From the Cockpit
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FROM THE COCKPIT IN THIS ISSUE >>> 03 ACES GUIDE: Year in Review 19 WORK IN PROGRESS: Anvil Aerospace Arrow 37 GALACTAPEDIA: Banded Fessle 39 WHERE IN THE ‘VERSE? ISSUE: 06 12 40 ONE QUESTION: What Was Your Best Star Citizen Memory From 2018? Editor: Ben Lesnick Copy Editor: Martin Driver Layout: Michael Alder FROM THE COCKPIT GREETINGS, CITIZENS! Happy New Year (almost)! 2018 has been a truly that’s passed around the internet quite a bit where astounding year for Star Citizen. When I first started he urges people to notice when they are happy “and working for Cloud Imperium Games back in 2012, I exclaim or murmur or think at some point, if this isn’t asked a co-worker and veteran of many long projects nice, I don’t know what is”. Our feature article does how he thought we were going to do everything we just that and looks back at some of the incredible wanted. At the time, we had the game plans we’d accomplishments from the Star Citizen team this past shared with the community and plenty of internal year and celebrates what they mean for the future. dreaming about how to go even bigger. It seemed like From entire planets to pocket carriers, this year was a monumental task and I wanted to talk to someone certainly nice. who had been through this scale of project before. Without missing a beat, he told me that yes, at the We also have a pretty neat feature on the new Anvil start, every game seems like an impossible challenge Arrow. For the past year, we’ve shown you how our and that Star Citizen was going to feel that way for ships are built. Readers surely know the process a time. But, there would come a very particular point now and mostly want to see all the ideas and little when we would understand how it was all supposed challenges that come up in that framework. Well, to come together. He likened it to riding a roller the Arrow is something different, something we all coaster: the trip up might seem interminable, but imagined back at the start: a ship built for immediate there’s a point where you can clearly see the route release instead of a concept presentation. That might ahead and the real excitement beings. I didn’t quite not seem like a big deal in and of itself... but trust me, understand what he meant at the time, but now I it’s the future! think 2018 was exactly what he was describing. It really feels like this was the year that the pieces we I will close the year thanking you all very much for saw in our head early on became not just possible, your support. I hope you’ve enjoyed the past few but real, tangible products that we can load up months of Jump Point. I’m excited to announce and engage with. There’s plenty of work to be that we’ll be making some changes to the format to done, for sure, but I don’t think anyone doubts that introduce new and better types of articles next year, it’s possible anymore. the first of which you’ll see in January. Until next time, I wish you all the happiest possible holidays and Before we move forward down the track, though, I will see you... in the ‘verse! we thought it would be a good time to look back on the year that was. There’s a Kurt Vonnegut quote Ben [email protected] A Roberts Space Industries Corp. production. A Star Citizen newsletter. Part of the Star Citizen/Squadron 42 universe. © 2018 Cloud Imperium Rights LLC and Cloud Imperium Rights Ltd. Star Citizen®, Squadron 42®, Cloud Imperium®, and Roberts Space Industries, LLC”, are registered trademarks of Cloud Imperium Rights LLC. 02 ACES GUIDE: YEAR IN REVIEW ACES GUIDE: YEAR IN REVIEW 3.4 MISC FREELANCER There’re no two ways to say it: 2018 was Star Citizen’s biggest year yet. From introducing an entire planet to finding new ways to share the development process with the community, the project has had a banner year. In honor of all this, we’re taking a short look back at five of the big changes that made this year so wonderful... BEGIN TRANSMISSION > CHRIS ROBERTS ON THE MAIN STAGE AT CITIZENCON TRANSIT TO LORVILLE 3.3 AEGIS HAMMERHEAD CITIZENCON DRAKE DRAKE KRAKEN CONCEPT IMAGE VIRTUAL TRAINING CENTER JUMP POINT MAGAZINE // 03 04 ACES GUIDE: YEAR IN REVIEW 1) LOOKING FORWARD: UPDATING THE ROADMAP The efforts of 2018 weren’t just limited to improving and expanding schedule. This has given the community a better understanding the website. We worked with our web developers Turbulent to create because it’s now a more automated process where the website the game itself: one of the biggest changes this year was the of how much work goes into a project like Star Citizen and lets a method and build the new hosting page. At the start of 2018, there is representing information directly from development, but Production Team’s concentrated effort to make sure a public-facing everyone understand why a simple feature can sometimes rely on a was a big push to organize our development Epics by their relevant because we’re able to show the community our future intentions. version of their internal schedule was available and regularly updated. dozen other milestones coming together before it can be released. releases and to begin scoping out work for the rest of the year, which We’ve seen some great feedback from the community and The Star Citizen Team has always aimed to be as transparent as also tied into our aim of releasing a new patch each quarter. There excitement generated from seeing a feature or improvement possible in letting the community know what’s in the works and how Producer Matthew Webster explains the work that went into this change: were many meetings to make sure that what we were seeing on our that won’t even be in the game as far as a year out. Seeing much progress is being made, but for 2018, Chris Roberts wanted to “We knew that we wanted a better way to represent our development Epics was being properly represented on the website, but we got there the buzz from this is a really good engagement point for us.” try and share even more. The result is a complex production schedule goals and ongoing progress to the community than the weekly in the end.” made easily readable that shares exactly what the team has been development updates (the ones with the screenshots of charts). We The production team is dedicated to continuing this level of openness working on. Gone are the captures of confusing internal charts, felt that a good way to do this would be to pull information directly from Why is this milestone so important for Star Citizen? Webster throughout 2019 and even plans to expand the process further, aiming replaced by an easy to understand but comprehensive production the Epics in our project management software, JIRA, and present it on continues: “This roadmap represents a great step for us, not just to show further into the future when possible. JUMP POINT MAGAZINE // 05 06 ACES GUIDE: YEAR IN REVIEW 2) HURSTON AND BEYOND THE INFINITE In late 2017, Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 introduced three fully explorable moons, Cellin, Daymar, and Yela. This was a huge milestone for the game, adding something that the team had considered a distant possibility when the project began: massive, realistic environments that put to shame the simple gameflow navigation screens that would’ve been utilized in earlier games. So where do you go from literally creating and populating moons? Why, you build planets, of course! 2018 is the year Star Citizen’s Environment Team truly became Magratheans. Using the procedural technology that had allowed the construction of moons, they constructed Hurston, an entire planet in the Stanton System. Hurston is the home planet of Hurston Dynamics and one of several corporate planets imagined early in the game’s development. The thought was that the Stanton System would be the 30th century’s equivalent of an enterprise zone, playing host to many of the mega- corporations that form the backbone of human commerce in 2948. But where developers early on imagined only a small map that would allow players to explore a spaceport, access their housing, and make necessary ship upgrades, they had now created an entire world to populate and explore. The final effect is stunning and so perfectly encapsulates what Chris Roberts has always believed was possible for the game. Hurston launched in Star Citizen Alpha 3.3, enabled by recent enhancements to Object Container Streaming that would allow the game to effectively move the incredible amounts of data required to simulate the world. JUMP POINT MAGAZINE // 07 08 ACES GUIDE: YEAR IN REVIEW The crown jewel of Hurston is Lorville, a company town set up by the crash sites, and the natural wonders spread around the planet. planet’s namesake. Lorville has all of the early features imagined for the planet and then some, including a working mass transit system. The city While Hurston and Lorville are impressive accomplishments on their is full of diverse, consciously created environments and is populated by own, they’re they’re glimpses of even bigger things to come. Just as NPCs. It’s an example of exactly what Star Citizen aims to do around the ship pipeline began by perfecting individual ships and the style the galaxy: points of interest that are natural hotspots for gameplay and books that go with them, building Hurston and Lorville has allowed the interaction that fit naturally into larger worlds that have near-infinite team to prototype the next wave of locations that will be built to the possibilities for emergent gameplay.