Controversies

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Controversies around the development of Star Citizen regularly make the news.

Scope creep

Main article: Stretch goal

Following the September 2013 community poll on what to do after the crowdfunding goal is reached, with 87% votes to keep the crowdfunding up through development and continue to offer stretch goal rewards in addition to extra features and development milestones, and following the June 214 Community vote on whether to continue to offer stretch goals, with 55% voting yes, the game's scope has massively expanded. The votes themselves has been criticized over the number of voters.

Delays

Main article: Release date

Both Star Citizen and Squadron 42 have been delayed several times, with development starting on the 10th October 2012 and still not being finished.

Alpha

Main article: Development timeline

While Star Citizen 1.0 isn't yet released, it is playable right now as an Alpha, with criticism over bugs, stability, performance and how long it has been in Alpha.

Cost

The cost of the development of Star Citizen and Squadron 42 is regularly criticized, however it should be kept in mind that the cost is spread over two games as well as the creation of the Cloud Imperium Games development studio from the ground up, from a handful of employees in working in a basement to over a thousand employees across offices worldwide, in contrast to the development cost of large single games and sequels by pre-existing well established studios. Recycled news articles propping whenever a funding milestone is reached has led to "Ah shit here we go again" memes within the game's community.

Microtransactions

The presence, and cost, of microtransactions has been criticized and is sometimes jokingly referred to as macrotransations.

Pay to Win

The possibility to purchase ships, weapons, and equipment for real money, has been called pay to win, however, they give no advantage in the game as they can also be earned by playing. The developers have stated that ships and other items will no longer be directly purchasable with real money near or at the game's launch, at which point it will still be possible to buy UEC, the game's primary currency used to purchase most items, with real money in a limited way.

"NO Pay2Win - You should never be able to buy anything with real money that you can't buy in with in game credits." -Chris Roberts

However, at the present time while the game isn't yet released, there are items that cannot be purchased without real money.

CitizenCon 2018 Paywall

The streaming of CitizenCon 2018 was planned to be paywalled behind $20, however thanks to players backlash the decision was reversed and it was kept free as before and after.

Lawsuits

Cloud Imperium Games has been involved in several lawsuits, most notably Crytek v. Cloud Imperium Games.

Hoaxes

Unverified allegations, including some that turn out to be hoaxes, regularly make the news, leading to difficulties sorting the true from the fake.