GREETINGS CITIZENS,

The rumors are true: the team at Cloud Imperium is very proud to reveal the finished look for one of our spacecraft today: the Roberts Space Industries Aurora! The Aurora is the ‘basic’ ship in Star Citizen, the one most players will start with… but make no mistake, we didn’t pay any less attention to detail in creating it! The Aurora was crafted by Hollywood designer Ryan Church (Star Wars, Avatar, Star Trek) and features just as much detail as the previously announced Constellation. Almost every shot you see in the brochure below is an in-engine render; what you see is what you play.

To celebrate the release of the Aurora, we’ve put together a special AURORA SALE WEEK promotion! We’re making a special edition version of the Aurora, the Aurora LX, available for a limited time. The LX will be available in the finished game, but this will be your only chance to pledge for it through the site (existing LTI Auroras may be upgraded through our promotion for $5 or in the finished game using in-game credits!) It features a unique paint scheme, twin lasers, leather seats (visible in-game!) and a four-missile mount with Talon IR 4 Stalker missiles pre-loaded. The standard Aurora includes an empty missile hardpoint and fabric seats… this is the luxury model! Several new packages including the LX will be available through Saturday, May 4th:

• Starter Package ($35) We know that a lot of players aren’t interested in the single player Squadron 42 game and they just want to join their friends in space as soon as possible. As a result, we’ve created a lower priced package that allows you to get into Star Citizen without Squadron 42! The Starter package includes Star Citizen with an Aurora LX, lifetime insurance and Alpha, Beta and RSI site access. This is the lowest price Star Citizen will be available before the game ships. The best way to be sure you can take off when testing begins!
• Advanced Starter Package ($45) Includes Star Citizen and Squadron 42 with an Aurora LX, lifetime insurance and Alpha, Beta and RSI site access. Your last chance to get it all for a low price!
• Aurora LX Add-On Ship ($25) Have you already pledged for Star Citizen and want to add another exclusive ship to your fleet? Add an Aurora LX for the same price as the base model, this week only! That’s a 10,000 credit value for the same low price!
• Aurora LX Upgrade ($5) Do you already have an Aurora? You can upgrade it to the Aurora LX for a small fee, this week only! Please note that you will be able to upgrade your Aurora to an Aurora LX in the finished game using your in-game credits; this package is entirely optional!

JUMP POINT

The Aurora has gone through the entire design process, from concept to flying in real-time in the CryEngine. Centurion and Imperator subscribers will learn more about that process today with a special issue of Jump Point celebrating the craft which will be released later tonight.

This month’s Jump Point also features articles on Earth and Roberts Space Industries and an interview with writer David Haddock. And for the first time ever, we’ve brought in a celebrity writer to add to the Star Citizen canon: Dragonlance co-creator Douglas Niles has the first part of a new Star Citizen serial, The Void Rats! If you’re interested in subscribing for Jump Point and to support the team, you can do so below.

SUBSCRIBE TO RSI!

WHY BACK NOW?

Over 40,000 people have signed up to use the Roberts Space Industries website without backing the game and this promotion is designed to offer them a final chance to back the game before prices go up and access to the site and the alpha are dropped. Here’s why we think you should back now:

• Prices are going up! We will be increasing prices when the new site launches, so this is the cheapest you will ever be able to pledge for Star Citizen!
• The new site is coming! The all-new Roberts Space Industries website will feature content exclusive for pledgers, including full access to post to the forums and to read sections like Engineering and the Galactapedia.
• Alpha slots are limited! We plan to begin testing Star Citizen’s space combat with the community later this year and the number of slots we can support are closing. We can support an estimated 50,000 more testers; after that, no more packages with alpha access will be sold! Pledge now so you can be one of the first into space.
• The best is yet to come! Brochures are in development for the remaining eleven pledge ships and designer Ryan Church is hard at work on the Aegis Dynamics Idris Corvette! We will also be unveiling a new ship, the Avenger, when the RSI website relaunches.
• STRETCH GOAL: If we can make it to $9 million in total pledges before the new site launches, we’ll go ahead and put a cool Roberts Space Industries Class II space suit in your closet, colored to match the new site! What’s more, every current pledger will get Lifetime Insurance! This will be your last opportunity to get LTI before the game launches.
• STRETCH GOAL: Our big goal before the website is $10 million. That’s a crazy amount of money, but we have a plan for it: $10 million would allow Cloud Imperium to build our own mocap studio rather than hiring out time from someone else. Renting mocap equipment and studio time is expensive: upwards of $35,000 a day, with four hours work for each 30-second segment. Having our own studio would cost more right now but will allow us to produce a lot more content for Star Citizen in the long run! We’ll provide more details very soon, but here’s one thought right now: it would even allow us to mocap a few lucky fans into the finished game!

Finally, we are very excited to announce that we will be conducting a second 24-hour live stream to celebrate the launch of the new site! Currently scheduled for late may, the Star Citizen team will again brave the night to keep our fans entertained and informed about the game. You won’t want to miss it! Further details will be announced when the site has finished testing.

I thought it would be good to explain a little of our thinking in the Aurora promotion that we are running with the Aurora brochure. According to our database we have over 40,000 users that signed up but have yet to back. Some of these may be accounts of people that have pledged but their account is unlinked. Some are secondary accounts of people that have backed through a different account. Some of these will be people that signed up but have since decided that they are not interested in Star Citizen. The last group are people that are interested but aren’t ready to back yet, either because they are not convinced just yet, or are waiting until they can play something. A really interesting statistic is that almost 20,000 of the accounts with Golden Ticket status show as of not having a pledge!

My dream is to make Star Citizen the first AAA game that has been 100% funded by the crowd – besides being a milestone there are many reasons why this a good thing, but the most glaring is that this will ensure that the community and developers are 100% in alignment. Both our priorities is to make the best game possible, no compromises. Star Citizen is going to cost approximately $20M to make. We have this covered already between the incredible funding we’ve received from you and the commitments from investors. But here’s the truth: I’ve been holding off on closing investors because your commitment means we won’t need as much money as we originally expected. Every dollar we make from crowd funding means one less we’ll take from outside investors.

To achieve this we need to bring in new people, as all of you have given more than we could have ever expected you should not be expected to contribute any more to the cause. What better way to get some new members than a sale to entice them to join before the new site and their access rights change? Which is why we decided to create a sale for the unveiling of the Aurora in all its glory. We’re really proud of the work that’s been done on the Aurora – I think you will agree that no other game goes to such detail in designing and realizing a universe. The Aurora is indicative of what we are looking to achieve in terms of detail and immersion in the final game, and while it is the cheapest player ship available it is by no means a “Starter ship”.

As part of this we’ve decided to create a little mini campaign around the new site, complete with some stretch goals, rewards for all backers and a 24 hour live cam setup to celebrate the new site going live at the end of May. For those of you that will want to add the Aurora LX to your collection now we’ve created a couple of options for you to contribute a little more money towards development and get in return add the LX to your fleet. I want to stress that if you did this it would only because you wanted to contribute to the development funding not because you have to. You will be able to earn credits to buy this ship in game once we go live. So please do not feel obligated to do anything. Everyone has given more than enough. This is purely a “for the fun” sale / event to hopefully push our funding along.