The year 2020 wasn’t kind to a lot of things, game release schedules included. It seemed like nearly every big and not-so-big game suffered multiple delays as teams had to cope with wildly changing work conditions. EVERSPACE 2 was no exception, with their open beta slipping out of December and into a black hole with an unknown exit vector. However, that exit is a mystery no longer, with developer ROCKFISH Games announcing that EVERSPACE 2 will be arriving on both Steam Early Access and the GOG Games in Development program on January 18th!
We got our first hands-on with an early Alpha build of EVERSPACE 2 back in October 2019. Since that early prototype, ROCKFISH Games’ team of veteran developers has been hard at work fleshing out a game that both builds on the success of EVERSPACE, and expands in directions that will satisfy a legion of dedicated spaceship pilots. The game will launch into Early Access with full professional voice acting in English for the first 12+ hours of the story campaign, and over 25 hours of gameplay when various side quests are factored in. Over the course of 2021, players will see the EVERSPACE 2 universe gradually expand into the full featured release, which is slated for the first half of 2022.
“After multiple rounds of community testing by some 2,000 players, and great feedback from various gaming outlets and content creators on the closed Beta, EVERSPACE 2 is ready for Early Access. We can’t wait to receive feedback on the initial release version from space game enthusiasts on Steam and GOG,” says Michael Schade, CEO & co-founder of ROCKFISH Games. “Of course, the game is far from being finished. On top of the two star systems EVERSPACE 2 pilots will be able to explore in Early Access at launch, we plan to have four to six more as well as several additional player ship subclasses beyond the Interceptor, Sentinel, Striker, Gunship, and Scout at launch, to be gradually added on a quarterly basis. In the final game, players will also be able to enjoy twice as much story content plus lots of worthwhile endgame activities. We look forward to working closely with our community over the course of the next 12 to 18 months to make an outstanding narrative-driven open-world space looter shooter.”
Players can already check out the free demo available now on Steam. Thanks to heavy demand from space sim fans, the Early Acess version of EVERSPACE 2 will launch with fully configurable HOTAS support and presets for popular Logitech and Thrustmaster joystick setups. We can hardly wait.
