Thread by @dsmart

Just putting this here for posterity. That time when Chris Roberts again blatantly LIED to Dean over @GamesBeat

Except context to follow...

venturebeat.com/2018/12/20/sta…

@GamesBeat Aside from the fact where their financial "brochure" showed NO SUCH THING. No cash basis. No liabilities. No line item tangible expenses. No balance sheet. No audit claims.

imgur.com/LyeCvzD.jpg

cloudimperiumgames.com/blog/corporate…

Except that if you were "open" the US financials would have been made public, and then nobody would need to be doing back-of-the-napkin math.

Aside from the fact that the financials CLEARLY show that you're spending MORE than you're raising.

imgur.com/Sj7EM8K.jpg

And if there was ANY internal debate about releasing the financials on how backer money was being spent, how come then this was Ortwin's (co-founder/partner) response to my attorney back in Aug 2015 when I took legal action DEMANDING the financials?

imgur.com/Yo8Ju1p.jpg

In that same period of legal back and forth, I had asked for refunds for backers, a schedule for the game, and the financials.

NONE of which you guys provided until YEARS later.

dereksmart.org/2015/08/star-c…

And as I laid out in my latest blog, the financial brochure released in Dec 2018, even though it's not an actual accounting statement, shows clearly that by end of 2017, the project was literally INSOLVENT.

dereksmart.com/2018/12/star-c…

$14M the brochure shows for YE 2017, aside from not taking into account things like refunds (which ended in 12/2017 due to low funds), is devoid of liabilities + debt, ($4M loan bal in UK for 2017), payables etc. So FULL DISCLOSURE with balance sheet would have shown INSOLVENCY

THIS is what a FULL public disclosure and audited financial STATEMENT looks like. And that's from another game company.

frontier.co.uk/annual-report#…

Then you are claiming "free rein" to use the investor's $46M as you see fit, and in another claiming that it's totally for marketing. Because selling 10% of your company for marketing of a game that's 2 yrs out is the sort of crap fools believe.

imgur.com/YHUjVML.jpg

Investors inserted a babysitter for their $46M for obvious reasons. Trust issues aside, it's about high risk, high reward; and a $500M valuation isn't worth the paper it's printed on if you can't ship a SINGLE product. And you need someone on the inside.

imgur.com/hSODzpc.jpg

Companies that need board members for guidance, tend to either hire them on a retainer, or get them for FREE. Rarely does an investor insert their own board member unless their money came with STRINGS.

It's the reason NOBODY gave money, and you had to get off-shore dark money.

Maybe, when you're talking about transparency and openness, you should tell your backers about the heated discussions that almost derailed THIS deal and how close you came to doing a MAJOR downsizing of this company in Q1/2018.

I'm sure they can't wait to see the 2018 finances.

You're the only one who has any reasonable confidence that SQ42 will ever see the light of day. It's already a foregone conclusion that Star Citizen is dead and will NEVER be the game that was pitched. And you couldn't do it in 6 yrs and over $250M of other people's money.

All that aside from the fact that since Oct 2012, you have CONSISTENTLY LIED about literally EVERYTHING related to this project. With ZERO remorse.

Even to this day.

Except now you have an investor capable of suing your pants off based on your own statements.

Next time someone emails or DMs me about this latest investment bs, I'm just going to send them this thread, and tell them to go ask Dean @GamesBeat how many times you have to LIE to them before they start asking tough questions.

Happy New Year!

{end}

As my work is never done, I wanted to add this ps so as to complete the picture in this train of thought.

CIG, the most open dev ever, was losing money right through to YE 2017.

Fact: They spent $193M while raising *only* $175M.

And they had loans on top of that.

Even as they were inventing new ways (land sales!) to rip off backers in 2017 (the year with the most sales ever), they went & raised $46M investment in Q1/18, closed deal May 2018.

NEVER said a word to backers

I broke the news first on 12/12

They made it public 12/20

When put all of this together, suddenly it all makes sense (at least to those who haven't been paying attention).

And between the top 4 execs, I have now received word from a reliable source that they collectively make $1.3M annually.

They haven't shipped a SINGLE game.

If you think that's ludicrous or far-fetched, imagine this: According to public UK filings, Erin Roberts (brother of Chris) makes over $325K a year. Almost DOUBLE what a similar director in Manchester, UK makes.

This is part of the scam whereby they all got rich from backers.

Oh, and get this, they're STILL out looking for more investors. I kid you not. But then again, when I said this back in 2017, most thought it was ludicrous, seeing as they had raised so much FREE money.

Then the $46M investment was made public over a year later.