Starting November 20, Star Citizen is holding an event where you can try out most ships in game for free. Now, this is to try to get you to buy or upgrade your ship, but even if you have no plans to purchase or upgrade your ship, you should still check out this event. It allows you to try out and familiarize yourself with the different ships in the game, and try out some of the mechanics you may not have experience with, such as asteroid mining or trading.
The event starts on November 20, in the city New Babbage on the planet Microtech in game. Once at New Babbage, you can take the city's tram system to the new Expo Center stop. Each day, a different 'manufacturer' will have their ships on display in the expo hall. There you will be able to check out the ships, and even rent them for free for a 2 day trial. The schedule of the expo and which manufacturers will be showing which days can be found at https://robertsspaceindustries.com/iae2950
I checked the Expo out a bit in the public test universe. You can really feel a difference between the ships of different manufactures, from the industrial feel of the ships from Drake Interplanetary to the sleek look of Origin Jumpworks’ spacecraft. You can check out all the ships available at https://robertsspaceindustries.com/pledge/ships
Wait, You can play Star Citizen?
It has been quite a while since Star Citizen was originally backed, and while the game still isn’t done, it is very much playable. While you will likely run into a glitch or two, you can play the game without much issue, if you know what you are doing.
A Drake Caterpillar cargo ship
If you are new to the game, it’s a bit different than most FPS games, but it shouldn’t take too long to get familiar with the controls. The biggest difference is how you interact with objects: To interact with an object, you hold the ‘f’ key down. This unlocks your characters’ look direction from your mouse, and instead lets your mouse control a cursor to make selections, while highlighting anything you can interact with. For example, as you approach an elevator, you can hold ‘f’ to interact with the elevator button, which highlights in yellow to show that you can interact with it. You then move your cursor over the button, which then highlights it in orange, and the words ‘Call Elevator’ appear over it. Left-click those words to call the elevator. Once inside the elevator, repeat to choose which floor you want, however this time you will likely have multiple choices, one for each floor the elevator goes to. You will likely want ‘Lobby’, or ‘Ground Floor’, depending on where you are. The other difference is just initially standing up. You will likely start in a ‘hab’ or habitation module, lying down in bed. You need to press ‘y’ to get out of bed. ‘Y’ will also get you out of ship pilot seats, and most other seats or beds as well.
A good resource for new players is the game’s website’s ‘Three Ways To Begin Your Adventure’ tutorial. https://robertsspaceindustries.com/playstarcitizen Here, you can either read a set of getting started tutorials, watch tutorial videos, or request an in-game tutorial from another player. You can also ask in the Shack News Chatty as there are several experienced players there as well.
A Cutlass Black Fighter / Freighter
Conclusion
If you have any interest in playing Star Citizen, or are currently playing it, you shouldn’t miss the IAE 2950 Expo. It’s a chance to get familiar with the different ships in the game and their capabilities and also to try out game mechanics you haven’t tried out yet, such as asteroid mining.
