The Star Citizen Multi-Crew Module was revealed in a demo at Gamescom in Cologne today. The full presentation can be seen here, but the section we’re really interested in is here:
The video shows players exiting a station to the landing pad, where they climb into an Aegis Avenger, an Anvil Hornet, and a Drake Cutlass Blue. Some of the players get in the pilot seats, while others cram into seats in the cargo bay of the Cutlass. They then take off and use their quantum drive to warp a long distance, off into the rocky rings of a planet. Their objective seems to be what looks like an old deactivated Aegis Retaliator, floating in the belt.
The Cutlass’ passengers exit out the rear hatch of the ship and float towards the Retaliator. They board the ship through a destroyed top hatch and walk around it, finding the systems they need to reactivate to first bring artificial gravity back online, then start its engines. Then they man the turrets.
They don’t get any time to relax, as an enemy Constellation warps in. A battle ensues, with much turret fire. The Constellation is outmaneuvered and outgunned, and it goes down in a couple minutes. The newly reclaimed Retaliator and its wing warp back to station and land. As they disembark, an Idris flies overhead. It is quite large.
The demo shows off the progress made in the game’s development despite the drama and leaks, and it’s really quite impressive. The players’ experience as they walk around in a ship that is moving is as you would expect it to be in real life, and their motion in Zero-G looks pretty solid.
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A New Alpha and a Brief Sale
Arena Commander Alpha 1.1.6 comes with new launcher that will replace only the files you need, matchmaking based on performance, changes to the rules of game modes that will make matches last longer, and increases to the difficulty of Vanduul Swarm. Additionally, a prize of sorts has been added for the completion of Vanduul Swarm, described below.
A Gamescom flash sale was announced, running for the duration of the presentation. It featured many limited edition heavy-duty ships, mostly in the 200-400 USD price range:
- Aegis Retaliator (275 USD) – A multi-crew bomber with a lot of turrets, and modular configuration. The standard variant comes with two torpedo bays, but now players can swap them out for more living space, cargo, or dropship capability. They’re not free though; the cargo and living modules are 25 USD a piece, the rear torpedo bay is 50 USD, the front torpedo bay is 75 USD, and the dropship module is 75 USD too. These, and the unladen unconfigured Retaliator (150 USD), are in the concept-sale stage, so they come with Lifetime-Insurance (LTI), while the reissued vanilla Retaliator only came with two years of insurance. The Retaliator base, and its modules, are still on sale.
- Anvil Carrack (350 USD) – reinforced fuel tanks for long-distance travel, advanced jump drive, advanced jump computer, crew medical, repair facilities, mapping sensor suite.
- Drake Caterpillar (245 USD) – modular, smuggling freighter.
- RSI Orion (325 USD) – mining platform, turret-mounted tractor beams, mineral storage.
- Aegis Reclaimer (350 USD) – industrial salvage, reinforced cargo bay, long-range jump drive, launch pods for drones. Tractor beams, floodlights scanner options, docking ports.
- Aopoa Khartu-al (Xi’an scout) (150 USD)- scout/explorer, Xi’An maneuver rig, more limited armament.
- Banu Merchantman (250 USD) – Sturdy, dedicated Banu trading ship.
- Vanduul Glaive (350 USD) – The medium fighter is now able to be rented, purchased, and flown only by pilots who have completed Vanduul Swarm (solo, or as part of a team), as of update 1.1.6. Only 1000 can now be purchased and will be available on a first come, first served basis. It is a stronger version of the Scythe fighter, and features a more symmetrical layout.
Cloud Imperium Game’s July report also suggests that the Valduul Glaive isn’t the end for “game-triggered rewards,” and that more details relating to in-game unlockables will emerge next month.
Social Module revealed
Finally, a first look at the upcoming social module was also shown during the Gamescom presentation. While it lacks the flashiness of the multi-crew demonstration, it still represents a step towards making the Star Citizen persistent universe a reality.
Eagle-eyed readers may note that the planet on display is ArcCorp, the third planet in the Stanton system, and the first planetary environment built for Star Citizen. While it has been featured in earlier media, this is the first time that ArcCorp, and interacting with other players in a planetside environment, has been shown in video.
At the time of publishing, Star Citizen has reached 86.1 million USD in funding.
This article originally appeared on TheMittani.com, written by Ramon Rakow.
