The broader gaming community often perceives it as a scam, criticizing it for its long development timeline, delays, monetization model, and ongoing technical issues.

That’s because it is a scam, full stop. The game will never leave alpha. It’s been 13 years, what you see is all you’re gonna get. They’ll keep releasing several hundred dollar ship “DLC”s every year or so just to keep the money flowing, but they’ll never deliver a finished product. Damn shame too.

900 million USD and 13 years of development and they still don't have the single player linear story game Squadron 42 released.

The visuals were absolutely crazy 10 years ago and are starting to look dated today. They've gone over and reinvented the wheel several times, including using a game engine that was never meant for online play.

The only thing that is keeping this level of incompetence afloat is the shit ton of money that people keep pouring into this. Previously Roberts had some executive that would kick him off a project if he got too... ambitious. But now he's in full control of his project and... Well... For the first, and ONLY, time ever I take the side of the executives.

I generally wonder, how the hell can you get almost a billion dollars and still not have a functioning product after 13 years?

Everyone here should go to YouTube and watch the investigative journalism docu “Sunk Cost Galaxy”. It’s EXCELLENT. I think the dude making it had to stop because of legal threats, but the parts that are out are VERY enlightening.

The funniest thing is that 13 years and $900 M later, they still don't have a working economy or even a basic balance concept. They have 200+ ships (many in JPEG form for over a decade) in their cash shop they've thought about beyond flashes sales videos and 3D assets.

I keep watching YouTube content about the game every few years, just to keep up with what's going on. Once the game hits 1.0, has all the rave reviews, and changes gaming forever, I'll put in money.

Damn, a lot of hate for a game no one apparently plays

I backed the Kickstarter back in 2012 or so. Maybe I'll be able to play it when I retire :D

The grift is the buisness now

...and still isn't worth a cock in cold water.

"Record breaking" is not necessarily a good thing.

In totally unrelated news Everspace 2 and Rebel Galaxy have been great additions to my Steam Library.

Picked up the latter for like 3 dollars on the latest Steam sale.

Tried a free weekend of Star Citizen a year ago.

It was awful.

Everything, and I mean everything, was insanely tedious. The UI/inventory was god awful. The movement felt clunky. There were bugs galore. The learning curve was extreme.

Initially the scale and visuals drew me in, but then I started experiencing all the awful and couldn't believe I was playing something with over a decade of development.

Major pass on this one.

I remember watching the first trailer they released more than a decade ago and thinking wow, those are some nice graphics and I am a sucker for space stuff. But at the time, my 1080ti didn't look powerful enough for such a game.

Then some 4 years ago or so, with a brand new 3080Ti there was a free weekend to try the game and, after cranking every setting to max, what I remember is, wow these graphics are outdated AF and it is a stutter fest. Uninstalled after a couple hours never to think about it again.

I was more excited about Squadron 42. I backed it a decade ago. Been waiting. Download and installed it a few months ago. Couldn't even get it to launch. Gave up. I have written it off as a lose and moved on.

How have I never even heard about this game?

I put in £30 early on almost a pound per year at this point