Two years after launching with a successful Kickstarter campaign, the players of Star Citizen have just kept giving. The space sim game continues to reach higher layers of the atmosphere, and has surpassed the $55 million mark. That makes the title the most crowdfunded project in history, made official by the Guinness Book of World Records.
When Star Citizen first appeared on Kickstarter, it had a goal of $500,000. The first round of crowdfunding wrapped up in November 2012 with $2.1 million raised. “Ship sales and new members of our community are the two main fund raising sources,” game creator Chris Roberts said in a post on his website. Star Citizen sat at $51 million in mid-August 2014.
Even with the record-setting number of money raised from backers, Star Citizen is open to further funding. Roberts cites the unorthodox approach to producing the game, a considerably different venture than his experience with the Wing Commander series.
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“Star Citizen isn’t a normal game. It’s not being developed like a normal game and it’s not being funded like a normal game. I’ve had to toss aside a lot of my knowledge from the old way of developing and embrace a completely new world. There is no publisher. There is no venture capitalist wanting a massive return in three years. There is no need to cram the game onto a disc and hope we got it all right,” Roberts said.
Roberts insists this money raised in the pre-launch stage of the game will be invested in the development of the title. Star Citizen’s development team now consists of over 280 members. Roberts insists that there is no consideration of “feature creep,” the continual delay of release because of the addition of new features.
With the latest round of funding, Star Citizen will add more stretch goals, a new ship that will be chosen by backers. Those who joined the community prior to the $55 million mark will gain access to an exclusive in-game ship upgrade.
