Wing Commander Creator Announces Star Citizen, Explodes Heads of Space Fighter/Trading Fans

Chris Roberts, the man known as the design visionary behind Wing Commander and Freelancer, has a problem with saying no. Believe me, I spent the better part of an hour last week trying to get him to say that word as we discussed the planned features of Star Citizen, his in-the-works CryEngine 3-based space game and its single-player component, Squadron 42. If it ends up being even half of what he promises, we could be looking at the second coming of not just Wing Commander and Privateer, but virtually everything anyone could ever ask for in an open-universe space game. Take a look.

• Is it PC exclusive? Yes.
• Is there a single-player, Wing Commander-style campaign? Yes (that part's called Squadron 42).
• Can my friends drop in and fly as my wingmen? Yes.
• Does the story branch based on my actions? Yes.
• Does it have a Privateer-style open universe with a trade economy? Yes.
• Is the economy dynamic? Yes.
• Can I skip the single-player campaign and jump right into that part? Yes.
• Is there a free, massively multiplayer persistent online universe? Yes.
• Will that universe constantly expand with new content? Yes.
• Can I play offline? Yes.
• Can I host my own server for me and my friends? Yes.
• Are there real zero-G physics? Yes.
• Can my friends and I crew a ship together, with one piloting and others manning guns? Yes.
• Can I have 64 or more players in one area? Yes (and that's the bare minimum he's shooting for).
• Can I mod it? Yes.
• Can I pilot a carrier starship? Yes (but probably not in the persistent online universe).
• Can I have a medium-sized ship with a single launchable fighter aboard? Yes.
• Can I get out of my ship and shoot people in first- or third-person combat? Yes.
• Can I hijack an enemy ship? Yes.
• Can other players hijack my ship? Yes.
• Will there be location-specific damage on spaceships? Yes.
• Will there be customizable weapons on hardpoints? Yes.
• Can I play with a mouse? Yes.
• A gamepad? Yes.
• A joystick? Yes.
• Will it support Oculus Rift? Yes.
• Will it take user-created content (ships, etc) and sell it, splitting revenue with creators? Yes.

Well ok then.

Roberts says the video in the trailer was captured using an Nvidia GeForce GTX 670, which, by the time Star Citizen arrives, will be a two-year-old videocard. I saw a very early version of Star Citizen running live on a Dell gaming laptop, and it looks absolutely astonishing -- particularly in the high-polygon ship models and lighting departments. This is what a high-end game built strictly for PC hardware in mind looks like. As Roberts flew around the carrier in his fighter and surrounding asteroids, the detail of the machinery on both ships was striking -- numerous moving parts flexed as the fighter wings adjusted, a half-dozen individual thrusters swiveled and fired as he changed direction, and weapon pods popped out to bare its teeth.


Roberts is, of course, keenly aware that he similarly wowed gamers in 1999 with an early demo of Freelancer's then-impressive technology, only to end up releasing it in 2004, when it looked good but not great. He's intending to have a playable version of Star Citizen in which supporters will be able to dogfight available a year from now, with the full thing following in 2014. He's targeting a 50-star system map at launch, with more to come.


When it does launch for real, Roberts promises Star Citizen won't nickel-and-dime us. "It's not subscription, because I don't like subscription-based stuff, but it's also not free-to-play, in that it's free-to-play and we're artificially making it really awful and boring at the beginning so that we can get money from you. Did I mention that I like the Guild Wars model?" You'll be able to buy stuff with real money, he said, but in keeping with both his pro-challenge and anti-grinding philosophy, there will likely be limits. "I'm thinking of limiting the amount of money anyone can spend in a month, so they can't just buy a whole bunch of credits," he said, in what might be the first time in recent years I've heard a gamemaker suggest turning away money.


Of course, he does need money to get this dream of a high-end PC space game off the ground for real, and outside the grip of a big publisher that's beholden to the whims of shareholders and "I have to raise some amount of crowd funding to validate that there are enough people that want to play high-end PC games, that want to play in space." To reach that $2 to $4 million needed to get his private investors to open their gigantic wallets, Space Citizen will open up to preorders soon through its Roberts Space Industries site (not Kickstarter), where you'll be able to preorder specific types of starting ships. "I could be completely delusional and no one cares, but I think it's a viable market," he said.

I do, too. You can expect GameSpy to keep a very close eye on this one -- since I plan to be among the first to preorder, I'll be keeping tabs on what he's doing with my money.