One of the things about PG Terrain is that they already planned it, but for some reason, some had the belief they would hand-craft everything. The current dev process on PG shows what they wanted to do, the best of both worlds. Call it... "Hand-Crafted PG".
This is completely false.
Originally the game was going to be 100% handcrafted with everybody proclaiming PG was for cheapskates, that it was boring and samey etc. The only thing CIG said was if they reached X amount of funding they would do some research into the viability of PG.
Originally the game was going to be 100% handcrafted with everybody proclaiming PG was for cheapskates, that it was boring and samey etc. The only thing CIG said was if they reached X amount of funding they would do some research into the viability of PG.
The original game did not had anything else but around 10 (or less?) landing zones like Arccorp, no planets or anything, was just a map loading in a believable matter. The very original vision did not need PG.
But the scope has grown up to that R&D Stretch Goal. One can't say what they are doing today is what they wanted to 100% hand-craft before, different scopes.
Originally the game was going to be 100% handcrafted with everybody proclaiming PG was for cheapskates, that it was boring and samey etc. The only thing CIG said was if they reached X amount of funding they would do some research into the viability of PG.
Incorrect.
Nothing definite was said back then either way ... not handcrafted, not PG ... certainly nothing about it "being all 100 % handcrafted".
That "everybody proclaiming PG to be boring" was referring to the problem of PG games often having only minimal storylines. That very quickly they feel empty and that there is no need or motivation to explore the OTHER 99.9999999999 % of the universe one has not seen yet.
With later Stretch Goals more modularity and more PG was added to SC, as it became clearer that a lot more zones/systems would be added to the game.
Procedural generation research was the $41 million stretch goal. There are no planets after that amount, the research was not even going to be about the viability of PG for planets, it was going to be for stuff in space. It was one of the main things they touted about the project, how it was all going to be hand-crafted and hand placed etc to avoid getting the been-here-seen-this-before look.
I assume that housing came up - it is one of those topics after all - and CR gave an answer. The end.
I find this silly. Since Gamescon we know that. Actually since 2014 back then when PG planets where stuff that was to go through R&D still, this was already a given possibility.
Erin Roberts has talked about this, Brian Chambers as well, several engineers on a CIG panel on Germany on a Q&A have talked about the design and plans on this.
When you see the actual devs on stuff as engineering talking about this feature then yeah, this is something they have design docs on and the idea on how to make it happen.
Let me rephrase slightly.
"I assume that housing came up in the interview. The topic of housing frequently comes up in interviews whatever the game. CR gave an answer. The end."
If they just went with the already available information it would be a pretty short interview. "Hi Chris the information is all out there?" "Sure." The end!
Procedural generation research was the $41 million stretch goal. There are no planets after that amount, the research was not even going to be about the viability of PG for planets, it was going to be for stuff in space. It was one of the main things they touted about the project, how it was all going to be hand-crafted and hand placed etc to avoid getting the been-here-seen-this-before look.
And that ideology is STILL present, you see PG around SC, but it's still the artists that literally hand-craft the planets, PG is just providing the scale, so are their editor tools scaled for it.
The original vision was just some areas like Arccorp, hence it was called the "Social Module". This is why I mentioned the different scopes.
the research was not even going to be about the viability of PG for planets, it was going to be for stuff in space.
Nope.
"Procedural Generation R&D Team – This stretch goal
will allocate funding for Cloud Imperium to develop procedural
generation technology for future iterations of Star Citizen. Advanced
procedural generation will be necessary for creating entire planets
worth of exploration and development content. A special strike team of
procedural generation-oriented developers will be assembled to make this
technology a reality."
Comments
This is completely false.
Originally the game was going to be 100% handcrafted with everybody proclaiming PG was for cheapskates, that it was boring and samey etc.
The only thing CIG said was if they reached X amount of funding they would do some research into the viability of PG.
But the scope has grown up to that R&D Stretch Goal. One can't say what they are doing today is what they wanted to 100% hand-craft before, different scopes.
Nothing definite was said back then either way ... not handcrafted, not PG ... certainly nothing about it "being all 100 % handcrafted".
That "everybody proclaiming PG to be boring" was referring to the problem of PG games often having only minimal storylines. That very quickly they feel empty and that there is no need or motivation to explore the OTHER 99.9999999999 % of the universe one has not seen yet.
With later Stretch Goals more modularity and more PG was added to SC, as it became clearer that a lot more zones/systems would be added to the game.
Have fun
"I assume that housing came up in the interview. The topic of housing frequently comes up in interviews whatever the game. CR gave an answer. The end."
If they just went with the already available information it would be a pretty short interview.
"Hi Chris the information is all out there?" "Sure." The end!
The original vision was just some areas like Arccorp, hence it was called the "Social Module". This is why I mentioned the different scopes.
"Procedural Generation R&D Team – This stretch goal will allocate funding for Cloud Imperium to develop procedural generation technology for future iterations of Star Citizen. Advanced procedural generation will be necessary for creating entire planets worth of exploration and development content. A special strike team of procedural generation-oriented developers will be assembled to make this technology a reality."
Note the operative word here : "planets"
https://robertsspaceindustries.com/funding-goals
Have fun