Greetings

[littlej0e]

Hello again, testies!

I took a break from this game approx. 3 years ago. Just checking in to see how everyone is doing and see what has changed. Just the cliff notes version if you will. in my eyes:

1. Vastly more stable and significantly less buggy and crashy.
3. Awe inspiring on an ultrawide monitor.
4. Much more immersive feeling and atmospheric. If you have a decent audio set up, the sound in this game is quite good.
5. Still quietly disappointing how far this game hasn't come:\
6. Still seems kinda buggy lol.
7. Economy seems more fleshed out and way better.
8. UI seems way more user friendly than I remember
9. Getting deeper as a game.


Would you gents be kind enough to fill me in on what I missed? Regardless, I think we probably have enough ships at this point, yeah? Seems CIG needs to be focusing on substance.

 

[Raven_King]

You got most of it, @littlej0e! There are a bunch of content changes - I think these were all within the past 3 years: Delamar was removed (it's going to be in the Nyx system). Mining was fleshed out a bit more. We have quite a few more ships to fly (and more concepts announced, of course). Physicalized components in some ships (sort of), physicalized inventory (if you drop something, it appears in a box) and a new personal/local/vehicle inventory UI. Missile mode vs gun (SCM?) mode, vs scanning mode vs mining mode on the HUD. The first few derelict crash sites. Loot boxes in bunkers, outposts and derelicts, but not at landing zones. They started a do-over re-balance of various ship components - guns, shields, quantum drives etc. and appear to have paused it while they worked on the upcoming changes for Master Modes - splitting flight into three modes rather than two. They continue to roll out new in-game interfaces built on the building blocks tech, so new UIs for lifts, an updated ASOP terminal, new UIs for trading and refining.

Aaaaand a metric TON of scope creep. New stuff being planned while old unfinished stuff lies abandoned and half done. Same old same old you're familiar with there! :)

 

[vahadar]

Welcome back littlej0e !

 

[FZD]

Hello again, testies!

I took a break from this game approx. 3 years ago. Just checking in to see how everyone is doing and see what has changed. Just the cliff notes version if you will. in my eyes:

Would you gents be kind enough to fill me in on what I missed? Regardless, I think we probably have enough ships at this point, yeah? Seems CIG needs to be focusing on substance.

Around 3 years ago was 3.5 to 3.8.
Highlights after 3.5:
- Ship purchasing / renting in game
- Mission sharing
- FPS mining
- Player inventory and its subsequent improvements
- Bunch of new missions, particularly 890 jump mission is pretty cool
- Mining improvements
- That weather stuff
- Prison gameplay
- Microtech (new planet and its moons)
- Reputation system
- Ship docking
- Crusader / Orison
- Healing stuff and various hospital locations
- Loot and selling it
- All around improvements to just about everything
- Way less stability issues, but even when they arise your stuff is much safer now, especially if you reconnect to the same server
- Like couple dozen new ships

 

[GPcustoms]

What FZD said...Welcome back

 

[Vavrik]

Welcome Back @littlej0e!
and

Prison gameplay

It's better not to ask...

 

[Sky Captain]

Welcome back!

We've seen a fair number of new concept ships/vehicles in the last three years too: The Odyssey, Cutlass Steel, Centurion, RAFT, Expanse, 400i, STV, Spirit, and more.

 

[littlej0e]

Thanks for the warm welcome (back) everyone. Holy moly have things changed.

You got most of it, @littlej0e! There are a bunch of content changes - I think these were all within the past 3 years: Delamar was removed (it's going to be in the Nyx system). Mining was fleshed out a bit more. We have quite a few more ships to fly (and more concepts announced, of course). Physicalized components in some ships (sort of), physicalized inventory (if you drop something, it appears in a box) and a new personal/local/vehicle inventory UI. Missile mode vs gun (SCM?) mode, vs scanning mode vs mining mode on the HUD. The first few derelict crash sites. Loot boxes in bunkers, outposts and derelicts, but not at landing zones. They started a do-over re-balance of various ship components - guns, shields, quantum drives etc. and appear to have paused it while they worked on the upcoming changes for Master Modes - splitting flight into three modes rather than two. They continue to roll out new in-game interfaces built on the building blocks tech, so new UIs for lifts, an updated ASOP terminal, new UIs for trading and refining.

Aaaaand a metric TON of scope creep. New stuff being planned while old unfinished stuff lies abandoned and half done. Same old same old you're familiar with there! :)

Thanks for the rundown! Same old same old indeed - haha. Guess I'll go try mining again. Loved it before (the gameplay loop was oddly soothing, even though it was totally frustrating and buggy as hell).

Around 3 years ago was 3.5 to 3.8.
Highlights after 3.5:
- Ship purchasing / renting in game
- Mission sharing
- FPS mining
- Player inventory and its subsequent improvements
- Bunch of new missions, particularly 890 jump mission is pretty cool
- Mining improvements
- That weather stuff
- Prison gameplay
- Microtech (new planet and its moons)
- Reputation system
- Ship docking
- Crusader / Orison
- Healing stuff and various hospital locations
- Loot and selling it
- All around improvements to just about everything
- Way less stability issues, but even when they arise your stuff is much safer now, especially if you reconnect to the same server
- Like couple dozen new ships

Really appreciate the summary. Guess I didn't give CIG enough credit. Holy crap have things changed. I just read CIG is working on Pyro and 4.0 is on the horizon. Are CIG still proverbially building the space ship while they fly it, or is most of the foundational tech finally in place (i remember server meshing being a huge deal back then)?

Welcome back!

Thanks, man!

We've seen a fair number of new concept ships/vehicles in the last three years too: The Odyssey, Cutlass Steel, Centurion, RAFT, Expanse, 400i, STV, Spirit, and more.

Yes indeed. Lots of new stuff...trying to pick up a 400i as we speak:-)

What FZD said...Welcome back

Thanks, dude!

 

[CosmicTrader]

Welcome back littlej0e !

Yes, it is great to have you back.

 

[Dirtbag_Leader]

Would you gents be kind enough to fill me in on what I missed?

I think your observations are pretty accurate, but the one big thing I'd say that's new/worth checking out is the 'dynamic events.' Every patch or so for about a week they launch some sort of event, and they're all pretty engaging in different ways. Jumptown has been really good for engaging larger scale PVP melees, Siege of Orison is big, lengthy PvE FPS war, Ninetails lockdown is a mix of cargo delivery and/or ship combat, and my absolute favorite, Xenothreat, is a big server-wide mix of everything engagement! So my advice would be to keep an eye out for whenever the next one of these events is announced and make sure to test it out!

 

[Dirtbag_Leader]

So my advice would be to keep an eye out for whenever the next one of these events is announced and make sure to test it out!

And apparently a new schedule of events was just released!

Dynamic Event Week - Roberts Space Industries | Follow the development of Star Citizen and Squadron 42

Roberts Space Industries is the official go-to website for all news about Star Citizen and Squadron 42. It also hosts the online store for game items and merch, as well as all the community tools used by our fans.

robertsspaceindustries.com

 

[Shadow Reaper]

Welcome back!

 

[littlej0e]

And apparently a new schedule of events was just released!

Dynamic Event Week - Roberts Space Industries | Follow the development of Star Citizen and Squadron 42

Roberts Space Industries is the official go-to website for all news about Star Citizen and Squadron 42. It also hosts the online store for game items and merch, as well as all the community tools used by our fans.

robertsspaceindustries.com

So cool!!!!

Depth is really getting there. Starting to remind me of the first time I played World of Warcraft; It was incredibly daunting and I had a lot to learn, but it was clear I was entering a legitimate new world with different rules and language. SC is starting to feel the same way. Obviously, it still has a long way to go, but I'm enjoying exploring and trying all the new mechanics (I just learned cave spelunking is a thing....).

At this point, my biggest concern (ironically), is lack of varied content. I'm guessing we'll need at least 3-5 fully fleshed-out systems to keep people routinely engaged. Will probably take a good 5 years just to get to that point :-(

 

[Dirtbag_Leader]

At this point, my biggest concern (ironically), is lack of varied content. I'm guessing we'll need at least 3-5 fully fleshed-out systems to keep people routinely engaged. Will probably take a good 5 years just to get to that point :-(

This is VERY true. My only suggestion is that playing together with other Testies will give you a better breadth of activities to do rather than rehashing the same stuff over and over solo. For example, maybe you don't own a Mole, but I think there's a Mining Monday thing where you can crew up on someone else's to try out mining from a turret!

 

[Vavrik]

We don't hold mining events on Monday any more, but on Thursdays when announced. @Athyrah is busy with her studies at the moment
That said, we often have impromptu mining ops, almost at any time. I will help anyone almost any time I'm online, I know a few others are good to go too.
Find us in Discord.

There's getting to be a lot to do though. Discord.
Also keep in mind, there are a lot of folks right now waiting for the next patch to drop, so population isn't always great.

There's going to be some more CIG events that tie a lot of the other activities together. There's a thread in TEST forums with the schedule.

Weekends: Saturday AND Sunday:
There are a other events too, Hard Flying for example. Decoupled mode set, you can bind that to a key in the settings - then go to someplace interesting (better in a group). Fly as fast as you can as low as you can while trying to avoid the terrain, other players and ... well generally don't hit stuff. It's really useful to have these skills, because many to most other players don't have a clue how to fly a space ship in atmosphere, let alone in space. Flying decoupled is how a cargo ship like the C2 with a full cargo (can be over 1 million aUEC at risk) can address someone attacking from the rear too, so it's a useful skill for sure.

There's combat flight events too. Learn how to fly your ship, fly in combat, fly in group combat... etc.

Have I mentioned Discord yet?

Also there's an event on Wednesday evenings called SC and Drinks which is kind of "figure out what you want to do" but also includes a group or two doing bunker missions, maybe some piracy, maybe some bounty missions (for pirates: it's a bit safer to get caught by another TESTie nutbar than a random nutbar.)... etc.

And ... for all this stuff, bring your own beer. Makes it more fun to do stuff with a beer in one hand and a belch on it's way. Hot coffee works too.

And, get into Discord. It's kind of the way to make what can become boring and mundane into more fun. Even if you're not doing anything specific, or with others.