SC Alpha 4.0: Destination Pyro First Impressions + Letter from the Chairman.

It's been 10 long years...

Today: December 19th 2024, Star Citizen 4.0 released to the Live "preview" channel. These are some of my first impressions of 4.0 from my testing in the PTU (public-test-universe). This isn't my impressions on EVERYTHING but just some of my experiences in pyro so far. I haven't even gotten close to experiencing everything in 4.0.

Server Meshing Observations:

The game feels smooth, like outside of the more client-leaning bugs (which trust me there are), NPC's seem to work 95% of the time, doors are snappy and responsive, calling ships and using ASOP's are instant, I've seen full shards have average server FPS's of 30 multiple times (near impossible to see in previous builds outside of empty servers). There are a few QT bugs that may or may not make it to live with SM like some items occasionally disappearing when crossing over into another SM'd zone or being shot out of QT when going across a SM border. Still I haven't actually noticed a transition outside of coming back to my pc and seeing I've been kicked out of quantum. It seems all those SM test we're worth it.

Jumping to Pyro:

As expected, it's just as special as I thought it'd be. It was a magical experience and actually quite difficult (at least the first time) navigating through the tunnels of the blue/black space anus. The music was magical (except for the fact it did glitch out and kept playing for the whole session until I turned off the music). Watch my first jump here:

Pyro's Planets Observations:

Pyro III Bloom:

Drop-dead gorgeous, temperate, mountainous planet with great sunsets. The darkside is very dark (like pitch-black). Outposts seemed friendly, it's honestly so cool to have outposts that aren't the copy-paste Stanton ones. It seems to have quite a bit of content to explore, including ground outposts that had sprawling (mostly working) NPCs with shops and even places to buy vehicles and cargo. It was (and is) genuinely cool to see this stuff working as intended. During the PTU cycle, I've spent most of my time on Pyro III and done quite a lot of mercenary, hauling, repairing, and savlaging missions. They all seem to pay quite a bit more (1.5-2x payouts) compared to stanton missions and work a bit different then they do in stanton. (example: in merc missions there aren't as many bunkers and more often the NPC's are inside outposts that you can fight through since no armistice).

Pyro VI Terminus:

Cold, VERY cold (down to -110*f) Population ain't too friendly but they ain't exactly hostile either. Looks prettier from orbit then on the ground, very swampy. I stopped by a trading outpost and bought a few med-pens. A few days later I stopped by and did some hauling missions, honestly these are big improvements then the ones I am used to from live and in Stanton, bigger payouts (risk factor is heavily increased)

Pyro's Stations Observations:

Ruin Station:

Absolutely gorgeous, by far the coolest station I've seen (yet). It's like the Omega from mass effect. To set expectations when I first landed I had to navigate through broken parts of the station to land in an ominous ass hanger and then when I took the elevator back it plopped me out in a random backwater corner of the station where I had to crawl out of the trash to get back to the main area. I went to the market and bought some gear, which was conveniently all in one spot and right next to the elevator that lead to both my hanger and the new "Contested Zones" (MMO dungeons). I checked one out and got to run around as it seemed pretty empty (I don't think anyone on my server was in there). I did get attacked by a dog but other than that it was really cool. It's located above Pyro VI (terminus).

Checkmate Station:

Located in a gas cloud, it's cool but now that I've seen Ruin Station, it's clear that it uses the same pallet but is just a bit bigger to accommodate it being the major LZ in pyro. Everything I said visually about ruin station mostly applies here except navigating is much more straightforward. It also had a lot more pads and docking collars. It's located at the L4 lagrange point of Pyro II (monox).

Obituary Space Station:

Located above Pyro III (bloom), it is by far my personal favorite spawning location as with the new spawning directly into hanger feature it means you can get right into some pyro gameplay within the first like 3 minutes of playing and since pyro III is near the middle of the system, it's a good middle ground for jumping to other planets. From what I've experienced, it's fairly busy as I've been attacked a few times leaving the station by players. (this will happen like 50% of the time so be ready)

Contested Zones:

The biggest new content are "Contested Zones", which are basically MMO dungeons. NPC hostile gang members spawn, hostile fauna spawn, and since it's available to anyone and their isn't an armistice: "Potentially" (probably) Hostile Players. These are located in the backrooms of Pyro's main space stations, abandoned asteroid space stations, etc. I like them, they're a fun addition and i've already claimed some loot from the poor bastards who I've come across all alone (i was alone too just with heavy armor and a FS-9).

Minor/QOL Updates:

FOIP Improvements:

It's much better, too bad I still have a shitass webcam. Still would recommend checking it out now that it's better. You can now actually use your mouth and not have to exxaggggerate all of your emotions just to get the damn thing to work. 3rd person head rotation is also now a thing.

Spawning in your Hanger:

This sounds basic to someone who hasn't played star citizen but by FAR this has been the biggest QOL update we've had in years. It turns SC from being a game that takes about 15min to get from menu to ready to go (with experience) to like 2-3 minutes to already have a mission ready and have left the station or LZ. Anyways, starting in 4.0 you will spawn at your home location when entering the game, UNLESS you have changed your spawn location. If you have changed your spawn location you will spawn in the habs at the location you selected like previous patches. Sadly, this is sort-of temporary as once they can make sure elevators and the such are fully functioning 24/7 and the game runs better, they will revert to spawning at your habs by default. However they have promised that in the future you will be able to log off in your hangers and spawn from there anyways.

Economy Updates:

I'm not really the type of person who know's alot about the inner workings of the SC economy, so hear it from the horses mouth instead:

Player provided feedback and data gathered in 4.0 will "drive ongoing adjustments and fine-tuning to ensure a balanced and immersive economic experience in the 'verse." The team is also monitoring closely for any exploits/loopholes.

One recent loophole allowed players to remove and sell valuable components from their own ships, then use a reclaim to receive a fully stocked ship. "This process generated large amounts of aUEC in a short time, disrupting the game's economy."

To mitigate this. CIG is implementing a temporary adjustment: the sale prices of ship weapons will be significantly less than their purchase costs. In the future, the insurance and warranty systems will better at addressing fraudulent duplication.

Mirai Guardian: The Fat Fury

The new Mirai Guardian is being added in 4.0 as Mirai's premier heavy fighter based on a similar design to the Mirai Fury snub/light fighters.

One-line Updates:

20 new heads are being added to the DNA pool
3 new base materials are being added: Tin, Silicon, and Ice
2 new rare materials are being added: Stileron, Riccite
A new space rat has been added
The fire rats have been added and control some Contested Zones.
The Anvil Carrack's cargo pods open and have full cargo grid functionality and the long-awaited blast shields for the bridge have arrived.
In 4.0 quantum drives now have their speed, acceleration rates, and fuel consumption based on their "Grade" and "Class"
Save Stanton will remain active in 3.24.3 despite 4.0 going Live
Mission systems have been refactored for pyro and server meshing.
There are HUNDREDS of more smaller updates alongside thousands of bug fixes, these are just the smaller updates that came to mind.

The Letter from the Chairman:

For the first time ever, 4.0 and 3.24.3 will run together in live. What does this mean? 4.0 will be on the "preview" channel, however unlike PTU's progress will be carried over when to 4.0 live.

For all intensive purposes, this is 4.0 live just without getting rid of 3.24.3 as a backup.

As for what happens to 3.24.3, for now you can still continue on like nothing happened. However, your progress in 3.24.3 will be wiped once 4.0 goes to live.

CIG is also changing the ways they release patches in the future, in an effort to have a "Focus on Playability" they are "decoupling feature development from content creation and general fixes", meaning that new major game-breaking features will stay in EPTU for long while smaller features, content updates, and bug fixes will continue to flow in as usual and the big features will only be added once they're polished and ready to go.