Hello folks, and happy Friday! The weekend is FINALLY here, and my GOD do I need it because I am soooo freaking tired. This week has kicked my ass, and I don’t even know why. Hopefully getting plenty of rest and gaming time this weekend will help. What are y’all up to this weekend, and what are y’all playing? It’s a light news day, so let’s get to it…
- Star Citizen – There was a presentation from the Cloud Imperium folks about the game and stuff (I haven’t seen it). However, you can now purchase a Retaliator heavy bomber ($250 – Concept Art) or a Gladiator bomber ($150 – Concept Art) for a limited time. They also announced The Next Great Starship contest starting early next year, in which modders can submit designs for new ship for the game and win all types of prizes.
- PULSAR: Lost Colony – A new dev blog video shows off new hand-crafted space stations in the game.
- Astrobase Command – A new developer blog talks design theory and the “semiotics of choice“.
- Wing Commander – The CIC has an article on the history of the Victory battlegroup, while Quarter to Three has a look back at Privateer.
- EVE Online – The official site has a community spotlight on Diana Dial and her site, EVETimeCode.
- Star Trek Online – There’s a new dev blog discussing the design of the Voth race.
Finally, we have one deal from GOG. This weekend they’re having an Exciting EA Exclusives sale, and almost all the Wing Commander games (save the recently released Academy) are on sale.
That’s it folks, have an awesome weekend!
Those SC bombers are niiiice.
Way, WAY out of line in price, but nice. If they were 1/10th the cost, I’d grab them both.
The funny thing is that this game is not even out yet. Really, Chris Roberts is THE master of marketing. To be able to con people into throwing money on a non-existing product… OTOH, I’m no better: I supported the KS campaign and spent some 30 bucks on it, so I do wish the game the best of luck.
It’s not a con, man, it’s an investment.
In what? In a game? In an online world where you hope to spend hundreds of hours? But what if the game or the playstyle or the online community or whatever doesn’t really suit you? See, while I admire C.R. for his marketing talent and while I am happy for such a flagship title for our favourite gaming, I am horrified that people actually throw huge amounts of money on something they really have no control over. But maybe that’s the Call of Duty generation/mindset, who knows.
Sorry for this rant. ^^
I’m afraid I have to agree with S.Katze. I actually bid $125 back on the first day to Cloud Imperium (RSI) figuring that I was really making a difference in getting a genre that had long been neglected back into production. Quickly though it became apparent the project was a slick PR machine that wanted far more than a little help to launch the title. I mean we aren’t even in alpha stage and in July, to quote http://www.gameskinny.com, C.R. was able to manage “200 Imaginary Spaceships Sold For a Real $250,000 in Star Citizen 24-hour Livestream Event”. It seems almost every update since late spring has been an opportunity to spend more real money for ships, upgrade options, etc. Contrary to their intent, each of these PR emails from RSI just irritated me more and more to the point I am trying to back out completely. Probably a futile attempt, but nothing that I have seen this summer impressed me with their technical progress to make the game I want to play, but rather PR and marketing to sell me more virtual junk (e.g. the 300i car advert and even the hanger mod). I know most dissenting opinions are shouted down on the official forums, but this is really starting to feel like C.R. is intently studying wargaming.net to replicate their World of Tanks success rather than make a game harkening back to the glory days of space sims.
Sorry for the continued rant and I am not trying to dissuade your support Brian, but just wanted to chime in with my view. It’s probably a dead thread anyway since its already several post down. :p
Welcome to the site, Drake, and no worries, we get comments for posts weeks or months old, depends on how folks find the site. :) I get your frustration even if I don’t share it. ;)
Damn you Brian, you made me question my intent to fully back out of Star Citizen ;). Given that I pledged on the first day, RSI was kind enough to allow me to downgrade my pledge from the Colonel level to the entry level Digital Scout. Sure I lose out on some of the cool physicals, but from other kickstarter rewards the physical items are kinda like the $120-150 XBOX/PS3 collectors edition games (i.e. ~$5-10 in materials, but a $60-90 price markup). We are still a long way from the end and I guess I shouldn’t give up hope yet, guess I am just a bit sensitive to the slow to no progress on the iControlPad2 KS and a few others. Assuming things get much better and I am kicking myself for dropping the Hornet (i.e. we all know the Aurora is gonna suck :) ), does LTI still apply until Beta phase is over.
Why would you back out?
Just for the reasons I listed above. My fear is this is going to be far from the epic return to the glory days of space sims and just a new over monetized system that destroys the immersion. Sure you don’t have to pay for ships with real cash, but with PvP and piracy in the persistent universe you can bet many of the ones ganking and greifing you will. For that reason and the fact RSI doesn’t really need more monetary support right now (i.e. on the way to $24M and will likely be at AAA budget by the end, since Alpha is a whole year away) I decided to back down to the minimum support level instead of fully out.
Yeah, one thing they have to be very careful of is expectation management.
Unlike Star Citizen, however, Wargaming.net actually has something to offer. I must say that I am really into World of Tanks, as it’s a lot of fun most of the time (if your team isn’t too crappy/noobish), and they regularly hold events where you can earn extra XP, and sometimes they give out their Gold currency that you then can spend on buying extras like new tank skins etc.
So, you *CAN* play WoT without spending a single penny. Some members of my clan are doing just that, and their experience is hardly any worse than mine. That being said, Wargaming does encourage you to spend money, but they don’t so it in the same in-your-face way as Chris Roberts does.
All in all, IMHO WoT is F2P done right.
Hopefully SC will also be F2P done right once its released.
Guys. check out the Greenlight section on Steam. There are many like that now. Games not even in Alpha and already in pre-order. I don’t have the funds to throw money at projects that might never even dome to fruition. I am also a bit troubled to be paying to do beta testing. Am I not doing a favor to the developers to beta test a game? I’m seeing other players voicing similar concerns; I am glad I am not the only one. Again, please understand, I’m not being cheap. I support indie games 100%. But I also cannot afford to be burned. When people pay for early access to games that never pan out it doesn’t bode well for other indie developers, either.
Welcome to the comments pannycan, and thanks for your insight.