News Star Citizen gets DLSS and Vulkan support, as new Nvidia driver adds support for F1 24, Hellblade 2, and more

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peachpuff said:
When's the release date?
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They have a few more years to go. But 4.0 Alpha release is scheduled for Q3 this year, so roughly 3-5 months from now which should give us Pyro(new star system) and Server Meshing version 1. The server load is really the thing holding this game back from ever being released. It makes the combat hard to enjoy due to desync. But once server meshing is complete, it should remove alot of the cpu and memory load off servers to have responsive gameplay. Right now, the whole star system is all loaded into a single server instance, which puts too much demand on a single server.

Once, server meshing is complete with a 2.0 version with individual planets or areas are on a single server instance, meshed with multiple servers to make up a whole star system. Then I think we can finally talk about an actual beta and full release date. Personally I think, server meshing 1.0 in 2024, server meshing 2.0 by the end of 2026 along with base building. Vulkan multi-threading in 2025. Beta in 2027, so maybe a 2028 release.
 
There is still no ETA on when Star Citizen will come out. I guess 2-3+ more years to go for the final version, IMO.

Star Citizen, even with the new Vulkan renderer, is still a CPU-heavy title. So, DLSS and FSR may not bring major performance improvements. There is still no support for Frame Generation as well.
 
As someone with a background in game design, it drives me insane that companies use specific terms like 'Alpha,' and 'Beta' for video games that are clearly already 'out.' These terms have become so diluted by people who had no idea what they meant in reference to video games that the words have become meaningless.
 
Metal Messiah. said:
There is still no ETA on when Star Citizen will come out. I guess 2-3+ more years to go for the final version, IMO.

Star Citizen, even with the new Vulkan renderer, is still a CPU-heavy title. So, DLSS and FSR may not bring major performance improvements. There is still no support for Frame Generation as well.
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Vulkan is currently single threaded, so no real performance gains until they move to multi-threaded vulkan. They're just laying the groundwork to do that. Solving alot of crashing issues so far.
 
helper800 said:
As someone with a background in game design, it drives me insane that companies use specific terms like 'Alpha,' and 'Beta' for video games that are clearly already 'out.' These terms have become so diluted by people who had no idea what they meant in reference to video games that the words have become meaningless.
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They allowed people to play it since it was literally just a hangar you could fly your ship around. Ever since then, they've been adding features to the game to make it a full game. Once they implement server meshing and base building. I think it'll be feature complete and can move onto beta for polish, then full release. After release they can add more gameplay loops and solar systems to keep the game going. It's come a long way in the past 10 years, but once server meshing helps solve the issue of running a full solar system on a single server instance, then I think you can finally see a light at the end of the tunnel.

While traditionally alpha is kept in house for testing, CIG decided to make it externally tested. They make it very clear that the game is in alpha and you're a tester. You will get wiped numerous times and lose all progress. No one gets mad because this is known. Traditionally, alpha for me is software that can be tested, but is not feature complete. You test, validate new features as they make their way into the software and check for regression. Once all the major features of the software are complete, then you move onto beta and work on bug fixes and polish. Then you put out a release candidate for a wider audience and then full release. CIG is being non-traditional by letting everyone be testers, but I think that's awesome.

While non-traditional I think this game does fall under alpha software level. Not all the major features needed for release are there yet, so it doesn't move onto beta.

At what point in it's development would you consider this a game that is "out?"
 
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gggplaya said:
At what point in it's development would you consider this a game that is "out?"
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So to start, the definition of a 'release' is when a game is accessible to play by the public or an internal review process. In game development 'alphas' and 'betas' fall under a game 'release.' An 'alpha' by definition has all major assets and features of the game, but is a bug ridden rat's nest that is used to hammer out all major game breaking bugs internally, or an internal 'release'. A 'beta' is a game that is completely feature complete with minor, non game-breaking, bugs. A 'beta' can be open to the public for testing network loading, and other cloud services. A 'full release' is directly after a 'beta' is finished ironing out all but the most minor bugs. Day one patches means a game was released before it was out of 'beta' and often even still in 'alpha'. Publishers and develops love to outsource bug reporting to people while simultaneously making them pay for the product before they even know whether the game will ever release.

Star citizen would be considered a released product somewhere between the middle of alpha to the middle of beta. Some aspects of the game are in a beta state while others are in alpha. Considering you have to pay for it you could consider the product that is star citizen fully released whenever you could pay for it if you are being very strict.

When a game is released with 10% of its planned features, 98% of its total life bugs, and 100% of its price tag you are effectively giving labor for the production and development of a game you don't know will ever be complete for free.
 
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I don't really care about the multi-player side of Star Citizen. When is the single player campaign Squadron 42 coming out? There has to be a roadmap with a real release date by now, surely? The campaign has nothing to do with servers.
 
nitrium said:
I don't really care about the multi-player side of Star Citizen. When is the single player campaign Squadron 42 coming out? There has to be a roadmap with a real release date by now, surely? The campaign has nothing to do with servers.
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It's feature complete but is in final polish. They're refining the shooting dynamics to be more like battlefield and flight characteristics to bring the skill floor up. My guess is 2025 release.
 
helper800 said:
So to start, the definition of a 'release' is when a game is accessible to play by the public. In game development 'alphas' and 'betas' fall under a game 'release.' An 'alpha' by definition has all major assets and features of the game, but is a bug ridden rat's nest that is used to hammer out all major game breaking bugs internally, or an internal 'release'. A 'beta' is a game that is completely feature complete with minor, non game-breaking, bugs. A 'beta' can be open to the public for testing network loading, and other cloud services. A 'full release' is directly after a 'beta' is finished ironing out all but the most minor bugs. Day one patches means a game was released before it was out of 'beta' and often even still in 'alpha'. Publishers and develops love to outsource bug reporting to people while simultaneously making them pay for the product before they even know whether the game will ever release.

Star citizen would be considered a released product somewhere between the middle of alpha to the middle of beta. Some aspects of the game are in a beta state while others are in alpha. Considering you have to pay for it you could consider the product that is star citizen fully released whenever you could pay for it if you are being very strict.

When a game is released with 10% of its planned features, 98% of its total life bugs, and 100% of its price tag you are effectively giving labor for the production and development of a game you don't know will ever be complete for free.
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That may be your companies definition of release, but that's not ours. We have several levels of releases for internal employee teams to either add their apps then another release for the validation team before it goes out to the public. These releases are denoted in our versioning. But I don't work in video game development, so perhaps that's the generally accepted nomenclature in that realm. This is my understanding of the definition of release: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/release_version

I can see your reasoning behind calling it an alpha/beta. It is a very playable game as it is if you have a beefy computer, albeit with some bugs and glitches and server lag and desync.

But from the beginning, this game was run like a kickstarter campaign. You pledged ships early on. Before there was even something to download and play. Like a kickstarter, if CIG goes belly up, that's it, you get nothing.
 
gggplaya said:
That may be your companies definition of release, but that's not ours. We have several levels of releases for internal employee teams to either add their apps then another release for the validation team before it goes out to the public. These releases are denoted in our versioning. But I don't work in video game development, so perhaps that's the generally accepted nomenclature in that realm. This is my understanding of the definition of release: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/release_version

I can see your reasoning behind calling it an alpha/beta. It is a very playable game as it is if you have a beefy computer, albeit with some bugs and glitches and server lag and desync.

But from the beginning, this game was run like a kickstarter campaign. You pledged ships early on. Before there was even something to download and play. Like a kickstarter, if CIG goes belly up, that's it, you get nothing.
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That is not my companies definition, that is the academic game design specific definitions of the terms. I also made a mistake, I edited my OP on the first line.
 
I would say it varies, but most games do a Pre-Alpha proof of concept, Alpha for internal testing, Closed Beta for internal play testing, Open Beta / Early Access, Release. Those last two can be a little blurry since most games are launched to a schedule and may not be truly stable or feature complete for months after release.

Sometimes those pre-Alpha are demoed at game shows and they end up not resembling the finished product at all. Like SimCity 3000. That was supposed to be a 3D game, but they backed out and ended up doing another isometric game.
 
Eximo said:
I would say it varies, but most games do a Pre-Alpha proof of concept, Alpha for internal testing, Closed Beta for internal play testing, Open Beta / Early Access, Release. Those last two can be a little blurry since most games are launched to a schedule and may not be truly stable or feature complete for months after release.

Sometimes those pre-Alpha are demoed at game shows and they end up not resembling the finished product at all. Like SimCity 3000. That was supposed to be a 3D game, but they backed out and ended up doing another isometric game.
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I was focusing on the terms that I see 'misused' that drive me crazy, but yeah there are definitely internal versions before the alpha state for proof of concept like vertical slices, pre-alpha concepts, and of course the prototyping for the game done at the beginning. There are also tons of concept art and story boarding done if that is relevant to the game being made. Game design documents are also done before prototyping preferably. A GDD is basically the game spelled out on paper before it becomes digital.
 
Legit question. .. is it the first game these developers ever do? Or are they actually experienced but attempting something that has never been done? Because it's what, already 10 years into the making and it's still in "early" development cycle it seems?
 
Eximo said:
I think the problem is fatigue. All these micro releases over 8+ years instead of releasing some gaming experience and then releasing DLC/Expansions.
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CB2077 took 8 years plus two years and half to include what it was supposed to be. All from a company with a thousand devs, all available pipelines and fully created company. One solo game versus two for CIG (SQ42 + SC MMO). This is a kickstarter project hence you do support from the very first day to get the product you pledged for: perfect description for SC.
 
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