Well, I mean, I would have launched it first (as an AAA game), but I’m no game developer. 🤷 And neither are they, from the looks of it. Good at perpetually raking in money for himself and his family, though!

  • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.worldOP
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    17
    arrow-down
    10
    ·
    9 months ago

    Yeah it’s “released”. Meaning that yes, you can buy it for money and launch it (so released), but it’s so shit they had to quickly officially declare it broken (“early access”) to save face.

    • breadsmasher@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      8
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      edit-2
      9 months ago

      When did they ever “release” it without saying its also early access?

      edit - assuming downvotes are cause of a misunderstanding. im not defending early access or star citizen. I am just saying I do not recall them “backpedaling” to early access. I thought they had always advertised it as early access. Which itself is shady af

      • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.worldOP
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        9 months ago

        What I mean is, “early access” is just release with the makers openly admitting that everything is unfinished and broken, instead of people finding out on release day. It’s still a product X being sold money Y, just like a “real” release. And hence it should always be evaluated for what you get vs what you pay, not the promise of what you might get later. See also: Preorders (at least these are protected by a lot of laws in some countries), Kickstarters, Religions.

    • DaDragon@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      10
      arrow-down
      7
      ·
      9 months ago

      Maybe because development has a high ongoing cost that they do not have any other product to take up? Star citizen has a fairly large scope, and the fact that they have even gotten to the point where a fairly high number of gameplay loops are fully integrated is quite impressive. If you look at their ship designs, for example, you can see just how much care was put into a lot of the designs (see the architectural reviews, for example)

      • Denjin@lemmings.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        31
        ·
        edit-2
        9 months ago

        Star Citizen has raised more money than the budgets of GTAV, Cyberpunk 2077 and Red Dead Redemption 2 COMBINED.

        The only people defending it now are those so deep in the sunk cost fallacy they can’t get out.

        Edit: the total budget for StarCitizen so far is equivalent to the nominal GDP in 2023 of Sao Tome & Principe

        • bigmclargehuge@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          11
          arrow-down
          5
          ·
          9 months ago

          I’ve spent $49.99 on it. As a space sim fan, it’s one of the most amazing experiences I’ve ever had in a game. Blows Elite Dangerous out of the water in terms of seamlessness. If it was better optimized it’d be one of the only things I’d play.

          I’m not trying to you’re wrong about anything. But for a certain customer, it’s already a pretty great experience.

        • KISSmyOS@feddit.de
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          4
          ·
          9 months ago

          And it’s much better than any space sim game developed by Sao Tome & Principe in 2023.
          Checkmate, atheists.

      • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.worldOP
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        13
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        9 months ago

        Yeah, maybe. But it’s also ridiculous, finish what you have instead of constantly bolting on scope to keep the sales treadmill running.

        Of course, it’s a business first and foremost. And if that’s what people gladly pay for, no fault in pocketing the money I guess.

        • Essence_of_Meh@lemmy.world
          cake
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          9 months ago

          Except scope hasn’t really changed in years? I might be wrong since I’m not trawling through every single piece of content released but I’m pretty sure most of the expansions are related to CIG figuring out details of already promised features.

          I’m sure someone following the game closer can provide more details on that.