On this week’s Around the Verse, Star Citizen’s Chris Roberts and Sandi Gardiner bookend two key segments. The first is a studio update with Foundry 42 checking in from Frankfurt; Brian Chambers describes the team’s efforts on procedural planets, spawning, moons, performance capture, the conversation system, NPC AI, and missions headed into Squadron 42.
The moons “are getting cooler every week, and they’re actually a really great test example where we’re sort of pushing our tech for the planets, which will also pay off on the more involved planets like Hurston or ArcCorp or Microtech and beyond,” Roberts says. “So it’s a great test bed, and it’s kinda fun for me, and we share it with you guys, but I sort of see the progress weekly in it, and it gets cooler and better. So this universe is going to be awesome.”
The second segment features the Star Citizen QA team spread out over the global studios — these would be the largely thankless but absolutely critical people who test the game-in-progress and catch bugs. “My day is awesome: I come into work and play Star Marine all day long. I can’t complain at all.” That’d be Scott McCrea. “Basically I come into work, start up Star Marine and try to break it all day long. It’s fun.”
Finally, Cloud Imperium has posted a length Q&A on the tech of Banu Defender concept ship that’s worth a peek if you really need every last detail on your pixel spaceships.
