Star Citizen: Is Development Chaotic and Slow? Yes. Is it a Scam? No.

Writing about Star Citizen can be a proper minefield. On one side, there are rabid fanbois, and on the other side, there are rabid hatebois.

[TK-66]

Actually looks at the development history, and then concludes with a rational opinion? N4G ain't gonna like this one...

[ElementX]

I think their monetary system is a scam. They'll show you some ships, charge you $100s for the awesome ones, and yeah it's for development costs, but then they'll release new ships and ask for even more money. So if you buy one of the first cool ships and then see a better one later on, either you'll miss out or fork over more cash. They should show all of the ships from the start, not keep throwing new ones out there hoping people will double dip.

[TK-66]

"I think their monetary system is a scam."

Let's start by addressing that. If you donate money to a project, and the project is still under construction and the people running it are still working to complete it, then you have no factual backing in your characterization. You can argue they're overpricing the content, but you can't claim it's a scam. You would need to provide evidence of dishonesty that can't in any way be misconstrued as incompetence or development hiccups.

This is the main problem with the people that scream about how SC is a scam; they don't actually provide conclusive evidence of this. I know people like yourself feel like it's a scam, but what's that popular saying about facts and feelings?

[sprinterboy]

What would happen if the game suddenly got cancelled, too ambitious or kept in alpha/beta form etc would that require a refund? Or would you lose your money?
Honest question, btw neither agreed or disagreed.
Edit: 240m is alot of money for a unfinished game and I understand the scope but....

[Lon3wolf]

@Sprinterboy

Would it still be a scam if they went under and not just ran with the money? I would understand if they never released a final product (keeping it at Beta stage forever) in questions about a scam but not for going under with every intention of releasing a final product (I am not an investor in SC to be clear, I am waiting for Squadron 42 though).

[SephirothX21]

@TK-66
This site is full of retards that don't understand simple logic. You're wasting your time.

[Master of Unlocking]

Every game dev on kickstarter or w/e that wants people to shell out 50/60/70$/€ without even having so much as a digital copy of the game secured for them when development's done, is a scammer IMHO.
100$ for a ship, eh? lol, GTFO

[TK-66]

@sprinterboy

You would lose your money. You're not an investor when you 'donate' to a project. You don't negotiate equity in the company when you donate. If that's a deal breaker to someone then they should never have donated to begin with, as it shows a lack of understanding in the process. People like that, in my view, deserve to lose their money in order for them to learn a lesson on how to sensibly handle their finances.

@sephirothX21

Other people lacking of basic intelligence doesn't mean I stoop to that level.

@Master of Unlocking

"Every game dev on kickstarter or w/e that wants people to shell out 50/60/70$/€ without even having so much as a digital copy of the game secured for them when development's done, is a scammer IMHO."

Except everyone has been playing it for years... Your 'honest opinion' is either based in ignorance or a display of bad faith.

[Sieden]

You can just trade your ship in for store credit of the full amount you paid and buy another ship if you want. They don't lock you in to a particular ship.

[ApocalypseShadow]

It's a scam if you keep asking for gamers money when you already have 240 million of their dollars and the game is still not finished.

What money are they going to use for marketing the game or is that included? Are they going to ask gamers to fund that too?

It's estimated that GTA 5 cost 265 million to make with marketing included. But has sold over 110 million copies and generated an estimated 6 billion or more in revenue.

Is Star Citizen going to even remotely compare with those numbers if it's only releasing on PC? Can't be just enough funds to give every donor a copy and when they're done, disband the development team because they got no money left. They need sales, ports to other consoles or beg for more money.

[thejigisup]

They won't need to beg there's microtransactions. Remember when you aren't having fun just pay some money and voila, your having fun again until you need another hit of mt. Wins /s

[rainslacker]

I think they just need to settle on what they want to make with the game, and make the game, then release it.

The scam part, although I wouldn't really call it a scam, in that they aren't making the game to release, and instead, are taking more money to change the game from what it was originally intended. The first backers aren't getting the game they backed. They'll get more in the end, but at some point, one has to step back and ask what exactly is going on over there.

A game with a clear direction shouldn't take this long to make, but they've changed this game, and the scope has changed to the point of being beyond Peter Molyneux level of promise. At this point, there shouldn't be any reason to have to try and get more funding. They have enough to make a large scale game 2-3 times over. I know it's big, but GTA was only expensive because of all the wasted development spending. There's no reason big games need to cost that much.

[rainslacker]

I use the term "they" to mean the dev. But yeah, I know Roberts is the one all over the place with it.

He's always been pretty OCD about his work. Even back when he was at Origin. Difference was, that at Origin, he needed to release games to get money, because customers weren't just sending them money for an unfinished project, and investors weren't as open with their wallets back then.

I respect the man's work, and Wing Commander is one of my favorite games of all time, but I think he needs to keep to his plans.

[Neonridr]

The big people that are invested in this game are in it for the journey. Plenty of them realize they may never get a finished game because the game may never be finished. But it's their money I guess so what they do with it is up to them.

But I hope the majority of games never go for this route.

[sprinterboy]

I basically just watch some gameplay streams every few months or so.
Does the job for me plus I once visited a custom rig website official with recommended specs to run SC properly lol, it was like £2,500 and that had performance issues.
I'll stick with watching thx but I have to say if it ever gets to beta form I may jump in.
Looks great and all that but...

[bluefox755]

It's not a deliberate scam, but it's still a scam.

[PokeNana]

I do think its a scam since they ask people to buy ships which cost thousands of dollars. not to mention the price you are investing along the way.

[thejigisup]

This guy Bruce said it better than I could in his post in the article, for those not willing to click for his comment I have included it below.

"bfwebster on October 23, 2019 at 8:57 pm said
My area of professional expertise for the past 25 years or so has been why large information technology (IT) projects fail. I’ve consulted with large corporations that have troubled projects; I’ve written, lectured, and taught on the subject (cf. my class website: http://cs428.cs.byu.edu); and I’ve acted as an expert witness in at least a few dozen cases involving failed/disputed projects.

When I was at PricewaterhouseCoopers, I reviewed documents associated with 120 or so such failed project lawsuits and noted several patterns, one of which I named “The Never-Ending Story” and described as follows (note that this is for two-party projects):

“The client contracts with the manufacturer to develop and install a system. The
project starts. The completion date slips. It keeps slipping. Each time the adjusted delivery date approaches, the project slips yet again. At some point, one of three things happens: the
manufacturer/vendor abandons the project; the client cancels the project; or the manufacturer delivers a system that the client terms wholly inadequate and unacceptable. In some cases, the effort has gone on for years, with millions of dollars spent and little to show for it.”

Star Citizen has all the indicia of a “Never-Ending Story”, with some “Irrational Exuberance” (another pattern) thrown in. The history of IT is replete with projects burning through millions, hundred of millions, and even billions of dollars without ever delivering anything meaningful. Multiple lengthy schedule slips for Star Citizen (Chris Roberts in 2013: “Star Citizen is still scheduled to come out 2015, and we’re on target for that.”) point to underlying complexity issues and/or the often-fatal error of deferring all the hard problems for the end of the project (cf. http://brucefwebster.com/20... In other words, the Star Citizen team grossly underestimated the amount of work required to achieve their goals, and I suspect they still do not have a clear development path to completion.

I’ll end with four of my favorite IT project maxims, all of which I suspect apply here:

“Start out stupid, and work up from there.” — Bruce Henderson

“In architecting a new program, all the serious mistakes are made in the first day.” — Robert Spinrad

“It is very easy to lose a day on a project. It is almost impossible to make one up.” — Robert Glass

“The only way to deal with schedule slip is to throw away features.” — me

..bruce.."

[SegaGamer]

The game looks boring as hell in all honesty. There is a lot to look at, but I have seen a lot of gameplay videos of this game at this point, and every single time the gameplay has bored me.

[Exvalos]

its not a scam as you pc dudes no up front what you are paying for. are they milking you? well yes they are but you all know your being milked.