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Beer4TheBeerGod posted:It's true. For example the Drake Dragonfly sale lasted 10 days, from 6/17 to 6/27. During that time period it made around $1.4M, which is actually a fairly successful sale as far as things go for CIG. The problem is that unless CIG is somehow dramatically more efficient than their competition (competition that doesn't have 300-ish employees spread over four studios) then their burn rate is conservatively estimated (by me) at around $100K/day. This is based on the burn rate of Frontier, which is a company about the same size as CIG but only located in one facility. So while they raised $1.4M over those ten days, they also burned $1M on normal development costs. The Starliner was a big sales flop and basically dragged in game mechanics that would be a standalone game (Euro Bus Simulator or something similar for example.) As for the burn rate, I tend to lean towards your figures yet I find them somewhat optimistic. The only fly in the ointment is trying to ascertain their employee count in regards to all the open positions. I will say this, their capital expenditures versus operational expenses is trivial. A $10K couch ain't a big deal (well it is in regards in total disrespect to backers, but I digress.) Pretty much a large portion of their operational costs go to salaries. To give some perspective, a $20 million company which has around 400 people making $10/hr (out of 500) consumes around 80% of operational expenses in the service type sector in the midwest. CIG has no R&D like Intel, no continuous capital initiatives like GM or Ford or BP, etc. They are located in high cost of living areas as well. In short, I would guess it is closer to $4m a month. Depends on the headcount as always, and that is the prime factor for really determining it.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:05
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C-Bangin' it 
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Colostomy Bag posted:The Starliner was a big sales flop and basically dragged in game mechanics that would be a standalone game (Euro Bus Simulator or something similar for example.) Plus NDA payouts to "leavers".
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Jun 28, 2016 19:08
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Can you guys who are talking about Engineering Debt or whatever explain how that isn't included in normal day-to-day operation of 300 employees? If it is some artists already on the payroll just making things out of cubes and stealing artwork how does that make it cost extra? I'm assuming they aren't working per diem.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:10
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EminusSleepus posted:This thread needs to have the shills back in here. Hi! What's up? I'm here.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:11
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Pointy posted:With no way to transfer or get rid of heat other than radiation, it would overheat even quicker in a vacuum. That's loving weird
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Jun 28, 2016 19:12
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did anything happen yet
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Jun 28, 2016 19:13
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ideate posted:CIG has made me take more notice of my office. Most of the meeting rooms have generic tables pushed together to make a larger surface, and that allows them to be easily reconfigurable.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:14
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Eonwe posted:did anything happen yet Two weeks. (Been rather slow all things considered, but you know this thread, it comes in waves). Ben Lesnick is a producer now.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:14
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Ultimately, regardless of how much they have left, it's still a dead-end company. They are not using their money to create a game that will bring them in more money - they are using their money to create assets for which they have yet to build a game. The only hope Star Citizen has is that when they release, it's such a great game that the backers who've given them $116 million to date are just the tip of the iceberg - the rest of the world will go nuts, and will be totally willing to jump in the pool with everyone else and drop $250 - $2500 on starships for years to come, funding continued development and more game enhancements. This is what Chris thinks will happen. He thinks there's an untapped market remaining out there - hundreds of thousands of people who will spend enough to make that "initial" $116 million look like peanuts. He just has to get a bit more out there for them to chew on, and they'll come running. He's missing the forest for the trees. People who would be interested in Star Citizen have already paid into Star Citizen. The only people left are those who would never buy $250 starships in the first place. There's no market for this game aside from the one it's already milked. The quality, functionality, and aesthetic of the game is so poor that even people casually interested can see it's a hack job. There's too much competition offering superior experiences and quality for lower prices. Nobody who doesn't already care about this game will care about it if and when it releases. Scruffpuff fucked around with this message at 19:17 on Jun 28, 2016 |
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Jun 28, 2016 19:15
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ManofManyAliases posted:Hi! What's up? I'm here. Hello, Toast 
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Jun 28, 2016 19:15
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Scruffpuff posted:Ultimately, regardless of how much they have left, it's still a dead-end company. They are not using their money to create a game that will bring them in more money - they are using their money to create assets for which they have yet to build a game. The only hope Star Citizen has is that when they release, it's such a great game that the backers who've given them $116 million to date are just the tip of the iceberg - the rest of the world will go nuts, and will be totally willing to jump in the pool with everyone else and drop $250 - $2500 on starships for years to come, funding continued development and more game enhancements. edit: I've got it - F2P gamers anonymously contract actual SC players to mine resources for them, CIG takes the real money from the mobile gamers and gives in-game credits to the SC players wyoak fucked around with this message at 19:19 on Jun 28, 2016 |
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Jun 28, 2016 19:16
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SirPhoebos posted:Hello, Toast Nope, incorrect. Strike 1.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:17
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SirPhoebos posted:Hello, Toast He's Batgirl now didn't you get the memo. Hello BatToast.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:17
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Matlock Birthmark posted:He's Batgirl now didn't you get the memo. Double incorrect. Strike 2
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Jun 28, 2016 19:18
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ManofManyAliases posted:Nope - incorrect. Strike 1. You are Toast.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:18
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Decrepus posted:Can you guys who are talking about Engineering Debt or whatever explain how that isn't included in normal day-to-day operation of 300 employees? If it is some artists already on the payroll just making things out of cubes and stealing artwork how does that make it cost extra? I'm assuming they aren't working per diem. Starliner is a perfect example; they keep selling niche jpegs that require them to construct entirely new game mechanics. I think they have at least farming, cargo simulator, and spacebusing to add to the game thanks to this strategy. They also narrowly-avoided space ups man with their last April fool's joke, Citizens pulled hard to get that added in.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:18
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ManofManyAliases posted:Hi! What's up? I'm here. 
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Jun 28, 2016 19:18
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SirPhoebos posted:You are Toast. Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:18
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ManofManyAliases posted:Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow. drat, never going to increase my RBI. See ya tomorrow Vladimir Putin.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:19
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Time_pants posted:That's loving weird No man. That's loving science.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:20
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ManofManyAliases posted:Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow. 
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Jun 28, 2016 19:20
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ManofManyAliases posted:Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow. We should have guessed sooner that, as the anti-smart, you get desummoned when your name is repeated three times.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:20
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ManofManyAliases posted:Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow. Aw man, I hardly even got to enjoy your presence this time.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:20
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ManofManyAliases posted:Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow. That was easier than I expected unlike your mom, HEYYOOO!
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Jun 28, 2016 19:21
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ManofManyAliases posted:Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow. Toast Toast Toast Now you can take tomorrow off. You're welcome.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:22
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Decrepus posted:Can you guys who are talking about Engineering Debt or whatever explain how that isn't included in normal day-to-day operation of 300 employees? If it is some artists already on the payroll just making things out of cubes and stealing artwork how does that make it cost extra? I'm assuming they aren't working per diem. I'm not really familiar with the term "engineering debt" per se. I read it as costs to develop something you can't sell (as finished) yet. So you spend hundred hours building something that one day you hope to sell. Pretty standard, and then I'd agree with you assessment (they are on payroll now, costs equal payroll + overhead). But Technical Debt is another thing. That's when you spend 100 hours to get something together, and know darn well you will have to re-do a portion of it later. The "debt" part of is the concept that there is "interest" on your 100 hours of development that will accrue. That interest is an unknown expense at this time, thus scary.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:23
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wyoak posted:That sounds ratchet as hell. I mean you don't need a wing but conference rooms should have conference tables. I guess maybe if it's some sort of classroom or something? I'd never noticed until I started my CIG furniture studies. I dunno. Engineers don't care, I guess?
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Jun 28, 2016 19:26
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rebounded posted:I'm not really familiar with the term "engineering debt" per se. I read it as costs to develop something you can't sell (as finished) yet. So you spend hundred hours building something that one day you hope to sell. Pretty standard, and then I'd agree with you assessment (they are on payroll now, costs equal payroll + overhead). Traditionally, I think the term "engineering debt" is features you are promising in your final product that you haven't designed or developed yet. You are promising X, so cost to produce X is the debt you take on when you make that promise. In CIG's case, they've taken it a step further because they are selling ships that don't exist yet. So the farming ship that costs hundreds is already sold, so you now need to make a "farming ship" a reality, with the gameplay that would entail. Repeat for however many ships and concepts that CIG has promised. Of course, the term "engineering debt" is actually irrelevant in this case, because as we've already seen several times. They will gladly sell a ship and then completely change what it is and what it does, and their supporters will suck that cock and violently defend their right to do so. And of course, No refunds ever.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:28
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Chalks posted:Toast Toast Toast
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Jun 28, 2016 19:28
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Decrepus posted:Can you guys who are talking about Engineering Debt or whatever explain how that isn't included in normal day-to-day operation of 300 employees? If it is some artists already on the payroll just making things out of cubes and stealing artwork how does that make it cost extra? I'm assuming they aren't working per diem. In short, you have to take into account artists, programmers, and a slew of other factors. Then combine this will their general level of incompetence of redoing everything five times because they are still learning. And why are they still learning? Turnover. Which has become a major problem with CIG. It takes months to get up to speed on learning the ever changing pipelines. Anyone smart there realizes they are basically at a community college to learn the ropes and is leaving for greener pastures to pursue other avenues. You raise $1m in a sale? Eh, sounds like a lot of money. Once you have the morass of a bumbling corporation basically making everyone redo work it really doesn't sound like much. Remember, there is a poo poo ton of overhead involved with companies this size. This ain't some 5 guys in a garage type operation. You have HR, you have mandatory trainings and other bullshit to deal with. Compliance is a bitch once you get over 50 employees. So to answer your question, the amount spent on salaries and overhead pretty much exceeds what they received in revenues.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:28
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ManofManyAliases posted:Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow. ManofManyAliases posted:I'm in for around 4k. I don't doubt the game will be made, but I do feel management is all over the place right now. Some indicators point to the notion that they'll find their groove and start to turn over content. I just don't think that content will be released in the near future, but I can wait for the long haul.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:28
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Colostomy Bag posted:Remember, there is a poo poo ton of overhead involved with companies this size. This ain't some 5 guys in a garage type operation. You have HR, you have mandatory trainings and other bullshit to deal with. Compliance is a bitch once you get over 50 employees. From Beer's post on Frontier's financials, I was surprised by how low the overhead was. My outfit (including R&D, marketing, benefits, etc) our overhead exceeds salary. I took one of our spreadsheets, knocked out R&D, slashed benefits by 50%, and reduced Admin overhead (cause Sandi can do the job of 10 people) and I was still around 1:1. Guess I don't know anything about game development!
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Jun 28, 2016 19:33
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Decrepus posted:Can you guys who are talking about Engineering Debt or whatever explain how that isn't included in normal day-to-day operation of 300 employees? If it is some artists already on the payroll just making things out of cubes and stealing artwork how does that make it cost extra? I'm assuming they aren't working per diem. Employees aren't sitting around waiting for things to do; if they were then presumably we'd have a game already. Now they have something extra to do in addition to everything else. For example let's think about the Dragonfly. Artists now have to create the ship, programmers have to handle the mechanics related to it and any new changes (such as having players fly a ship while still being exposed to space), designers have to incorporate the gameplay (how is a Dragonfly used, how is it balanced, what could it do that would lead to abuse), producers have to manage the ship along with the other assets, Chris has to unapproved the design once it's been finalized, etc. None of this is stuff that they had to do before the ship was sold (since there's no obligation to deliver something until people have paid for it). Nothing gets added without a consequence. In this case what gets sacrificed? Is the delivery date pushed back? Are more contractors brought on, accelerating the burn rate? Is another ship like the Genesis put post-release, or a feature like how private servers are now the last thing CIG will ever develop? Now my guess is that the Dragonfly provided a net benefit. It's a small ship and $1.4M is a healthy amount. Same is likely of most variant sales like the Vindicator. But the Genesis Starliner or the Endeavor? I can't imagine those are net benefits given how large the ships are, and how much gameplay they add.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:35
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no_recall posted:Why do you need a hat in a spacegame? To cover your bald spot when you're indoors, silly. I guess you could always buy a space toupee, though.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:39
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rebounded posted:I'm not really familiar with the term "engineering debt" per se. I read it as costs to develop something you can't sell (as finished) yet. So you spend hundred hours building something that one day you hope to sell. Pretty standard, and then I'd agree with you assessment (they are on payroll now, costs equal payroll + overhead). Technical debt is when you do something sloppy and eventually leads to having to scrap the entire thing because its mere existence is completely detrimental to the entire picture. It can be caused by a lot of things, people not following the proper design structures, not documenting things, and taking shortcuts. Sometimes its caused by making the wrong decision at the very start when you try to hammer an engine not designed to do something into trying to do that thing. FFXIV 1.0 started off on the wrong foot by using the wrong engine (one designed for single player jrpgs) and trying to fit it into an MMO. Half of its problems were solved when they shifted from that to whatever it is they are using in 2.0+ Engineering debt is a term I started using around the time that they got really hog wild with the big ticket ships that all use some completely different mechanic that hasn't even been though up right and would need hundreds if not thousands of ENGINEER hours to just get it programmed. Basically a completely new problem is created and now the engineers need to solve it, the problem was created to sell ships, the ships are already sold, so its a debt held to the engineers. The drink mini game, the passenger cruise-line, the liquid mining poo poo, etc are all examples of engineering debt.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:39
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Matlock Birthmark posted:Traditionally, I think the term "engineering debt" is features you are promising in your final product that you haven't designed or developed yet. You are promising X, so cost to produce X is the debt you take on when you make that promise. In CIG's case, they've taken it a step further because they are selling ships that don't exist yet. So the farming ship that costs hundreds is already sold, so you now need to make a "farming ship" a reality, with the gameplay that would entail. Repeat for however many ships and concepts that CIG has promised. It's not really debt if you're already morally bankrupt! It's right there in the TOS! They are under no obligation to deliver anything, ever! God, I love this company...
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Jun 28, 2016 19:39
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rebounded posted:From Beer's post on Frontier's financials, I was surprised by how low the overhead was. My outfit (including R&D, marketing, benefits, etc) our overhead exceeds salary. I took one of our spreadsheets, knocked out R&D, slashed benefits by 50%, and reduced Admin overhead (cause Sandi can do the job of 10 people) and I was still around 1:1. Yep, which makes things more complicated. I'm up on basic US stuff and my figures are US centric because that is what I'm familiar with. As for Canada, remember, healthcare (group insurance on the line item of financial statements) is basically eliminated in most other first world countries. And leave that comment as that.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:42
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Sabreseven posted:Crobblers all finished now at the plane_arium, I mean Imagi_arium now? I've lost track of it all, if there was even a track to follow. Speaking of that, can someone take a guess on the cost of using Imaginarium for 3 months, and having hollywood actors doing full performance capture (no cheap things like mocap or voice overs)? I think I heard a quote of around $100K per day for the studio itself.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:49
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Colostomy Bag posted:Yep, which makes things more complicated. I'm up on basic US stuff and my figures are US centric because that is what I'm familiar with. Holy poo poo I completely forgot about that. Since I'm US based I assumed that the company would include insurance premiums as part of overhead.
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Jun 28, 2016 19:50
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Time_pants posted:That's loving weird Nah. It's just Hollywood having taught you wrong about this as well. One of the major problems of space isn't the cold (indeed, depending on your definition, space simply doesn't have a temperature and thus can't be cold), it's heat: it's a really tricky thing to get rid of in a vacuum, and doubly so if you have a nearby star that keeps pumping more energy into you. Once you go beyond something more complex than the a soda can design of, say, the Apollo capsules, all the machines and engines and other stuff on board will start generating so much heat that you need to dedicate significant ship volume to radiators and heat sinks that gets rid off all of that nasty stuff before the crew is toasted. This has all kinds of interesting side-effects, if you're going for a realistic setting. For instance, space combat can be reduced to something as simple as throwing a bunch of high-speed pebbles at the opponent — no need to puncture the hull or defeat armour or anything; you just have to shred their radiators, which by their nature and function need to be both exposed and flimsy. It also kills all hopes of achieving any kind of stealth since there's no way to hide the heat expulsion required to stay alive. 
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Jun 28, 2016 19:54
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