Star Citizen Needs To Stop Growing In Scope, And Start Fulfilling Its Promises

When does a project go from being highly ambitious work of enormous scale to a scam that is never coming out? I think you know just what I’m talking about. One of the most controversial projects in gaming history, Star Citizen’s true nature is as unclear as it gets. Many people consider it a genuine effort and continue to support it, while others see it as nothing more than a blatant scam. What do you think?

$700 Million And No Release, What’s The Holdup?

I think you’ll be as surprised as I was to know that Star Citizen has now crossed $700 million in funding. A crowdfunding project with promises I don’t think it can keep, Star Citizen continues to paint itself in a bad picture.

$700 Million has been reached
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Less than a year ago, it crossed the $600 million mark, and I sat down to look at some of the reasons why it still eludes us. Now, another 100 million bucks acquired, yet I’m as confused as I was back then as to why the game refuses to wrap things up. With every passing day, Star Citizen is burying itself deeper, and I dread to imagine what will happen eventually.

There are many internal politics and factors involved, and the project has gone through many changes. I’m not completely ruling it as a scam just yet, I prefer a “wait and see” approach. Still the optimistic kind after all these years. But, Star Citizen really needs to speed things up now.

Why Star Citizen is taking so long. A short history lesson.
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Star Citizen Has Made Genuine Progress, But It’s Not Enough

Before you start bashing me for saying it’s not doing anything, I’ll go ahead and admit myself that the game is certainly making some progress. Provided it’s in a perpetual Alpha state, Star Citizen has added meaningful additions, the devs are transparent enough about consistent updates, and we get to see it all in real time instead of being tied up into NDAs and strict veils.

SC Roadmap “Advanced” Release View (2024-02-07)
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However, my question is, is this development enough to justify the $700 million that it has gathered? No, I don’t think it’s even close. Star Citizen is a buggy mess with many game-breaking glitches, performance, and frame rate that make you want to kill yourself, and many accessibility features and QoL updates still missing, making the game as barebones mechanically as it was many years ago.

Star Citizen is consistently getting content and updates, but they pale in comparison to the funds it has. If even after gathering this much money, the game can’t fix the most basic of the flaws, what even is it doing? I know the devs have worked considerably on the single-player Squadron 42 update, but if it remains in the state it currently is, the massive funding can never be justified.

How to make money with literally nothing? My game glitches and I lost everything except my ship
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The “Mega” Transactions Are Not Helping

Star Citizen’s devs may be transparent and consistent, but there’s a major reason why it can never escape the scam allegations no matter what. That reason, my friends, is the microtransactions. Apologies, I meant the “Gigantic” transactions.

Star Citizen features bundles of spaceships that go for as much as $48,000 each. Can you tell me this is not a scam with a straight face? On top of that, the game somehow “runs out” of these digital items, in a misguided attempt to tempt people into getting them while buckled under the pressure of a soul-crushing FOMO.

3000$ for a space ship isn’t exactly what i call a ‘microtransaction’
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“I have to get that $40,000 spaceship, it’ll be sold out in under 10 hours.” No matter how much I want to give Star Citizen the benefit of the doubt, I can never for the life of me justify this. A game that owes its existence to crowdfunding should never make such impossible demands.

Yet, People Continue To Spend On Star Citizen

Alas, this is where all my argument becomes null. No matter what I say or think, as long as people keep feeding it money, Star Citizen will continue to work at the pace it’s going on. What’s the hurry, the game’s bringing in a ton of cash already. Let’s keep it this way. Every few years, the game grows enormously in scope, and the release gets pushed back further. It promises you greatness while continuing to extract more money from you.

I think we need to stop giving money to CIG if we want the development to pick up the pace.
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Who in their right mind can call a $40,000 pack fair? Yet, people buy it, and extensively. How else did a game gather a whopping $100 million in less than a year? Star Citizen is improving, yes, but not at the pace at which it’s getting the money. There’s plenty wrong with Star Citizen’s aggressive money-making schemes, whether you agree with me or not.

Star Citizen – A Scam from Day One: The Evidence
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All I Want Is A Release Now, No More “Increasing The Scope”

Thus, as a person who was genuinely interested in the game, only to be turned away by its suspicious actions, there’s only one request I’d like to make. Take Star Citizen close to completion now. The game has already grown beyond the scope of anything else, it’s ample. The current scope is already ambitious enough to create an unrivaled spectacle, provided it is completed.

When Star Citizen finally releases
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Star Citizen has yet to deliver even the stuff it promised a decade ago. Instead, it continues to promise more and more, showing you the illusion of further greatness in return for your patience. I think it’s plenty now. 

Squadron 42 is almost done now, it’s declared feature complete. Thus, I think it’s high time Star Citizen moves towards an official release. Work with the scope currently in place, and focus on refining that to perfection, that’s all I want. The only way Star Citizen can escape this scam debate is if it presents a release date now.