I expected you would link a PTU server video, zen. You know, the server thats only even up for a week before each big update for bulk testing. Not the current live version.
Oh yeah @selbie, it still crashes now and then. Between me and my friend playing yesterday for something like 10 combined hours, we had 1 crash between the two of us and 3 other issues that required leaving and rejoining crusader. But thats not “continually worsening” as zen seems to suggest, its doing pretty great. And thats the persistant universe, the other modes i havent had crash for me in a very long time.
Most probably like all 99% other people who have been playing further AAA titles like E:D, Diablo 3, BF4, A:I, FC4, Watch Dogs (just to name a few various, depending on their likes) in parallel as well, and which dont care that much meanwhile as they enjoy other games, and now prepare to upgrade their system just by another GPU which isnt that much of an invest as the rest of the system still performs well. Like they do anyway every 3-4 years since PC games exist. Thats what keeps the PC industry running for decades now.
Speaking as one of those that upgraded specifically to play SC, sorry but not everyone is made of money and updates their computer every 4 years… In fact, I would never have updated my computer if I had known what a crapfest SC was going to be.
Persistent universe crashes are down but that is the roller coaster of Star Citizen, something will be fixed one patch then unfixed the next. lol. And sure you might be able to point to development but we shall see. If the history of development, redevelopment and un-development has any say, you will be lucky to get 10 hours of gameplay when the final version comes out - if it comes out.
Upgrading your computer with no knowledge of the final system requirements is on you. Is this why your so peeved at them, you gave someone other than CIG money and thats their fault?
Besides, have you tried arena commander recently? Optimization is coming along nicely, your rig will probably be fine. AC runs excellently compared to a few years ago, on low settings its possible to get a solid 50-60 fps on an i7 920 and a gtx 580 even at 1080p. Crusader isnt faring as well but the performance issues there are due to a specific problem with server to client communication thats being worked on. If you don’t believe me just look at your gpu and cpu usage % in crusader. a 580 will sit at 30% usage while your cpu will have similar usage to arena commander.
Well, clearly you will never come to a logical conclusion regarding SC’s chaotic development and dubious practices. As for being peeved, yes, a lot of people are after SC has moved the bar so many times - downwards mostly - that it’s impossible to rely on anything they say. What’s more videos clearly demonstrate how nicely SC is coming along. lol. So good luck with that. At any rate, I will leave it at that. And I will leave you with this video that pretty well sums up the entire Star Citizen Experience:
Yes I’ve noticed that too with 2.4.1 and Port Olisar already, where within my computer (i7 2600k from 2011 btw. which still performs fine ) the GPU was pushed to ~50% maximum according to MSI Afterburner, there is room for optimization somewhere (however I cant tell if its within network communication or somewhere else maybe in their render pipeline). Haven’t tried 2.5 and Grim Hex yet, but I was suprised that 2.4.1 already ran better than previous versions.
In regards to Star Citizen already beginning to look dated, I think you are overstating how much an engine has to do with graphics.
Just about all games shaders end up as HLSL or GLSL before compiling to machine code. There’s no special sauce any engine has for better shaders, while shaders have most to do with a game’s look.
There are exceptions, like sparse virtual textures or megatexture, and the engine is what’s passing things to the shader that they might do in a clever way like their certain sort of compositing…
But… yeah. Star Citizen would look a heck of a lot better with just better lightmaps, better shaders, and things like that. These don’t require a new engine, just better written shaders.
They have the quality of models and textures there already. It’s just too freaking one-note, dark, glossy, and has those shimmering pixels from poor AA which SMAA would largely fix.
I would have thought that part of the decision behind using CryEngine in the first place was because of the fancy shaders (for the time) that came with it? The engine was clearly no more capable on its own than, say, the Source engine. We’ve already seen what a nice bit of spit ‘n’ polish will do to Source in Titanfall after all, that was a pretty game
I think CryEngine made a lot of sense at the time they chose it. UE4 was still very much in private development and Source was already well past its prime - I assume Respawn has put considerable effort into updating it for Titanfall. The point at which they realized they were going to continue raising $10’s of millions of dollars and UE4 was going to come out they had probably already paid for a full CE3 license and were already committed.
It’s easy in hindsight to be critical of their choice of CE3 however I think it made a lot of sense for them at the time and was likely pivotal in their crowdfunding success. CE3 would have worked just fine if they had stuck to the original vision for SQ42 - I think they began running into problems with their technology choices once they decided they wanted to modify CE3 to compete with open-world planetary technology like ours.
They should have concentrated their efforts on getting something smaller like Squadron 42 out in working order. A new Wing Commander in a sense, with a good SP-story and some MP-action presenting the game and the universe to the players.
Once that was working the Star Citizen part of the game would have been easier to get going. Problems with the game- and network code would have been easier to work out.
Now I get the feeling they try to get it all out at once tripping over themselves in the progress.
Edit/ I’ve not spent a lot of time in the game so far trying to avoid alpha-burnout, but it crashes a lot for me. A lot more than other games I’ve been in under development. Games like Starpoint Gemini 2 and E:D.
The choice was clearly that they could make a pretty tech demo quickly for the time, yes.
Why they stuck with it? I don’t know. Teams switch engines all the time. Maybe it was anxiety over not being able to make pretty enough marketing material during development if they started over with a new engine, even if it means in the long run having to rewrite much of the engine.
Making games is hard, though. Not so much the actual game making part, that’s easy, but the selling and marketing it part. That’s hard.
They maybe chose CryEngine because it made the hardest part, the marketing, easy.
As you say, I think the benefits of the pretty engine helped sell the game during crowdfunding, but clearly they committed before they had an idea of the game’s final scope.
@INovaeKeith, I completely agree that the choice at the time helped them sell it, and I also agree it probably was the best choice for SQ42 and had they committed to keep that separate from the SC PU, they might have released by now. In fact, they could have then ditched CE for the multiplayer portion of the game and created a new engine from the ground up (or picked another more suitable engine if they could find one).
To be fair I did a similar thing when X-Rebirth came out. I bought it, on pre-order I might add, and found the performance was terrible. I bought a new graphics card and guess what, it was still terrible.
At least that new card made other games run better. Never went back to X-Rebirth and likely never will.
IBS was my primary reason for upgrading the GPU, it was about time, but that was the trigger. Suppose I’ll see how I feel about it when it releases 2017-2018…
) the GPU was pushed to ~50% maximum according to MSI Afterburner, there is room for optimization somewhere (however I cant tell if its within network communication or somewhere else maybe in their render pipeline). Haven’t tried 2.5 and Grim Hex yet, but I was suprised that 2.4.1 already ran better than previous versions.
