Author Topic: Star Citizen Citizenship  (Read 1075107 times)

DemonInvestor

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2175 on: January 07, 2020, 04:13:14 PM »
With Chris and lawyer buddy its really hard to imagine what other cross investing that has occurred beyond turbelent that would help attract new money. Just trying to imagine the scheming these two are could come up with, I'd say they could out theory craft their own backers when it comes to money.

That's why i focuses on the loan part.
I've seen unsuccessful companies "marketing" themselves to (mostly) private investors for decades, without getting anywhere. Which is why i've written often before, that death can be slow for companies. If you ever read about "pump and dump" on penny stocks, you'll see that finances can be a real dark place for the unsuspecting people.

jwh1701

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2176 on: January 07, 2020, 10:30:24 PM »
That's why i focuses on the loan part.
I've seen unsuccessful companies "marketing" themselves to (mostly) private investors for decades, without getting anywhere. Which is why i've written often before, that death can be slow for companies. If you ever read about "pump and dump" on penny stocks, you'll see that finances can be a real dark place for the unsuspecting people.

I'm in crypto so I have to do a lot of research so many pump and dump scam coins.

dsmart

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2177 on: January 08, 2020, 11:11:50 AM »
Okay just because i'm getting bored by the repetition of 'they easily could have gotten a loan'...

a) They wouldn't have needed a loan/investment if they weren't bruning more than taking in - because they easily got 40+ million in bank before they upscaled.
b) It's more preferable to take a loan instead of an investment in terms of costs - Sum y for % of y or Sum y for % of Everything.
c) Outside capital is more risk averse than venture (investment) capital - because they don't participate in your eventual winnings, so lower expected payoff for an investment in most cases.
d) Software companies seldomly have any real asset as collateral. The 'Star Engine' is worthless without an acompanying Lumberyard/CryTek Engine License (and other sub licences), and they won't nessecarily agree upon you using said engine. The 'Star Engine' itself will hardly be as documented as any commercially available engine - so worthless without the actual talent behind the current engine. Art Assets are also quite worthless as such is most often quite specific for a product. (Which is by the way, why software companies also tend to hold quite some money in their hands).
e) Even if you count CIGs assets, you've got to ask through how many legal loops do you have to hop with a multinational company for such a small credit?
f) Limited liability companies are inherently less trustworthy to banks, they mostly take a look at the board then. And let's be real even if you think CIG is run well, that's not CRoberts history...

Sure there are some outliers - an investor with very specific knowledge who could help you beside his investment and would only do if he gets part of the cake, can't judge it here, or other such things.
So again if anyone thinks it's likely that CIG could have gotten a ~50 million loan on his company with a net current value (ignoring good will) of ~30 millions, than be free to tell me why. I might have gotten a bit rusty on my financial taining and am a bit drunk...

That was such a waste of time because you're trying to convince someone who is beyond the realms of reality. The fact is that the project isn't a "going concern" because their revenue stream is volatile and they have no tangible product.

ps: Banks don't give loans to entities that aren't turning a profit and in which their P&L doesn't show a healthy cash flow and the ability to pay it back. It's why Coutts in the UK took ALL their assets as collateral for such a small loan which was already based on guaranteed tax credits.
Star Citizen isn't a game. It's a TV show about a bunch of characters making a game. It's basically "This is Spinal Tap" - except people think the band is real.

Slapmeandcallmegurl

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2178 on: January 09, 2020, 04:27:30 AM »
Okay just because i'm getting bored by the repetition of 'they easily could have gotten a loan'...

a) They wouldn't have needed a loan/investment if they weren't bruning more than taking in - because they easily got 40+ million in bank before they upscaled.
b) It's more preferable to take a loan instead of an investment in terms of costs - Sum y for % of y or Sum y for % of Everything.
c) Outside capital is more risk averse than venture (investment) capital - because they don't participate in your eventual winnings, so lower expected payoff for an investment in most cases.
d) Software companies seldomly have any real asset as collateral. The 'Star Engine' is worthless without an acompanying Lumberyard/CryTek Engine License (and other sub licences), and they won't nessecarily agree upon you using said engine. The 'Star Engine' itself will hardly be as documented as any commercially available engine - so worthless without the actual talent behind the current engine. Art Assets are also quite worthless as such is most often quite specific for a product. (Which is by the way, why software companies also tend to hold quite some money in their hands).
e) Even if you count CIGs assets, you've got to ask through how many legal loops do you have to hop with a multinational company for such a small credit?
f) Limited liability companies are inherently less trustworthy to banks, they mostly take a look at the board then. And let's be real even if you think CIG is run well, that's not CRoberts history...

Sure there are some outliers - an investor with very specific knowledge who could help you beside his investment and would only do if he gets part of the cake, can't judge it here, or other such things.
So again if anyone thinks it's likely that CIG could have gotten a ~50 million loan on his company with a net current value (ignoring good will) of ~30 millions, than be free to tell me why. I might have gotten a bit rusty on my financial taining and am a bit drunk...

You clearly know more about these things than me, only point I'd question is your assessment of net current value being around 30 million. They sold about 10% of the company for 46 million, which suggests your figure is a bit off doesn't it?

Facts are, they have secured bank loans and they have secured private investment.

That was such a waste of time because you're trying to convince someone who is beyond the realms of reality. The fact is that the project isn't a "going concern" because their revenue stream is volatile and they have no tangible product.

ps: Banks don't give loans to entities that aren't turning a profit and in which their P&L doesn't show a healthy cash flow and the ability to pay it back. It's why Coutts in the UK took ALL their assets as collateral for such a small loan which was already based on guaranteed tax credits.

I'd question 'volatile revenue', which has consistently been 30+million dollars a year for, what, 5 years running? It may bounce up and down month to month but year on year is steady as a rock.

As for 'no tangible product', well, there's plenty of people playing in the ever expanding PU every day and spending money to facilitate said play. I reckon 21 Millon dollars in two months is pretty fucking tangible!

jwh1701

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2179 on: January 09, 2020, 03:39:52 PM »

As for 'no tangible product', well, there's plenty of people playing in the ever expanding PU every day and spending money to facilitate said play. I reckon 21 Millon dollars in two months is pretty fucking tangible!

I would not consider it tangle product till we have the promised features from the basic KS not even including the extended. How much more money has he received vs what he needed? They are 8 years in and still supposedly working on tech, the devs stated in 2016 the planet tech was done and way ahead of everyone else. But 4 years later no where near the basic ks. I'm personally surprised the money has not greatly diminished.  Could there be enough new players completely unaware of the disaster that are buying just the starter packages or a few ships to account for it? I would find it hard that any whales would still be investing at this point.

Slapmeandcallmegurl

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2180 on: January 09, 2020, 04:41:44 PM »
I would not consider it tangle product till we have the promised features from the basic KS not even including the extended. How much more money has he received vs what he needed? They are 8 years in and still supposedly working on tech, the devs stated in 2016 the planet tech was done and way ahead of everyone else. But 4 years later no where near the basic ks. I'm personally surprised the money has not greatly diminished.  Could there be enough new players completely unaware of the disaster that are buying just the starter packages or a few ships to account for it? I would find it hard that any whales would still be investing at this point.

I suppose what we consider tangible is irrelevant, bankers and investors would see a product producing very tangible revenue. 21 million dollars in November and December suggests whales, salmon, tuna, barracuda and whitebait are still throwing money at them.

Motto

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2181 on: January 09, 2020, 05:37:59 PM »
Please stop feeding the troll.

DemonInvestor

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2182 on: January 10, 2020, 04:24:17 PM »
You clearly know more about these things than me, only point I'd question is your assessment of net current value being around 30 million. They sold about 10% of the company for 46 million, which suggests your figure is a bit off doesn't it?

Facts are, they have secured bank loans and they have secured private investment.

I'd question 'volatile revenue', which has consistently been 30+million dollars a year for, what, 5 years running? It may bounce up and down month to month but year on year is steady as a rock.

As for 'no tangible product', well, there's plenty of people playing in the ever expanding PU every day and spending money to facilitate said play. I reckon 21 Millon dollars in two months is pretty fucking tangible!

Well you got a point i haven't run a real valuation. It's more a simple look at their annual reporting and book values (and even not that truly).
But onwards onto actual valuation, CIG is currently not running any profit. So they're at a 'make belief' position and some people will believe you when you're in an elevator with them an got a few seconds to tell you how your online bookshop might sell huge amounts in the future and others will tell you books are dying. In the same way some people will believe you when you tell them you've got a machine that only needs to need a pint of blood instead of litres to find out every illness someone has for less money and others won't.

Now again towards the negatives (in terms of why i'm more critical about what people percieve the worth) - already high monetization of their user base, user base growth might be limited by their actual theme and game focus (how many play WoW instead of Eve Online?), currently a game that doesn't run well on mid-tier systems (lesser chance to sell well in e.g. BRIC countries), ongoing server costs vs. onetime sales, complex game without clear focuses - such often sell less well.
So comparitavely speaking you've got 4 big main sellers currently - SP + Microtransactions complex stories and such; Freemium simple games; Moderately complex MMOs (even though that seems to have died down a bit) and ongoing supscription fees; Competitive fast paced reflex games with microtransactions. Where would you place SC? Which means is it sensible to estimate a maximum of 2 - 10 millions player on an uncertain release or it reaching the actual Olymp of 5 times that?

And all that isn't even covering some problems they're quite likely running into, like:
- attrition of their engine base, as they'll have to spend more and more money to keep their engine up to date.
- attrition of their art assets - they already had to redo stuff, because they though their initial quality level they aimed for was to low.
- upcoming rivals (honestly people will now understand that there's money in Sci-Fi space games; and with a constant outflow of knowledge from CIG even if you give them the doubt of them having cutting-edge technology, that will get out there).
- actually making the game fun, with for players with interfering gaming foci (the ole' how can have a PVE gamer have fun, when the game is PVP?; How can the soldier on ground have fun, when other's are playing bombers?). I don't see CIG yet making good and solid points in these respects.

An all of the above still hinges on them actually delivering what they've promised yet.

It's a single project company currently, which isn't running a profit. Meaning it's really a venture investment - and those people normally look for at least a 3 times payout on projects that actually get finished (because the success ratio is around 33% - so for 3 projects funded 3 die without making back much) in some cases more, in some less. And you can count on a lot of people wanting a tenfold repayment within only a couple of years. Which is why movies that got made for ~150 millions and only made 300 millions are considered quite bad ones if not to say financial failures.

So again, my conclusion stands as this being a high risk project, with a fanbase that shifts uncomfortably currently.

--

And again already being in debt is not exactly positive for wanting to go deeper into debt and loans and investment are different things. So just because they got someone and already had some loans, doesn't mean that's nessecarily something inviteable.

@All sorry for the long shitty post. I hope at least someone gets something worthwhile from it.

Noztra

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2183 on: January 14, 2020, 12:01:27 AM »
You gotta love his optimism. :)

Spends 20min mentioning 3000 features that needs to be done, but still can't see that they will never be done. :)


And the comment section is even more funny. :)
« Last Edit: January 14, 2020, 12:04:39 AM by Noztra »

wiser3754

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2184 on: January 14, 2020, 05:38:47 PM »
That's probably for the best for BoredGamer. The longer and longer CIG can drag out the development the more videos he can upload on everything CIG does or doesn't do. It's not like the majority of his videos feature his gameplay with his commentary so it's easy for him to create "new" videos.

dsmart

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2185 on: January 16, 2020, 10:50:22 AM »
Finally i lost my faith and removed myself. One of the biggest issues for me are those toxic mods at spectrum. I can't believe how they can install such people to take care of pledgers. All the fun is gone at all ... a real drama this show!

One last question ...i allready checked a thread here, were you discussed the identity of kraiklyn. Anyways because CIG is known for family affairs in leading positions and i've seen similar hometowns at facebook profiles. Could it be that Kraiklyn (if its his realname: Henry Davis) is a brother of Eric Kieron Davis and protected/untouchable. Would fit or?

So goodbye SC see ya when its done...greetings worldpeople.

Yeah this isn't new. It's been this way since the start.
Star Citizen isn't a game. It's a TV show about a bunch of characters making a game. It's basically "This is Spinal Tap" - except people think the band is real.

Mbk

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2186 on: January 22, 2020, 07:01:29 PM »

Title: Star Citizen Refunds

Description: This subreddit has been suspended for repeated hate crimes against video games. The moderator team has been dismissed and replaced. Contact the new moderators for more info.

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Kyrt

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2187 on: January 23, 2020, 10:41:54 AM »
They changed scope, added features and made mistakes and I just don't care. I'm told most games go through similar troubles during development but CIG is just doing it publicly.

Do other games go through similar troubles?
Sure.
Are CIG doing this publicly?
Sure...sorta. Kinda. Well...more publicly than usual.

But there is "similar" and then there is CIG.

Had this been any other game at any other company, a big part of the reason why we wouldn't have heard of these troubles is because the game would have been scrapped.

Most of CIGs problems stem from overpromising and underdeveloping. Most/all of what they promised can be delivered. Look at ED and NMS. NMS has already largely delivered what SC has promised and ED is well on the way to matching it. It seems increasingly likely ED will get Space Legs with the next season, and FD are spending quite a lot of time developing this expansion...but then, space legs is essentially another game in its own right.

But SC is hobbled by poor planning, poor management and poor development. If it wasn't going to be cancelled, the program should have been restarted from scratch a long time ago and built according to a proper development schedule and project. Instead, what we have is feature creep, where new features and systems are tacked on to an existing build which then gets more and more unwieldy and complex and problem filled and which then costs increasing amounts of money to change, update and expand. Then there is the need to address Tech Debt, and the increased march of technology and PC capabilities which mean the game needs continual refreshes simply to keep it looking relevant - it looked superb in 2012 but is merely average now.

I am still positive that CIG will eventually release a game. That game may even end up being fun. It might even be successful - long term; presales alone guarantee it a short reign as No.1 and are therefore irrelevant.  But I am also positive that what they release will be very different in many ways from the game that was promised, the game people paid for. I am also positive that whatever they end up releasing will not be worth the money they spent on it. Both NMS and ED have been developed for far less and both are far more capable and polished than SC. A $500 million game than could have been developed for $50 million or less.....if the project had decent management.

I am not going to comment on the fund raising practises or the loans or the apparently shoddy deals and wasteful spending. That's a matter for the backers and I they are content to overlook CIGs dodgy accounting, then who am I to complain?


Quote
I do like chatting with you all here, it's fun. Derek's particular stance and blog writing and Twitter rants and interviews and everything else he's got up to over the last few years just make him a gold mine of funny opinions and quotes, so yeah, poking the Derek bear is amusing.

Maybe, but the trouble is, Derek Smart has been right about quite a bit regarding this project. He is quite knowledgeable about the programming side of things, and his business insight is fairly developed. He has underestimated the willingness of whales to keep throwing money at CIG but so long as they're having fun, let them. It's their money. I'm more concerned about he backers who invest but can't really afford what they are pumping in.


wiser3754

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2188 on: January 23, 2020, 03:31:22 PM »

The "Stats Page", as described by Disco Lando.

jwh1701

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Re: Star Citizen Citizenship
« Reply #2189 on: January 24, 2020, 02:44:48 PM »
Title: Star Citizen Refunds

Description: This subreddit has been suspended for repeated hate crimes against video games. The moderator team has been dismissed and replaced. Contact the new moderators for more info.

https://subredditstats.com/r/starcitizen_refunds

When I saw that is was such a good laugh.

 

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