Everspace 2 comes to Steam and GOG on January 18

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2020 was a rough ride for the open-world space shooter Everspace 2. A Kickstarter campaign in late 2019 was very successful, pulling in nearly $620,000, but a planned Early Access release was postponed twice: Once because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and then by Cyberpunk 2077's move from November into December, which developer Rockfish Games (along with a few others) had no interest in messing with.

But with Cyberpunk now out of the way, and the pandemic clearly sticking around, Rockfish said today that Everspace 2 will finally make its big appearance on January 18. The initial Early Access release "will be good for at least 25 hours of gameplay," Rockfish said, with core gameplay mechanics in place and English voice acting for the first 12 hours of the campaign and several side missions.

"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," Rockfish CEO Michael Schade said. "In the final game, players will also be able to enjoy twice as much story content plus lots of worthwhile endgame activities."

The plan is to keep Everspace 2 in Early Access for a year to 18 months, and release it sometime in the first half of 2022 at a "reasonably increased" price. The initial release will be available for $40/£32/€38 on Steam Early Access and GOG Games in Development.

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.