Development team

The development team of Star Citizen consists of hundreds of people, working on making the game a reality in a distributed development process. From the west coast of the United States to Frankfurt, Germany, highly-skilled, passionate people toil, making breath-taking progress all the time. On top of Cloud Imperium Games' in-house studios, many contractors and partners have contributed into the project.

As of 2020-12, CIG has a total of 695 staff. 512 of whom are developers.[1]

Studios

Cloud Imperium Games, LLC

CIG Los Angeles Team Photo 2018

Located in sunny Los Angeles, California, CIG LA is Cloud Imperium's flagship studio. Home to Chris Roberts and much of the company's leadership, CIG LA represents a cross-section of the company and includes the ship development pipeline, technical designers, high level engineering, community, marketing and more.[2]

Notable members

Cloud Imperium Games Texas, LLC

CIG Austin Team Photo 2018

The team at Cloud Imperium Games Texas' Austin studio (Bee Cave, Texas) is responsible for making the Star Citizen persistent universe a reality! From character artists to engineers, CIG ATX is a creative hotspot tasked with making an entirely new kind of game. The crack DevOps team is also located in Austin, keeping servers running and building out the infrastructure that will be needed to make Star Citizen sing.[3]

As of 2018-02-16, CIG Austin has a total of 71 staff working on Star Citizen.[4]

Notable members

Cloud Imperium Games Ltd.

Foundry 42 Wilmslow Team Photo 2018

Formerly known as Foundry 42, Ltd. The heart of Manchester, England is also the heart of Star Citizen's Squadron 42 single player game. This fully-equipped development team is responsible for creating a unique cinematic experience in the Star Citizen world. A AAA game in itself, Squadron 42 is using groundbreaking cinematic techniques and best-in-the-industry game design to craft a narrative you won't want to put down.[5]

As of 2018-02-16, F42 Manchester has a total of 234 staff working on Star Citizen.[4]

Notable members

Cloud Imperium Games Ltd.

Foundry 42 Frankfurt Team Photo 2018

Formerly known as Foundry 42, Ltd. Frankfurt, Germany is home to Cloud Imperium's latest internal development studio. Staffed with top CryEngine development experts, Foundry 42 Germany is responsible for developing the pioneering backend technologies that will allow Star Citizen's persistent universe to shine![6]

As of 2018-02-16, F42 Frankfurt has a total of 80 staff working on Star Citizen.[4]

Notable members

Cloud Imperium Games Ltd.

Formerly known as Foundry 42, Ltd. An official satellite studio of Foundry 42 Manchester, the Derby office is a small team looking after all aspects of the facial pipeline. From taking delivery of the Face Rigs from 3Lateral, implementing them in-game, taking all the face animation from Cubic Motion and also creating all the Facial animation for the PU that Cubic aren't doing.[7]

As of 2018-02-16, F42 Derby has a total of 15 staff working on Star Citizen.[4]

Current Partners

Turbulent

Turbulent works with Cloud Imperium Games to develop web platforms such as Spectrum, the Starmap, Issue Council, the website and the launcher.[8] They have been with CIG since 2012.[9] In 2019-12-03, CIG went through a mutual investment with Turbulent. Cloud Imperium UK Ltd. purchased 22,250 shares of Turbulent (25%) directly from their co-founders Marc Beaudet and Benoit Beausejour, and acquired two seats on the Turbulent board. Meanwhile, Turbulent founders Marc Beaudet and Benoit Beauséjourv each acquired 1,170 shares (2,340 combined) in Cloud Imperium UK Ltd.[10] In 2020-11-24, Turbulent announced that the company will open a Montreal game studio focusing on building star systems for Star Citizen. The studio will be directed by Benoit Beausejour (CTO and co-founder) and industry veterans Guillaume Voghel (Producer), Pierre-Luc Boulais (Art Director), and Louis Rousseau (Lead Game Designer).[11] As of 2020-04-05, Turbulent had 42 people and growing working on Star Citizen.[12]

Notable members

3Lateral

3Lateral works with Cloud Imperium Games on character faces in Star Citizen.[13]

Amazon

Amazon works with Cloud Imperium Games on the development of Amazon Lumberyard since 2015, which is what Star Engine based on. Amazon also provides game servers for Star Citizen on a cloud-based service called Amazon Web Services (AWS).[14]

Faceware Technologies

Faceware Technologies works with Cloud Imperium Games to develop the Face Over Internet Protocol (FOIP) feature that was built with Faceware's LiveSDK. A facial motion sensor specifically for Star Citizen is also in the work. However, since late 2018 no mention of the product has been made by either CIG or Faceware. [15][16]

Firesprite

Firesprite is contracted to Cloud Imperium Games in 2017-01-11.[17] On 2021-03-18, CIG and Firesprite publicly announced the collaboration on the PvP combined-arms multiplayer mode, Theaters of War, which has began in early 2019.[18]

Intel

Intel works with Cloud Imperium Games to promote the Optane series SSD for desktop users and workstations. They also sponsored hardware to CIG and also their conventions.[19]

Perforce

Cloud Imperium Games utilize Perforce Helix to support its DevOps.[20]

Tobii

Introduce official head and eye tracking support for the Tobii Eye Trackers.[21]

Gamerizon

Gamerizon developed the interactive 3D part of the front-end javascript client for the Starmap.[22]

As of July 2022 they are helping build Quantum.[23]

Other Partners

Past Partners

Advanced Micro Devices

AMD partnered with CIG to promote their Radeon™ R9 or R7 Series graphics cards with Mustang Omega, as a part of the AMD Never Settle Space Edition promotion.[24]

Airship Images

Airship Images is specialized in character arts and worked on characters, hairstyles and R&D tasks for CIG in the years 2016/2017.[25]

Atomahawk Design

Atomahawk design did concept art for Foundry42.[26]

Behaviour Interactive

Behaviour Interactive (BHVR) is responsible for art production for Star Citizen since 2012-12-12.[27][28]

CGBot

CGBot was responsible for the early concept arts and assets production for Star Citizen and Squadron 42.[29]

Confetti SpecialFX

Confetti SpecialFX are a thinktank for advanced graphics technology that worked on a capital ship damage system and nebula effects for Star Citizen between the end of 2013 and end of 2014.[30]

Crytek

Crytek was the game engine developer of CryEngine, the base game engine for Star Engine before the switch to Amazon Lumberyard in 2016.[31] In 2017-12, Crytek filed a lawsuit against CIG on breach of the game license agreement (GLA). As of 2018-01, both parties are still engaged in the lawsuit.[32]

IllFonic

IllFonic was responsible for the initial FPS module and the FPS components of the game.[33]

Massive Black

Massive Black did concept art and ship design for Star Citizen, including the design for the 300i in 2013.[34]

Moon Collider

Moon Collider was responsible for the Kythera AI development prior to the development of Subsumption. CIG started working with Moon Collider in Spring 2013.[35]

Rmory

Rmory was responsible for early weapon concept arts for Star Citizen and Squadron 42.[36][37]

Streamline Studios

Streamline Studios worked on SQ42 art assets, such as the Vanduul ship models in 2014 and 2015, a number of their assets were leaked to the public in 2015 as part of the "Lando Leak".[38]

The Imaginarium

The Imaginarium was responsible for the motion capture mainly for Squadron 42, but also for the Persistent Universe.[39]

Wyrmbyte

Wyrmbyte was responsible for early network engineering for the Persistent Universe in 2014.[40]

Virtuos

Virtuos was responsible for the early ship and prop assets in 2014.[37]

voidALPHA

voidALPHA was responsible for environment art till the end of 2015.[41]

References

  1. Cloud Imperium Financials for 2020
  2. Los Angeles Office on Cloud Imperium Games
  3. Austin Office on Cloud Imperium Games
  4. 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Star Citizen and Squadron 42 Staff Grows to 475 Employees Working on the Game
  5. Manchester Office on Cloud Imperium Games
  6. Frankfurt Office on Cloud Imperium Games
  7. Development comments on Foundry 42 Derby
  8. [Replay] Un développeur Star Citizen sur la chaîne ! #1 Interview in French with a Turbulent technical artist
  9. Turbulent - Case Studies: Star Citizen
  10. Cloud Imperium & Turbulent Extend Their Long-Running Partnership Through Mutual Investment
  11. Turbulent creates new game development studio in montreal to make worlds for Star Citizen ​​​​​​
  12. How many staff work at the Montreal Studio? Sandi Roberts Twitter
  13. Monthly Studio Report: January 2017. Transmission - Comm-Link
  14. Star Citizen and Squadron 42 Utilize Amazon Lumberyard Game Engine. Press - Comm-Link
  15. Cloud Imperium Games and Faceware Bring Real-Time Character-to-Character Chat to Star Citizen
  16. Faceware Technologies Announcement. Transmission - Comm-Link
  17. Get to know Firesprite, a new CIG contractor. on Reddit
  18. UK-based Developer’s Key Role in Development of Star Citizen Combined Arms Multiplayer Mode Confirmed Ahead of Community Playtest
  19. Blazing-Fast Gaming with Intel's First Client Optane SSD
  20. Case Study: Cloud Imperium Games on Perforce
  21. Tobii Eye Tracker 5. Transmission - Comm-Link. Retrieved 2020-12-22
  22. Gamerizon worked with Turbulent and Cloud Imperium to produce the Web Starmap for Star Citizen. Our contribution was the development of the interactive 3D part of the front-end javascript client.
  23. Star Citizen Live: All About 3.17.2
  24. AMD Never Settle Space Edition promotion, Archived 2014-09-06
  25. [1]
  26. Star Citizen Portfolio
  27. BHVR Portfolio - Star Citizen. Archived 2018-01-24
  28. Behaviour Interactive teams with Cloud Imperium to help create new space sim game with legendary designer Chris Roberts. Archived 2015-05-19
  29. CGBot Portfolio - Star Citizen
  30. Confetti SpecialFX Star Citizen work
  31.  Clarification by Chris Roberts on the switch to Lumberyard
  32. Crytek CIG lawsuit documents
  33. IllFonic Portfolio - Star Citizen
  34. Star Citizen among other portfolio work
  35. Moon Collider Case Studies - Star Citizen
  36. Rmory Portfolio - Star Citizen
  37. 37.0 37.1 Monthly Report: July 2014. Transmission - Comm-Link
  38. Streamline Studios post about the Vanduul Void Bomber
  39. Inside CIG: Imaginarium. Engineering - Comm-Link
  40. Monthly Studio Report: April 2015. Transmission - Comm-Link
  41. voidALPHA's tweet on departure of SC