As someone who hasn't gamed in a decade, there are certain game projects I just like to check in on every now and then out of sheer fascination with the dedication that's been invested into them.
• Thrive — An overly-ambitious, Spore-inspired, free/open-source survival game. It's everything people wished Spore was with the depth of mechanics and scientific basis. They've been working on it for over decade (releasing weekly dev updates) and they've barely scratched the surface on the multicelluar stage (stage 2 of 9 planned stages)
• Dwarf Fortress — One of the most phenomenal passion projects ever created and it's pay-what-you-can. I hope some day they consider open sourcing it or passing it on to other hands so it can live on forever.
• Star Citizen — see tfa.
• No Man's Sky — The most dramatic turnaround of a reputation in gaming imo. Fans saw a trailer and way overhyped it leading to a dramatic disappointment at release. The devs have never stopped releasing content for it since launch, turning it into one of the most beloved games on the internet.
• Minecraft — The original indie breakout star (no longer indie). This year they switched to a 2-year version naming system. The PaaS-ification of gaming is complete.
• EVE Online — Just the economics of it really.
Special mentions: Overgrowth, RimWorld, Terraria, and Stardew Valley
People are looking at this all wrong. What you have here is a 13 year old business that makes about $100M per year. Nothing to sneeze at, but when compared to successful live-service games and MMOs, it’s peanuts. The cumulative revenue is irrelevant, and again, peanuts compared to successful games. Genshin Impact made $100M per month when it was released. World of Warcraft is a few decades old and still made $680M in 2024 (the most recent numbers I could find).
What makes Star Citizen unique is that it was crowd-funded—it started taking money before any features were available at all, and released to buyers (“backers”) in an unusually incomplete and buggy state. But all that revenue is turned around and plowed right back into development. (Their finances are publicly available.)
The game remains incomplete and buggy to this day, but with lots of stuff to do and clear forward progress, and, from what I hear, it offers a uniquely immersive experience. People like it enough that revenue keeps increasing, with nearly every year setting new records.
So that’s all this is: a moderately successful company with big ambitions, a lot of bugs, and a passionate fan base. Its annual revenue is nothing special. Don’t fall the sensationalism of the way its modest lifetime revenue numbers are shared.
(Just an interested observer with no horse in this race. I’ve never played the game or spent any money on it.)
I remember being in high school, so excited about star citizen coming out as soon as I get to college. College was 5 years ago, and I’m still waiting. The promise of this game is so unbelievably enticing but I’ve given up on it.
In my Traveller RPG campaign, which is set over 3500+ years in the future, Star Citizen is still not out yet. The joke is that the space opera future has arrived before Star Citizen. It has been in omega for the past 1000 years since they ran out of Greek letters.
> Rockstar and Take-Two have not yet confirmed the price of GTA 6, but some expect the game to be priced above the $70 standard for current-gen consoles. Last month, Zelnick addressed the concerns around the game's price and said that consumers would pay for the value offered.
The difference, and the reason these comparisons are always disingenuous, is that Rockstar didn’t have the consumers fund its development and miss its promises repeatedly.
The studio is funding it and has been clear they’ll release it when they feel like it.
There have been very few games that gave me this flash-like sensation of breathtaking wonderment at the vastness of their world. Ultima Online, Planetside 2 and Star citizen come to mind.
I caved in to curiosity and got SC maybe 2 years ago.
I’d login in every 3, then every 6 months or so for 1-2 fly-throughs.
Fly-through is when I get into a ship, take a mission or two, get to some planet. Maybe I crash maybe I complete a mission, maybe I succumb to the bugs. Anyhow I keep flying till I’m dead. Then I log out. The whole endeavor takes 2 hours at the longest, so I set some time aside for this.
I don’t watch any tutorials or guides, just figure things out by myself, or, don’t, and leave them for the next flythrough.
I certainly got my money’s worth of entertainment from these few fly-throughs.
There are certainly deeper games out there, or even bigger in terms of playable area. Still, I think, if we put the games on a “immersive experience” chart where Y is visual effects and X is scale, then Star Citizen will be in the top right.
Who keeps paying for this shit? There are infinite games on steam for under $20 and they're all more polished, more fun, more worth your money than this
As someone who hasn't gamed in a decade, there are certain game projects I just like to check in on every now and then out of sheer fascination with the dedication that's been invested into them.
• Thrive — An overly-ambitious, Spore-inspired, free/open-source survival game. It's everything people wished Spore was with the depth of mechanics and scientific basis. They've been working on it for over decade (releasing weekly dev updates) and they've barely scratched the surface on the multicelluar stage (stage 2 of 9 planned stages)
• Dwarf Fortress — One of the most phenomenal passion projects ever created and it's pay-what-you-can. I hope some day they consider open sourcing it or passing it on to other hands so it can live on forever.
• Star Citizen — see tfa.
• No Man's Sky — The most dramatic turnaround of a reputation in gaming imo. Fans saw a trailer and way overhyped it leading to a dramatic disappointment at release. The devs have never stopped releasing content for it since launch, turning it into one of the most beloved games on the internet.
• Minecraft — The original indie breakout star (no longer indie). This year they switched to a 2-year version naming system. The PaaS-ification of gaming is complete.
• EVE Online — Just the economics of it really.
Special mentions: Overgrowth, RimWorld, Terraria, and Stardew Valley
People are looking at this all wrong. What you have here is a 13 year old business that makes about $100M per year. Nothing to sneeze at, but when compared to successful live-service games and MMOs, it’s peanuts. The cumulative revenue is irrelevant, and again, peanuts compared to successful games. Genshin Impact made $100M per month when it was released. World of Warcraft is a few decades old and still made $680M in 2024 (the most recent numbers I could find).
What makes Star Citizen unique is that it was crowd-funded—it started taking money before any features were available at all, and released to buyers (“backers”) in an unusually incomplete and buggy state. But all that revenue is turned around and plowed right back into development. (Their finances are publicly available.)
The game remains incomplete and buggy to this day, but with lots of stuff to do and clear forward progress, and, from what I hear, it offers a uniquely immersive experience. People like it enough that revenue keeps increasing, with nearly every year setting new records.
So that’s all this is: a moderately successful company with big ambitions, a lot of bugs, and a passionate fan base. Its annual revenue is nothing special. Don’t fall the sensationalism of the way its modest lifetime revenue numbers are shared.
(Just an interested observer with no horse in this race. I’ve never played the game or spent any money on it.)
I remember being in high school, so excited about star citizen coming out as soon as I get to college. College was 5 years ago, and I’m still waiting. The promise of this game is so unbelievably enticing but I’ve given up on it.
I thought you could play it?
you can but not that much to play and weird bugs
2025: $800M (7 points) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43646825
2024: $750M (125 points, 170 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42291101
2022: $500M (57 points, 71 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32916496
2021: $400M (3 points) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29289859
2020: $300M (1 point) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23512946
2019: $250M (4 points) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21680999
... 2027: $1.1B?
2033: Star Citizen buys SpaceX for 4.2 trillion, easier to just give people the real thing than do another refactor
In my Traveller RPG campaign, which is set over 3500+ years in the future, Star Citizen is still not out yet. The joke is that the space opera future has arrived before Star Citizen. It has been in omega for the past 1000 years since they ran out of Greek letters.
Has a company ever had a greater fiduciary incentive not to finish and release their game?
Will $250 million and 20 wizards squeeze out an MVP in 9 months for MacBook Neo?
Use AI agentic coding amplifier.
I can only think of one other game that has gone this far.
https://www.gadgets360.com/games/news/gta-6-estimated-budget...
> Rockstar and Take-Two have not yet confirmed the price of GTA 6, but some expect the game to be priced above the $70 standard for current-gen consoles. Last month, Zelnick addressed the concerns around the game's price and said that consumers would pay for the value offered.
The difference, and the reason these comparisons are always disingenuous, is that Rockstar didn’t have the consumers fund its development and miss its promises repeatedly.
The studio is funding it and has been clear they’ll release it when they feel like it.
> I can only think of one other game that has gone this far.
Duke Nukem Forever
There have been very few games that gave me this flash-like sensation of breathtaking wonderment at the vastness of their world. Ultima Online, Planetside 2 and Star citizen come to mind.
I caved in to curiosity and got SC maybe 2 years ago.
I’d login in every 3, then every 6 months or so for 1-2 fly-throughs. Fly-through is when I get into a ship, take a mission or two, get to some planet. Maybe I crash maybe I complete a mission, maybe I succumb to the bugs. Anyhow I keep flying till I’m dead. Then I log out. The whole endeavor takes 2 hours at the longest, so I set some time aside for this. I don’t watch any tutorials or guides, just figure things out by myself, or, don’t, and leave them for the next flythrough.
I certainly got my money’s worth of entertainment from these few fly-throughs.
There are certainly deeper games out there, or even bigger in terms of playable area. Still, I think, if we put the games on a “immersive experience” chart where Y is visual effects and X is scale, then Star Citizen will be in the top right.
[dead]
By the time they do a final release we'll have people playing it on the Moon and Mars.
Who keeps paying for this shit? There are infinite games on steam for under $20 and they're all more polished, more fun, more worth your money than this
Is it now classified as a Unicorn?
[dead]
So a game that’s at what? 40% of its projected goals/completion is now 33% more expensive than the most expensive game ever?
Quite an achievement…