous section was moved; and now reads:
VII. Fundraising & Pledges
“RSI agrees to use its good faith business efforts to deliver to you the pledge items and the Game on or before the estimated delivery date communicated to you on the Website. However, you acknowledge and agree that delivery as of such date is not a firm promise and may be extended by RSI since unforeseen events may extend the development and/or production time. Accordingly, you agree that any unearned portion of your Pledge shall not be refundable until and unless RSI has failed to deliver the relevant pledge items and/or the Game to you withineighteen (18) months after the estimated delivery date.“And in the current ToS, here is a key section that ties into the above:
VII. Fundraising & Pledges
“For the avoidance of doubt, in consideration of RSI’s good faith efforts to develop, produce, and deliver the Game with the funds raised, you agree that any Pledge amounts applied against the Pledge Item Cost and the Game Cost shall be non-refundable regardless of whether or not RSI is able to complete and deliver the Game and/or the pledge items. In the unlikely event that RSI is not able to deliver the Game and/or the pledge items, RSI agrees to post an audited cost accounting on the Website to fully explain the use of the amounts paid for Pledge Item Cost and the Game Cost. In consideration of the promises by RSI hereunder, you agree that you shall irrevocably waive any claim for refund of any Pledge that has been used for the Game Cost and Pledge Item Cost in accordance with the above.”Yup, totally called it. So someone in the PU managed to reach the edge of the game world.
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