Non-player Character

a list of important characters in Star Citizen

Non-player Characters (short: NPC) is an entity within Star Citizen that is not controlled by a player character in real time. Star Citizen uses 5 different types of NPC's to populate the Persistent Universe.

Types of NPC's

 * Character - Character NPC's are Real NPC's that are critical to the story line or mission, many using A-list actors. Most of the character NPC's were completed fully by CIG using motion capture acting using professional actors. The Squadron 42 portion of Star Citizen uses Character NPC's to script the story.


 * Simulated - Simulated NPC's make up the background of the Persistent Universe. They are endowed with basic personality traits, utilize resources from the economy and react as a mass population would to help simulate the masses of the cities, planets, systems and universe. Simulated NPC's are not visually represented in Persistent Universe, however the greater the simulated NPC population, the greater the represented population by Real NPC's at places like the landing zone or shops.


 * Probabilistic - Probabilistic NPC's are basic algorithms that are basic back-end NPC’s that are less NPC and more probabilities. These NPC's will not have direct interaction with the player character


 * Virtual - Virtual NPC's or "spoofed" NPC's are non existent in the PU until required for the dynamic mission system. When a mission is created a virtual NPC is created. Once a mission is accepted the Virtual NPC is converted into a Real NPC for the duration of interaction with player character.


 * Real - Real NPC's are NPC's that are fully simulated within the Persistent Universe, to include visual representation. All Character NPC's are real NPC'. These types of NPC's are very resource intensive which is why simulated, probalistic and virtual NPC's are required.