Star Citizen: Big MoMA's House

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aleksendr: May 14, 2014

Khanstant posted:

err... can I control everything with an xbox 360 controller lol

Yes, it has been released for the Xbone. Personally i use keyboard + basic stick (5 button joystick, no hat switch) and its perfectly serviceable. You just might have to do a little bit more menu navigation in game compared to someone with a HOTAS.

First post catte (not mine)

aleksendr fucked around with this message at 17:34 on Feb 7, 2016

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:31

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# ? Apr 24, 2024 09:53

D_Smart: May 11, 2010; by FactsAreUseless; College Slice

Beer4TheBeerGod posted:

An ANONYMOUS GAMES DEVELOPER requested I post this here so his boss wouldn't fire him. Or something. Either way it's a good read and makes fun of Star Citizen so I support it.

I wonder how many people understand the absolute insane cluster-gently caress this would be to try and implement. Star Citizen seems to have enough trouble getting a normal client-server mechanism going, and this implies that each client is attached to multiple servers/instances. So the main server will be telling your client about the ship you're in, while another server will be giving information about what's going on outside your ship, and yet more servers could be giving information about what's going on inside other ships which are nearby.

Imagine this:

The fully crewed mining freighter, Whale 1, is going through space, and the pirate constellation USS Goon, also fully crewed, decides they want to board it and raid it. The USS Goon shoots out the Whale 1's engines, then uses its main weapons to blow a hole through the side of the ship. It then comes to a stop next to the crippled ship, with it's main door roughly aligned with the hole it just made.

So, we have 3 instances, one for space and one for the interior of each ship:

Blue is the instance for the pirates, pink is the instance for the miners and white is the instance for space. According to the design, a pirate can look through the door, through space and through the hole into the other ship, where the miners are stood waiting, but cannot shoot at them or interact with them. Now, say the pirates decide to jump out of their ship, and EVA over into the other ship, we now have 3 problems:

1) The system needs to seamlessly transition the pirates from the blue instance into the white instance, and then into the pink instance. This is not a simple thing; a lot of the glitches we see in the PU are caused by the system loving up moving a player from one physics grid to another, this problem is like that, only much worse. This can be done though, it's just hard.

2) These instances are all supposed to have a limited number of players, so what if the number of players in the mining ship is already enough to reach the max player limit for the ship's instance? What does the system do as the pirates try and enter the blue instance? It can't just spin up another instance, because then you'd have half the players in one copy of the mining ship and the other half in the other copy of the mining ship. I honestly can't see a way of fixing this issue, instance based systems only work when a controlling system can safely allocate players to instances to balance them. If players can freely move from instance to instance at will, the system is hosed, end of story.

3) A pirate could float literally just outside the hole to the whale ship, and still be invulnerable to all attacks from inside the miner since they're still in the white instance, not the pink one, and players can't interact between instances. In theory, you could code the instances to talk to each other so that a bullet fired from one instance is capable of damaging a player in another instance, once again this is NOT easy to do by any means. If nothing else, it undermines the whole reason for having separate instances in the first place, since each instance would not only need to track the players within it, but also the players in nearby instances who might be shot at from inside the instance, so you might as well just shove everyone in one huge instance and have done with it.

Now, I haven't done network coding personally for a few years, so maybe someone will come in and tell me how completely wrong I am, and that I know nothing about game development, but I'd really love someone to try and explain how they'll fix this stuff.

He's right. But he only outlines a very small portion of the problem. Let me give you another one: both sides decide to engage in small arms fire. Imagine what happens to shots going from one ship to the other. They won't.You would have to EVA into space for that to work. And that's assuming the three instances can talk to each other.

This bullshit goes beyond networking, it's about an impossible architectural paradigm of everything that's FUBAR in the engine they are building

As I've said before, if they survive 2016, post-SQ42, they are going to change the PU into an instanced game with server browsing. And each section (like what they have in mPU right now) will be a "level" that will be part of the cycle that a client can spin up.

They will never - ever - build, let alone deliver, the game they've promised. It's technologically impossible and croberts is too incompetent to realize that.

ps: I have it on the record (in a phone call last night) that what Clifford was talking about Tony showing him during his visit at Austin, is pure bullshit; and is no different (in context) from the procedural planet level hack they showed last year. Which is why Clifford added the disclaimer that "it's a long way off". That should've rung the alarm bells considering how much poo poo they've shown and which is either non-existence, canceled, or a long way off.

I can't say more without running the risk of outing my sources.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:31

Daztek: Jun 2, 2006

Kavak posted:

Now edit it so as the helmet's closing it yells "LET ME loving FINISH!" and it opens back up super quick.

Hmm, does anyone have a link to the stream where he says that?

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:33

DoctorStrangelove: Jun 7, 2012; IT WOULD NOT BE DIFFICULT MEIN FUHRER!

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:34

D_Smart: May 11, 2010; by FactsAreUseless; College Slice

Booblord Zagats posted:

So how does GTA Online handle it? Because really that's what they should be trying to rip off wholesale anyhow

They don't. And don't have to. It's one massive world that's streamed in chunks.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:35

D_Smart: May 11, 2010; by FactsAreUseless; College Slice

A Neurotic Jew posted:

btw if anyone is waiting for a response from customer service right now, they mentioned on the latest RtV that they've caught up with the cue. So you will probably want to send another email.

Well they flushed the whole queue.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:37

teh_Broseph: Oct 21, 2010; THE LAST METROID IS IN
CATTIVITY. THE GALAXY
IS AT PEACE...; Lipstick Apathy

Wtf does "physicalized" EVA mean? How is that a word they use to describe a feature

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:37

D_Smart: May 11, 2010; by FactsAreUseless; College Slice

Daztek posted:

http://i.imgur.com/uOQuYKj.gifv

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:38

Dusty Lens: Jul 1, 2015; All Glory unto the Stimpire. Give up your arms and legs and embrace the beautiful agony of electricity that doubles in pain every second.

Furthermore GTA is perfectly happy at capping the population at a (relatively) low level and maintaining zero persistence in the world outside of your wallet, wardrobe and garage.

In GTA you circle the block and the hell you wrought a moment before is again a serene coffee shop. Star Shitizens would want to find a telephone pole they rammed 3 years previously to still have a tell tale smear of red paint.

teh_Broseph posted:

Wtf does "physicalized" EVA mean? How is that a word they use to describe a feature

It means in 6 months they'll issue a statement informing the backers that they've finished defining the physicalization pipeline and the internal builds look extremely promising. More to come extremely soon.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:38

D_Smart: May 11, 2010; by FactsAreUseless; College Slice

Daztek posted:

Hmm, does anyone have a link to the stream where he says that?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znR3JvQJPMc&feature=youtu.be&t=3h5m

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:40

Happy Sisyphus: Nov 13, 2013; You take the blue paarp - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red paarp - you stay in pre-alpha, and I show you how deep the sperg wallet goes.

anyone else think it seems kind of stupid for people to spend so much money on a computer game?

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:40

1500: Nov 3, 2015; Give me all your crackers

Daztek posted:

https://gfycat.com/JubilantConventionalCarpenterant

Is it just me or does it look like that face shield cuts into the guys head, when it pivots.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:42

Beer4TheBeerGod: Aug 23, 2004; Exciting Lemon

Happy Sisyphus posted:

anyone else think it seems kind of stupid for people to spend so much money on a computer game?

It's not stupid if it's a plucky little indie developer thing that you really believe in and want to see become a reality. It's absolutely stupid when you're talking about a $100 million international company with a track record of failing to deliver.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:42

Tippis: Mar 21, 2008; It's yet another day in the wasteland.

aleksendr posted:

The problem is that you have to balance boarding against your whole loving economy and MMO paradigm.

a) boarding is fun and profitable - Why grind for big ship then ? Just wait with your friend with a space short bus and steal the biggest ship you can find. Rince-repeat until everyone in the gang is pimped.

b) Boarding is hard or not economically viable - You just spend a few M$ on content nobody use.

They cant design boarding because they need to design the economy and the whole persistence (reputation, consequence on death, insurance, ect) thing first, and they have to push SQ42 out before they even begin doing that.

Indeed, this is a fundamental problem that permeates every (non)design aspect of the entire game. The instant you start talking about a competitive environment, you have to start thinking economy. Long before you even get to such seemingly basic concept of cash and goods, you have to consider any number of different economies that will affect what player can and will do, as well as the interactions between those economies.

There's the good old �action economy� that goes all the way back to boardgaming: what �moves� are available at any given instance; what is required to unlock them; what do you have to do to actually employ them; what is the pay-off for executing them? Are they properly balanced, or is some high-yield move underpriced or some low-yield one simply not worth the effort? Then there's the power economy: what provides power in the game? How do you acquire it? How do you lose it? What are the marginal benefits of increased power?

It is ridiculously easy to design systems that break either or both of these economies; where power becomes self-replicating and runaway, leaving no way to catch up; where different forms of power are not just unequal (which isn't a problem in and of itself) but also reinforced by unequal acquisition schemes; where different �move sets� are available depending on your chosen path, but where there is only one sensible way to go because it's so much cheaper and more efficient.

And then you come to the problem of a monetary economy, and the layers of production and destruction of assets and of cash itself that this implies. How easily can you acquire cash and what does it buy you? What are your options for foregoing cash and building your own stuff � how do you acquire the means to do all of that? These represent several more layers of actions and power that have to be balanced against each other, but also against the sheer tenacity of players. For instance, an easy trap to fall into is to believe that cost can balance anything: in reality, at least in an open-ended economy, cost can only ever delay, and players will have no problem grinding the resources required to get �the best� equipment. Something that is overpowered by pricey is still overpowered; something cheap but crap is still crap. No amount of pricing will let the crap be balanced against the overpowered stuff.

So one of the first things you have to decide on is the many economic aspects of the game, and then you have to revisit and tweak it over and over and over as you add stuff or adjust balance. It's not something you can design as an after-thought unless it has no real impact on the actual gameplay (in which case, why design it at all?).

As far as anyone can tell, they haven't even begun to consider any of these aspects beyond an insanely naive �hurr� expensive ship big!� that cannot possibly be balanced in any sensible way. Arguably, they could start doing that after SQ42, but that would mean that they would have to completely re-do every single ship and piece of equipment all over again when they move from single-player to multiplayer� and look how quickly they've managed to (not actually) do any of that so far.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:45

A Neurotic Jew: Feb 17, 2012; by exmarx

everyone loving hates versebusters

https://forums.robertsspaceindustries.com/discussion/317329/not-really-fond-of-versebusters

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:46

Maldoror: Oct 5, 2003; by R. Guyovich; Nap Ghost

D_Smart posted:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znR3JvQJPMc&feature=youtu.be&t=3h5m

holee sheet dood u mad

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:46

Beer4TheBeerGod: Aug 23, 2004; Exciting Lemon

Happy Sisyphus posted:

i'm still not convinced that you need a-list actors to shoot mocap for a video game

You don't. What you need are professionals with experience on mocap who will work for far less than Gary Oldman, and then top notch talent voice actors who can overcome the limitations of the medium through the power of their voice.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:49

Dusty Lens: Jul 1, 2015; All Glory unto the Stimpire. Give up your arms and legs and embrace the beautiful agony of electricity that doubles in pain every second.

1500 posted:

Is it just me or does it look like that face shield cuts into the guys head, when it pivots.

The helmet doesn't look like it would survive ten minutes bouncing around in my helmet bag.

I guess it's something that's meant to look pretty in cutscenes. In actual gameplay I wont be looking at it, no one else will be looking at it. You would have to stand in front of me and stare me down to take in the stirring sight of my cheek modules unfolding to provide whatever service those flimsy over engineered hell nonsense are supposed to provide.

Star Citizen's design goals appear to be breaking away from jpgs into the real of animated gifs.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:49

Maldoror: Oct 5, 2003; by R. Guyovich; Nap Ghost

Happy Sisyphus posted:

anyone else think it seems kind of stupid for people to spend so much money on a computer game?

i remember when you could by a game for 50 - 60 dollars then maybe an expansion for 30 - 40 dollars, then hundreds to thousands of peeps would release their own mods and add ins for free and you could play the game in like literally thousands of different ways and experiment with it for years

now everything's locked down and drm'd, you have to pay for everything, you can't mod anything, and if you buy into the mindset you spend hundreds to thousands of dollars doing what in the past you did for free in a way more open and unrestricted way

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:50

Tippis: Mar 21, 2008; It's yet another day in the wasteland.

teh_Broseph posted:

Wtf does "physicalized" EVA mean? How is that a word they use to describe a feature

Ragdolls and collision effects in zero-gravity environments.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:52

Damn Dirty Ape: Jan 23, 2015; I love you Dr. Zaius

1500 posted:

Is it just me or does it look like that face shield cuts into the guys head, when it pivots.

Just think about how that helmet would feel if you had a big nose.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:53

Damn Dirty Ape: Jan 23, 2015; I love you Dr. Zaius

Beer4TheBeerGod posted:

You don't. What you need are professionals with experience on mocap who will work for far less than Gary Oldman, and then top notch talent voice actors who can overcome the limitations of the medium through the power of their voice.

You need it if your primary goal is to pad the ego and resume of your wife while reliving your failed dream of being a real movie director.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:55

Brazilianpeanutwar: Aug 27, 2015; Spent my walletfull, on a jpeg, desolate, will croberts make a whale of me yet?

Maldoror posted:

holee sheet dood u mad

# ? Feb 7, 2016 17:56

Yolomon Wayne: Jun 10, 2014; You call it "The Big Bang", but what really happened is; Grimey Drawer

D_Smart posted:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znR3JvQJPMc&feature=youtu.be&t=3h5m

wait is that real?

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:04

D_Smart: May 11, 2010; by FactsAreUseless; College Slice

Maldoror posted:

holee sheet dood u mad

...this is news?

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:07

darkarchon: Feb 2, 2016; My name is a trolling word

Please everyone, chill out and have some cattes.

Bonus meme catte

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:09

BluestreakBTHR: Oct 2, 2015; Fucking Star Citizen True Believers are passive-aggressive douchebags. Sorry if I have the ability to use my critical thinking skills. I didn't drink the Kool-Aid, motherfuckers.

That's me trying way too hard to fit in here. Please accept me, I need validation. I'm very depressed.; Grimey Drawer

Brazilianpeanutwar posted:

did they SERIOUSLY put that janky poo poo on around the verse?

Yep. Greatest Marketing person in the 'verse.

Beer4TheBeerGod posted:

I was there. It was a simpler time.

Sigh. I still have the audio clips.
There's nothing worse in the 'verse than wasted talent... and Crobbers certainly was wasted on stage.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:11

BluestreakBTHR: Oct 2, 2015; Fucking Star Citizen True Believers are passive-aggressive douchebags. Sorry if I have the ability to use my critical thinking skills. I didn't drink the Kool-Aid, motherfuckers.

That's me trying way too hard to fit in here. Please accept me, I need validation. I'm very depressed.; Grimey Drawer

D_Smart posted:

Here's why...

The industry is mostly like a camp of inbred morons who live to cover their own collective asses. They're selfish, egotistical, corrupt and opportunistic.

When you have people with those qualities, given how everyone knows everyone, nobody is going to say anything for fear of running afoul of their industry friends.

That's the difference between resident rear end in a top hat Kevin Dent and guys like George Broussard who, despite the fact that he gets attacked all the time for DNF (which was their own money btw), he has been sounding the alarm for awhile now.

It's also the same reason why there are so many leaks - by those who know it's just not right - coming out of RSI/CIG; but nobody wants to put their face or name to them.

People who know me, know that with all my faults, I am neither corrupt, nor do I strive to fit in anyone's lovely club. I can't be intimidated, fired etc. I stand alone. And it's just the way I like it.

Only registered members can see post attachments!

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:12

Tippis: Mar 21, 2008; It's yet another day in the wasteland.

BluestreakBTHR posted:

I think the ship may have sprung a leak.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:14

Tanith: Jul 17, 2005; _{Alpha, Beta, Gamma cores

Use them, lose them, salvage more

Kick off the next AI war

In the Persean Sector}

BluestreakBTHR posted:

Wait, is this from just now? Who are both these people again?

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:19

A Neurotic Jew: Feb 17, 2012; by exmarx

naa its old

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:19

BluestreakBTHR: Oct 2, 2015; Fucking Star Citizen True Believers are passive-aggressive douchebags. Sorry if I have the ability to use my critical thinking skills. I didn't drink the Kool-Aid, motherfuckers.

That's me trying way too hard to fit in here. Please accept me, I need validation. I'm very depressed.; Grimey Drawer

Tanith posted:

Wait, is this from just now? Who are both these people again?

It's from a few months back. Found it tucked away in a folder, thought it appropriate to bring it back in.

-edit-
I also have the same image with comments... not sure I want to post that, yet, because it may have been part of a private thread.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:20

EminusSleepus: Sep 28, 2015

Tanith posted:

Wait, is this from just now? Who are both these people again?

He was a concept artist way back when CIG was still a viable indie game developer. He was tasked to make the concept model of the Xi'An Khartu, he was fired for reasons only via and him knows.

He was active in the community back then.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:21

BluestreakBTHR: Oct 2, 2015; Fucking Star Citizen True Believers are passive-aggressive douchebags. Sorry if I have the ability to use my critical thinking skills. I didn't drink the Kool-Aid, motherfuckers.

That's me trying way too hard to fit in here. Please accept me, I need validation. I'm very depressed.; Grimey Drawer

EminusSleepus posted:

He was a concept artist way back when CIG was still a viable indie game developer. He was tasked to make the concept model of the Xi'An Khartu, he was fired for reasons only via and him knows

Elijah was one of the first visible departures - this opened the floodgates.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:22

Agrajag: Jan 21, 2006; gat dang thats hot

BluestreakBTHR posted:

"game(s)"

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:40

A Neurotic Jew: Feb 17, 2012; by exmarx

https://www.reddit.com/r/starcitizen/comments/44mjkv/ideas_and_thoughts_on_an_ingame_photography/

quote:

Ideas and thoughts on an ingame photography career path and how it could be diverse, fun and even competitive

Inspired by the post of /u/jakedx6 over here I was thinking about how to implement photography as an interesting and even challenging ingame career. Maybe you have additional ideas or maybe this is just stupid or maybe just not doable tech-wise - but here are my thoughts and ideas:

This might be a good additional profession for the game that at least in part could use assets already implemented or planned.
In order to handle this ingame and not just take random screenshots there should be several important elements that could be implemented:

Ingame photography platform:

An ingame version of ArtStation or similar � lets call it ArtSpace � this can be accessed via the Mobiglas and terminals. The biggest issue probably would be server space for the saved pictures � so the number of �slots� per character should probably be limited � say 10 for example.
You could set a price and ArtSpace would take a cut of that price.
Optionally there might be a kind of subscription fee for you as seller / photographer. This would limit the amount of users to those that plan to pursue a serious career in this path and as a result limit the number of uploaded images (which in turn would allow more slots for those players that do use it)

Means of ingame photography:

a) The Mobiglas could serve as the basic model for everyone � pretty much like a smartphone today. For gameplay reasons the magnification might be limited to a simple 1x or slightly better.
b) Professional cameras with various magnification ranges and maybe other additional accessories
c) Ship-mounted cameras as they are already planned for the Reliant Mako for example. Those would be primarily used for in space photography.
Since photography would be done ingame with ingame devices there could be standardized resolutions / sizes meaning for example they could be automatically turned into sellable posters. As we already have hangar posters we just would need some automation tool in the game that automatically �prints� them.
Sources of income:

A professional photographer would have two main sources of income (I can think of):

1) Posters (Art): Here the popularity of the picture at hand would be the most important factor, primarily driven by other players purchasing those posters from you through ArtSpace, but maybe also NPCs. There could be a few factors that could go into determining who buys what. NPCs from Terra that live on Nyx might be more interest in getting a picture from their homeworld. Military NPCs might be interest in cool spaceship pictures etc.
An additional option might be doing portraits of players or NPCs that they then also could hang up as posters in their hangars.

2) News photography: Here I image two main subcategories.
a) War photography: Basically shooting photos of others shooting with guns.
b) Celebrity photos: Now this could also include for example the photo of a criminal on the run, or the last photo of a very successful pilot (or pirate) before they died, maybe even moments before. Here it kind of can blend back into war photography as well.

Competition and Chellenges

Now how to make this into a competitive career? By delivering the photos to various news outlets � which depending on their form of journalism might just print what they get first or they might wait a bit to get the best possible pictures. This also gives additional jobs / missions to info runners and ads a bit more player driven content for the Herald.
What is important for this to work though would be an under the hood tagging system that can identify objects and characters ingame with which the game could work and attach a value to those images.

Some examples would be:

Photo taken at 9:24pm Character in photo died at 9:31pm (or was arrested, or got a bounty put on them etc)
The closer you get to the final moments of the characters life the more valuable the picture will be and it would also be a criterion for an NPC news agency for selecting one image over another.
Additional modifiers could be whether the character was in the center of the photo and how far away they were.
Now if this is just a random person this might not be worth two much but if you bring in the reputation of that character � be it as a highly decorated soldier or a ruthless pirate with a huge bounty.. or that player that found and named that one star system the value could skyrocket.
But it does not stop there. You might also be able to make a photo of a pirate that usually stays hidden all the time. There might only be two photos of that person ever made.. and they might be months or years old. So rarity could be another factor.

Plus you might then device whether to send this photo to a news agency or maybe to the Advocacy / police which in turn would increase your own reputation with either of those resulting for example in getting photography jobs offered from the news agency or getting access to information from the advocacy, or you just might sell it to a player group of bounty hunters.
Similar choices could be made for photos from inside alien territory as well� sell to newspapers, to the UEE or independent scientists maybe�. Or you print more posters.
So there are quite a few options here

tl:dr
There are many options of how to make inghame photography an interesting and even competetive career. Main hurdles are server storage space and the need for an automatic tagging system in order to assign a value to photos.

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:41

Chalks: Sep 30, 2009

A Neurotic Jew posted:

quote:
Main hurdles are server storage space and the need for an automatic tagging system in order to assign a value to photos.

The main hurdles in the way of this feature are server storage space and the AI semantic gap problem.

This is the essence of the entire game to be honest. The main blockers that SC faces at the moment are not having the textures ready for the interior of their ship showroom, lack of cover animations for the FPS mode and the fact that the core concept of the game is impossible to achieve.

Chalks fucked around with this message at 18:50 on Feb 7, 2016

# ? Feb 7, 2016 18:46