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[Tic174]

Does anyone know when the next livestream is?

I think on reverse the verse they said it was gona be the 16th December.

 

[MikeDown]

"There is alot of broken things, this is such a massive accident. I'm only one man, its true." Credit where credit is due, appreciate there transparency here.

 

[Dictator93]

I love that devs respond on their forums to my (arguably) annoying questions

Ali Brown, ladies and gentlemen

One thing I noticed while playing Alpha 2.0 on the PTU is that the muzzle flashes no longer produce shadow casting light sources.

Could this possibly return at one point when over-all perforamance has been increased / be limitted to a user enabled option / higher settings? I absolutely love the way it looks when a muzzle flash causes shadows to kind of "dance around".

Thanks again,
Dictator

Hi Dictator,

Muzzle flash shadows cost an incredible amount to render as they require 6 shadow casting spot lights (to cover 360 degrees), and so for now we've had to disable these given we can have up to 16 players all stood in the same room firing their guns. However we definitely agree that having the shadows enabled looks great, so I'd very much like to see them return one day, but just in a smarter way. For example we can do things like:

- Prioritise shadow casting on the players gun
- Use lower resolution shadows for players further away
- Limit shadow casting to just from the character and not the environment which would reduce it from 6 shadows to just 1
- Open the above settings up to the community so you can tweak to your heart's content!

We are intending to implement a general prioritisation system for the shadows to make the game cope with the very difficult/expensive cases which are possible in an MMO with such high-end graphics, and so we can potentially look at the muzzle shadows as part of this.

Ali Brown
Director of Graphics Engineering

"There is alot of broken things, this is such a massive accident. I'm only one man, its true." Credit where credit is due, appreciate there transparency here.

lol wut

 

[KKRT00]

"as they require 6 shadow casting spot lights (to cover 360 degrees),"

LOL, they went to extreme with this.

 

[Sothis Krieg]

Wanted to back this for a long time, maybe now is the right time. The offer is a bit overhelming any advice here (just want the game and the beta access if possible) ? Edit : i did not see the most obvious link in the world... i was lost in the bundle and ships page.So there are 3 packages Aurora LN, Aurora MR or Mustang Alpha. I want a fighter for starter so Mustang is out of the way , but which Aurora to chose ?

 

[tuxfool]

Wanted to back this for a long time, maybe now is the right time. The offer is a bit overhelming any advice here (just want the game and the beta access if possible) ?

Get one of the starter packages, 45$. That gets you everything, then go from there. Alternatively feel free to try out the free flight that is running until Dec. 14th.

 

[Dictator93]

"as they require 6 shadow casting spot lights (to cover 360 degrees),"

LOL, they went to extreme with this.

Yeah haha, point lights with shadows use 6 spot lights arranged around eachother if I am not mistaken. So to have 360 shadows would need all 6 to be on!

I really love the response though.

 

[UpDownLeftRight]

So PU access members, how are things looking now? Last week Roberts said in a recording for 10FTC that he was hoping the PU may go live that day (last friday) and obviously they had some blockers. Is it smoothing out? Are we close to where it was before they added another wave last time performance-wise?

 

[CyberPunked]

Yeah haha, point lights with shadows use 6 spot lights arranged around eachother if I am not mistaken. So to have 360 shadows would need all 6 to be on!

I really love the response though.

I don't think it's even a question whether they should leave it up to the user to decide. If it's too demanding it can be turned off, I don't see the issue of them being implemented.

 

[WGMBY]

So up to citizen #210k is invited to the PTU, but I'm around #216k :'(

I guess I'll just wait for the actual release.

 

[Rephin]

So PU access members, how are things looking now? Last week Roberts said in a recording for 10FTC that he was hoping the PU may go live that day (last friday) and obviously they had some blockers. Is it smoothing out? Are we close to where it was before they added another wave last time performance-wise?

Well it's... crashing a little less, and I can play for longer periods of time. I'm also not getting timed out/disconnected or getting a crash to desktop as often as I used to when I try to get in now. That's progress. Danthrax is definitely getting those issues more than I do, reading his last post. It might be due to our less than godly comp builds, maybe?

Some of the issues that they said they fixed are still there for me though, like when my Hornet spawns without the landing gear down, lol. I also get some clipping issues, and this weird thing where if I EVA and I start rotating, I don't stop spinning even if I counter-steer it using boosters. Or maybe that's just damage to the suit? I don't know. It's weird and obnoxious, and the really funny thing is if I land on a surface I can walk on, my camera starts spinning and doesn't stop. I always have to restart the program at that point, lol.

I say it still needs some optimization work. The crashing is still frequent enough to be frustrating to the average user and there are Bethesda-class bugs, and that wouldn't look good to the majority of backers.

 

[Akronis]

Yeah haha, point lights with shadows use 6 spot lights arranged around eachother if I am not mistaken. So to have 360 shadows would need all 6 to be on!

I really love the response though.

I believe the original Metro 2033 did something similar. It's definitely an incredibly expensive effect.

 

[Geist-]

So PU access members, how are things looking now? Last week Roberts said in a recording for 10FTC that he was hoping the PU may go live that day (last friday) and obviously they had some blockers. Is it smoothing out? Are we close to where it was before they added another wave last time performance-wise?

No live until they fix more crashing problems and the framerate problem they said was fixed is still affecting me sometimes. The times where I can play are some of the most fun I've had in a video game, but ready for live it is not. Still, if they can keep releasing patches every day like they have been, it's still possible it may reach live in the next week or so.

 

[Dictator93]

I believe the original Metro 2033 did something similar. It's definitely an incredibly expensive effect.

Yeah it was cut out in metro LL sadly (although for some reason it still works on the rail gun) much like the over-abundance of volumetric lighting in the original. But we all know why they did that... [shifty eyes].

No live until they fix more crashing problems and the framerate problem they said was fixed is still affecting me sometimes. The times where I can play are some of the most fun I've had in a video game, but ready for live it is not. Still, if they can keep releasing patches every day like they have been, it's still possible it may reach live in the next week or so.

Yeah, the server performance bug still happens rather often (but not always) and i am still crashing.

Plus there have been numerous isntances where interacting with some object sends my player camera anywhere from 40-140,000 KM away from where I should be. And then I juist float mindlessly in space till I suicide myself. lol

Needs some more love before Live!

 

[Zabojnik]

System Shock 3, lads.

What a time to be cybernetically enhanced.

 

[Geist-]

System Shock 3, lads.

What a time to be cybernetically enhanced.

I thought you were joking, holy shit, yes!!!!!!

 

[KKRT00]

Yeah haha, point lights with shadows use 6 spot lights arranged around eachother if I am not mistaken. So to have 360 shadows would need all 6 to be on!

I really love the response though.

Its funny, because its more than some games have set per scene ;p

----

I don't think it's even a question whether they should leave it up to the user to decide. If it's too demanding it can be turned off, I don't see the issue of them being implemented.

I'm pretty sure CIG will give us full control over console in S42.
Star Citizen will be of course more restricted, but i think those kind of commands should be available, if not, we will be whining loudly

---

I believe the original Metro 2033 did something similar. It's definitely an incredibly expensive effect.

Few games did it, but most use only one shadow casting light.

 

[Akronis]

Yeah it was cut out in metro LL sadly (although for some reason it still works on the rail gun) much like the over-abundance of volumetric lighting in the original. But we all know why they did that... [shifty eyes].

I did much prefer the 90-144 frames I was getting compared to the potential drops to like 14 in the original

 

[Zalusithix]

Edit : i did not see the most obvious link in the world... i was lost in the bundle and ships page.So there are 3 packages Aurora LN, Aurora MR or Mustang Alpha. I want a fighter for starter so Mustang is out of the way , but which Aurora to chose ?

The Aurora is hardly a fighter. Neither of the starter ships are fighters. They're both small, cheap, multi-role ships that you're not meant to keep for very long in game. There's the LN variant of the Aurora and the Delta variant of the Mustang which are both skewed towards combat, but they're still not going to last long against a real fighter.

You'd have to up your pledge considerably to reach the first "real" fighter (Avenger Stalker) at $75. Of course, there's absolutely no need to do that as you can get everything in game.

 

[mercenar1e]

over $100+ and the Hornet F7C is a shit fighter ship.. the two best current fighters are the Gladius and the FC7-M.. maybe ill save up for the next sale of the M variant.

 

[Zalusithix]

over $100+ and the Hornet F7C is a shit fighter ship.. the two best current fighters are the Gladius and the FC7-M.. maybe ill save up for the next sale of the M variant.

The F7C can be upgraded in the PU to have the ball and canard turret which would turn it into a single seat FC7-M. So you can keep the pledge ship and have a great fighter with a bit of work in the PU. On the other hand, nothing you do to an Aurora or Mustang is going to raise it much beyond mediocre. The (limited) Mustang Delta has a shot perhaps with the reduced radar cross section, maneuverability, and decent weapon loadout, but it's kind of an exception in the starter ships.

 

[jaaz]

over $100+ and the Hornet F7C is a shit fighter ship.. the two best current fighters are the Gladius and the FC7-M.. maybe ill save up for the next sale of the M variant.

I have an FC7-M and just got to try the Gladius during this free trial period or whatever. I have to say, the Gladius is fun as hell to fly, agile and fast, but seems less powerful than the FC7-M. I guess that's the trade off.

To me:

Gladius = F-16 Fighting Falcon
FC7-M = F-15E Strike Eagle

 

[Zalusithix]

I have an FC7-M and just got to try the Gladius during this free trial period or whatever. I have to say, the Gladius is fun as hell to fly, agile and fast, but seems less powerful than the FC7-M. I guess that's the trade off.

To me:

Gladius = F-16 Fighting Falcon
FC7-M = F-15E Strike Eagle

The Gladius isn't supposed to be the equal to the FC7-M in AC. That's the role of the upcoming Sabre. Still, the Gladius is a capable ship, and far cheaper than either of the other two.

 

[mercenar1e]

I have an FC7-M and just got to try the Gladius during this free trial period or whatever. I have to say, the Gladius is fun as hell to fly, agile and fast, but seems less powerful than the FC7-M. I guess that's the trade off.

To me:

Gladius = F-16 Fighting Falcon
FC7-M = F-15E Strike Eagle

I have killed more ships in the Gladius than in the Hornet FC7 (not the M variant) its the worst ship in the higher priced bracket of fighters.. spending $10-$20 EACH to kit out that ship isn't worth it because the stats are subject to change. i think the pricing should reflect this possibility but instead people are getting fleeced

FC7-M on the other hand is a whole lot better.

 

[Raticus79]

Next PTU patch is available now. I skipped H since it was mostly crash fixes and it was still crashing a lot. They say this one fixed a bunch of crashes, but some new ones are popping up as it gets further into the code.
https://ptu.cloudimperiumgames.com/comm-link//15053-Star-Citizen-Alpha-200j

This is a patch for the 2.0.0 PTU. Please fully restart your client and launcher to ensure your client is updated – your PTU client should show “2.0.0-304132-PTU” as the version. Due to the number of recent fixes to the PTU, it is strongly recommended that players delete their PTU USER folder and verify their files after patching. The USER folder can be found (in default installations) at C:\Program Files\Cloud Imperium Games\StarCitizen\Test. Game files can be verified through the launcher, by clicking on the advanced options (Gear icon) and clicking “Verify”. This is particularly important if users encounter any odd character graphical issues or crash on loading.

If you don’t see Patch Notes in your launcher, please restart your launcher immediately to update it. At this stage of testing, please refer to the PTU Issue Council for submitting bugs and feedback for optimal turn-around time. Please note that this is only for this phase of PTU testing and that the normal Issue Council is for the submission of bugs only. During this initial testing phase, PTU access will be restricted to a invitation-only group of players that we will expand on over time. You can check out the full 2.0.0 PTU notes for more details about the patch and content or our 2.0.0 PTU Known Issues FAQ for bugs we are already aware of.

Important items of note:
Arena Commander has been temporarily disabled on PTU to allow us to focus our server monitoring on Crusader performance and stability.
Area 18, ArcCorp will still be available.
We have a specific Issue Council thread where are requesting additional information from players regarding Error 0 disconnections.

Fixes:
Environment
- Fixed an issue where the Hangar elevator was appearing with red lights.

Technical
- Fixed a client crash on loading into the hangar.

User Interface
- Fixed an issue where the error message overlay would not go away without a full game exit.

Social Module/Persistent Universe:

Balance/Tweaks:
Ship
- Constellation destruction, debris and detail level have all been overhauled.
- Gladiator detail levels have been updated for better performance.
- Gladius detail levels have been updated for better performance.
- Mustang (all variants) detail levels have been updated for better performance.
- Hornet (all variants) detail levels have been updated for better performance.
- Constellation has received some handling tweaks to make it feel a little more massive. Reduced jerk on strafe, increased rotational jerk on yaw and increased ship responsiveness.

Fixes:
Gameplay
- Fixed an issue where civilian AI would thank players for assistance, even when pirates were still alive in the area.
- Fixed an issue where the “online” indicators for party members would not work.
- Fixed an issue where party members would also appear in the general contact list.
- Fixed an issue where the invite message from the party system would not go away after 30 seconds.
- Fixed an issue where one character could push another character away from the ship spawn terminals while interacting with it.

Environment
- Fixed an issue where the large landing pad at Cry-Astro Service Station was not large enough for the Constellation and Retaliator to land or repair.

Equipment
- Fixed an issue where several P4-AR’s on Security Post Kareah could not be picked up.

Technical
- Fixed a client crash in Crusader.

 

[Sax Russel]

I reaaaaaally want to fly around, and have PTU access, but I couldn't handle all these patches (which I assume are full/close to full re-downloads?)

Just gotta hold out for that live release.

 

[Danthrax]

I reaaaaaally want to fly around, and have PTU access, but I couldn't handle all these patches (which I assume are full/close to full re-downloads?)

Just gotta hold out for that live release.

They are thankfully not full redownloads but they're often about half a redownload, which still takes a lot of time on, say, a DSL connection.

But yeah, the frequency of new patches is crazy. Takes me a day to download one and then it's outdated a day later. This is why I've never tried to be part of the PTU before ... I can't download patches at the frequency they release them. I'm only trying now because it's the first PU rollout. I really want to play it.

 

[pottuvoi]

I believe the original Metro 2033 did something similar. It's definitely an incredibly expensive effect.

Indeed it is.
Some games used the dual paraboloid shadow mapping, which requires only 2 shadowmaps per pointlight.
Sadly it requires quite tesselated world to work properly.

I would certainly hope to see something like distance field shadows in future, but it has it's own set of problems.

 

[Raticus79]

New crash is a CryEngine error: "Grid Refcount != 0 - this should never happen!". Seems to be happening to everyone within a few minutes.

 

[Dictator93]

Dictator | Dictator said:
[source]

Hi Ali & Ben,
Sometimes only accessories on characters have motion blur applied when they move.
Most of the time the whole body does though (looks great!)
But sometimes the whole body does, but eyes don't?

What typically causes such ... behaviour?

Without looking into the specific issues you've highlighted here I can't be 100% sure, but there are two separate systems for rendering solid geometry (helmet, attachments, weapons) and geometry that bends with the skeleton (everything else on the player such as skin, clothing, armour) which we call 'skinned' geometry. Skinned geometry is more complex to motion blur because you need to track the previous position and orientation of every joint on the skeleton, and any errors in this can break/disable the motion blur on that geometry. So in this case it's likely a problem or limitation in the skeleton animation system, or the shaders aren't correctly calculating the position of the polygons on the previous frame's skeleton.

Dictator | Dictator said:
[source]

Hi Ali & Ben,
And as a kind of follow up question about motion blur, is it possible to have particle sprites or transparent objects which have motion blur applied?
r

The post-effect motion blur technique used in CryEngine and almost every game only supports a single layer of blur, so for example two sheets of glass on top of each moving perpendicular directions can only be blurred in one direction. Generally games work around this by only blurring the opaque geometry, but another option is to blur based on the velocity of the closest polygon, however this can have issues if you have a very transparent piece of glass in which case it'd be better to apply the correct blur to the background rather than just the glass.

Motion blur is sometimes applied using completely separate techniques for just the transparent geometry, but this tends to be very expensive and doesn't produce such clean results as the post-effect motion blur. For example there is limited particle motion blur support in CryEngine, but it currently can only be enabled/disabled when building the game exe (so not by the user) which means we can't currently enable this without hurting the performance for everyone. This is something I'm sure VFX team will want us to look at later on in the project though.

Ali Brown
Director of Graphics Engineering

.

 

[tuxfool]

.

Damn straight. The graphics guys and the sound guys really like explaining their stuff.

 

[CyberPunked]

.

Awesome, but i think the real question is, why do you have such a love for motion blur?

 

[Danthrax]

Dictator93
Motion blur's biggest fan
(Today, 09:33 AM)
Quote

 

[Dictator93]

Awesome, but i think the real question is, why do you have such a love for motion blur?

I was rapidly shaken from side to side as an infant.

Spoiler

lol jk

Dictator93
Motion blur's biggest fan
(Today, 09:33 AM)
Quote

lol

 

[KKRT00]

.

So awesome.
So Crytek has new motion blur technique called 'per build motion blur', right?
Really weird solution.

 

[CitizenVectron]

Quick question: I bought in at the beginning (#68041) and since then I upgraded my Freelancer to a Super Hornet when it became available. Before the game actually opens up officially, is it still possible for me to melt this down and choose another ship to start with? The SH seemed awesome at the time, but with feature and ship creep happening it might not be by the time the full universe opens.

 

[Geist-]

Quick question: I bought in at the beginning (#68041) and since then I upgraded my Freelancer to a Super Hornet when it became available. Before the game actually opens up officially, is it still possible for me to melt this down and choose another ship to start with? The SH seemed awesome at the time, but with feature and ship creep happening it might not be by the time the full universe opens.

You can always cross-chassis upgrade the ship to another that's more expensive without losing anything.

As far as the Super Hornet, pretty sure it's not about what the ship can do as the equipment you put on it when the full universe launches. Right now it's all about the ship, but pretty soon I'm sure the parts you have will become the bigger indicator of how good a ship is (power plant, avionics, sensors, etc...).

 

[staticneuron]

Quick question: I bought in at the beginning (#68041) and since then I upgraded my Freelancer to a Super Hornet when it became available. Before the game actually opens up officially, is it still possible for me to melt this down and choose another ship to start with? The SH seemed awesome at the time, but with feature and ship creep happening it might not be by the time the full universe opens.

It is possible to melt down any package and purchase another. If you have LTI you might not want to.

There is no ship or feature creep. All the ships are role based. The super hornet is a heavy hitter. For a single pilot it may be the most sturdiest and hardest hitting ship out there but not the most agile. The only recently announced ship that is similar in class is the sabre. And that ship seemingly is weaker but more agile and stealthy.

Most other ships outside of fighters are dedicated to jobs. Exploration, mining, salvage, repair, mechanics, merchants, and transportation for example. So the idea isn't what ship is better in terms of a stat comparison, it is more about what is better for what type of experience you are looking for.

 

[Raticus79]

Looks like they sorted out that grid bug and are getting ready for another update today. Another long update post:
https://forums.robertsspaceindustries.com/discussion/302630/2-0-0-ptu-update-dec-9-2015

Hi everyone!!

As we’ve been hammering away at 2.0.0 on PTU, we’ve seen some massive improvements in the past couple of weeks!

Most obvious to all have been the persistent crash/CTD issues that prevent a lengthy playsession, but we’ve got good news: Chris Roberts and Sean Tracy discovered a major bug – it’s true, they’re Bugsmashers, too! – that’s a source of many of the problems. We’re testing a much more stable build right now, which will be a candidate for another PTU push today.

We talked last week a bit about the items we wanted to address for 2.0 to get to the Live service, so here’s an update on those.

• Several fixes for framerate and game server bottleneck issues have gone in, resulting in massively improved gameplay experiences. We’ll continue to work on additional improvements.
• We’ve made several fixes to GIM disconnections and assorted dedicated game server and client crashes. We have found a series of Code 7 crashes that we are tracking down, but some of the more nefarious Code 0s have been identified.
• We continue to work on the party system, and the reality is that it’s largely placeholder and a work in progress. We don’t anticipate this being ready for 2.0. Playing with your friends is absolutely crucial to the online experience, and we’ll be working to make this as intuitive as possible.
• We’ve resolved the annoying error message overlay that would not go away.
• We’re still working on SLI mode.
• We’ve updated the tiny Chat UI (this was really a problem on 4K monitors).
• We’ve fixed the scenario where destroying small ships with a physics grid would render a character stuck in an unplayable state on respawning.
• We continue to research and work on damage states in multiplayer games.
• We’ve fixed players getting stuck in their respawn rooms when in the seat or turret of a multicrew ship that gets destroyed.
• We’ve updated and fixed various spawn points issues, including wrong locations.
• EMP distortion damage now has a tangible effect.
• We’re continuing to work on the transition of players from zero g to gravity zones where a player character can fall and take damage or suffer lost functionality.
• We’ve got a fix in the automatic landing of an Andromeda; it works but currently is not being repaired.
• Main thrusters are still missing on the 350R.
• We’ve made several fixes to the main menu, particularly the infinite load screen for Arena Commander. We’ll regress this issue when we turn Arena Commander back on for PTU.
• We’ve settled the issue of top speeds fluctuating in IFCS/SCM modes.
• We’ve fixed the issue of ships not regaining mass after repairs.
• We’re now also working on the prevention of item use from outside ships.

Lots of stuff in here! So much of this is due to your efforts in helping us find these problems, and this has truly been a team effort of everyone involved in making the BDSSE.

Thanks everyone, see you in 2.0!
- Will Leverett

Nice to see that SLI's on the table at least.

 

[LucidMomentum]

Nice to see that SLI's on the table at least.

Purchase justified.

Well, once VR starts really utilizing SLi...

 

[Daedardus]

Looks like they sorted out that grid bug and are getting ready for another update today. Another long update post:
https://forums.robertsspaceindustries.com/discussion/302630/2-0-0-ptu-update-dec-9-2015



Nice to see that SLI's on the table at least.

Chris Roberts is da man, our lord and savior.

 

[Shy]

So, when 2.0 goes live, will the baby PU part of it only be available to people with alpha slots. ? and and for everyone else, it will be just multi-crew ships in arena commander. ?

Sorry for the dumb question.

 

[Danthrax]

So, when 2.0 goes live, will the baby PU part of it only be available to people with alpha slots. ? and and for everyone else, it will be just multi-crew ships in arena commander. ?

Sorry for the dumb question.

If you're allowed to play Arena Commander, you'll probably be allowed to play the baby PU.

 

[Shy]

If you're allowed to play Arena Commander, you'll probably be allowed to play the baby PU.

Ahh, thanks. I was just wondering when the Alpha slots kick in.

 

[Rephin]

Ahh, thanks. I was just wondering when the Alpha slots kick in.

They've gotten rid of Alpha access and gave everyone access to everything since Gamescom. It's just PTU that's invitational right now. All the Alpha backers got compensated. Once 2.0 goes public, everyone goes in (and CIG servers die harder lol).

 

[Shy]

They've gotten rid of Alpha access and gave everyone access to everything since Gamescom. It's just PTU that's invitational right now. All the Alpha backers got compensated. Once 2.0 goes public, everyone goes in (and CIG servers die harder lol).

Ahhhh, i didn't know about that. What did we (alpha slot peeps) get for compensation. ?

 

[Rephin]

Ahhhh, i didn't know about that. What did we (alpha slot peeps) get for compensation. ?

IIRC it was 10,000 UEC. People who had to buy an Arena Commander pass for $5 got credited with $5.

 

[Shy]

IIRC it was 10,000 UEC. People who had to buy an Arena Commander pass for $5 got credited with $5.

Ahhhh, neato.

 

[Zalusithix]

Once 2.0 goes public, everyone goes in (and CIG servers die harder lol).

If servers were living things, they'd be classified as undead by the time 2.0 goes live.

I hope CIG is keeping track of the crash count for some postmortem after they've stabilized things. It would be interesting to see how many thousands of times the community managed to kill them along with a plot of crashes per day/patch.

 

[Lutherian]

Asking a few questions for thoses you are on the PTU 2.0 Alpha :

- Can you finally customize your avatar / character ?

- Does the PNJ looks more or less alive than the 1.3 Planetside Social thing ? The video of the "Discover the Planetside !" seems to be tons of bullshit (why is there no PNJ talking, moving, and terrible lifeless models ?).

- Is there any real Graphics Configuration panel ? I can't believe that you still CAN'T make a custom preset in the settings. Forcing players to have blur everywhere / special effects you don't want or drain FPS is perfectly stupid, especially for a game that claims "I AM A PC GAME".

Thanks in advance.