The Star Marines module of Star Citizen, which contains the guts that make up the close-quarters combat systems that allow for sharp, precise, and quick gunplay, is finally coming in the upcoming 2.6 patch. Cloud Imperium Games has shared footage of the module with IGN that shows some impressive gameplay.

Star Marine was supposed to be integrated into the Star Citizen Alpha much sooner than this. However, in mid-2015 Chris Roberts announced that "technical blockers and gameplay issues," led to Star Marine being delayed. While I haven't had a chance to get into the 2.6 PTU, IGN's video and reports from the Star Citizen subreddit indicate that Star Marine is excellent, especially for the first version of a new module.

The Star Marine module in 2.6 lays the foundation for integrating this fast-paced, responsive gunplay into the central Star Citizen package. It's somewhat bare bones, but the groundwork is there for making an excellent FPS experience. The Star Citizen team stated that they hoped that by patch 3.0, which will mark the integration of many new systems, that things like atmospheric venting and decompression will be worked into the game.

I've been following Star Citizen since just before patch 2.0, and I've been up and down with my feelings about it. However, the release of Star Marine feels like a good sign. It's been a skeleton in the closet for Cloud Imperium, and it's great to see that the module has turned out as well as it has. If Star Citizen can integrate this type of active, fast-paced movement with multi-crew ships in a dynamic universe, they'll truly have something revolutionary on their hands.