Over the past couple of days, it has been a total 180 on performance. I now average closer to 40 FPS while in port and the spikes are few and far between. I still, of course, get crashes, bugs, and issues associated with playing an Alpha, but the stability is better. So I was able to get in and play and as it turns out, I have inspiration again. I got my mojo back!
I often forget that this game is an MMO because I am very much an “In the moment” person. I can plan for the future, but my plans extend from what I am experiencing now. For now, I have had very few player interactions. I would see other ships and players in passing, but they might as well have been AI to me. There was no real interaction or even a need for one. Perhaps the obligatory flashlight flick greeting or an emote wave...but nothing of substance.
My very first player interaction happened the very first time I played Star Citizen in 3.0 and landed planetside. I landed at the Javelin crash site with a friend and we were doing one of the dreaded black box missions. Soon after we landed, we heard a series of explosions and weapons firing...followed by a large explosion and a shower of debris from what was once my Avenger Titan.
A Cutlass black had come in, saw the vacant ship and proceeded to destroy it...which really was not that big of a deal. After all, I come from playing Milsim games, and Survival games, being randomly ganked just because I was there, is sort of the status quo for my gaming experience. Shit happens, I should have planned better...oh well.
It didn't end there, as I crested the hill that my smoldering titan was sitting on, I just HAD to see the Cutlass closer. I got a pretty good view when he started to open fire on me. I ran among the fire and brimstone he unleashed around me. I get into games when I play them, I live in the moment after all...and I was living in that moment. It was a combination of fear and joy as I ran from him and he continued to miss me. I was laughing as I spoke to my friend and org mate “Ape” on discord.
“This fucker can't hit shit...” I yelled as I ducked into the aft section of the derelict ship we had been combing for a stupid black box.
Ape had gotten into a good position so he could observe, from a safe distance, my predicament. He saw me run in, he knew the rat was in the hole and all he had to do was wait. I assumed he had no idea Ape was there, it is a 1 man ship I was in after all he had just ridden in the cramped cargo bay.
In true Butch and Sundance fashion, I drew my pistol and charged out of the opening to face the Cutlass Black version of the Bolivian Army. I maybe got 2 or 3 shots out before his aim improved and he smoke checked me like he was taking out the trash.
So, of course, knowing that his prey had been killed, the Cutlass pilot landed and decided HE was going to make off with the black box...so when he landed he left his cargo door open. So while he poked around trying to find the black box, Ape climbed aboard his Cutlass and waited.
It was not long that the righteous hand of fate dealt her final cards. The Cutlass asshole clambered aboard his Cutlass, arms encumbered by a black box. He turns, closes the door and the interior of the Cutlass dims as the sunlight is closed off. Ape then closed the door on the Cutlass pilot's life and dimmed his light with several well-placed shots.
“Bro...we got a fucking Cutlass now...”
That was it...that was really my only experience with another player, and that was right around Christmas 2017. I have had a few random encounters where people came in with weapons out, and we drew down, had a standoff and everyone left unharmed. I killed someone that stole my friend's ship while I was taking a piss, and I got a pretty sweet video of a Top Gun intro style dogfight situation that was improvised fun, but not really a true player interaction.
So for me, Star Citizen has been a Sandbox (missing some sand, and some box...but some elements are there) but mostly a single player or co-op experience. Most dog fights were against AI pirates, and as I understand it the game is truly meant to be more of a PVE experience with PVP being sort of seamlessly mixed in and of course random player encounters (Pirates, Gankers, Role Players with a story reason to kill you, etc).
Then Service beacons come out with 3.1..and I finally get to experience the missing piece of the puzzle. Even without having VOIP (which for me is a feature we need more than any right now) I was now having what felt like, real interactions with people. People were using them, and I was more than happy to oblige.
Requests for rides because they were left stranded, seriously you owe it to yourself to take out one or your smaller or starter ships and go play Uber in Space for a while. It is just good clean old fashioned fun to me, someone calls for a ride and I fly out and pick them up and they pay me. It is not really any different than doing an AI mission, but for that moment the fate of a real person sitting on the other end of a computer from god knows where around the world, and mine are intertwined. I have to trust that this is not some kind of an Ambush, and they have to assume that I am not going to just show up and kill them or fly off with them as a makeshift prisoner. Its a mutual, shared trust and a little bit of that old-fashioned mutually assured destruction that makes these single-serving player relationships so fun.
Now Star Citizen feels like a living and breathing world to me, because now I can actually see the consequences of others actions and how they affect me. Likewise, others get to take advantage of my consequences for actions.
I seriously thought the beacons were going to be kind of neat, but not hold much appeal or value to me personally. I thought it would serve as a means for me to pay members of my org to assist with trading or to give friends and org mates some cheddar now and again. I figured when repairing, rearming, and refueling was added the beacons would mean a lot more to me and open the door for what I thought player interactions would be. I never thought I would enjoy playing Taxi. I never thought that playing Taxi would actually be the one thing that breathed life back into Star Citizen for me.
Because of the service beacons, even in their early state, I feel like I am a Citizen in the verse. For the first time for me, Star Citizen has felt alive with Citizens. So keep creating and accepting those service beacons...you really owe it to yourself.
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