Wingman's Hangar ep055 . February 5, 2014

Transcript — every row opens the video at that moment

1. 00:00:08

   Hey everybody, Eric Wingman Peterson. It's a new year on Wingman's Hangar. Less fluff, more stuff. We got an all new set. We're coming live. We've got some new stuff happening for you. If you're new to the program, this is kind of an inside look at all things Star Citizen, the new epic space adventure by Chris Roberts. Let's just get right to it, shall we? We have the week in review. We have coverage of the big summit, the big production summit we did last week, and we have an interview with Will Leverett and Jake Ross to talk about what exactly went on at the summit and what we can do going forward from that. We also have forum feedback with your questions. So, let's get right to it. What happened last week? Week in review, Next Great Starship debuted. Episode 1 is already happened and it's been huge. Kudos to Sandi for putting that together

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   and and Chris and everybody else for Mark Skelton and Chris Olivia, Chris Smith, and John Tracy. They put out an awesome and epic show and you should check it out. And don't forget, you can vote for your favorite wild cards. Check out the YouTube link, Roberts Space End. Be there or be square. We got new hires this week. We got Billy Lord, Jake Ross, and David Jennison. Two of them are character guys and one of them is a production coordinator. We need them all. We're growing, growing, growing. We got to bring this epic adventure to you guys. And new Jump Point came out last Friday. If you're not a subscriber, you don't get to see this stuff. You might want to check it out. It's really, really fun and Jump Point is done by David Ladyman and it's incredible, very informative. And of course, last week or this week, well last week, we hosted the summit. Hi everyone. I'm here for the 2014 Cloud

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   Imperium Games Development Summit. This week teams from all of our offices are here to refine the process for the making of Star Citizen and Squadron 42. Chris Roberts and his teams have high hopes for this week. Hey, there he is. How you doing, man? Welcome. Welcome. I can barely sit. How's it going, Chris? Oh, it's not good, brother. Not good. Thank you for asking, man. Oh, give me a hug. Oh, good to see you, man. Good to see you. Hi, I'm Chris. How you doing? Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. Is this the war room we're going to meet in? Yep. Nice to Roberts Space Industries? Guys, take a job. What's going on, Chris? Good to see you, man. Mr. Roberts, how are you, sir? Good to see you. All right. Some of you guys haven't met Chris, right? Good to see you, man. Wow, long time no see. All right. Chance, right?

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   Yeah. All right. Pretty nice to meet you. How's it going, Chuck? Chuck, nice to meet you. I'm Kendra. Hi, nice to meet you. So, I saw I saw this The idea of the summit that we're doing this all week long is to get everyone involved from around the world that's working on Star Citizen and and basically put the key leads in a room and discuss the aspects, all the different aspects cuz this is a really hugely ambitious game that has a lot of different, you know, areas from flying around in space to down on a planet to running around on on foot, you know, having gunfights, boarding ships. First off, it's great coming out to Austin because although myself and Derek and the team went out to Los Angeles and the Los Angeles team in October when we were basically working on the story side of it and now we've obviously got a story that we're very happy with. From that, we're proceeding with with the development side in terms of, you know, breaking out

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   the missions are, what the scripts are, all that kind of stuff. So, let's go see what's happening in one of the meetings. Hey, guys. Hi. Hi, hey. What is going on in here? Uh, this meeting's all about PBR and uh how we're going to implement it and when we're going to implement it. Yeah. So, yeah, part of the process is is like these guys, Forest and Nathan and the the Austin lot have been kind of spearheading a bit the process of transferring to PBR. So, in this summit, we're trying to figure out what the other studios need to to to learn learn from you guys. material library is going to be. Yeah, so part of the whole thing is that everybody's building different components of the game and we have to make sure that like when we they all come together that it all makes sense. We can find out all the interdependencies

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   between the various areas, be it you know, a planet side, first person, space combat, which we're now kind of referring to space or the dog fighting modules people call it. But really seeing, you know, who's who has ownership of it as well as what are the interdependencies between all the modules. So, it's mid-week now. Let's check in and see how things are going with development summit coordinator, Ron LaJoy. The first two days were very high-level and there were a lot of new things that came up. I crammed all the producers in a room last night for about five hours to schedule out the the remainder of the week. There's a lot of stuff. Like I said, we could easily easily go another full week. What is happening in here? Hello. Looks very serious. Yeah, what's prediction? We're talking about how to make the spaceships so

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   that people look well across the network and be smooth. But I see you would you would send across just positioning rotation updates and interpolate between them. Since we're dispersed as development all around the world, this allows us to get to know the person that's on the other side of that video conference in a personal manner to where you can have you know, maybe you're you're a little more comfortable giving a little criticism to them without and they're maybe a little more comfortable taking When you think about just kind of sitting in a room and talking all day, it doesn't sound like a whole lot, but you know, after 9 or 10 hours of discussing major features and kind of arguing back and forth about certain things, it takes a mental toll. It'll be well-deserved at the end of the week to get some really good barbecue, kind of have everybody relax a little bit, a couple drinks, and just kind of get to know each other a little bit better. All right, it was a great gathering. We were all together working super hard. A lot was accomplished. I'm we were tired

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   now, but a lot was accomplished. That was the goal. We had so many meetings to nail out some really important points and I think like now it's Friday. I feel accomplished. But I feel I could use another week, but you know, that's going to be business as usual when we go back on Monday for sure. I thought it was really good. I mean, that you know, it was it was actually really good now that we've basically staffed up the groups to do every single aspect of the game. Getting everybody together, sort of having a big overview of big plan of how we're going to be tackling all the remaining tasks and then obviously there's a lot of remaining tasks. And also how we're going to sort of roll out parts of functionality to the community out there for them to actually play and test and give us feedback. Each studio at this point has a has clear ownership of certain parts of the game. Um, they're going to see it from beginning to end and make sure that

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   everyone else is aligning to those standards. Clearly we talk about very often how high our standard is. Um, we're building ships to a level that nobody's done before. Um, but one thing we don't have an entirely clear example of quite yet is where is our bar exactly? How high is that bar? You know, we're always just we keep pushing up. This needs to be better. This needs to be better. Um, so that's one of the things that came out this week was that we are going to pick um, some small pieces and bring them as high as we possibly can until everyone is agreement that this is our level. This is what we're shooting for. It's really good cuz I mean obviously Chris has the vision for the game which is great and obviously we've we're sort of working on the vision on the Squadron 42 side, but then obviously feeding a lot of stuff back to Chris and then coming back through and and what we're really trying to do is just really drive

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    the process of getting um, you know, moving the game forward as fast as possible and then working with a bunch of you know, cuz there's a huge amount of CryEngine experience in the rest of the organization. We have some, but not enough and so it's great picking up on that and then using that stuff to to to make us better and then also, you know, Chris probably knows as much as anyone about it cuz he's been working with it now for you know a few years as well. Also, uh you know, Squad Squadron 42 has dog fighting elements, so they're going to assist on some areas of the dog fight like the AI side of it where we're going to focus more on the PvP side. And that's it. Dog fight, dog fight, dog fight, dog fight. After a long week like that, everybody was pretty exhausted, but it was incredibly productive. We have a clear goal that we're all going to march towards now. As big as it is, everyone came out of

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    that very excited and and ready to just get rolling on it all. All right, since you saw that about the summit, let's get to two of the principals, Ron and Jake. We'll talk about So, you guys were at the summit or you know, Ron, you pretty much chaired a lot of the events and helped do the schedule together. So, what what was the summit all about? was a week-long planning session basically. Um brought everybody together, all our studios, sat everybody in a room, various rooms. Hey Jared, is various meetings four rooms, so to speak. Follow and offices and random computers and desks, but yeah, it was a week-long planning session to make sure everybody knows exactly what we're doing and it's clear to everybody since we have, I mean, a lot of different studios working on this. Right, and we don't want to step like

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    have multiple people doing the same thing. We don't want to step on toes. Everybody's on the same page with what we're doing, who the owners are. Exactly. We're marching towards. So, did we get it all accomplished? Yeah, not quite. We probably had another week's worth of stuff. a huge dent. We made a huge dent. Uh definitely feel a lot better about the next year. Yeah, it's going to be yeah, the next year. We've got a lot of work to do and and you know, we can continue the planning from various locations, especially now that we know the people that we've done it with. You get to know them a little better, what their strengths are, what they can help, where they can help, things of that nature. Now, Jake, you started the first day of the summit. It was your first day. That's right. You're like our new project coordinator, right? Your job is to go around and do what, exactly? So, my job is to uh do whatever Ron tells me to do. So, but I I uh go around and I make sure

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    people are are on task and and following up on on uh their their tasks that they do. Good Jira tasks, right? So, you know, we use Jira for um tasking and for tracking. And, you know, it's it's tough when you're doing something and you just move from one thing to another or the next thing, sometimes you might not select resolve on your Jira ticket and then somebody might be waiting for that ticket to come back, which which turns them onto a task. And so, your job, and one of your one of the couple that's going to be here, is to poke people. Right? Lots of poking involved, lots of prodding, lots of trying to get people to do what they need to do. Right. So, nobody's annoyed at you yet. Not yet. I've only been here a week, a little over a week now, but they'll get there. So, what was it like first week, then? Uh you know, it was it was tough. It was tough, but uh you know, it was nice to get like a giant crash course on Star Citizen and everything that was

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    involved, you know. I compare it to uh you know, I I learned how to drive on my mom's big, huge, clunky blue Suburban. So, I feel like any car I drive after that is is pretty pretty easy, you know. So, you know, I it's uh got this huge huge uh summit thing coming out of that. And uh now feel like it's going to be smooth sailing and all that, right? right. So, Ron, where do we Where do we go from here? What's next for Now that we've had this summit and we've we put our giant task list together specifically for the dog fighting module. What what uh what are we going to be What are we expecting to see out of this now? Um so, basically a high-level plan, which we're going to break down um into specifics with everybody at every studio. Um there's still a lot to be done coming out of this summit. There's a lot of meetings that we still need to have, a lot of follow-up. Um and that kind of that high-level plan still needs

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    to be put together and put in front of everybody's face. Right. And And the re- We have one already at Cloud at Star Citizen, but this is one where now we're encompassing, you know, we just got Squadron 42 or the Foundry 42 guys. Lots changed. We just got the other studios that we can talk about some we can't, you know, that Yeah. are here. So, we've got to find a way of coordinating them and where they fit into like maybe there's other modules that might be out that we're not going to talk about right now that um so as we're building this piecemeal and you know, for the for the fans and citizens out there that they'll get a part of. So, hey, I want to thank you guys for joining us. Appreciate all the the conversation and what we what all the work you guys did last week and and now it's time for us to jump into forum feedback. From Kiwi Pete, he asks, "Do you have a road map you can share? No dates or commitments, but the projects the entire team is working on and

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    general sequence for development. I feel knowing this will give us an appreciation of the complexity involved in creating Star Citizen." Wow, Rob. No no commitments. I like the no commitment part. That's really important. So, really what it's about is that we have all of these different modules going in parallel right now and and it was a chance to mix the teams together and get everyone to see the big picture, which then gives us, you know, sort of a look at how all those things relate to each other as far as people are doing things that other teams depend on, but we are doing, you know, first-person shooter and dog fighting and persistent universe and all in the hangar still even moving. All these in parallel while, you know, it's all coming together for the final project. And Squadron 42 and the economy and all those good things. Right, right. And we're doing those. That's that's why we are distributed and this allows us to

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    make sure that kind of allows us to get together. So, yes, we have a road map and as things get closer we will put stakes in the ground and say this is when we're coming out with that and things like that. So, is there any from player two up from player two up? Is there anything new you can talk about that came out of last week's summit? It's not really anything new. I mean, we're we're not we're not reinventing the wheel here. What we really we had an opportunity to do now was to to do a deep drill down on some of the tech and design and production of everything. And again, we talked about having this big picture that we're putting together and getting everyone to see it at the same time. But the other thing that Chris really gets out of this and that he wants to see out of the studios doing these independent paths is that we each have our own sense of ownership and our

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    pride in in ownership of these different systems. So, you get better focus on each of the systems than you would if you were one big studio just trying to divide their work. Okay, good good good. From Syntech, he says, "What do you think was the most beneficial part of the summit in terms of moving towards the goal of release? What can you talk about?" What can we talk about? the What was the best part of the summit? They're being very polite about it, what you can talk about. So, they they understand. I think they understand that yeah you but I mean, certainly face time. It's we have studios globally, right? So, having people that are on your Skype and your email all the time and suddenly become faces and people that you're interacting with, that makes a big big difference. Um and again, it's it's really all about

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    having everybody getting the vision, sharing the vision together at the same time. Yeah, and you know that's the the part about face time is it can't be overlooked because the truth is when you're meeting with people on Skype or you send out an email, you can have this little barrier there between everybody. And so, it seems like you know maybe that you take things personal when really that's not what the intent was. So, what this does is allows you to become friends. It allows you to get to know the person that you're talking to and in those instances, you can maybe be a little critical or maybe be a little more direct and they understand and they and they take that as a you know as as what how it's intended, right? Because look, there's going to be situations where we need stuff done and you don't have time to flowery it up, so to speak. All right, from Danny. "How do you guys sort out conflicting thoughts about what awesomeness really means in the verse?"

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    See? There you go. What do we do when we have to sort something out when there's conflicting ideas. That's that's a no-brainer. Ask Chris Roberts. That is true. We do. Chris solves all conflicts. It's a judge of one. So, from Sloppy Joe, "Has a decision been made about the planned release of Squadron 42? Will it be smaller episodes step-by-step, or will it be delivered in larger or bigger parts?" That's a good question. It's an excellent question. So, um one thing we we did determine is just there's not really a good reason on a single player game to release alpha content. It just It doesn't make much sense. Now, in the persistent universe, sure, because you're really trying to to iron out the kinks, but Squadron 42, it needs to be a polished product. So, the

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    current, and of course we always stress current development plan, is that we're going to for our backers, we're going to release the content episodically. So, you will get to see a piece at a time. That's cool. But, it's not We're not talking like, you know, each one is a little mini adventure. It's It's still a big story. It's a big Chris Roberts-style adventure that spans multiple episodes. So, you will get to part of the way through, but it's not like we wrap it up and start a new story. It's to be continued. It's like an episode a week of a TV show. Well, that's cool. So, but it won't be an episode a week. Sorry. Sorry. I shouldn't have said that. That's okay. Okay. Good. Good. Good. So, episodically is how we're going to release it to backers only, just to be clear. From Star Killer, "How do you keep in touch with so many different teams to make sure the wheels don't come off the starship?"

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    Are there Are there wheels on all our starships? Not all of them. Yeah, that's true. That's true. How do we keep in touch? There are so many different things. I mean, of course we had a summit. This is This is one of the things we determined. It's like, how can we really drive this production better? Well, let's have a summit. And now, we we're going to do those for some or all of those same people, probably every 3 months is what they were saying. every 3 months or so. And then some big ones cuz we really need to keep the steerage going. Right. Um and then I mean the day-to-day activity it's email constantly, Skype. Every single person in this office is on five, 10 different Skype channels that are constantly in motion, you know? We have a Skype channel about RSC or one about design, just you know, the things that I'm on for instance. And then whole team and studio ones. So, you know, we're

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    we're constantly talking to each other around the globe. And then we have a bunch of collaboration tools, too. I mean got Jira, we've got Shotgun. It's all these ways that people can interact through software and get a look at people each others concepts or code or whatever, so. Right. Well, there you go. That's good. From QLZ 19. And I just want to go on record here is I don't think I butchered anybody's name this week. What? Must be the sake. I should have pulled some harder names. Yeah, please don't. What kind of stuff did you all do for fun over the time the teams got together? Hmm. Well, I mean we did we we we had sort of interdisciplinary or intercompany dinners each night. Lunches, too. So, you know, if you were in a meeting a lot of times that meeting just broke and went to lunch. Um so, we we continued the communication but with

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    a little bit more of an air of, you know, just building camaraderie, getting the team together. Um then Friday we had kind of a a wrap party if you will. I mean cuz it was a pretty grueling week. It was it was I mean you know, I told my wife was uh "Are you going to be home at midnight every week every night?" And I'm like, "Mhm, yes." Yeah, could could happen. And then uh well, some of us might have had a little more fun than others. Ooh. That about gets me very far. My car's a big piece of Cuz these shocks are shot. I see Caldy's broken. Got two tires in a uh Here's Michael Morlan with this week's MVP.

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    I'm Michael Morlan sitting in for Ben Lesnick in this week's most valuable post. This week's MVP goes to Zar for his post Operation Pitchfork Special Report A Forker's Tale. A member of Operation Pitchfork recounts the details of action with a pirate clan, discusses the challenges of working under the watchful eye of the UEE, and shares the features of his favorite ships. A special shoutout to writer Nightswatch and character voice talent Mike Marlowe. You've created this week's most valuable post. Thanks, Mike. Good job. Can't wait to have Ben back in that spot, though. And now it's time for fan focus. This week's fan focus is from Shader Cool. I think I got that name right. And what Shader Cool has done is created

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    some inside hanger or potential what their office or home would look like inside your hanger. He's created like a couple bedroom suite. Look at that. Just incredible looking there. And of course, we have the ship customization from the couch. Any hanger wouldn't be complete without that. And of course, what would any hanger be missing or missing if it was not in there? The bathroom. Well done, Shader Cool. That's this week's fan focus. It's always great to see what the fans are up to when they take our assets and create some really, really cool stuff. Can't wait to see what he has next in store for us. Thanks a lot to subscribers and pledgers, particularly subscribers, for allowing us to bring together this cool set, this cool show. It's all because of you guys. Thanks to pledgers. Without you guys, none of us are here. That's a big help. Coming up next week, we have Jira tasking. Tasking? Did I say

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    tasking? That's right. We have the animation summit with Brian Brewer teaching mocap and cleanup on all the animation data. We are still hiring if you're a really talented person out there that's a programmer, artist, or designer, send in your stuff to HR at and of course it wouldn't be the same without this week's next great Starship episode two. Wow, I cannot wait to see that. It's I

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    was very excited by the last one. I can't wait to see what's going on this week. Subscribe to our YouTube channel, be the first to find out exactly what happens at Cloud Imperium when we post a video up there, you'll be the first to know. Submit your questions to the RSI forum. We're doing a little bit different this time. We're trying to take themes so we're more about the theme of what's going on and join us for Wingman's Hangar 15 minutes after the show. It's a little informal, hard to believe, look at we just talk directly, Skype calls, things like that in chat roll. Join us 15 minutes after the show. Remember, if you want your stuff featured on Wingman's Hangar, send it in. We just might use it. We'll see you in the verse. Hi Wing Man, this is B Man and I do have

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    a question and you know, I understand you've been asked this hundreds of times.