Star Citizen is one of the smash hits from the crowd-funded game world over the past few years. SO much so that it even left KickStarter in favour of its own website. The game has managed to raise over 200 million dollars since the funding began way back in 2012.
Cloud Imperium, the company making the game, has spent $193 million on the game already. $50 million of that was in 2017 alone. Even though the time and money spent on this game rivals that of AAA games, Star Citizen is still a way off from being finished. Having said that the single player will be ready for beta testing in the second half of 2020.
If you are interested in Star Citizen in any capacity then check out the gameplay below:
It recently launched its $27000 pack. That’s about £20000, or the down-payment for a small mortgage. Now, if you for some reason want to purchase this (and if you do, we know of some loony bins you can check into for less money) we have bad news for you. You won’t be able to unless you’ve already spent another $1000.
Cloud Imperium are the publishers that are creating the game and they’ve received more than $200m in crowdfunding. The campaign was launched in 2012 on Kickstarter. While the game itself is still in development, it apparently has more than two million players – that is if the website is to be believed.
Star Citizen is a pretty standard sci-fi title, trying to create a huge universe that can be explored in various spaceships. It features online play, multi-player play and first-person space combat. A single-player version, Squadron 42 is being developed as well. It’s set to feature performances from Gillian Anderson, Gary Oldman and Mark Hamill.
Now, leaving all of this aside, the real kicker here is the in-game pack for over 20k. Sure, expensive micro-transaction purchases aren’t exactly uncommon any more, but this goes a little far. The pack in question is called the Legatus pack.
Unsurprisingly, the pack contains nothing but in-game content. In total, it comes with 117 different ships and 163 extras like skins, vessels and a lot of in-game credits. This makes up nearly the entire fleet of ships available in the game…and let’s just repeat this: All for the same amount of money as a mortgage may be.
“Despite there being no ‘real’ object attached to this package, it may still offer tangible value to buyers. Putting aside the marketing value of this move, purchases like this can bestow special status on buyers within Star Citizen’s community, as well as offering extreme shortcuts to a more advanced role within the game itself.”
That’s not exactly revolutionary info of course, and he did have some concerns as well: “Can Star Citizen can maintain the kind of compelling visibility from here on out to justify these kinds of premiums on its contents, and what kind of impact does this have on the game’s fairness, as perceived by other players?“
If the Internet is anything to go by, the answer to that question is a resounding no accompanied by a small chuckle. It gets even weirder though – the pack alone is bad enough, but in order to even be allowed to purchase it, you have to first spend a grand already. Now compared to the pack itself, that’s more like small change than what someone might pay for a used car or bike, but still.
It’s rare that one has to pay for the privilege of purchasing something so outrageously expensive, and even more so when you consider that the game is not only not finished yet, but has been collecting millions in Kickstarter money for well over 5 years.
Will you be putting money towards Star Citizen or will you be saving your money for V-bucks?