Here’s Gary Oldman fighting space Goombas in over an hour of new Star Citizen Squadron 42 gameplay
(in space)
Earlier this month, we learned that Star Citizen studio Cloud Imperium Games were mandating overtime for employees in the lead-up to their fan convention, Citizencon, which was held this past weekend. Additionally, this TOIL (time off in lieu) wouldn’t be made available until the release of space game Star Citizen’s accompanying single player campaign, Squadron 42.
At CitizenCon over the weekend, CIG head promiser Chris Roberts said that he’s “confident” that Sqorty-two will release in 2026, via Ian Games. CIG also released a video of the entire first hour and fifteen of the game, which you can watch below.
As of this May, Star Citizen had raised over $700 million in crowd-funding. I imagine a fair old chunk of that went towards rounding up at least one and half Kojima’s worth of Gr8 M8s, including Mark Hamill, Gillian Anderson, Gary Oldman, Andy Serkis, Mark Strong, Sophie Wu, and Henry Cavill.
I haven’t watched the whole video yet, but it’s got some fun aliens in it. They’ve got teeth like the Goombas from the (good) Super Mario Movie. Has that film has a proper critical re-evaluation yet? Like, I feel that bad but interesting is better than just, palatable. I’m trying to fill space here because I don’t want to start watching the video and saying things about it. It’s very impressive but it’s still vaporware until I can physically shoot some aliens and make dialogue choices that annoy Gillian Anderson. I don't want to believe it's real just yet because, context aside, it does look very good.
Sqorty-two was first announced in 2012, so this clip marks a decade and change since. The game was announced as “feature complete” at Citizencon last year. Wing Commander 3: Heart Of The Tiger is currently on sale! at GOG for £2.39, and you get to make Mark Hamill say dumb shit.
Edit: I originally wrote 2026 was next year because I was sleepy, and because I assumed CIG wouldn't be brazen enough to have recently given their staff TOIL which they knew wouldn't be redeemable for two actual years. I take it back. It doesn't look very good. It looks poopy.