Thread by @dsmart

BREAKING: I hate to say "I told you so", but CIG have now REMOVED (under the guise of "It was a bug") the ability to use FREE ships in the game.

That's the patch they just pushed last night.

robertsspaceindustries.com/spectrum/commu…

To the casual on-looker, this is no biggie. To us, it's totally a big deal.

Let me explain why this is SIGNIFICANT.

1st, this is what REC (Rental Equipment Credits means. Note that it's from Chris Roberts. Back in 2015. Wait, it gets better.

pcgamesn.com/star-citizen/n…

When a backer sees something like this

"REC Ships are no longer available in the Persistent Universe"

in patch notes, you know that CIG just found another way to screw you out of money.

The PU is Star Citizen proper. It's the focus of everything they are currently working on

As you can get ships for FREE via REC, you could use those ships in the PU without SPENDING ANY MONEY.

Now, following 3.1 - which crashes abound, and LONG wait times for insurance claims means that you have to wait or BUY ships, they have REMOVED it.

The reason is as hilarious as everything associated with this scam.

This is what Chris Roberts said back in Feb 2015.

Read it. All of it.

robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/tran…

Having read the patch notes, this is the reason for its removal

"Ships obtained with REC were never intended for use in the Persistent Universe. While they have been available for a little while, the root cause of their presence in the PU has been corrected"

See what they just did there? You can no longer use REC ships - earned free - in the actual game that everyone is playing.

You have to buy ships. For cash or whatever credits you have.

Yes Felicia, this is the next stage of the blatant cash grab. And once again, they've screwed their backers.

It gets worse.

You know how there are 4 modules which are all independent of the actually Star Citizen actual (aka PU)?

Well, for a project with approx 500K backers (that 2m number is nonsense, due to duplicate accounts), NOBODY IS PLAYING THEM.

Here's proof...

From those metrics. This is how abysmal things are, and why only a few whales (being repeatedly ripped off by CIG) are propping up this train wreck...

Period ending March 31:

Star Marine:

1.3 average concurrent players, 99.9 uniques/day

Arena Commander:

1.0 average concurrent players, 27.9 uniques/day

Murray Cup:

0.3 average concurrent players, 18.7 uniques/day

All modes combined:

2.6 average concurrent players, 139.5 uniques/day

NOTE: Squadron Battle leaderboards do not update because, well, NOBODY IS PLAYING!!!

Since the backers are mostly focused on the PU - which generates ALL of the interest (nobody gives a shit about Squadron 42, except Chris Roberts) - that's why they focus on those features and selling ships for it.

If they allow you to earn REC ships, which you can then play in the PU, guess the end result?

That's right. They don't MAKE MONEY.

This is where we are now. Yet another promise that Chris has now walked back - with impunity.

Because he can.

For those who are interested, you can see more of our metrics on my website.

Note, CIG does NOT generate these. They are scrubbed by data mining the publicly available data directly from the games.

dereksmart.com/forum/index.ph…

They have long since known that people only play those modes in order to earn REC. Now they've done something about it because it affects their bottom line.

Next up - and I can almost guarantee is what comes next - aUEC (the in-game currency used in this test bed) is going away. Which means you have to buy the actual game currency, UEC, for real money. Which is precisely what it was designed for.

You mad yet?

unroll