Star Citizen Drama

By +Asmodai
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+Asmodai MVC

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Anyone else following this?
 
I thought this was a well written piece:
 
How No Game Developer Should Revoke Access for an Opinion

 

There's tons of other background and articles that are too much to recap here, especially if no one here cares anyway, but I'm curious if anyone else is following it and what thoughts they have on it.

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Grand Master

+E.Worm Jimmy Subscriber¹

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first time i heard of it, but i had some time to read the article and dereks posts and other articles about them.

while i do not yet know about the future of star citizen, i have no problem of them publicly announcing HIS ban.  

the dude is a massive troll, and pretty much deserved it, it seems!

 

just my 2c

 

 

Claiming he

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Grand Master

+Eternal Tempest MVC

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If it was expressing concerns about, I'm afraid this game will never get done, I wish I could get refund, etc. It's still within game dev right (not that I agree to this). 

That being said, the person banned with the information above was just asking for it.

 

Also... Kickstarter is not a pre-order, you **invest** in a project, which promises a reward. Some investments go south, and you lose it all. 

I can understand frustration, I've had a kickstarter fail (game even) fail. But I knew the risk up front.

This is the fear kickstarter has, too many funded failures drag kickstarter down.

 

Also Star Citzen has spent money, I doubt they have money to "refund" everyone if it collapses. 

It's not like they were sitting on it, doing nothing.

 

From Kickstarter

https://www.kickstarter.com/trust?ref=checkout

 

We take our responsibility as Kickstarter's stewards very seriously. It's our job to provide a system deserving of your trust
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+Asmodai MVC

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I agree he's a massive troll, however I agree with the article I linked.

 

To me it doesn't matter how big of a troll he has been in the past.  I don't think it's right to just say "Oh it's Derek Smart, lets ban him, close his account, and refund his money."

 

He did give them at least $250 (I'm not sure if he bought anything additional on RSI but that's his kickstarter pledge and what they refunded).

 

He didn't "troll" them from the time he made that pledge to well beyond the projected release date published in the kickstarter.  Considering how big of a troll he is that leads me to believe that he honestly wanted the game and had the game he backed been finished on time he would have been happy.

 

While I may not agree with all of his "demands" (the dude has an ego that won't quit) there IS some reason for concern, especially for kickstarter backers.

I don't think it can be argued that the scope of the game has not changed from what the kickstarter backers pledged, more and more has been added to the game AFTER the kickstarter closed and their money was taken.  As a result of the greatly increased scope the project is way behind schedule.  What is being made now is not what kickstarter backers paid for.

 

Even if you consider his posts trolling (I'm certainly not going to argue they're not) or even an attempt for publicity or to promote his own game(s) he's doing so ON HIS PERSONAL BLOG.  I don't think it's right for any company to take back a product they sold you (without even a warning) because they don't like what you post on your own personal blog.  If he posted those blogs on their message board then absolutely, ban him (although even then I'd think a forum ban would be sufficient not a complete removal of his account and refund)  Personally I suspect they did that because part of his "trolling" is threatening lawsuits and they hoped that by refunding him his money he'd have no legal standing to bring such a lawsuit.

 

He's also apparently willing to put his money where is mouth is by contributing up to $1m in an escrow account to help pay for an independent audit.  So he's willing to put his money where his mouth is.

 

Now I backed Star Citizen both on the Kickstarter and on the RSI page and I don't currently want a refund.  I still hope the game comes out, I'm happy with it's increased scope, and I'm willing to wait longer to get it.

 

I only backed for $5 on Kickstarter though with the bulk of my support being done on RSI.  I know the RSI money is not eligible for a refund and I knew the risks when I gave it and I'm ok with that.  That being said I can see why someone who never went to the RSI site but just backed the Kickstarter for a solid amount of money might want their money back since the game is no longer what they backed and it's passed the projected release date.  I like the increased scope, others may not and I don't think that makes them bad.  The Kickstarter money was only like $2m of an $85m project so I really don't think it would be the end of the world to offer kickstarter backers refunds of their kickstarter pledges.  I would hope that even if they did make that offer many would stick around and buy into the increased scope and not ask for it.

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DefyTheOutcome

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I knew the name Derek Smart was familiar: Google gave me immediately 'Battlecruiser 3000AD' and I remember the associated drama with it from almost 20 years ago. He is a massive drama queen.

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+Asmodai MVC

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Also... Kickstarter is not a pre-order, you **invest** in a project, which promises a reward. Some investments go south, and you lose it all. 

I can understand frustration, I've had a kickstarter fail (game even) fail. But I knew the risk up front.

This is the fear kickstarter has, too many funded failures drag kickstarter down.

To play Devil's advocate here he's not treating it as a pre-order as you say. The kickstarter didn't just fail.

You're absolutely right that you **invest** in a project and it may fail but the project originator is supposed to make a good faith effort to deliver what was described in the estimated time.

It can be argued that they aren't even making what was described anymore, they've got well beyond that. It's also not like they tried to make what they sold and failed.

If I can use an analogy it would be like hiring someone to build you a 2 bedroom house. They estimate it will take a year.

You come back in a year and it would be ok if they ran into unexpeted delays in trying to make your house and weren't done on time.

It would be bad luck but still understandable of they just couldn't make the house, ran out of money trying, and the company folded.

But if you come back in a year when it's supposed to be done and what you see is the foundation laid for a 12 bedroom mansion then that's an issue.

They aren't trying to make just a two bedroom house anymore, maybe you don't want a mansion and you don't want to wait for them to build that beast (even if they can)

That's kind of the situation Star Citizen is in. I personally want the mansion, I'm glad its gone from 2 bedrooms to 12, I'm willing to wait longer and I realize they could fail but I hope they don't.

I understand why others wouldn't share my opinion though.

Also Star Citzen has spent money, I doubt they have money to "refund" everyone if it collapses. 

It's not like they were sitting on it, doing nothing.

That's not the case. Star Citizen isn't being run like a normal kickstarter (that's part of the issue). They didn't stop collecting money when the Kickstarter finished (or shortly thereafter) as kickstarter normally do, they're STILL collecting money even now.

Kickstarter was only a small fraction of their total funds (roughly $2m of $85m) and Chris Roberts in the past has said that they keep a reserve so that if money just suddenly stopped flowing in they'd have enough to finish the project, scaled back from what they are aiming for but still well beyond what was sold in the kickstarter.

If that's the case then that reserve should be more than enough to refund the small kickstarter percentage of the total funding... and again hopefully a lot of the kickstarter backers wouldn't want a refund even if it was offered.

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+Asmodai MVC

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I knew the name Derek Smart was familiar: Google gave me immediately 'Battlecruiser 3000AD' and I remember the associated drama with it from almost 20 years ago. He is a massive drama queen.

He actually created a whole blog post about it that documents his "trolling" pretty well:

http://www.dereksmart.org/2015/07/the-gaming-urban-legend/

 

I don't think anyone is trying to say Derek Smart is a nice guy.  That doesn't make it ok to take back something you sold him and ban him for what he says on his own personal blog though.

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Grand Master

Dotdot

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I know little of this, but after 10mins reading his articles I can feel nothing but ego and self love dribbling of every page. Arrogant and shifting all blame to others around it seems, with nothing ever being his sole fault.

Even if Star Citizen is going belly up and is being totally un-fair to backers, this guy does nothing but promote his own ego at every turn.

Ive honestly never seen or read such an egotistical blog!!

Literally every article reads "me..me..me..ME!"

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Grand Master

Osiris

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Well I read the article and the comments above and I just don't have an opinion.  Or rather star citizen itself is such a bigger drama this seems insignificant. 

 

Interesting either way, will either be one of the best games in history or it will fail so hard that a generation of people may never trust and believe in anything ever again.  The hope of a million backers could be wiped out to the extent that the jedi feel it.

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Grand Master

Bryan R.

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I guess I don't understand the allure to a rendered spaceship without any context, no environment, no gameplay, just a rendered graphic. I guess it's why I really don't get the whole "invest" terminology when it comes to this Star Citizen. This whole Star Citizen thing is confusing to me, why it's so accepted, etc.

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Grand Master

FloatingFatMan

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The guy is clearly a drama queen and troll, however, I've been convinced Star Citizen was nothing but a sham from the very start.  The whole thing stinks to high heaven, and I'm glad I didn't back it.

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HawkMan

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The guy is clearly a drama queen and troll, however, I've been convinced Star Citizen was nothing but a sham from the very start.  The whole thing stinks to high heaven, and I'm glad I didn't back it.

 

He does come off as a troll, but his arguments are valid. 

 

I do hope the game does end up to be good though, though I'm afraid in their eagerness to chase graphics, they've made the game unplayable for the majority of their users.

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Melfster

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There are some people I would listen to but this guy is awe-full.   The reason why I decided to back it because I think most Publisher suck Activitsion, EA, ubisoft, Warne rbrothers and Sony..  These are really bad companies that like to regurgitate Tittles over and over  produce broken and incomplete games.  That don't like to push the limits.  I don't if star citizen will be successful but personally think has good shot because of the talent the recently acquired even from crytek.   I have PS4 and frankly it sucks it pitifully underprowed I am not impressed with it graphics at all.  

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Grand Master

HawkMan

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 Could we have shipped a small scale 30 mission game in the old Wing Commander format in two years? Yes, but that's not the game the community wants or the game we're building. 

 

Well he never really asked them. He set up the kick starter he created the stretch goals and decided what game i was going to be without asking the community. the community just paid for a space sim. reaching the stretch goal doesn't mean they all wanted an open persistent universe. I'd wager the majority of backers and players would be happy with a multiplayer combat module(squadron 42) and a standard quality single player campaign, probably more so than a persistent universe with cookie cutter grind "quests"  I have yet to see any of these system have a worthwhile story. 

 

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+Asmodai MVC

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Well he never really asked them. He set up the kick starter he created the stretch goals and decided what game i was going to be without asking the community. the community just paid for a space sim. reaching the stretch goal doesn't mean they all wanted an open persistent universe. I'd wager the majority of backers and players would be happy with a multiplayer combat module(squadron 42) and a standard quality single player campaign, probably more so than a persistent universe with cookie cutter grind "quests"  I have yet to see any of these system have a worthwhile story. 

 

Squadron 42 isn't a multiplayer combat module.  Squadron 42 is the single-player story campaign that's akin to the old Wing Commander games.  As stretch goals they added more (drop-in coop and such) but the base kickstarter was basically just for a new Wing Commander successor and it grew from there.  As such I suspect there are quite a few backers who absolutely would be happy with a 30 mission story based game like Wing Commander... just updated to CryEngine level graphics and such.

Personally I was hoping it would grow to something more akin to Wing Commander: Privateer or Freelancer (single-player open world) via stretch goals when I initially backed it though I would have been happy with just a Wing Commander/Starlancer game.  I don't really care about persistent online universe but of what it HAS become that's what interests me the most.  I have ZERO interest in "Star Marine" the whole FPS thing they're doing now and little interest in just a PvP combat.  I either want single player story with combat (Wing Commander/Starlancer) or I want to do the merchant, trading, exploring thing in their persistent world (online Privateer/Freelancer).

Again I'm still holding out hope they actually deliver but I have to say it doesn't look good right now.  Again I only backed $5 via Kickstarter but I'm in the hundreds over the years via their website which I'm fully aware I'll never get back if it tanks.  I knew that going in though when I chose to back via their website.  Kickstarter offers more assurance to backers though then going direct through so people who backed for large amounts of money through them actually have more rights.

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Grand Master

FunkyMike

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KWzFoKA.jpg

You got to have balls to pull off a project like this. Employees weep like little girls when they overview Chris Roberts mighty vision.

 

It was also alleged that Roberts' wife and Cloud Imperium Games Vice President of Marketing Sandi Gardiner enforced discriminatory hiring practices.

Oh she is his wife?! :D 

Looks like the guy who wrote the piece on The Escapist is a known troll.

 

https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/transmission/14979-Chairmans-Response-To-The-Escapist

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Grand Master

HawkMan

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You got to have balls to pull off a project like this. Employees weep like little girls when they overview Chris Roberts mighty vision.

 

 

Unfortunately, projects led by visionaries tend to always fail. Visionaires are good to be creative leads, but as much as we hate to see games released without everything promised(Peter Molyneux syndrome) for projects and games to bi finished, they need to be reined in by a leader who can see what can be done and what can't be done and what may need to be reduced at least for now. 

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+Asmodai MVC

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KWzFoKA.jpg

You got to have balls to pull off a project like this. Employees weep like little girls when they overview Chris Roberts mighty vision.

 

Oh she is his wife?! :D 

Looks like the guy who wrote the piece on The Escapist is a known troll.

 

https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/transmission/14979-Chairmans-Response-To-The-Escapist

The "guy who wrote the piece on The Escapist" is Lizzy Finnegan, I'm pretty sure she's not a guy.  Also the response on Roberts Space Industries is linked right at the top of the escapist article I provided the link for (I posted it here after the Update that included it went live or I would have included the response myself)

The "known troll" is Derek Smart and is not mentioned at all in the article.  Who Derek Smart is has already been gone over in this topic if you've read it from the start.

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Grand Master

HawkMan

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The "guy who wrote the piece on The Escapist" is Lizzy Finnegan, I'm pretty sure she's not a guy.  Also the response on Roberts Space Industries is linked right at the top of the escapist article I provided the link for (I posted it here after the Update that included it went live or I would have included the response myself)

The "known troll" is Derek Smart and is not mentioned at all in the article.  Who Derek Smart is has already been gone over in this topic if you've read it from the start.

Actually Derek is mentioned once, in a quote by Chris. of course that quote alone gives me more respect for Derek than Chris, so there's that. 

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