Star Citizen‘s 3.0 Alpha Build will functionally bring the game to the same level as a title in Steam Early Access- so it’s a big milestone for the ambitious space sim game, and it’s something we have been looking forward to for a while. Thankfully, we’ve had the chance to look at the build before multiple times- but it has always been Cloud Imperium showing it to us. ‘Pure’ footage, just of a player playing it, has so far been scarce.

That changes today- below you will find a video from a player who starts playing the 3.0 build for the very first time. It’s our first look at what it will be like to exist in the game’s extensive universe- and these early indications seem to convey that it will be every bit as spectacular as the hype, years in the making, has promised.

The footage is even available in 4K- if you have a 4K panel. Check it out below. Star Citizen is bound for Windows and Linux PCs exclusively.

Cloud Imperium Games’ Star Citizen has received some new screenshots and videos showcasing some of the newer content coming to the game.

The screenshots showcase update 3.0, which shows off the planetary technology that can be expected. A video looking at the various development studios of Cloud Imperium and how they work has also been released. It’s worth noting that the estimated release for update 3.0 is on June 29th so mark your calendar.

Around the Verse has also received a new episode which showcases the Javelin class of destroyers in-game. They’re quite imposing and can deal out massive damage.

Star Citizen has a lot in store this year, including the first chapter of Squadron 42 – the single player campaign of the game. What are your thoughts on the screenshots and the overall progress of Star Citizen? Let us know in the comments below and stay tuned for more updates in the coming months.

It’s been four years since Star Citizen‘s record breaking crowdfunding campaign began, and while the game, nor any part (er, module) of it is still not out, it is still under active development, and fans and those who funded it are constantly kept in the loop about how things are coming.

Today, Cloud Imperium Games went ahead and shared a brand new trailer, that introduces two new ships that will be in the game, by functional company Origin. The ships look great, and the trailer is well made, taking on the style of a reporter introducing new models from a well known company. Star Citizen fans will probably appreciate this.

Star Citizen is due out on PC exclusively. The first person shooter experience, Squadron 42, was originally set to launch this year, until earlier this year, it was revealed that it would not be releasing in 2016. Hopefully and presumably, it is out some time next year.

Star Citizen continues to look more and more impressive each time we see it. And now here’s a new trailer for the game, running in engine, in real time, that shows off what the planetary exploration in the game will be like. The planetary exploration seems to be powered by a brand new technology that will procedurally generate the surfaces, much like No Man’s Sky, although the technology on display here seems to be a bit more impressive.

Everything that you see in this video is running in-game, in real-time, although naturally, it is important to remember that this is pre-release footage from an in development build of the game, so the final game may vary a bit from what you see here. According to Cloud Imperium, the need for such a system came from the fact that it would be impossible to fit so many planets (they have a lot of them in Star Citizen) in the game’s memory with as much detail as they wanted- the options were to either limit the detail of each surface, or to limit the scope of the game. So they went with option number 3, which is procedurally generating the surface of the planets.

Check this out for yourself below:

Star Citizen is almost here- or at least, as much of it as will be launching next year, since the game itself will be launching in parts (the official term is ‘modules’). And ahead of its launch next year, the most crowdfunded game in history got a brand new trailer at The Game Awards to demonstrate to the mainstream game buying just what Star Citizen is, and why they should care about it.

The best possible way to demonstrate it was to talk about just how the game manages to merge multiple genres and playstyles in one seamless, breathless fusion. And all of it in those gorgeous graphics the game is known for, of course.

Star Citizen is going to launch exclusively on the PC next year (your consoles can’t handle this). I just want to know one thing- to quote his own concern, can Mark Hamill be on the poster for the game, please?

Luke Skywalker. The Joker. The Trickster. And now add another name to that list, as Mark Hamill will be playing the enigmatic The Old Man character in the upcoming PC exclusive space game Star Citizen. Cloud Imperium today revealed a brand new trailer for Squadron 42, which is the single player campaign module of the game, and this trailer acted as an introduction for Hamill’s character.

The character’s actual name is Lieutenant Commander Steve Colton. The trailer below teases his character in the game, which seems to continue on from where Luke Skywalker in Star Wars left off- Steve Colton seems to be an older, grumpier Luke.

Star Citizen is due out in 2016 exclusively on PC, or well, at the very least, the single player module Squadron 42 is. The game is sort of being released in bits and pieces, so I guess it’s hard to prescribe a traditional release date to it.

Star Citizen developer Cloud Imperium has lost a key member, as executive producer Alex Mayberry apparently quit the company at the end of June, citing ‘personal reasons,’ Gamespot learned today. However, it appears as though development of the game will continue as planned, with Global head of production Erin Roberts taking over a lot of Mayverry’s responsibilities.

“We were sorry that Alex had to leave the CIG family,” Cloud Imperium said to Gamespot. “No impact at all on development. In fact, it’s full steam ahead for us.”

That last part should be music to the ears of Star Citizen fans, especially considering the unexpected roadblocks that the development of the game seems to have hit of late- for instance, just recently, the first person shooter mode of the title, which was an integral part of the experience that a lot of people were looking forward to, was delayed indefinitely, amidst a series of technical difficulties. Given that, it is good to see that development won’t be further hindered by staff changes and departures.

Will Star Citizen’s crowdfunding success ever stop? It doesn’t seem that way. Hell, rather than the campaign slowing down with time, it seems to be speeding up. You want proof? Consider this- the Chris Roberts helmed PC exclusive space simulator has now hit $77 million in finding. A staggering amount, on par with the budgets for some of the most expensive AAA games ever made.

But you want to know something even more crazy? It made that last $1 million in five days. Five days. If anything, the game’s crowdfunding campaign seems to be speeding up.

If this keeps up, $100 million ion crowdfunding may not be a stretch for the game; even if, by some miracle, it does not hit that amount, consider that this is already the most successfully crowndfunded thing in history.

Star Citizen will begin to be available to PC players in some form soon. Stay tuned to GamingBolt for more coverage and information.

Star Citizen is a wonder of crowdfunding- at this point, no matter what the final game is like or turns out to be, it will always be remembered in the history books simply because of how it managed to gather the trust and loyalty of so many PC gamers even before it launched, and how it managed to get them all to put their money where their mouths are. The crowdfunded wonder has already set records, and just days into the new year, it shows no sign of stopping, as Cloud Imperium announced that the game has now officially reached a staggering $69 million in funding.

717,000 people have contributed to this number, already up from the 694,000 people the game was at two weeks ago. The game’s budget, at $69 million, is already touching Shenmue’s, which was $70 million, and is considered to be one of the most expensive games of all time. Just to give you an idea, that’s the kind of money this game has been able to command from the players.

Chris Roberts, on his part, is very proud of the project- he envisions the crowdfunding reaching $100 million one day (which, you know what, at this point, I’m not gonna argue with him), and states that he has never had this much fun before.

“I have never had so much fun building a game and if you asked any Star Citizen developer they will probably agree with me,” he said.

Stay tuned to GamingBolt for more coverage on Star Citizen.

Another year, another successful bout of crowdfunded video games via Kickstarter. Ever since the platform gained prominence as a means to ask fans to fund games that might otherwise not get made for whatever reason, Kickstarter’s crowdfunding programs for video games have been trucking along. In 2014, Kickstarter raised $89 million for game projects (this includes video games, card games, and board games, but the vast majority of money would naturally be needed and going towards video games, simply because of how resource intensive they are). This money was spread out over 1,980 games, with Kingdom Come: Deliverance being the biggest beneficiary, with over 35,000 backers and $1.1 million raised.

Of course, this isn’t even the most successful crowdfunding story for video games in 2014- the continued success of Star Citizen, which has now grossed roughly $60 million in crowdfunding (or over two thirds of as much as all of the games on Kickstarter could manage) certainly bears notice.

But most of all, what bears notice is that games that would otherwise not have been made are now being made, and that is a good thing.