Star Citizen Live Q&A: Distribution Centers
Transcript — every row opens the video at that moment
- 00:00:04
hi everybody Welcome to Star Citizen live our weekly behind the scenes discussion with developers about the making of Star Citizen in Squadron 42 I'm your host uh Posh Jared hucke I just learned that word Posh I comb my hair so I'm Posh uh on the show this week uh we have two members from our steam development team uh talking about distribution centers the big giant uh uh uh uh microcosms of all FPS related gameplay in the persistent universe that are coming online in Alpha 323 I like that word microcosm I I I forgot that I fed it to you during the ISC interview and then I used it in my hosting and then it's like in there twice and we doubled down on microcosm then like one of the comments was like what the this microc and I'm like look it up uh so yeah let's get to our guests uh we've got John and James
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John and James how you doing hello uh so you know every every show is somebody's first show so we're we're take a few minutes and introduce yourselves tell everybody who you are and what you do James you're in the you're in seat number one so we'll start with you James who are you what do you do for Star Citizen um I am James k um I am the lead content designer at cig um we work mostly well we work entirely on the Pu um mostly around missions but also there's some location setup stuff so we'll do like all the harvestables the mables and all the stuff behind the scenes uh to I guess make stuff work generally you said the lead content designer are you the only one yeah we've got other designers we've got other lead
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designers but I'm the lead content you're the only lead content designer think you're I think C curiously I looked at it I think there's only three people in the company that have the word content in their in their title yeah I'm one I'm one of them too are you yeah oh okay did you know yeah yeah that's awesome cool cool the other one Sean Tracy so so can't be perfect uh why am I giving Sean Tracy trash oh cuz Forest is here John tell everybody who you are and what you do for Star Citizen um so hello again uh my name is John Gus I'm lead environment artist for EU sandbox 2 and I've been I suppose guiding the ship that is distribution centers into existence and uh that's that's basically
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been why been doing yeah Reddit you heard it here first distribution centers are a ship so we'll get stats on that immediately just it's one on the ground that's huge that doesn't move um but lots going on um you've been working on distribution centers probably as close to the beginning as possible it's am I right everybody there's there's this thing in development called the product owner it's it's it's the person that that just kind of like if somebody else isn't around ask this person and you know if a decision has to be made real quickly you know go with what this person says until we can all think about it are you the product owner for distribution I am the product owner for DCS yeah we've never talked about this role this product owner role on the show
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before what did I get it right is there something is there something I left out about what a product owner does yeah it's a um is there someone I can speak to about DCS and they're not on my direct team they the message gets passed on my name gets passed to them and then they come into my inbox or on teams or what have you and then I have to try and answer whatever question they have and then at that point if I can't answer it I can at least recommend people to go to um but I also I know the location names I know what's at each location I you know I'm the knit all to most for to to some degree for DCS um which is quite good because you know I'm I'm quite you
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know reactive in I suppose conversation when stuff needs figuring out quickly I know where where the problem is um but it also means that I have a lot of information in my brain about this thing and then once it goes out I can forget all of that I was going to say keep John it's just yeah it's it's the minute it goes out patch goes out it's like okay onto the next thing well I should update the Confluence and then gosh I I don't I don't think I've seen an updated Confluence since 2014 but um all right so uh today's show is an is a Q&A show that's where we basically uh put a thread up on Spectrum which is our bespoke communications platform available at Roberts spased industries.com uh we let you submit your questions and then vote up on the which
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ones you want to see answer the most uh I let John and James collect the questions that they felt they were most capable of answering as always some questions just don't have answers at certain points in development you know we like to call that's a problem for future us or whatever but we did collect the questions that we felt we could answer uh today and so we'll jump into those so right off the bat uh here's here's a pretty I like I like the contentious attitude in this I'm going to try to read this the way I think this was written are these going to be just another copy paste like we have seen with bunkers or can we expect to see actual Variety in the building design yes I'll take that one um so yes and no so the main form the main structure that is going to look the same
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but there is going to there are Feathering assets uh around each DC um to make them all unique I suppose um some are going to be have quite a large footprint I mean it's a big thing on the ground anyway but it's there's going to be a bit more of a spread on some some of them and some of them are going to be smaller um but yes visually they will be different um from the exterior so that you do feel like you're going to a different place each time um also we have uh factions that own each one and that will be their branding will be on the building the the name of the place will be different um you know you'll go into the lobby and the brand you know that corporate facing area is going to be branded to
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that faction so that would be quite novel which be which would be nice um but they are not just a copy and paste of the same well even though I just said that uh they do feel different I would say when when you're flying to them and also they are you know some of them are where they are on the um on planets they're next to you know interesting features so hopefully you'll get a recognition of um oh this is the place on Stanton one because it's next to this lovely sea and the Sun never goes down oh I know the one you're talking about I'll meet you there type of thing which will be you know something that we actually thought about rather than just going one here one here one here you say stanta one you mean huren yes okay sorry no there's there's this thing you know here's a little
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actual behind the scenes truth stuff none of the developers here there's 11 1100 1200 actually know the names of the planets they all refer to them as Stanton one Stanton 1B Stanton 2 Stanton 3 and it's like I have spent a decade at this place like trying just trying to asss this all you you you mean this planet right nothing this it's cuz you know the development I would say the the file path is ston plus a number that's why I know it but on H and micr they'll be released yeah so so let's talk about that one of the questions and I think it's in here but we'll do it now uh people have asked where these are going in in uh in a 323 uh I think there's approximately 13ish 13 ofish uh where are they going is it just planets is it planets and
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moons so in this initial release it will just be planets um we we've considered having them on moons um but due to time constraints um we won't be releasing initially on moons um this is just because we need I believe that the the wings uh should be different when you're in a uh what was it like an airless atmosphere right you know the way you're interacting with cargo moving things around in zerog G is going to be different too when you're in gravity so because we don't have those things yet we won't be releasing them yet but so for the moment for this release planets only right and and when you say planets I assume that we can take out Crusader
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and we can take out our Crusader because there is no surface that we can reach and our court because it's the it's it's not it's not made in the same way that that HST did in uh micr so so these are 13 split amongst huren and Microtech for 323 yeah okay uh can we expect Missions at distribution centers to tie into other professions like Salvage mining medical Etc either in 323 or down the line in future patches I think down the line yeah certainly I think distribution centers are obviously an enormous location um and they needn't just stand alone on the surface there's no reason why potentially in the future they could
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have outlying structures that Supply them and house the people that work there um so they could be very large and with a large population there's a lot of scope for lots of different gaml so like salvaging like mining um expanding the delivery missions and the hauling missions so they they have more um more variety more scope um there's there's tons of stuff to do as well um so it's just like for me the 323 release of distribution centers it's like them in their most basic form you know this is where we start where we take it in the future it's yeah that's so much that's the first iteration we
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were talking about this before the show actually we're talking about you know you know ideas like uh the distri C Distribution Center was raided and like they don't they now they don't have the ore that they were supposed to have in stock in order to fulfill an order so they might send you out to go mine this or and bring it back and we're just going to put it in the box and pretend like it was always there you know or or or maybe the Distribution Center can uh can crank out some kind of um detritus you know not toxic waste but but but some kind of Refuge that then needs to be broken down like hey you know we could sure use help you know go in the back and you know and using Salvage you know break down all this you know excess garbage that we're producing through whatever it's like there's definitely opportunities to come up with additional Mission types and have it tie into other uh uh professions in the future um but for 323 it's basically the the the four
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kind of uh areas we talked about the uh the the can you remember what they were well there's the hauling um that's that's the major one they distribution centers after all so the the they tie into this New Hauling Loop so you're taking massive quantities of cargo between different places there's all the various um what you might call The Courier like the Box delivery missions um we're hoping to rework those somewhat so you're more of a um FedEx driver than you are now um so there's scope for those there's scope for delivery missions just internally these distribution centers are so large you can have delivery missions just inside them like taking the cargo from like say
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the storage room to the warehouse the warehouse to the freight terminal freight terminal to like um a little base like on the on the perimeters of of the of the center so there's there's tons and tons of scope for just you know moving stuff around Distributing stuff within the center you might say you said the word yeah I I I think there's there's a lot of Focus right now uh on combat right and stuff not just with distribution centers and the missions but Master modes and stuff like this um this happens naturally 323 is I mean what there there's no secret this is this is the patch where we bring a whole bunch of stuff from Squadron over and bring it into the Pu and it's I don't think I'm telling any Tales out of
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school to say that a lot of Squadron is very combat you you know focused so a lot of these features are going to be very combat focused uh your big questions you know after yesterday's Master modes episode we knew there were coming like you know how does this apply to non-combat ships there is a healthy and a vibrant and I think very I don't want thirsty is not the right word since that has a different contition but very hungry uh a a type of Star Citizen out there who's looking for more non-combat oriented things to do in the P so I think there's a lot there's a big hope that distribution centers uh yes we'll have some of that in 323 but going forward Beyond 3 323 might evolve to involve more non-combat opportunities and of course there were big questions about how PVP and PVE will intermix and everything and we'll get to that here in
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a bit but I I I think there's there there's a very healthy uh calling for that right now and I say this as there's an enormous Idris event going on right now where you can you know battle and potentially capture the Idris you should check that out go to the Roberts space.com website and read all about that if you haven't already because that just started just before the show um but yeah I it's obviously every a lot of things are very combat focused right now but I just want to I think there's there there's still a very healthy portion of people who are like I would like to be able to play this game without ever firing a gun if possible and there's still lots of things we can do to support that and to expand that uh next question uh I had never thought about this but this is kind of obvious are abandoned or derck distribution centers planned
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um not at the moment but I think going on the fact that there are rundown or abandoned versions of other locations there's no reason why we couldn't have versions of the DCS which were in the same category yeah yeah and then you could then have um DCS on in like pirate systems like pyro for example where they are kind of up for maybe it's a bit of a capture the flag type episode on it but with players you know that would be quite cool to have you know who owns this distribution center um does it change hands a lot are you then competing with um kind of more established factions in the game uh that would be pretty great but uh yeah right now we haven't got plans to do that but I don't see why we uh shouldn't do that in the future I mean we we you're right
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we do make abandoned or darl versions of everything else it's just I don't know things you know the these brand new things look cool and then you you you rough them up and you mess them up and they just they just seem just that much more real so I would be I would be very surprised if the call isn't made at some point yeah I think you know in the first release of anything he says thinking about pyro right now um you need an occupied version and then when you have that it's kind of like you've done all the setup already you're just making new overlays which then dress it in a a certain way so uh you know the hardest part is the initial release what we want but then after that it's it's still work to get these things done um but it's not I suppose as much work hopefully um I
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don't know it's it's it's it's you know I've seen when they were making the derc ships it's a lot of work to to break them up in a way that's not just crap to be complete yeah I suppose with ships though it's it's different because the ship is formed and they have to yet unform it whereas with us you know our base rooms already exist it's just new dressing on top of them you put some holes in there yeah um one of the things that got when we were showing it at citizen gone one of the things that really came through were uh there are roads in some of these things roads have been this like when we talk about like the top 10 oldest questions that keep coming up over and over again over the year roads are are are one of the the big ones it's you know we do have ground vehicles and they're all kind of off-roaders right now um this question
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says in the future is it planned to have distribution centers connected by a road network with smaller Outpost or settlements e possibly several kilometers away from in their surroundings yeah I don't see why not I don't think well I mean who knows it it could be that there's a Motorway from one to the next um but I think it depends on what the next you know location is you know if that's a big town or what have you then maybe you have roads within it but then it kind of turns into dirt road and then Blends back in the DCS or something like that um it would be cool to have you know this is where the DC is and then five clicks this way there's a small town five clicks this way it's like a um you know an or depository or something and and then
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you've got a kind of a link there to you could just spend your time just going between the three places um grabbing the cash as it were but yeah I don't see why not in the future to have roads it was interesting you know when I did the presentation at s and con yeah got a big woo for roads and I was kind of like okay didn't know this was a thing so um I'm looking forward to when people um you know start doing more races and you actually then have to go through maybe you have to go into the oh wait hold on no Sam said don't get vehicles in there so uh yeah may maybe you can incorporate some DCS into into those races um and then have fun at getting around those Corners quickly is all I'm going to
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say um next question here is a bit farther out for stuff but you know we'll we'll ask it and see what we get uh will the distribution centers ever be able to be uh operated and uh or held by organizations oh I'm I mean in the future I think yeah there's there's definitely um there's definitely opportunity for that um you could have it so that the organization that operates it is just the initial owner of the location and then really it could potentially just come down to Manpower who can actually defend it you know who who owns it is just like well who's got the biggest gun yeah I I I I think if I again when they when they when they talk
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about operate though I mean let like generate missions or like is there besides just I want to hold this and nobody else can have it you know is is there room here for the idea that that that these might be operable these might you know benefit an organization I I think I mean one thing that the Resource Network might eventually lead into is the opportunity to generate stuff you know the Distribution Center um it could for example if it's a gray cut Distribution Center it it could potentially manufacture things there's no reason why not um so if there's a player organization out there
- 00:20:20
which essentially owns this facility then they would have the you know de facto rights to manufacture that stuff but then that kind of bleeds into the question of well where do they get the materials from you can't manufacture things out out of thin air so you need a supply chain and obviously you need these things that you do manufacture they need to go somewhere so you need a buyer so it's this whole supply chain you you're just owning just owning the Distribution Center is just like one piece of the puzzle you know the well it's we're we're doing a bit of we're doing a bit of Theory crafting here right now the the the the nickel version of the answer is that there's no plan for it at this point but you know we do this we do the same Theory craftting
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that's where all ideas start from that's where all you know everything that gets put on the calendar everything that gets put into development starts with people like us in our room going well what if we did this and wouldn't it be cool if we did this and then and then you know some somebody says okay somebody Taps a producer and potential product own and says all right build me out of schedule and let's see how much time that would take how many resources would take and then you make the decision about whether that's going to go into active there I know that there are you know it's it's there are some people who don't like the theory crafting or whatnot there are some people like you know you know we're in year 12 or something you know and Theory crafting it's because this thing goes it's it's like it's not like it's it's s is not working towards an end there's not a point where it's like okay it's done it's gone like this thing just keeps going it just keeps building
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everything so I really like that the theory crafting it it doesn't stop it there's always there's always that well maybe we can work towards this and these things help us know what we're working towards because one of the other things I really like about working in this place I'm just going to go off on on a tangent here for a second is I love that we're never afraid of the better idea so it's there are plenty of times in our history where we thought we were doing this like this was the plan and then somebody in a random conversation is is theor grafting and what if we did this he go oh well that's way cooler than what we were doing and it's like well let's do that instead and whatnot it's it's I love that about this place so you know just as a my five cents to anybody that's out there that's like oh they're just the aircraft and whatever that's where all the best ideas are birth you and you guys do it when I watch your
- 00:22:47
YouTube videos and your streams and we do it too when I when I say there's no difference between you and us I mean that uh will the new ugfs replace or be an addition to existing bunkers well we already know that that's that's an addition the existing yeah yeah they will remain and DCS will just be yeah there as well one of the reasons we replaced the name like we were calling these new underground facilities for a while and it's like it just got confusing people thought they would replace it no we name them because these are in addition um uh all right we talked about raids now we talked about raids a little bit at citizen con uh we we mentioned at the end of the thing uh when we talk about the future of distribution centers uh what what can you tell us about rates
- 00:23:36
what what what's what's known uh great question [Music] um well what's known is we want them to be the end game you know so you've done the story or or what have you you've um explored your career as much as you want to um and then you can dip into these yeah endgame missions as it were and this is where you're going to find um super rare loot or super high value items and they're going to take place at DCS which are owned by you know big corporations or big Brands big factions um and yeah we you know like you said
- 00:24:26
before it was they they were the new ugfs underground facilities um and we still have the idea of you know some of them they do go underground and that's where the raid takes place so not only do you have to you know fight your way through the airspace of the DC um then realize it's too hot so land get your ground Vehicles out and approach on foot you've got to get into the thing and then down into the race so um they're going to be difficult they're going to be you know expect you to be you know aame people going in you have your squad all kitted out everyone has a role to play um you know when the Resource Network comes
- 00:25:13
online you're going to have to kind of work strategic strategically I can't really say long words um to try and get in um which is going to be great and then you know what happens if when you're in there and reinforcements are getting called in but you've disabled everything so it's actually even harder for you to get out um yeah we we want it to be tough uh but we also want you to be rewarded for doing them as well um so that's kind of the general overview that we want uh we now have to go and do that I going to say I want to be real clear this is not a 2024 thing like anybody's you know raids are not a 2024 thing it's on the calendar for 2024 uh uh in don't even ask me beyond that it's like what's the point um but there's this as star say
- 00:26:03
and continues to develop as continues to develop as continue to harden the systems you know it becomes closer and closer to the game that you know we want it to be uh we're going to continuously ask oursel these MMO related questions like like like we don't want every trapping of every MMO that you ever see out there we're not trying to be every single game that that's ever once but there are there are certain tenants and there are certain tropes if you will of an MMO space that you know it's that interest us that that that that we like and stuff like this you know and I can see us trying a few of them I mean organizations are just guilds by another name you know and stuff like that so it's it's it's not every not every MMO Trope is bad some of them are expected some of them are frankly necessary to achieve the you know the experience that we want uh raids will be an interesting
- 00:26:52
experiment for us when that time comes because we don't have health bar the the traditional a lot of the traditional you know class systems and stuff like that so it'll be an interesting experiment when that time comes and and I'm looking forward to us trying it will it work will it not work yeah hey you know you know maybe maybe it's going to be a hover mode maybe it's going to be a master mode it's like you don't you don't know it's I I like that we try things so but again that's not a 2024 thing don't yeah I think for additionally to that is I've been hopping on about how big these things are on the ground for quite a while and I just don't think anyone realizes how big they are so I'm really looking forward to them going out and people going oh he was telling the truth this whole time um but if you think some
- 00:27:41
of the missions that they're going to release with are going to be difficult and you think okay so if this is how hard it is now just think where we can get to when raids come online and you think it's big on the ground now just think of the the Networks you're going to have to go through to conquer these raids so just bear that in the back of your mind when when these do go out uh so let's talk let's let's move into the big question before we lose your time here uh a lot of folks we we knew this we knew this when we were filming it and we know going uh this idea that PVE and PVP can meet in the same place uh this obviously excites some people uh some people who are a bit more what was the
- 00:28:31
what was the aggressive outla the aggressive Outlaw unlawful player uh you know kind of licks their chops at this idea while the non-aggressive lawful player is like what yeah are are you dumb um how do we how do we go about that H how is this how how are these things going to merge not just in in 323 and what we're doing for 32 but but long term cuz obviously I cuz I already know where this is going all the systems in place are not going to be in place for 323 so so talk to me about 323 and then we'll go long term okay so I think the first thing to bear in mind about distribution centers is they're very varied you know so some of them have like some of them
- 00:29:23
will welcome players some of them won't but they're also varied in terms of level of security so some of them will have security like at the lower end if you imagine an extremely well fortified bunker that's like the lowest level of security for this distribution center for the highest level of security you're talking something alongside the rest stop that kind of level lots and lots of turrets probably a green zone missile turrets as well yeah they're they're going to be about as well well fortified as we can make them for 323 right so in in 323 there's 13 spread across micr Tech and hon yeah um uh my understanding is that they come in kind of three three flavors yeah what what
- 00:30:11
are these three flavors okay so these aren't the visual thing these are this is the what we're talking about how to manage PVE and PVP yeah this is the broad sort of game play kind of flavor so we've got distribution centers which we're terming friendly um and on the opposite end of the scale we've got distribution centers which are hostile and then in between you have a whole range which are just mixed there's some combination of all the different factors um put put together in different you know different levels okay so what makes a hostile one a hostile one so it's separate to the security level um but a hostile one BAS basically does not welcome players if you enter regardless
- 00:31:01
of who you are what you've done what your reputation is with any kind of um uh faction um they're going to shoot at you with whatever kind of Weaponry they have around uh they will have turrets they will have trespass zones they will have security guards all over the place um yeah that's that's a hostile one it's like Chris when he sees me coming uh okay what's the other what's the friendly the friendly one friendly ones are much more welcoming they will allow players in kind of you know as long as they have a neutral reputation with the owner they will allow players in and you can just go in you can land you can like request landing access you can get in
- 00:31:49
the hanger you can walk around no restrictions no holds SP just go wherever you please no problem and my understanding is that in 323 these have an additional layer of security yeah so the the friendly ones are going to be more towards the restop level of security so with green zones with green zones all right so the so so so there will there will for 323 because we don't have the full Law and Order system towards uh some of the some of these distribution centers will have a will have a green zone Y and and that'll protect the players who you know those those lawful aggressive players you know it's like oh I'm going to take if I'm going to take a mission you know I don't think I don't think we'll outright tell them which is which it's one of those things we like people to discover on
- 00:32:36
their own but you you'll discover okay missions to this distribution center and this distribtion Center are safe you know it's I I can go there I can be I can be a lawful unaggressive player and not get harassed and stuff like that and then there's the super aggressive where it's just I I just want to be a I want to be a pain in the ass for somebody and go and then they'll be the the collection of ones in between exactly okay okay and that is of course until you know until the Law and Order system continues to to to evolve players saw it in with in the Pyro playground and stuff uh some of these stations were supposed to have you know faction oriented NPC guards that are supposed to stop griefing and stuff that's all part of this Law and Order system that's still being developed and still coming online uh additional Evolutions to the law system uh you're involved in the law
- 00:33:27
you generally speaking you're involved in the in the criminal uh what's what's it called the law system the criminal criminality word am I looking for I'll say it under world this that determines whether you're a criminal or not Justice what no we have a do we not have a name I can't think of the name for it spacing right now I'm sorry guys um but this crime stat the the the crime Stat system even that's going to evolve you know the point of having harder crime stats and and crime stats that don't enti irely wipe away and stuff like just or you got rid of your crime staff but there's a database that still remembers that you had one and you start getting too many of them it's like you know maybe you're just a permanent criminal Yeah Yeahs I I think there's a drive to make it um make the security side um quite more
- 00:34:18
how can I put it robust in their pursuit of justice and quite more persistent in it and once you once you are caught to make the punishment more severe and fitting so it's it's it's not flat it's it scales and and I want to I want I want to say what we're talking about right now is not the theory crafting stuff that we talked about before there is actually a there's there's actually a very detailed Law and Order you know you kind of plan in place things that we're working towards uh I can't tell you what patch you know one patch two patch three patch four patch you know from now or whatever uh whenever it's ready in online but but there is a very obviously we see what happened we saw what happened in pyro playground uh we we we we we can see what's happening in a lot of these places with grieving and stuff like this
- 00:35:05
and there are there are many things in place uh that we that we want to attempt people will then naturally ask well why don't you just tell us about it because we want to we need to try things we need to try this and if that doesn't work then we're going to try this and if that doesn't work you're going to try this you you you don't just have like one idea you have an A idea B idea C idea and you you want to test these things uh sit there and say we're going to do this and then so then we end up not going with a and going with C like well you told us you were going with a well a didn't work we had to test it first so let us continue to do some refinement and work on it and I promise like all things uh considering that it's literally my job to do so uh we will inform and and share the design and the intention of it when we feel that it's ready to be done so uh but I just want to say that's not the theory crafting that's that's on the calendar and stuff so
- 00:35:55
um quick question question about you can't have question that's not how the show works if um say I'm hauling to a friendly uh DC and I'm worried that I'm going to get attacked by Pirates you know in between doing my bit at the DC and going to the other location like a space station can I theoretically message out to see if anyone can protect me in transit and then maybe offer up some of the goods as payment because we don't have the system yet to do that but we could There's an opportunity for players to potentially build some trust with one another well we have the service Beacon system that that allows some aspect of that and stuff like that and of course that's
- 00:36:42
going to continue to iterate and stuff that' be pretty cool yeah just put it out there people uh we we do tend to like player oriented Solutions whenever possible um all right so yeah uh that's about it guys that's that's all the time I had for you uh thank you for taking the time out of the out of the end of your week to this James was literally in a call until about 10 minutes before the start of the show we had to rush him over here uh he was literally presenting to other directors in the company about the current state of this and where it was at what we still needed to do and stuff like that uh in case you think my show is the priority it's not making the game is uh so I do appreciate you rushing over here to do the show we're going to take a short break and when we come back uh
- 00:37:29
we're gonna have an old old old old old friend that made him sound like he's really how that may sound like you're super old you're not he's not super old I think he's actually younger than I am he's just been with the project for about as long as any human being uh's he's here visiting we're going to have him the show and talk to him for a little bit so stay tuned we'll be right back and we're back uh joining us on the show now for our meet the devs uh section is is somebody and I don't know how accurate I was right I'm pretty sure you're like employee number two or three or something like this uh what you're what's your title now it's it's it's principal technical artist principal technical artist forest stefen forest how you doing man good great thanks for having me on the show you've been like I said you I don't want to I don't want to
- 00:38:17
oversell this but I don't know that I can you're you're literally there was a point in this company where it was Chris Sandy ortwin you like and a couple others like David hack and zann and you know just a handful of people and yeah when the company was less than 10 people you were here yeah just could less than the fingers on my hands yeah so uh welcome uh you're a your title now is principal technical Artist Artist you're one of those technically an artist yeah technically an artist you're one of those people we'll talk a little bit about what a technical artist is but I don't think it accurately I don't think it accurately covers what what you do because you're I always felt a kinship with you because you're kind of Ben used to call me fix a flat it was it was you're just you're
- 00:39:06
here for when we need something done but we don't have a specific person for IT y give it to Jered and see if he can do it give it to Forest and see if he can do it and I always I saw that with you and I always just kind of we never I don't think we ever really talked about it but I always kind of like he's like me but on the other side it's whenever there's something weird and random it's like there's no obvious person to do it you're the guy they tap yeah absolutely I mean we both you know love working for Chris so if he needs something and and he has some kind of vision um we just hop on that thing and we just drive it until we accomplish it you know and it's always been like that since the very beginning okay so what is a technical artist so a technical artist uh will a lot of times bridge the gap uh between an engineer and an artist so the artist will make the art content and make all
- 00:39:54
this really amazing stuff and then the engineers will write all of the you know uh kind of backend tools and work on the engine and just give us the ability to do these amazing things that we get to play but there's this like in between thing that happens where the artists need to interface with this code that the engineers write and so what a technical artist will do sometimes is they'll write scripts to help interface with some of the you know more backend code whether it is you're in your 3D program and you need to export something or we need to uh maybe make something faster so the artist can make more content at kind of a faster rate um or sometimes it's just you know things could get complicated and we're trying to figure out wait how do we do this and so you know it could be as simple as you
- 00:40:42
know how do we make an explosion or you know how do we uh get this helmet to look as awesome as possible and so a lot of times we'll take the vision from Chris or a director and then we'll be like can we we do this can we hit the Benchmark that we want to hit and uh sometimes we can and sometimes we can't if we can't we'll step in we'll figure out how to make it faster we'll figure out how to make it better and uh we'll train up artists we'll help write documentation and so our job a lot of times is to help artists be successful but at the same time you know really embrace the engineer tools and be able to make sure they reach the full capacity of uh what they're able to do good answer oh thank you we have little known we actually we actually filmed an entire episode trying to explain what
- 00:41:28
technical artist was one time back in like 2019 and it's one of the only episodes that have never aired because I'm like I don't think we got it it's a pretty good answer um go back to the beginning now because this part of the show is we're talking about you in your in your history and I don't I'm a big I'm a big history nut and I like to we we've moved so far from where we started I but I don't want to ever lose that there's some people like you know humor me for a second when did you come aboard the project I came aboard the project in the spring of 2012 the spring of 2012 so before we announced that's correct and and what was your what was your job in the spring of 2012 my job was anything and everything if it needed to be lit I
- 00:42:16
would lit it if there needed to be particles do some particles if I needed to optimize an asset optimize an asset if I needed to make an asset I would make an asset you know we had uh a pretty clear vision of what Chris wanted to do for the initial crowdfunding campaign um but we didn't have funding yet you know and uh I was young and I was cheap you know and uh and I was uh I would do anything you know to uh work on a project like this and I was like uh Chris asked me if I was willing to work on it and of course he was like hey do you know you know I knew how to do some things as was environment artist but he's like hey do you know how to light do you know how to do this you know how to do that and I was like yeah of course I do I can do all that yeah no problem goes all right you're hired then I got off the phone and I just started Googling YouTube on how to do all these things that is exactly how I started all right make it you make it so
- 00:43:06
uh so at this point in the spring of 2012 uh how many people were on the project do that you can remember I I want to say that there was probably um gosh you know I was working with David hadla there's probably five or six honestly that was we also had um because we were you know working with you know cry engine so I was I had access to you know uh people that were like Sean Tracy who wasn't actually an employee yet he was Moonlight yeah exactly so um I had a lot of interactions with these really talented experienced people with these tools and so um while internally U we had a very limited staff of nobody you know what I mean uh but we did have some resources to help you know
- 00:43:54
get the trailer out the door obviously um there's this there's this belief out there that when people talk about you you know how long star citi's been in development you know I I see it often cited or referred to that oh well they were working on it for a whole year before they were doing this or like they like oh it was 1100 people back then no five people yeah were working on it you know for the time period before it got out and some of them were only hired in that same year and it wasn't making the game it was making this demo this this video demo for yeah it was a a vertical slice is what we were calling it we were like what is the game and can we create a small section of what that game could potentially be and we knew that we didn't want it to be an offline render
- 00:44:42
we knew that we wanted to build everything in engine and we wanted like you know the thrusters physically firing you know which Chris was working on and coding and stuff like that and so we just uh we wanted to see can we really make this thing and one thing that was very clear C after the demo of the trailer is we knew we could and um I luckily the fans believed in us too you know no I'm glad you brought that up that that you know obviously when we debuted on October 10th in 2012 you know we played a video where there at GDC we don't have the infrastructure to do a live D but the fact that you know even at that point he wanted it all created in engine yes you know it's like we may have recorded it but it it had to work it had to be physicalized it had it had to function like we were representing it it worked it just you know it didn't
- 00:45:29
have the frame rates yet fair enough yeah you know yeah some things never change 60 frames per second otherwise what's the point right we're working on it someday um all right so how did you you said Chris asked you what is this did was it like a Craigslist ad how did you and Chris get connected oh well um he had uh my old boss was a uh had worked with him in the past and then the company that I worked for uh lost the funding and so I was unemployed and so you know Chris was talking to you know um his you know peer and cooworker and friend and um who happened to be my ex-boss and told him about the project and so he said I know this kid that doesn't have a job and he'll do you know
- 00:46:17
he'll he'll go for it you know what I mean so uh with that recommendation I got the phone call and I did not expect it it came out of absolutely nowhere you know I'm at my friend's house I get this call and it's like it's Chris Roberts and I'm like shut the dogs up everybody be quiet Chris Roberts is on the phone and everyone's like yeah right you know what I mean and sure enough you knew who he was I knew who he was yeah well I I knew who he was because I was a big fan of the uh like Mark Hill and all that from the wing commander games and so I you know I I thought the wing commander games were fun but I was really into the fact that we had full motion video um in a game and I thought that was like the coolest thing ever and obviously like Star Wars I was like drawn to it and so when I knew that I was like oh my gosh like here we go like this is going to be a 3D version of that and now you've been with the project for 12 years that's
- 00:47:04
right yeah so I am I allowed to say my age on here I so so I was talking you I was walking around the office you know and I was kind of like you know somebody's like yeah you know they're telling me they're getting old you know they're like I'm 30 you know what I mean I was like well if it makes you feel any better I'm 40 and I've been working on this game since I was 28 so have have have things changed I know the answer this but I'm curious about your perspective we didn't get any chance to sink before this so we're going like from your perspective because you've been here yeah literally since the beginning yeah how have you seen things change well it's here's the to me what the biggest change between then and now back then we had to figure out what to do and a lot of things were like is this even possible right and it was just one hurdle at a time and you know it's
- 00:47:54
it's hard to figure out you know how long is something going to take because you don't it's never been done before right so how do you schedule it you know what I mean uh but now we know uh we're confident we know what needs to be done we know how to do it and now we're finishing things and that's the biggest difference between before we figuring it out and now we're doing the darn thing it it it's hard because I mean it's it's again there's there's no there's no sense in acting or pretending like we we've had a great track record predicting you dates and stuff like this it it it always come I knew this before you know in my time at blizzard but it really Crystal the knowledge crystallized here if you're doing something in know that let me rephrase this differently all estimation regardless of what it is
- 00:48:43
whether it's building a swimming pool I used to be a swimming pool contractor way back in the day you know laying gun plumbing and stuff all estimation in any field is based on prior work exactly so if you can tell how long a thing takes with certainty you're de facto doing something that's been done before and it's an average of how long it's taken in the past so not only is it has to be done due once you have to do it multiple times and then the more times you do it the better you can average how long this thing takes yeah so so this a good point so so so not only has it been done before but it's had to have been done several times before to have an accurate ESS exactly if you're truly doing something that's never been done before or doing something that has been done before but in a way that's never been used to do it getting an accurate estimate is practically you're you're
- 00:49:32
you're trying to make your best educated guest yeah and that's it yeah and I'm not I'm not sitting here I'm not sitting here trying to make excuses for us I mean historically one of the things I go I go to I go to Bar citizens in fact there's a bar citizen in Manchester not this Saturday but next Saturday at uh Brew dog uh I don't at 3 p.m. brew doog and Manchester at 3 p.m. if you're in the area or you want to be in the area you want to attend do that but one of the question questions that that comes up more times than not when I'm at these things is people want to ask people ask me when is this or when is that or they try to yeah and it well it's like the re one of the reasons we stopped answering this question is is is is because it's we recognize that you know we have many strengths yeah our strengths are in our people our strengths are in the in the quality and the character of the people
- 00:50:19
I do what I do here because of how much I like the people that that I work with uh and stuff like this uh it's in it's in our technology it's in our Innovation like this our strength is not knowing when a thing is going to come out it's but you know what that does it creates a game that's never been created before yeah yeah so so I'm not trying to make any excuses for it it's just you know it's recognize where it's well just you know the reality is that's that's just what it is right you know and and uh I think a Chris project you're always going to have Innovation so you're going to have some element of that but at the same time because we've had now done things before we are much better at understanding a schedule and how to follow it he does have this bit we're going to just turn this into a into a into a you know jibing about Chris here uh he does have this habit of of asking if there's another way of thing can be
- 00:51:07
done sure it's it's like well okay we want to do this thing all right well that's how these people did it and that's how those people did it how can we do it is is there a way that's as good as that they were able to do was is there a way to do it better is it just that they didn't spend the time is it just that they didn't figure it out or is it just that the technology didn't exist to do it better when they did it and maybe it does now or maybe we we're in a place where we can create it and stuff like so he he's never this isn't where I thought the show was going to go it's it's he he's he's never very interested in the easy way or the obvious way he always challenges people to to find a better way to find a more interesting way to do something and I think that's always I think that's why so many of these the weird things either fall on your plate
- 00:51:55
if it's it's tack orful on my plate if it's not and it's just I like that about this place yeah I mean I mean that's my favorite thing and obviously I've been working here for a long time there's a reason that I've been working here for a long time and it is that challenge I mean the r the reality is uh it's like you know you don't really say like something's impossible right it's just a matter of you got to try it and he was willing to take that Gamble and have somebody like me or you know there's so many talented people in this company he's willing to challenge them and be like you don't know if it won't work because you haven't tried so try it and that's why I love that uh we only have a few more minutes and I've got you here and folks if you're you know if you're wondering a forest is here visiting you know as always you meeting with the teams and stuff like this so whenever whenever we have these visitors you know I always
- 00:52:42
try to make the chance to to to find some time for them uh and I haven't we haven't spent much time with each other since busy um do you have any uh uh we had we had uh John ersin and Mike Jones on a couple weeks ago doing something similar to this you have any stories you when I say when I say can you think of a funny or a terrifying story from yay old days it's not going to get either one of us fired uh I think they all get us fired I mean we just you know back then uh you know it was just so fun but like difficult I mean when I was in the Austin office we were basically in a house and our offices were just you know like so we used to when you would walk down the hallway there would be a desk in the
- 00:53:29
hallway so if the programmer artist would back up their chair they'd be back into you and you pin you against the wall you know um and so we just had a lot of good times there you know and and now we're in this you know amazing spaceship with a thousand devs or whatever and it's it's quite different but it it's special in its own way and back then was special in its own way uh I I'll narrow I'll narrow this down for you so let's go back back to that 2012 demo that presentation uh uh any particularly trying or vexing moment from that yeah totally so you know um and I did this on my own accord I'm not trying to you know say that company making me work too hard or whatever but I remember and this is I'll kind of blame the backers for this one for go ahead go ahead and explain myself
- 00:54:18
now but once we uh did the crowdfunding campaign and the funding started coming in one thing that we wanted to do was we wanted to keep delivering content because we felt that if they were going to you know continue to give us money we needed to give them content so David hadock would keep writing new systems and new planets and descriptions and I would do renders of the planets and kind of give a visual representation to go with the story and to go with the lore and we decided every $50,000 we would post another system that was backed and the backers were giving money so quick that we were not able to create things fast enough and we were just working around the clock cuz they were like hit another milstone hit another Milestone let's get another thing going let's get
- 00:55:05
another thing going and it was taxing to say the least yeah that that that desire to provide like like they're they're providing to us so we want we want to uh reciprocate as much as possible yeah you know goes all the way back you know I'm I'm gonna speak on behalf of wingman yeah now uh for those who don't know uh these programs that we do today inside Star Citizen and star Citi live go all the way back to in a Genesis uh to the efforts of Eric wingman Peterson and Michael Morland uh who were out of the out of the Austin offices and originally that was just supposed to be a monthly it was supposed to be one show a month that's it and you know and that that that alone is more than any other game studio with only 20 employees would ever do but because because that kept you
- 00:55:57
because the support kept coming in there was this well no we've got to do more we we we we we've got we we've got to we've got we've got to provide more stuff so you know he took it upon himself to turn that into a weekly into a weekly thing even though we had only ever committed to a month and that continues that continued from him up through you know Ben and Sandy and around the verse you know through me now it's like this this this this we were never on the hook for a weekly thing but it was just a we had only ever committed to monthly thing but it was just this man when you see this level of support you want to give back in whatever way what you're doing you know what I mean so you want to share it with the people that are as excited as you are you know what I mean and and to be honest like nowadays there's a lot of you know game studios that are bringing you inside but back then that wasn't a
- 00:56:44
very common thing and I felt like when we were doing that was very kind of groundbreaking and not weekly definitely no definitely not no way we weekly and then you there there you know the the Thursday show evolves into this you know docu series and then he goes and adds Thursday is not enough we're also going to do a Friday live stream you know the these are the legacies that I've inherited and I've inherited them proudly and you know yes they age me prematurely I'm only 23 this is what happens but uh but no it's a it's just I always try to keep that I always try to remember that it's it's always been about this deep-seated appreciation of that level of support continu support and it's why we you knowy why we put as much effort into making ISC every week why we you know
- 00:57:33
put less effort into making this show yep I mean again I'm not going to lie to you it's this show is what it is but sorry I can throw myself up Wonder well but it's it's because it's this it's it's this it's this reciprocity it's this feeling of of of ownership that we have so like that um um yeah uh beyond that any other any news any any fun stuff any any any any Goss I haven't heard we got one minute left what you got for me you know um well the first thing is just you know going down this road thank you for all the fans that have been with us for 12 years I mean my goodness right and they're out there you know what I mean um yeah uh besides that um I'm still working I'm still doing my thing I'm working on heads we're you
- 00:58:21
know working on character creators and we're just trying to get these characters look it's so awesome in the verse and we got some uh you know hashtag tun things coming and it's exciting and I'm excited and you know we're going to keep going and we'll be talking about the character customizer in Alpha 323 I think it's scheduled four or five weeks from now in ISC I was just talking to Sean Tracy about it yesterday and stuff like that so uh we want to get a few more things in there before we before we show it to you um but yeah Forest thank you for taking the time uh be here uh folks that does it for this week's uh St citizen live uh thanks for watching if you haven't check out yesterday's inside Star Citizen about master modes and precision targeting and all the gimbal changes uh and all the archetypes and stuff uh that went out yesterday and of course we're going to
- 00:59:08
have uh we are taking uh next week off uh for Star Citizen live I'm mixing my messages now it's was talking about ISC so next week we're taking a Friday off uh it's Dune part two day at the office I'm not I'm not gonna lie to you the whole office is going to see Dune 2 so I'm like I'm going to go see I'm going to go see Dude too so so so no next week but when we come back the week after we'll have Yogi and members from that team on to answer uh many of your questions that you had after yesterday's Master modes episode uh we booked it in before the episode went live we knew they were coming so look out for that in about two weeks uh and then uh going on right now in the verse is the um I don't know what the official uh name of it the this Idris event that's going on where a bunch of cig developers or spawning
- 00:59:55
addresses in the the precis universe and challenging you to take it from them uh some folks are like you know the first folks I saw were just going after to the D store it's like no no no you can capture this thing and fly it around it's got the interior and everything it's like it's like it's it's a chance for you to you know to see how long you can hold on to an Idris uh before other people come and try to take it away from you so uh that's going on right now and uh next week in inside Star Citizen we'll be we'll be doing a special director's commentary version of uh development on the address with Nate dearsley and John crew who will take you through the the the interior and show you you know what it's c what its current status is and stuff like that so you can check that out next week uh so for Star Citizen live I'm Jared that was Forest uh again thanks to uh John and James who you know took off and went
- 01:00:43
back to their meetings and we'll see you next week everybody take care
Transcript from YouTube’s automatic captions — punctuation and Star Citizen jargon are approximate. The video itself is hosted by CIG on the official channel.
