Star Citizen: Alpha 3.0 Feature Trailer

Megalith

Megalith

24-bit/48kHz
Staff member
Joined
Aug 20, 2006
Messages
13,000
Cloud Imperium has released a send-off of sorts for December’s Alpha 3.0 build of Star Citizen, which introduced planetary surfaces, a revamped mission system, and new launcher. Skeptics say that the game plays nothing like this, as the framerate is much worse.

Step into a first-person universe and experience boundless exploration, awe-inspiring ships, weapons and gear, and intense combat in space and on the ground. Whether you're immersed in Star Citizen's Persistent Universe, engaged on the battlegrounds of Arena Commander and Star Marine, or racing at break-neck speeds in the Murray Cup, your adventure awaits.
 
What boggles my mind, is this game isn't anywhere close to going to beta, it's literally years away from being beta tested, in a releasable form. How many years will it spend in beta? I bought in to this right after the Kickstarter ended for $40 or $50, how many years ago? shit I don't even remember my login anymore. This game could have been released long ago, and they could have been working on Star Citizen 2.0 if Roberts had kept his massive Epeen in his pants and just set some reasonable goals.
 
I've been playing 3.0 pretty extensively. Mostly testing shit and bringing it to the issue council. I am (was) a very competitive combat pilot in 2.6.3 so I have a good grasp of this game with what is right and what is wrong from all angles.

What's Right In Relation To This Video:

Frame Rates typically hover between 25 and 50 FPS on my rig. The trouble is... I'm running a very high end rig. Many of my org mates are running mid tier or low tier setups. They report 10 - 20 fps on low end rigs and around 20 - 40 fps on mid tier rigs. Changing resolution / setting graphics to the lower settings helps somewhat...but not as much as you would like. For me, and others though, it's usually pretty smooth gameplay. Performance optimizations happen frequently server side. We are scheduled for a big improvement to performance in 3.1. Again, doesn't affect my rig much, but should help the lower tier guys. SLI is broken in SC.

All of the different aspects of this video exist in the game. When a ship explodes, cargo is spread. Depending on the environment will determine the physics behind what happens with the debri / cargo physics. Blow a ship up near any form of gravity and it will fall to the planet surface. We're talking thousands of individual boxes. This can take a toll on frame rates, but is usually pretty smooth for me. You can see a video of some testing I did that shows some of the physics and shit here: Cargo Testing

The ships shown are all in game. They all look as depicted. SC is a great wallpaper generator. lol

The planets are as shown and massive. FPS doesn't bog on them much. Atmospheric flight models need work, but you do get a sense of weight / aerodynamics of a ship in atmosphere. Wind is also in affect in planets that have atmosphere. Planets also sport their own varying degrees of gravity that are fun to play with. You can see a video of some planetary stuff here: Planetary Flight

Piracy is my favorite pastime when everything works. Bringing ships to the ground and breaching the doors, then killing the occupants and stealing their ship is always fun. Piracy Video

CIG is now making major releases occur quarterly instead of the prior model (yearly). This is due to some major engine changes (like subsumption and asset management) that provide tooling to the devs to make complicated tasks a quick endeavor. Roll outs of these fixes can happen rapidly with the delta patcher (should have been there from the beginning).

What's Wrong

Ship to ship combat is AWFUL in 3.0. EPS and IFCS systems need a TON of work. It is such a stark change from 2.6.3. I would say that in some ships it feels kind of right (like the glaive) but in others is completely broken. That being said.. We see changes taking place in the game frequently as they narrow down the issues. A few days ago I got a survey from CIG asking for our gripes about combat. They have taken that into account and are focusing on fixing them. They do seem to be very concerned and want to address the issues. TBH though, they could have just left everything intact as far as combat goes from 2.6.3 and they would have been fine. In 3.0 combat is far more frustrating than fun. When it worked in 2.6.3 it was extremely satisfying though. Hopefully we can get to that or better soon. As for now...I don't bother.

There are some issues with game mechanics that are being fixed. This is mostly around player / ship spawning, hit boxes, balancing, inventory management, cargo, cockpit ui, mobiglass, etc.. These issues are being worked on with the progress being tracked publicly. Updates and fixes are happening relatively frequently. I was getting really pissed off at their lack of communications regarding these issues since 3.0 launched in December. Around the 20th of January things picked up and seem to be back to their normal cadence though. Definitely shit that makes the game frustrating.

The ship explosions are cool...but the debris only works right on some ships. Other ships it's kind of locked into a box. Weird. They are updating damage states and that should be fixed in 3.1.

Keep in mind that these are just observations from a guy who has spent MANY hours in this game. I'm no fan boy and 3.0 definitely has its issues. But, the game is shaping up to be something cool. If they can get everything fixed up in 3.1 in a month I will be much happier.

So. There ya have it. It's a game in alpha that has a huge budget. The devs are working on it and providing text / video updates daily. Will this be the game to redefine gaming? Hopefully. Time will tell though. Until they fix balancing and combat... I remain skeptical.
 
Last edited:
Thanks Schtask

If it ever gets into anything approaching beta or heaven forbid, decent gold status I'll really look forward to playing it since I still do want to believe the original promise. Who wouldn't?

But unfortunately talk is cheap. It does sound like they are making actual progress based on your experiences so perhaps this "project" will graduate from hype to reality after all. That would be cool if it ever came true!
 
wootius said:
That's true. Pretty sure we were on 7xx when this started, 12xx is when I expect this to come out or bust.
Click to expand...
Then shouldn't this game run smooth as silk today?

I'm not a game designer, obviously, but do designers bump up their graphics to handle "the future" knowing their games won't come out for years?
 
I want to like this game. I'm hopeful that it does well. Please don't be Battlecruiser 3000.
 
I felt like I was watching a quake2 intro remake at first then it turned into planetside2.
 
Schtask said:
I've been playing 3.0 pretty extensively. Mostly testing shit and bringing it to the issue council. I am (was) a very competitive combat pilot in 2.6.3 so I have a good grasp of this game with what is right and what is wrong from all angles.

What's Right In Relation To This Video:

Frame Rates typically hover between 25 and 50 FPS on my rig. The trouble is... I'm running a very high end rig. Many of my org mates are running mid tier or low tier setups. They report 10 - 20 fps on low end rigs and around 20 - 40 fps on mid tier rigs. Changing resolution / setting graphics to the lower settings helps somewhat...but not as much as you would like. For me, and others though, it's usually pretty smooth gameplay. Performance optimizations happen frequently server side. We are scheduled for a big improvement to performance in 3.1. Again, doesn't affect my rig much, but should help the lower tier guys. SLI is broken in SC.

All of the different aspects of this video exist in the game. When a ship explodes, cargo is spread. Depending on the environment will determine the physics behind what happens with the debri / cargo physics. Blow a ship up near any form of gravity and it will fall to the planet surface. We're talking thousands of individual boxes. This can take a toll on frame rates, but is usually pretty smooth for me. You can see a video of some testing I did that shows some of the physics and shit here: Cargo Testing

The ships shown are all in game. They all look as depicted. SC is a great wallpaper generator. lol

The planets are as shown and massive. FPS doesn't bog on them much. Atmospheric flight models need work, but you do get a sense of weight / aerodynamics of a ship in atmosphere. Wind is also in affect in planets that have atmosphere. Planets also sport their own varying degrees of gravity that are fun to play with. You can see a video of some planetary stuff here: Planetary Flight

Piracy is my favorite pastime when everything works. Bringing ships to the ground and breaching the doors, then killing the occupants and stealing their ship is always fun. Piracy Video

CIG is now making major releases occur quarterly instead of the prior model (yearly). This is due to some major engine changes (like subsumption and asset management) that provide tooling to the devs to make complicated tasks a quick endeavor. Roll outs of these fixes can happen rapidly with the delta patcher (should have been there from the beginning).

What's Wrong

Ship to ship combat is AWFUL in 3.0. EPS and IFCS systems need a TON of work. It is such a stark change from 2.6.3. I would say that in some ships it feels kind of right (like the glaive) but in others is completely broken. That being said.. We see changes taking place in the game frequently as they narrow down the issues. A few days ago I got a survey from CIG asking for our gripes about combat. They have taken that into account and are focusing on fixing them. They do seem to be very concerned and want to address the issues. TBH though, they could have just left everything intact as far as combat goes from 2.6.3 and they would have been fine. In 3.0 combat is far more frustrating than fun. When it worked in 2.6.3 it was extremely satisfying though. Hopefully we can get to that or better soon. As for now...I don't bother.

There are some issues with game mechanics that are being fixed. This is mostly around player / ship spawning, hit boxes, balancing, inventory management, cargo, cockpit ui, mobiglass, etc.. These issues are being worked on with the progress being tracked publicly. Updates and fixes are happening relatively frequently. I was getting really pissed off at their lack of communications regarding these issues since 3.0 launched in December. Around the 20th of January things picked up and seem to be back to their normal cadence though. Definitely shit that makes the game frustrating.

The ship explosions are cool...but the debris only works right on some ships. Other ships it's kind of locked into a box. Weird. They are updating damage states and that should be fixed in 3.1.

Keep in mind that these are just observations from a guy who has spent MANY hours in this game. I'm no fan boy and 3.0 definitely has its issues. But, the game is shaping up to be something cool. If they can get everything fixed up in 3.1 in a month I will be much happier.

So. There ya have it. It's a game in alpha that has a huge budget. The devs are working on it and providing text / video updates daily. Will this be the game to redefine gaming? Hopefully. Time will tell though. Until they fix balancing and combat... I remain skeptical.
Click to expand...
That's a lot of text to describe a tech demo that constitues less than 5% of the promised game that's more than half a decade in development.
 
Meeho said:
That's a lot of text to describe a tech demo that constitues less than 5% of the promised game that's more than half a decade in development.
Click to expand...
Yes, exactly, it's all great what they're doing, the problem is that for a realistic and feasible development cycle this state should've been reached in 5 months, not 5 years. And I mean the state in the actual playable version, not what they're showcasing in promo teaser videos, because things in that are not ready, just window dressing. It's very easy to sell a feature in a video, it's very different to actually do it in action. I should know, I'm doing the same thing often in promo videos for my company. We're promoting features that if someone would order we'd be scrambling like rats to actually implement them.
 
M76 said:
Yes, exactly, it's all great what they're doing, the problem is that for a realistic and feasible development cycle this state should've been reached in 5 months, not 5 years. And I mean the state in the actual playable version, not what they're showcasing in promo teaser videos, because things in that are not ready, just window dressing. It's very easy to sell a feature in a video, it's very different to actually do it in action. I should know, I'm doing the same thing often in promo videos for my company. We're promoting features that if someone would order we'd be scrambling like rats to actually implement them.
Click to expand...

Just curious... Have you played the game?
I ask because everything in that video is in game now.
 
sfsuphysics said:
Then shouldn't this game run smooth as silk today?

I'm not a game designer, obviously, but do designers bump up their graphics to handle "the future" knowing their games won't come out for years?
Click to expand...

It's not unprecedented. Wing Commander IV and FreeSpace 2 both released with 1024x768 graphics support at a time when it was unfeasible to actually run those games playably with those settings.
 
THRESHIN said:
I don't think Roberts has threatened to sue anyone for insulting him on internet forums, so I'm going to go out on a limb and say we're safe :p
Click to expand...

I don't think he's been found to have allegedly assaulted an innocent Coke vending machine either.

For the record, Derek Smart absolutely HATES this shitshow vaporware experiment...And he's gone on record to expose it multiple times.
 
Derek Smart, ROFL.

The guy that attempted to make a competing space game, and after about 10 years of "development"(and still ongoing) released THIS for the bargain price of only $100. Then took the game off steam because it had 99% negative reviews.

You can not get a more clear example of Tall Poppy Syndrome if you tried. :)

Tso0Tpq.jpg


saZGETN.jpg


VHFic20.jpg


5QNVu4F.jpg
 
Garrick said:
If they had released the promised game then all would be potentially OK. However the game has expanded to "fill" the amount of money collected.
Click to expand...

I am on no ones side when it comes to this. I backed it early I think... 5 years ago now. Kinda enjoy the demos but honestly I do not see an end game due to the ever growing list of features, API rewrites, and other Issues that rise.

But I am not going to trash talk every SC article that is released.
 
Schtask said:
Just curious... Have you played the game?
I ask because everything in that video is in game now.
Click to expand...
I'm an original backer from kickstarter, it never ceases to amaze me how far it is from an actual product. But I admit I didn't watch the video, just assumed that they're showcasing non-implemented stuff again.
 
Satyrist said:
For the record, Derek Smart absolutely HATES this shitshow vaporware experiment...And he's gone on record to expose it multiple times.
Click to expand...

Not going to call this thing vaporware yet because quite frankly we don't know. Maybe it'll come out, maybe not. I'm certainly not putting my money into it yet.

As for Derek smart, it's not star citizen he hates. It's Chris robberts. Those two have a long standing animosity going way back. Derek smart is also well known to be a shit disturber, constantly threaten lawsuits if anyone so much as sneezes in his direction, and so on. He also has never been able to make a decent game to save his life. This guy has an agenda and it's not to help out the poor ripped off customer. If they even have been ripped off, time will tell.
 
Schtask said:
I ask because everything in that video is in game now.
Click to expand...

So...a box blasted out of a ship is captured by a planet's gravity, makes a fiery (but survivable) entry into the atmosphere, impacts the planet, and is salvageable by a team of two who fight off "bad guys". That's all in the game?
 
0neTwo said:
Derek Smart, ROFL.

The guy that attempted to make a competing space game, and after about 10 years of "development"(and still ongoing) released THIS for the bargain price of only $100. Then took the game off steam because it had 99% negative reviews.

You can not get a more clear example of Tall Poppy Syndrome if you tried. :)

Tso0Tpq.jpg


saZGETN.jpg


VHFic20.jpg


5QNVu4F.jpg
Click to expand...
And yet that shitshow is ten times the game SC is. How sad is that?
 
I really wish Kyle and the news team would commit to giving us one of these threads weekly.

Always fucking gold.
 
Meeho said:
And yet that shitshow is ten times the game SC is. How sad is that?
Click to expand...
riiiight

Whats it like playing on the internet while being blind?

I swear some of you are PROUD to show stupidity... Watch how you will prove me right in your next post :)
 
0neTwo said:
riiiight

Whats it like playing on the internet while being blind?

I swear some of you are PROUD to show stupidity... Watch how you will prove me right in your next post :)
Click to expand...
An SC backer in 2018. calling others stupid? :ROFLMAO:
 
0neTwo said:
mJSjUhp.jpg
Click to expand...

Don't dox me! I thought I had deleted all traces of that picture.

Also, not American. Also, did change my mind when I, as an original backer and a long supporter, learned the facts about SC and got out while I could.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top