Star Citizen ’s Reverse The Verse just premiered a few hours ago, and we’ve got a recap of the highlights. Foundry 42 Studio Director Erin Roberts made a rare on-camera appearance to discuss fan questions related to space combat, female character models, 3.1 and a whole lot more.
Here’s a quick summary of everything featured in this week’s episode:
Weekly Event Recap
- Star Citizen alpha 3.0 is out, so you can play it right now.
- Additional tickets for the private Concierge Event were made available but are likely sold out by the time you read this. Luckily, there will be a video diary of some kind for those who can’t attend.
- Latest subscriber ship is the Retaliator Bomber
- Subscriber survey will change perks
- Subscriber-specific tour of LA and Derby offices is happening. Tickets will be discussed in future newsletters.
- Thursday’s ATV
- Calling all Devs show begins Monday with Q&A from qualified devs.
Erin Roberts Interview
- The studio analyzes the large holiday audience, takes feedback and uses it to plan the rest of the year.
- Builds can be made in about an hour now. This is three or four times faster than in the past.
- Roberts says “we’re still building a company and a game,” so there’s still lots of work to be done on a fundamental level.
- Alpha 3.0 doesn’t feature as much as the studio would’ve liked. Certain features, like jobs and the revised damage system, simply weren’t ready for primetime.
- Last year was all about laying down the technical framework in 3.0. Now that we have that, it’s time to get feedback.
- The new quarterly release model will be date-driven not feature-driven. This means launches will actually be predictable. One or two features may slip to the next quarter, but the intent is to deliver on the vast majority of promises. The studio is actively trying to make its predictions better by taking on content in smaller chunks.
- 3.1 is all about solidifying 3.0 to make it faster. It will have a better main UI and combat UI, fixes for economy exploits and the first phase of the Service Beacon feature. Roberts mentioned a February release for 3.1, but the latest production report says March.
- Space combat: Things like thruster adjustments and slowing down movement speed made combat more visceral and challenging. In the future, the hope is to make physics and flight AI better. Tweaks will be part of 3.1, but it’s constantly evolving.
- Squadron 42 : Sam Wittwer of Days Gone wants to be in the game. Some cinematic elements of Squadron will end up in the PU.
- The Delta Patcher is most effective for Evocati and PTU testers, but, beyond the four quarterly updates, it will also be used to push smaller patches to the live community too.
- Blind Jumps: It’s still being decided what do do with those. They’re fine in theory but could potentially be exploited in game-breaking ways. The current warp point system encourages exploration. Blind jumps could return but not for now.
- Female character model is still happening, and you’ll be able to customize her just as much as the male model.
Wrap Up
- The LA studio has a Fan Cave full of fan art. 12x16 size works best for submissions.
- Chris Roberts will read anything on the teleprompter.
Those are the major developments from the first RTV. Come back on Tuesday for our recap of Calling All Devs and read our ATV recap while you wait!
Star Citizen is in alpha for project backers on PC.
What do you think of Reverse The Verse? Will CIG be able to deliver on its 3.1 and quarterly release promises? Tell us in the comments section!
