Star Citizen

[Ivan2006]

If Shadowcat had SC, he'd be very welcome in the FCIA. He seems quite devoted to the cause of the Great Aye-Aye Overlord.

[Shadowcatbot]

If Shadowcat had SC, he'd be very welcome in the FCIA. He seems quite devoted to the cause of the Great Aye-Aye Overlord.

If the cheapest price to get in wasn't like $40 then maybe, but I think il wait till it drops.

[Ivan2006]

It will drop down to 30$.
There is already a package of that price. And that one gets you more than buying it when it's done.

[Error]

Bear in mind that gets you the cheapest-ass spaceship you ever did see.

[Ivan2006]

Bear in mind that gets you the cheapest-ass spaceship you ever did see.

It gets you a slightly-less cheap-ass spaceship than if you buy the game after release.
(with the 30$ package, you get an Aurora MR and some ingame cash; if you get it after release for the same 30$, you start with an Aurora ES (slightly lower stats everywhere) and a debt.)

[Shadowcatbot]

So the whole game is P2W?
Nope.

[Error]

Pay to Play; it's a buy-once getup unless you want to add more money to your pledge.

When you buy a sheep, you're putting money towards development. So there's that. But AFAIK it won't be free to play / pay to win.

[Ivan2006]

So the whole game is P2W?
Nope.

Actually no.
They are doing the best possible to eliminate P2W.
You buy once and get the game, and from there you can get basically anything in-game without injecting further money.
"ship buying" is only possible during the backing campaign, and the better stuff you get for the same price now is basically a "thank you" for helping to fund the game.
You can also get anything you buy now in-game later, even those "limited edition" sales they are doing are freely available in-game.
The better ship is the starting condition, not the only thing you're gonna fly for the whole game. Sorry if I phrased stuff confusingly.
But yea, you can start with a better ship, some cash and no debt if you buy it now instead of when it's "out".

[Error]

So I melted my 315p in favour of an Avenger; TIL exploration is a rather saturated area of the game.

Besides, Avenger's more multipurpose. So there's that.

[Archduke Daynel, PhD]

Right, I'm getting more into SC and even read this whole thread.
I kind of agree with Shadow about it being P2W to some extent, seeing as how people with lotsa monies have one hell of an advantage. Unlike most P2Ws, however, in this one it is actually possible to work your way up, which does make the ships more worth it, don't you think?

Besides, as P2Ws go, this one seems hella good.

[Error]

Well, considering a Connie Phoenix is $400 and a Hornet could probably whip its ass with a decent pilot, more expensive ship =/= better starting position.

That said, early buy-in is a tad P2W, but hey, if you complete SQ42 before entering the PU, you get paid and have a UEE Navy record and shit. So yey.

[Ivan2006]

Well, MMOs have always faced the problem of either being P2W or P2P if they want to keep their servers up, so you can't really expect any MMO to be neither, simply because of money reasons.
What Star Citizen does is actually concern themselves with balancing P2W. Yes, it is P2W, but the point is that P2W is an option. Yes, early buyers will get advantages by paying hella money, but on the other hand this early "buying in" is what allows them to fund the game 100% on crowdfunding, keeping any outside publishers or big sponsors out of the game, which allows them to make the overall game better because aforementioned producers don't give them any rules that end up causing the game to become worse than it could be.

[Iv121]

Well problem is that by doing it they already play by their rules with some big companies dictating them or without em, what you see there is NOT an idie, some would say you shouldn't expect it to behave like other crowd founded indies because of it however P2W is P2W ...

[Error]

It is indie; independently made. No publisher.

And yes, the early-backers is a P2W thing. That said, you pay far more than powt-release buyers for the advantages you get. So it balances out; not like buying a roflpwn ship and killing everything immediately. As I said before; the most expensive single ship in the game currently is a nigh-useless luxury ship.

[Iv121]

An indie is something beyond a dictionary definition Error just like 90% of what makes up our world, in our case we talk about a movement, and approach to game making, it has its own philosophies and Im afraid that is why Star Citizen doesn't fit in. It also has much MUCH more money than most indies, it doesn't even fall in the same category gameplay wise. What you see there is more or less traditional game release philosophy with sophisticated pre-order options with early P2W included.