Dante80 posted:

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)?

Beer4TheBeerGod posted:

On a lark I decided to be a little less charitable towards CIG and try something different. I assumed that CIG's growth in dedicated staff was linear between each data point, leading to a total predicted expenditure of $44 million. Again that's based on Frontier's monthly expenditure of $9320 per person. I then decided to see if I could estimate the contractor burden. We have three available data points from CIG about "developers" as opposed to dedicated staff. In October 2012 there were only 5 developers so likely no contracts. In October 2013 there were 90 developers and 52 dedicated staff for a difference of 38 people. In October 2014 there were 240 developers and an estimated 172 dedicated staff (assuming linear growth) for a difference of 68 people. We know that Behavior started working with CIG in December of 2012, and CIG also has contracts with Turbulent and CGBot as well as a now defunct over with IllFonic. So for shits and giggles I decided to estimate a "contractor burden" of 40 people, and estimate that load from December 2012 to the present. That translated to around $13 million. So if you assume that CIG's staff growth is linear between their data points, and that CIG's development contractor expenses are the equivalent of 40 people per month, then you're looking at $57 million spent. Obviously the numbers surrounding the contracts are ridiculously soft but it's a fun mental exercise.

There's also the expenses associated with all of the motion capture equipment, which is $230K. Of more interest is the cost of Imaginarium, which CR used for 11 weeks for Squadron 42. Now according to Chris's own words motion capture costs between $25K and $50K per day. I'm assuming that Imaginarium is at the high end of that, so we're talking about 55 days at $50K per day or $2.75 million. So for just the motion capture rig and 55 days of performance capture alone you're looking at $3 million. It should also be noted that motion capture and performance capture technically aren't the same thing, so it's entirely possible that Imaginarium is even more than $50K per day. We don't know and CIG won't say.

I don't think it's unreasonable to estimate that CIG has spent at least $60 million and has a monthly burn rate of $2.8 million. The major issue is what their net difference is between amount earned and amount spent; if we use Frontier's numbers and assume an equivalent of 300 people then any day that they earn less than $93,200 is considered a loss. Their average income for the last 365 days has been around $91.5K so not a big difference yet, but if their expenses are significantly higher than estimated or sales start to falter then things could get really bad.

ManofManyAliases posted:

Strike 3. I'm out until tomorrow.

Cao Ni Ma posted:

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.

Beer4TheBeerGod posted:

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.

rebounded posted:

This makes sense, thanks. So not an additional "interest-bearing" debt (like technical) but like "salesman sold X, now figure out how to make it." Close enough?

THEN they compound the technical debt on top because, well, look at the track record.

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.

Fat Shat Sings posted:

One of the best things about this whole thing is how the guy that is a failed movie maker is obviously burning tens of millions on a dumbass movie that nobody wants, but so many people refuse to believe it and keep giving him money.

It's the part in the documentary where there would be a line like this

*interviewer* So you went so deep into Star Citizen you lost everything. Your house. Your job. Your wife. Your Children. You put $30,000 into this video game.
*backer* Yes
*interviewer* Was there any indication that they were wasting the money on the CEOs pet side project?
*backer* ....NO
*interviewer* but this went on for years. It was widely reported by people. I know we are looking back with hindsight but the CEO only speaks with confidence about Squadron 42. All updates and work was related to Squadron 42. He was taken off of Freelancer for this exact reason. Add to that his own words about his bad management in the past. Do you stick by what you said about there being zero indication?
*backer* Yes. CIG promised a dream. And I believed it.

*cut to interviewer narration* Why did so many people refuse the evidence in front of them? See a tree and tell themselves it was a rock? Cloud Imperium Games did promise a dream. But it was the backers who chose to remain asleep.
(sad music montage to now homeless backers getting soup at a soup kitchen or getting comfortable under a bridge)

Polish Avenger posted:

Engineering or technical debt is not a direct monetary cost or loan to be repaid (although it can result in those things). Engineering debt is usually a task that, as a result of some decision, you must complete at some point in the future. Typically its functionally or contractually critical, it must get done or there are real consequences. You can't/won't deliver it now. It's a way of viewing things like tasks and projects that are not easily converted into man-hours and $$. So for instance, by agreeing to the stretch goal of private servers being a feature of Star Citizen, CIG received more money but also added to their engineering debt, because now they have another thing they will have to build in order for their product to ship or not breach their agreement or whatever. It's not easily quantifiable, but is useful when assessing certain decisions to be able to point out that one option has a high upfront cost whereas another is relatively inexpensive upfront but adds some engineering debt.

Another good example is software projects. A project may have modules that, due to some issue, may require major refactoring at some point but for now don't need to be fixed. If technical debt like this isn't regularly cleared up, it can balloon to the point where all work on new features must halt or it causes a critical problem.

Madcosby posted:

Whats the real Star Citizen documentary going to be called?

Reached for The Stars, Got Full Burn : The Chris Roberts Story

Tippis posted:

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.

WhiskeyWhiskers posted:

orcinus posted:

What about the fedora industry?

I don't care if you don't like how ships fly, If you are angry because your precious LTI was made irrelevant and messed your grey-market business, If you are bitter because you got kicked from the forums or if you are angry because the Idris was upgraded from a corvette to a frigate or because Procedural Generated planets are coming sooner rather than later.
In Short: If the Star Citizen Development/Crowdfunding Campaign didn't followed as you expected and you now are: Disappointed/Bitter/Angry, whatever is fuelling that hate, take a step back and think twice before posting, because what that attitude is showing, is that whatever CIG did to make you step away from backing the community/game, they did the right move. Because that toxic behaviour is not welcomed anywhere, being it in Star Citizen or in any other game. So way to go in proving CIG right.

Madcosby posted:

Whats the real Star Citizen documentary going to be called?

Reached for The Stars, Got Full Burn : The Chris Roberts Story

Matlock Birthmark posted:

Hello thread.

Ben Lesnick: Producer

Madcosby posted:

Whats the real Star Citizen documentary going to be called?

Reached for The Stars, Got Full Burn : The Chris Roberts Story

Fat Shat Sings posted:

Now it has the ability to run on ghost fuel, which is concentrated ghosts.

Beet Wagon posted:

Tell me more.

AP posted:

https://twitter.com/Nighthawk_Zale/status/747615366080167936

Fat Shat Sings posted:

Ghost Fuel Tanks are made of a special metal with an eletronic cap release mechanism. $4800.
You also need a PKE Meter to find the ghosts. $2300.
The proton pack / ghost trap is a special deal. Buy it now, Combo price is only $12,000 (Regular $25000)

Ghosts will deliver better mileage and performance that is tenfold better than any other fuel source.

I will deliver you all of these things in exactly gently caress you give me money. Here are pictures of someone listening to EVPs to prove the technology exists. GIVE ME MONEY.