Mystic Worlds

Star Citizen Alpha - Trading Round 2

My newest article discussed the ups and downs of my second attempt at trading in Star Citizen's Alpha 3.0 Patch. My objective was to see how much I could earn doing trading for two hours using one of the smaller ships, the Cutlass Black. The Cutlass Black is a popular multi-purpose ship recently redesigned. It's manufactured by Drake, known for creating ships that are popular among pirates. I have one on loan while waiting for the Cutlass Red, the only ambulance ship sold to date, to be flyable in game.

The dynamic nature of the trade pricing caused my initial route plan to be unprofitable during this second attempt. At this point I could choose to take those losses or risk that and more, looking for alternatives. You can read the outcome of the adventure here.

Star Citizen Alpha - Let the Trading Begin

Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 has unveiled the first implementation of cargo hauling and trade. At first, I spent time doing a little of both. In the end, I decided to focus more on trading. It suits my preference for ad hoc free wielding gameplay scenarios versus checking off lists for NPCs. The newly introduced content still has its share of bugs. The server performance is less than stellar. Even so, with patience, there are enjoyable adventures to be had in these fledgling feature sets.

Before you jump in, let the buyer beware. There are posts on Reddit, the official forums and in-game, from people who've managed to lose all of their money. Yikes. It can be a slow road back into the black if only have one ship and it's a small one. Check out my post on Alysianah's World for my impressions of cargo hauling, trade and what NOT to do.

Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 PTU - Turned a Corner

Two Pesky Patches

I sat out two patches due to CPU spikes and what seemed like rampant RAM consumption. It's testing of Alpha on the Private Test Universe, so it's not entirely unexpected to run into memory issues and unoptimized code. Both of which have been addressed EXCEPT my technical problems persisted, as it has for others. Partly, because they seem to have introduced something that doesn't play as nicely as it once did with NVidia. And current indications are that game appears to need more RAM than it's 2.x predecessor. Unfortunately, for me, my gaming desktop with an i970 only supports a maximum of 12 GB of RAM which I have. Configuring a larger virtual memory pool on the SSD did little to improve the situation overall, due to constant disk utilization. Memory at 98%, CPU at 60+ and Disk at 60+ didn't make for a stable gaming experience. 

Laptop to the Rescue

With the unexpected CPU spiking resolved, I decided to take apart my gaming setup in the bedroom. I moved my gaming laptop and its peripherals into the living room. I'm a sad panda about the necessity of doing that since I enjoy playing The Sims to empty my mind before going to sleep. And no, this isn't the type of laptop you want on your lap. It's too heavy, and I keep it on a sturdy cooling pad that has four fans. Configured with an i6700 and 32 GB of RAM, the game played much smoother so that sealed the deal. Back into the breach of Alpha 3.0 PTU testing.

Having moved to playing on my laptop, I had the best 3.0 PTU sessions so far! I server-hopped four times to find one with 25+ FPS. Once I landed there, I played a few hours of uninterrupted magnificence. It made me very hungry for the days where 30+ FPS is the minimum. I can't imagine how enjoyable it will be for 60+FPS which is CIG's target by release.

Amazing - Tip of the Iceberg

The ability to freely explore anywhere and everywhere, in a game with such high fidelity is spectacular. It's seamless. Yadda...yadda. 100% under your control. Yadda...yadda. We all know the sales speak well enough. It's the doing it yourself that's exciting and unprecedented. When I look at the gorgeous photos and video I captured today; it's hard to believe they're not just beautiful pictures. No, they're things I did! In a single gaming session no less. It's all just the tip of the iceberg and why my support stays grounded even when it's storming outside.

I've started the arduous task of organizing and cataloging my images and video before they get out of control. You can look through what I've uploaded so far here. I'm looking for a WordPress media widget that will optimize them as they're uploaded. I don't have the time to deal with resizing hundreds of images individually. For now, they're going up full size so it's not a pretty sight on a mobile device.

Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 PTU - The Rest of the Story

In Part 1 of my Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 PTU experience, I expressed my concerns about the game in general. Now for the rest of the story. There are a lot of strong feelings surrounding Cloud Imperium Game's development of this title, on all sides of the fence. Things are rarely black and white, and neither are my opinions about the game. Check out part 2 of Casual Citizen episode 29 to hear more.

 

 

Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 PTU Leaves Me Concerned

I've been play-testing the newest patch for Star Citizen, Alpha 3.0, on the Private Test Universe. I'll admit up front, this is the first patch that's left me feeling concerned about Star Citizen as a whole. I'm a long time backer with a considerable amount pledged. I'm not worried that the game won't be completed. I'm not concerned about how backer money is being used. I believe that CIG is doing everything in their power to deliver what has been promised. However, the time it's taken to develop and test 3.0 leaves me with the impression, it's a much longer road to hoe than many of us think. And I considered myself realistic and patient, recognizing the ambition of the game and its feature-set. However, the condition of 3.0 after the Evocati has already been testing for weeks and the fact that we don't even have all of the planned 3.0 content to test yet, gives me pause. The mountain I knew we were climbing and willing joined in on the adventure, suddenly appears considerably steeper.

I believe certain design decisions will be reoccurring issues, the detailed animations being among them. I fear that some aspects of what Chris Roberts and crew think adds immersion is going to seem like unnecessary time wasting fiddly bits to me. There's lots of time to change course if enough backers don't like an implementation. But who among us wants more rework?? I know I don't. I work in product management so I get the iterative nature of agile development. At this point, however, I'd probably vote to suffer a few things I don't like then see systems reworked, delaying the release further.

In the end, I still have confidence that CR and CIG will deliver the goods. I believe they're doing everything in their power to get there. Hell, I'm sure they want things done even more than we do as backers. I may not agree with how some things are implemented. I'll adjust as and where I can. But this is going to be longer than I'd dared to think it would be.

Want to hear specifics? Check out my First Impressions of the Alpha 3.0 PTU.

 

 

Star Citizen Nightbus EP7 - New Ship, Game Changer, New Aly's World Content and More

It's been a while since I've posted about Star Citizen or produced one of my related shows. It's not because I've lost steam or interest in following the game. I've just been very busy with real life commitments, some of which, are the result of producing my SC content.

Nightbus Episode 7 discusses the following:

• Why I purchased the controversial Origin 600i Explorer
• My Favorite Player Speculation about the 'Game Changer' Ben Mentioned
• When I think I'll be producing more SC Content
• New Visual Map added to Aly's World

Links

• SoundCloud version of the show: https://soundcloud.com/lauren-michele-12/star-citizen-nightbus-episode-7
• YouTube version of the show: https://youtu.be/WkoOixQq1og
• Aly's World Star System Composition page with Visual Map: http://alysianahsworld.com/_system-overview/?q=314
• Aly's World Route Planner with Visual Map: http://alysianahsworld.com/route-planner/

Writing Template to Help Formulate a Cohesive Story

 

An easy to use template that helps you formulate the essential elements for defining a cohesive story. This is something I've developed iteratively over the past year of writing short stories in the Star Citizen universe. It's helped to simplify the process and ensure the critical elements of storytelling are in place before I begin writing. You may find this useful for penning fan-fiction, short stories or creating the outline of a story for machinima scripts. This article on my blog explains how to use and access the template.

 

Cheers, hope you find it useful.

Star Citizen - My EVE 2.0

It's been several years since I've had an MMO to call home. I've played all the AAA MMOs that have come to the NA market. Unfortunately, out of the seemingly endless sea of MMOs, I've tried, the only ones that felt like home for any period of time since my WOW days were GW2, EVE, ROM, WAR and AA. With EVE being the only sci-fi title among them.

There's a particular blend of gameplay needed for me to find long-term satisfaction in a game. A compelling mission system that provides progression to max level or whatever is considered end game. A sense of exploration, where I can wander freely while traveling, harvesting or completing quests. A robust crafting and/or trade system on which to hang my character's hat in her adulthood. Regular injections of new content, abilities, professions and economic opportunities. And although I'm not a classic RPer, I enjoy good lore - deep backstory and context that gives meaning to what we're all supposedly doing in that universe. My Holy Grail MMO needs to have all of the above or at least, a majority.

Continue Reading on Aly's World of Star Citizen

Star Citizen - 3 Hours of Narrated Fan-Fiction

I just released Star Citizen Nightbus Fiction Collective Volume 1. Whew, that's a mouthful. It's a compilation of the fan-fiction I've written thus far for Star Citizen. It contains the serialized stories that were previously released in NB episodes 1 to 6, plus the narration of Maggie's Origin Story.

Star Citizen lore and the upcoming MMO have inspired me to start writing fiction again and I'm enjoying it. As ever, I wish there were more leisure hours in a day to explore all of my hobbies but, I try to make do as I can. Smile Somehow, I'm going to begin making time to resume writing my own fiction while I'm feeling excited and motivated.

There's more to come for my NB fan-fiction too. The next two pieces of fiction that will appear alongside my OpEd pieces will be "An A.I.'s Story" and "Murder on the 890 Jump". A.I. will play around with the idea of telling a story with a non-human as the protagonist and Murder will be in the style of Clue, letting readers play along to guess the identity of the killer. These are both a few weeks out as I have other obligations to fulfill in between.  Until then, I hope you enjoy this collective.

 

New Star Citizen Fan-Fiction: Maggie's Origin Story

Story Synopsis: Maggie, a licensed paramour in Croshaw plans a new life in Stanton but a demanding and malevolent client has other ideas.

Background: Maggie made her first appearance in The Exterminator. This is her origin story, describing how she ended up in Stanton.

Excerpt

Maggie rolled away from him, relieved his session was over. She sat up and swung her legs over the side of the bed. It was out of fashion but she wore her hair loose and natural. The auburn waves undulated down below her shoulder blades. She clutched the bed sheet to her chest, about to stand up and wrap them around herself. She stopped when she felt him reach out and rub his knuckles up and down the small of her back. She winced as he slowly traced his fingers along the bruises he’d left there. It took all her composure not to flinch away in revulsion.

You can enjoy the full story here on Alysianah's World of Star Citizen.