with the Squadron 42 team and with our other developers, but it’ll be this year when he moves over for longer periods of time. Hopefully that means we can progress Squadron 42 through to completion faster. We want to get that game finished, but it will be finished when it’s ready.”
Woah there! Let’s wind that back a bit. Sequels
for Squadron 42? as in, more than one? Squadron 42 is the cinematic sidekick to Star
Citizen, a single-player space adventure more in the vein of the old Wing Commander games that Chris Roberts came to prominence with. Starring the motion-captured likenesses of Mark Hamill, Gillian Anderson and Gary Oldman, the game was announced in the wake of Star Citizen’s crowdfunding success for an initial 2014 release. Not only has it not been released, it’s been put back so many times that CIG have understandably fallen on the “done when it’s done” mantra. However, with Chris Roberts in the process of re-establishing himself in the UK after many years in LA, perhaps we can pin an ETA on that game as well, seeing as he’s looking to hang around the north west for up to two years. “I guess we’ll see how long he needs to be over.
But yeah, it could be one or two years more” says Jones. “He’s spending more time over here
TACTICAL OPERATIONS Jones has said in the past that his job is to manage all the things that Chris Roberts doesn’t want to, which means the long-standing COO is not the go-to guy for development updates. His priority is to get the office moving again, as well as moving office. This might have been easier seven years ago when CIG numbered barely more than a 100 staff, but in the time since the company has expanded massively. Right now there are studios and offices not only in the UK and US (Austin and LA), but also in Germany. There are more than 400 based in the UK and 750 worldwide, and space is getting tight. “During the pandemic we increased to a point
beyond which we have capacity for in our offices, which is why we’re looking at new offices in most of our locations. Obviously CIG isn’t just developing Star Citizen, we’re getting it out there to the public, we’re publishing it ourselves, and there’s a huge amount of people needed to deal with all that.” There are a number of reasons why Manchester
is the focus for current and future growth. One is that CIG is already well established in the area, close to Manchester Airport. Another is that Califorian-born Chris Roberts grew up and went to school there. More importantly, it’s cheap. Thanks to the UK government’s Video Games Tax Relief for Corporation Tax, CIG can plan for a larger expansion than would be viable elsewhere. “The availability of
resources is great in the UK,” adds Jones. “It’s always been a great place for game developers. Aside from about 20 years ago, with the great brain drain, I think we’ve come back to massive strength in this country and we’re able to hire very, very
20 | MCV/DEVELOP January 2022
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