Star Citizen's single-player Squadron 42 will rival GTA 6 as the 'biggest budget' game of 2026

Here's a stat that might or might not surprise you: Star Citizen, the epic everything space game from veteran designer Chris Roberts and Cloud Imperium Games, has now raised over $1 billion in crowdfunding. Development on the game, and its single-player cinematic standalone campaign Squadron 42, began in 2012, with Star Citizen getting its first 'Early Access' release in 2017.

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Even though we've been covering the progress of both Star Citizen and Squadron 42 for several years now, according to Chris Roberts, the finish line is in sight. Although Star Citizen 1.0 is on track for a 2027 or 2028 release, gamers can look forward to the launch of the star-studded Squadron 42 sometime in 2026 - next year. It's set to be released alongside the only other billion-dollar juggernaut on the horizon, Grand Theft Auto 6.

"It's Top Gun meeting Star Wars," Chris Roberts said when describing Squadron 42 to French-Canadian outlet LaPresse. Even though GTA 6 is set to launch on May 26, 2026, on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, Chris Roberts and the team at Cloud Imperium Games probably know enough not to launch Squadron 42 anywhere close to that date.

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"We're hoping it's going to be almost as big an event," Chris Roberts adds when comparing the upcoming launch of Squadron 42 to the long-awaited arrival of GTA 6. "Aside from GTA 6, it's probably the AAA game with the biggest budget." Squadron 42 features a star-studded cast of motion-captured actors, including Mark Hamill, Henry Cavill, Gillian Anderson, Gary Oldman, and many more.

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Set in the Star Citizen universe, Squadron 42 is a more traditional and linear narrative game that blends on-foot missions with aerial and space dogfighting. According to the article at LaPresse, all of the new elements that Squadron 42 is set to introduce will then be used to improve Star Citizen for its big 1.0 debut.