Star Citizen, a game that has been forever playable but has yet to be officially released, now has an in-game purchase that looks designed solely for the kind of person who would be betting entire planets in a sci-fi casino.
It’s called The Legatus Pack, and costs USD$27,000. In real money. For all that cash you get basically everything available in the game, from every ship (and there are a lot of ships) to a seemingly endless array of extras and cosmetic items.
That’s where this game, and its astronomical crowdfunding success, is at in May 2018. A collection of 117 ships and extras that costs so much money that the game’s developers, Cloud Imperium, have restricted access to the pack’s purchase page to players who have already spent $1000 on Star Citizen stuff already, to certify that they’re genuine galactic high rollers.
It’s easy to joke about this kind of money, just as it’s easy to joke about a game that has been in very public development for 6 years and is yet to see any kind of final release. But like...this game has reportedly raised over $185 milion dollars directly from fan pledges. It’s clear that as absurd as the figures seem to bystanders, there are still players out there willing to spend big money on Star Citizen.
It should be noted that The Legatus Pack isn’t an all-new idea; it simply replaces an older offering, priced at $15,000, with the higher price reflecting the extra ships and content produced since it first went on sale.
Cloud Imperium couldn’t tell Kotaku whether anyone had actually purchased The Legatus Pack or not.