I think you can see why we’re so excited about the 300 Series. The brochure and commercial show exactly why Cloud Imperium puts so much effort into each ship. Months of work to produce a single vehicle may seem extreme, but the results speak for themselves: unparalleled detail that will get you into this game like nothing before.

As always, we are doing these promotions as way to bring new people into the community – the Aurora promotion managed to bring in three times the amount of people to the game that were previously joining and almost 70% of the dollars raised came from new backers which was great! If you are an existing backer please pledge because you want to support the game’s development and our quest to make this the first fully community funded AAA game and not because additional ships are necessary for the experience. You will be able to acquire all of these craft and upgrades in the finished game using in-game credits.

For people on the fence about jumping in and backing Star Citizen, this promotion and next week’s “grace” period (more below) will be your last chance to get Life Time Insurance (LTI) with your ship! Those who want to jump right in to Star Citizen’s roles will enjoy the 300i, which allows them to go farther, faster (and since it’s an ORIGIN design, you’ll do it in style!).

I would also like to provide some details about next week’s livestream and website launch. As you know, we will be switching to the entirely new Roberts Space Industries website on June 28th and are kicking off the long-overdue change with a celebratory livestream. The stream will be broadcast from both Cloud Imperium offices, in Los Angeles and Austin. Like the first livestream, there will be a “main” camera showing both conference rooms interacting plus other cameras located around the office.

The existing Roberts Space Industries website will go down at noon CST on Thursday, June 27th. A 24-hour downtime is necessary for porting over our existing database and making sure it slots into the new site correctly. The site will be replaced by a static site with information during that time, but you will not be able to log into your account or access the forums. At 11 AM CST on Friday, June 28th we will begin a live broadcast of Wingman’s Hangar that will culminate in the launch of the new site. After that, you’ll be able to explore the new page, choose or change your handle and assign your existing credits.

The new site will launch in several phases. Friday will be the base update that replaces the WordPress system currently used for RSI. You will have a genuine e-commerce platform that will allow you to modify your pledges and make many changes to your account that were previously impossible. All data from the current site will be ported over and you will be able to access any Comm-Links and Spectrum Dispatches with a much improved navigation system that includes the ability to actually search for tags! The live chat and forums will also be rebuilt, with existing posts ported to the new forums. There may be a temporary loss of some forum features (like private groups,) but these will be replaced with new game-derived grouping features in the near future. In the coming months, long-awaited additional features like the Galactapedia and the Holo-Viewer will also come online.

To avoid the confusion that came with the previous livestream and promotions, there will be a one-week grace period for all pledges. You will have until Saturday, July 6th to pick up packages with the old prices and features, including LTI through the new site, as well as limited ships and other things offered during the 300i and Livestream promotions. This is necessary to allow Kickstarter backers to attribute their pledge credits and to avoid some of the customer service confusion we have experienced in the past.

The whole team is very excited about the livestream. If you saw the initial stream in November, we’re aiming to have the same level of fun plus plenty more reveals. We have a lot of Star Citizen content to show off and a lot to talk about… and we’re eager to involve the many amazing fans we’ve gained in the past six months! So please, be sure to join us at this time next week. It’s going to be one hell of a show!

I sincerely hope you enjoy the 300i materials released today. Even if you choose not to add a 300 Series spacecraft to your hangar you should enjoy the new materials and have a good idea of just how detailed Star Citizen is going to be! I look forward to interacting with fans everywhere on the livestream—see you there!