‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game • Hacker News Board

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#231

Post by yborg » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 6:39 PM UTC

wiz21c wrote: post #23

if I was RSI with that much money, I'd say : "let's never finish the game, we got plenty of money to live on for years, making cool tech demo's"...

At this point what they're selling is the story of the making of an MMO space opera game, and there are clearly many people that enjoy this tale enough to keep paying for installments of it. Indeed, like Lord, they are actually participating in the drama, so it's even interactive.

It would be a lot more straightforward for RSI to have made a mobile pay-to-win game like Clash, etc. that make even more money than Star Citizen has pulled in in a lot less time. I think they meant well in the beginning, but at this point there's pretty much zero need for them to ever ship a finished game.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#232

Post by ABCLAW » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 6:40 PM UTC

s73v3r_ wrote: post #225

ajross wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the public service of justice is slow and expensive, we need to fix the public service, The public service (small claims court) was present and used. He just didn't get the result he wanted. It's not like the "public service of justice" was evaded. He got a hearing . The judge (a real judge!) said the arbitration clause was enforceable. So he lost. In court. Having exercised his constitutional right to petition…

No, he did not get his constitutional right to petition his government for redress. He was denied this because a company added a clause forcing people to go into the private justice system. A clause that never, ever, ever should be enforceable, because it is entirely unconscionable. The system did NOT work.

Yes he did.

He was denied his right to redress because the judge thought the case wasn't worth enough to be worth his time, wrote a very dismissive ruling and then hoped it wouldn't be appealed so his shitty ruling wouldn't be torn apart.

This isn't a 'the sky is falling' situation. This is a judge cutting a corner to get to cases he views as more important.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#233

Post by ensignavenger » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 6:43 PM UTC

gwern wrote: post #112

cornholio wrote: post #66

He lost because of a forced arbitration clause. This massive privatization of justice where any boilerplate service or product now comes with forced arbitration is making my blood boil. The justice system should always be an option when arbitration fails, and arbitration should take no more than a reasonable time to fail (say, two weeks for this $5000 amount). The whole point of a small claims court is to handle such…

I'm more disturbed by the parts of the article which say that he never agreed to a forced arbitration clause in the first place because it wasn't in the ToS when he paid, but the judge decided to go with the later ToS anyway: > According to Lord, the terms of service when he made the initial pledge aren’t the same terms of service they are today. The original terms of service, according to RSI’s own records, make no…

It sounds like a case of a small claims judge ruling in favor of a defendant simply because the defendant had a lawyer, and the plaintiff did not. Of course, there may be more to this story, but in general, lawyers almost always get preferential treatment to non-lawyers in court. That is sad state of affairs.

The plaintiff can still appeal the case though, and stands a good chance of having the case heard, if the facts are as presented.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#234

Post by lykr0n » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 6:44 PM UTC

bduerst wrote: post #197

lykr0n wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got a HTC Vive when it came out. I spent close to a grand for it. When I set it up, got it working, and was able to play a game I thought "I'm happy I spent this money" after a couple of minutes. It's the same with Star Citizen. I've gotten enjoyment for my money. > There are better games for much less money. Yeah. And there are better cars out there than a Lamborghini. But I still want a Lamborghini because it's a…

This still sounds like rationalization. Lamborghini is a brand that has been built on a reputation and track record of supplying high-performance machines for decades. Cloud Imperium Games is just promises at this point.

There is nothing wrong with rationalizing, contrary to your tone. I'm explaining my thought process in response to a discussion.

> Cloud Imperium Games is just promises at this point.

Completely and utterly Wrong. There are alphas. They are doing everything they are saying they are. Delays? Sure, but they are (now) being transparent. You can buy a package, download, and play now.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#235

Post by panopticon » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 6:47 PM UTC

skohan wrote: post #108

raesene9 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me, Elite:Dangerous had a better model (although still not without it's troubles). They delivered the base game in reasonable order and have been iterating and adding content since then. Whilst the early game was pretty sparse in terms of content, at least it was delivered and reasonably complete.

I'm a huge fan in general of starting a project from a complete, well-polished core and growing outward gradually while maintaining quality. Once things get messy it's almost impossible to get back to that same level of refinement as if it was kept clean the whole time.

I imagine keeping the community interested, thriving, and paying for years of development is a tough nut to crack. Obviously it's not impossible (see Minecraft, Fortnite, etc), but the success ratio seems to be orders of magnitude lower than the traditional game development model.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#236

Post by Karunamon » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 6:55 PM UTC

pixl97 wrote: post #223

Karunamon wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what it seems like, most large companies tend to use the same few arbitration firms. JAMS and AAA come up often in the contracts I've read. How often does this "arbitrator shopping" actually happen? It's a complaint I hear often, but little in the way of data to support it. I have seen data to suggest that arbitrators rule often in the favor of the companies, but that could be a result of more people raising bul…

>om what it seems like, most large companies tend to use the same few arbitration firms Maybe the other arbitrators went out of business because they ruled on the consumer side. See: survivorship bias.

I'd love to see the data either way. "Arbitration is popular because it always screws the customer!" is a wonderful emotionally-evocative talking point, but that seems way too simplistic and pithy for me.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#237

Post by georgeecollins » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 7:00 PM UTC

lloydde wrote: post #200

I choked on my coffee when I read "Lord is a data scientist who works on developing AI for SAP—a data-processing company in Colorado." SAP as in the 90k employee German-based European multinational software corporation?!

That bugged me too. It makes me wonder about the quality of the journalism in other places.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#238

Post by thegginthesky » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 7:01 PM UTC

nottorp wrote: post #222

dejawu wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your skepticism is well-founded, but I'd like to put in a good word for Elite Dangerous. I bought it for $15 on sale long after the Kickstarter had ended and it constantly impresses me with its sense of scale and level of polish. Sometimes I'm amazed that game exists at all, let alone that it successfully came out of a Kickstarter. It's not for everyone but if the idea of "Euro Truck Simulator in space" appeals to yo…

Is it Euro Truck Simulator in space? Because I read some previews a couple years ago (multiplayer, mind) and they sounded like a clone of Eve: Online...

It definitely can be played as Euro Truck Simulator in space, but there's also a lot to do in terms of exploration, combat, missions and multiplayer. It's a game where nothing is really forced on you and you can play as you'd like.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#239

Post by s73v3r_ » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 7:04 PM UTC

serg_chernata wrote: post #38

I'm a backer and I have no problem with this. Many AAA titles take a decade or more from start to finish. For example, between Diablo 2 and 3. I want the best space sim and I like what RSI is doing. I'm not holding my breath, just living my life and when the game is finished I will be happy to play it. Although, I also did not drop 5 grand on this game.

"I'm a backer and I have no problem with this"

That's fine that you're happy with what they're doing. Other people aren't, and they should be able to get their money back when the direction went somewhere else.

Re: ‘Star Citizen’ Court Case Reveals the Messy Reality of Crowdfunding a $200M Game

#240

Post by everyone » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 7:04 PM UTC

zinckiwi wrote: post #2

I pledged a fraction of this fellow's total in Star Citizen, probably the lowest tier that would result in a digital copy of the game once complete. I was after a modern Privateer reboot, essentially, and figured it was worth the gamble. I haven't followed the development with anything more than a casual, occasional glance and accompanying eye-roll. I doubt I'll ever see anything come of it. A shame, not necessarily…

Its not feature creep that killed SC. I'm a game dev and I followed its development just out of sheer morbid curiosity.. Pretty much their entire process was fucked from the beginning, and they never corrected it. Its a huge case of 'Escalation of commitment' rather than feature creep, being the root cause.

At the very beginning Chris Roberts hired some artists to make a visual demo in Cryengine, to raise money. It worked, great! .. This is when they should have scrapped the demo, and hired a really great lead dev to plan out the full game. But, no, they kept building on this amateur Cryengine demo in a disorganized fashion and have been ever since.