[Luis Dias]

That's an entirely different game design. The whole theme is to be inside this moving bunker. And each mode of "watching" is actually superior to Star Citizen's.

[Phantom Hoover]

Here, for comparison, is a screenshot of Elite: Dangerous' cockpit/HUD:



Note how it too has a big block taking up the bottom of the screen, but the geniuses at Frontier used this otherwise useless space for the bulk of the HUD, which as a bonus now has a reliably contrasting background. In the rest of the screen, where the universe is, they put in a few small struts and the weapon information.

It's not hard to do this stuff right. CIG are getting it consistently wrong because of chronic mismanagement.

[Akalabeth Angel]

That's an entirely different game design. The whole theme is to be inside this moving bunker. And each mode of "watching" is actually superior to Star Citizen's.

Yeah, it was a joke.

Also you're missing a very possible aspect of game development, the fact that the cockpit is intentionally large to enable better frame rates. If the game has less to render, the GPU has less to render, ensuring better performance, and so forth. It's an ongoing cheat used on consoles for games like COD where they use large models and small FOVs.

I know that Star Citizen is going for no holds barred development but presumably they also don't want to release a janky looking video with frame drops every half second.

[Turambar]

I'm expecting to have a VR set by the time I'm playing Star Citizen. 

[Phantom Hoover]

Too bad Star Citizen's going to be **** on VR because of the obsession with headbob and letterbox helmets.

e: Also VR doesn't compensate for **** cockpit visibility; why do you think real fighter jets have big unobstructed glass bubbles?

[Aesaar]

Too bad Star Citizen's going to be **** on VR because of the obsession with headbob and letterbox helmets.

e: Also VR doesn't compensate for **** cockpit visibility; why do you think real fighter jets have big unobstructed glass bubbles?

CIG's focus on realism and verisimilitude is applied to the most nonsensical things.  Rather than design sensible, realistic helmets, CIG intentionally designed stupid helmets just so they'd obscure the edges of the screen, even though that helmet, used by an actual person, would almost completely obscure his/her peripheral vision (because screens have much smaller FoV than human eyes do).  These are helmets designed for CQB environments:




This is a consistent thing with SC.  Simulate reality, but only halfway.

Helmets obscure vision in real life, so helmets are designed to maximise visibility.   SC forgets that last part.  Helmets designed to obscure narrow screen FoV.  CIG create very poorly designed helmets that would never get accepted IRL because they destroy visibility and therefore situational awareness. 

End result: Less realistic than if they'd left the feature out entirely.


Headbobbing.  Non-issue in real life.  It happens, but your brain filters it out.  SC forgets that last part.   CIG write a complex stabilization engine that sorta smooths it out, but it's still an issue.

End result: less realistic than if they'd left out the feature entirely.


Cockpits are visible in real life, so fighters are designed to maximize cockpit visibility.  SC forgets that last part.  Most ships, even military fighters, have zero rear visibility, fairly mediocre side visibility, and okayish front visibility.  Test pilots would ***** about this nonstop IRL, fighters probably wouldn't get accepted into service because of compromised situational awareness.  To add to this, the cockpit glass in SC is stated to be just as strong as the hull.  It isn't even a weakspot because CIG don't want pilot snipes (this makes the helmets stupid too). 

End result: less realistic than if they'd left out the feature entirely.

Addendum: the F-35 was designed with external cameras which, combined with the helmet, allow the pilot to basically look through the plane.  It doesn't work all that well ATM (like everything else about the F-35), but the point remains.  In 10 or 20 years, cockpit visibility could be a complete non-issue.


I'm tempted to go on because there's even more, but I'm tired, so I'll leave it there.


It's semi-realism.  Just enough to adversely affect gameplay, not enough to actually make sense.


EDIT: I lied. I just couldn't leave this one out because it's hilarious:

Women can wear heels, but they can also not wear heels.  SC forgets that last part.  CIG want women to be able to wear heels, but they don't want to be unrealistic and use the same animations for both, so they made all women wear heels all the time.  (Third last post on the page if post link doesn't work)

End result: lol.

[CT27]

Is the single player game Roberts is producing (called "Squadron 42" IIRC) having problems too?

[Aesaar]

Is the single player game Roberts is producing (called "Squadron 42" IIRC) having problems too?

Yes, it was originally meant to be released in Nov. 2014.  Then last year they said that it'd be released in Fall 2015.

[CT27]

last year they said that it'd be released in Fall 2015.

...and look at where we are now right?

[The E]

Also you're missing a very possible aspect of game development, the fact that the cockpit is intentionally large to enable better frame rates. If the game has less to render, the GPU has less to render, ensuring better performance, and so forth. It's an ongoing cheat used on consoles for games like COD where they use large models and small FOVs.

That's not what's happening here though. In ye olde days (like early Wing Commander olde), the cockpit stuff was there so that you could restrict 3D rendering to only a small part of the screen, but in SC, everything you see on screen goes through the 3D pipeline. They're not going to get a framerate increase by rendering cockpits.

[666maslo666]

Again, one or two missed deadlines is no big deal.  Every deadline being missed is a big deal because it says very bad things about how competent management is.  Sure, no one would care about missed deadlines if the game was good, but if the management is incompetent, the game isn't terribly likely to be good.

I dont agree with that, once game development begins to slip, it is likely you will miss every single deadline, because time adds up. The important part is not how many deadlines they missed, it is how much time did they miss them by. If it is by less than 1-2 years (for a total development time of 4-5 years), I can still forgive them as long as the final product is good.

[Phantom Hoover]

If one deadline slips you can update the subsequent deadlines to account for that. CIG have done this constantly and they still miss the updated deadlines.

[Spoon]

Also you're missing a very possible aspect of game development, the fact that the cockpit is intentionally large to enable better frame rates. If the game has less to render, the GPU has less to render, ensuring better performance, and so forth. It's an ongoing cheat used on consoles for games like COD where they use large models and small FOVs.

That's not what's happening here though. In ye olde days (like early Wing Commander olde), the cockpit stuff was there so that you could restrict 3D rendering to only a small part of the screen, but in SC, everything you see on screen goes through the 3D pipeline. They're not going to get a framerate increase by rendering cockpits.

Last time I played WC3 (a year or 3 ago), disabling the cockpit actually gave an incredibly significant increase in frames per second. With cockpit on it would chug along at sub 20 fps.

[The E]

Huh, that's interesting.

[Luis Dias]

Here, for comparison, is a screenshot of Elite: Dangerous' cockpit/HUD:



Note how it too has a big block taking up the bottom of the screen, but the geniuses at Frontier used this otherwise useless space for the bulk of the HUD, which as a bonus now has a reliably contrasting background. In the rest of the screen, where the universe is, they put in a few small struts and the weapon information.

It's not hard to do this stuff right. CIG are getting it consistently wrong because of chronic mismanagement.

That's an interesting comparison. Notice how the frame structure of the front windows are thinner and allow a much more fluid understanding of the entire left-right field of view (You can draw a straight line between one edge of the screen to the other without being encumbered by the ship's structure. And you're correct, they placed their HUDs in the correct places, except for two overlays on both the left and the right, which sit on top of.... the very frame structure I was talking about, so to minimize impact on what's seen outside.


I still think it's visually crowded. They could have perfectly downsized the cockpit framework and the below parts. A comparison with my previous screenshot follows:



2 073 600 pixels the same.
~ 852 400 pixels encumbered by the structure of the ship.
~ 40 000 pixels in overlays over the windows.

That means 41% of the pixels are the ship's structure (compared to 44% of Star Citizen). It's not that different a number, but it feels better designed because most of it draws a horizontal line at the bottom which is much nicer in terms of visual design, and the framework on top is way way thinner, giving the impression of continuity between the windows.

2% are spent on overlays on top of those windows, compared with 12% on Star Citizen. This might vary according to missions, etc.

Unencumbered we have then 57% of the screen real estate to watch the sky, compared with the piss poor 44% of Star Citizen. And there's no 8.5% window at the middle of the screen where you have to figure almost everything out in it.

[666maslo666]

That means 41% of the pixels are the ship's structure (compared to 44% of Star Citizen).

You see, it is not a significant difference. So I find complaints about SC cockpits unfounded, at least in contrast to Elite. And we would have to analyze more ships to really get to the truth. Per ship cockpit variation is probably going to be high both in Elite and in SC, so it is hard to judge just from one example.

Where I do see an issue are those FPS helmets. Field of view seems far too restricted on them. Probably an issue of Chris chasing after muh immersion while forgetting about realism.

[The E]

That means 41% of the pixels are the ship's structure (compared to 44% of Star Citizen).

You see, it is not a significant difference. So I find complaints about SC cockpits unfounded, at least in contrast to Elite. And we would have to analyze more ships to really get to the truth. Per ship cockpit variation is probably going to be high both in Elite and in SC, so it is hard to judge just from one example.

Numerically, it isn't. In terms of how it feels though? Every single E:D cockpit feels spacious, giving you a good overview of the space you're in. SC, by comparison, makes things feel cramped and tiny, and actually overloaded in terms of the information presented. Think of it like this: E:D gives you what you need, SC gives you what it thinks you want.

And SC is pretty much wrong about that.

[Phantom Hoover]

You see, it is not a significant difference. So I find complaints about SC cockpits unfounded, at least in contrast to Elite. And we would have to analyze more ships to really get to the truth. Per ship cockpit variation is probably going to be high both in Elite and in SC, so it is hard to judge just from one example.

There's very little variation in E:D, just the model of the dashboard and the exact placement of the struts. Anyway, the percentages are irrelevant: the difference is in the use of screen space. Star Citizen has a big block of obstruction right in the middle of the screen, where the player's attention is focused, and puts the clear views off at either side where they're then just a background to the HUD. The obstructed area at the bottom of the screen is just a blank model, there's no useful information there.

If I had to sum up Star Citizen's design in one word it would be thoughtless.

[General Battuta]

*hundreds of individually modeled panels and switches light up*

Yes, immersion. Immerse me

*gloves creak with physically based fabric tension*

I will paw lovingly at the controls. Immerse me. LEt the immersion rise up over my knees and lap against my balls

*an optometrist's helmet with 40000 pinhole sized lenses seals over my head*

Switches. Buttons. More. More HUD. Turn every switch with paralyzed paddle hands until I Activate HUD. The immersion is so warm....

*blinding neon technoflash swarms and spins over all the cockpit glass, immersion splashes over my helmet. everything begins to short circuit and catch on fire*

YESSSssssssss it's like being in the WOMB. I can smell it through my micropore simulated RSI helmet filters. It smells like mother

*my body begins to dissolve into the sea of immersion as the fire spreads*

I'm going home

[General Battuta]

We are boarding the Huhn ship. They charge at us with their katanas screaming 'ten million years' and only a wall of hyperlead from our M2 Garind assault rifles can stop them!

As I take up firing position my model's left toe crunches against a wall. A huge mistake! I will be rightfully punished for failing to treat my avatar as a real person in real space! My character pauses to play a stagger animation and a gorgeously lip-synced howl of pain captured from the voice of major Hollywood actor Rocco Siffredi. Should've pre-ordered the ADRENAL SYSTEM SIMULATOR PACK I think as my Full Immersion Jumpsuit calculates the correct amount of nausea and humiliation to inflict and begins to punch me in the dick