Star Citizen 2026: Where Is the Game Actually At?
April 25, 2026
The Evolution of Space Games: From Asteroids to Starfield
April 27, 2026
• What the ongoing war with the Thargoids means for returning players
• How much time you need to sink before it gets fun
• Why 2026 might (or might not) be the right time to jump back in
⭐️ 5 min read
I Left the Black Two Years Ago. Here’s Why I Came Back.
February 2022. I was 487 jumps into a Colonia run in my souped-up Asp Explorer, about 15,000 light-years from the bubble, when I just stopped. Not because my ship got destroyed or I ran out of fuel. I stopped because I realized I was bored out of my skull. Elite Dangerous had been my main game for four years at that point. I had an engineered Corvette, a Fleet Carrier I’d grinded for, and more credits than I knew what to do with. I docked at Colonia, logged off, and didn’t come back for four years.
So when a friend texted me in March 2026 asking if I’d heard about the Thargoid war ramping up, I honestly laughed. “Didn’t they already do that?” I asked. He sent me a screenshot of a Titan wreck site with actual on-foot combat. I reinstalled that night. $45 for the Odyssey expansion (it was on sale), plus the base game download of 28GB. And here’s what I found.
Odyssey in 2026: What Actually Changed
When Odyssey launched in 2021, it was a disaster. I remember watching the reviews pour in — NPCs glitching through floors, missions that didn’t work, performance so bad my RTX 2080 sounded like a jet engine. I deliberately waited for patches. By late 2023, most of the critical bugs were squashed. By 2026? It’s genuinely playable.
The on-foot combat is still not great. I’d describe it as “functional but floaty.” Shooting feels like the weapons have no weight. I did a settlement raid on a planetary port, cleared about 15 NPCs, and it just felt… okay. Not terrible, not amazing. The Odyssey promise was “walk on planets, do FPS stuff, buy a space suit.” It delivers on the bare minimum of that promise. The frame rate on foot on my RX 7900 XT hovers around 70-80fps at 1440p, which is fine. The drop from 144fps in ship combat to 70fps on foot is jarring though. Frontier still hasn’t optimized the lighting engine for ground zones.
The Thargoid War: Finally, a Story Worth Following
This is the big reason to come back. Frontier actually committed to an evolving narrative. The Thargoids invaded, pushed into the bubble, destroyed several starports. Players fought back in organized AX operations. The reward — a community goal that actually had tangible consequences in the galaxy — is something Elite had been missing since the original Thargoid encounters in 2017.
I joined a private group focused on Anti-Xeno combat. First AX fight, I got my canopy blown out, barely limped back to a rescue ship with 37 seconds of life support left. My hands were shaking. That moment alone was worth the reinstall cost. There’s something about Elite’s combat — when it works — that no other space game replicates. The sound design, the module damage, the panic of a heat sink failing mid-battle.
The Titans are the endgame. Massive Thargoid motherships that require coordinated squadron attacks. I attempted one solo and lasted about four minutes before my hull hit 12%. I felt stupid but also impressed. The game can still humble you after hundreds of hours.
The Grind: Still the Same Old Problem
I have to be honest here — Elite’s grind is brutal. Want to engineer your ship? You’re looking at 50+ hours of material gathering, unlocking engineers, gathering more materials for the actual engineering, pinning blueprints, traveling to engineers across the galaxy. I had unlocked all engineers in 2022, but coming back, I had to re-learn the entire material trader system. It’s not intuitive. It’s not explained. You need a third-party website (Inara, EDDB) to function effectively.
Odyssey added more grind on top. New materials for suit upgrades, on-foot weapons, consumables. I spent my first three evenings back just gathering materials for a Dominator suit and a plasma pistol. That’s about nine hours. Was it fun? No. But once you’re upgraded, the on-foot combat against scavengers on derelict settlements actually becomes interesting. The payoff is there — it’s just buried under busywork.
The Fleet Carrier upkeep cost is another sore spot. I logged back in to find 120 million credits drained from my carrier’s bank over four years. I had to scramble to sell cartographic data just to keep it afloat. The game literally charges you for not playing. That feels bad, and I’m still annoyed about it.
The Verdict: Should You Come Back in 2026?
If you never left, you already know the answer. If you’re on the fence, here’s my honest take. The Thargoid War content is the best thing Frontier has done since the original Beyond Chapter Four update. The galaxy finally feels alive — starports being repaired, new technologies being developed based on community progress, an actual sense that player actions matter. That’s not nothing.
But Elite is still Elite. It’s a mile wide and an inch deep. Exploration is beautiful screenshots separated by ten minutes of nothing. Mining is profitable and detailed, but mining for more than two hours makes me want to fall asleep. Bounty hunting is fun until you realize the NPCs follow predictable patterns. The game rewards patience and punishes impatience. I personally love that about it, but I also understand why people bounce off hard.
For $10-15 on a Steam sale, absolutely buy Odyssey. For the $45 sale price I paid, I’d say it’s borderline worth it if you’re a returning player with nostalgia. If you’re brand new? Start with the base game. See if you can stomach the supercruise before committing to the expansion.
TL;DR — My Honest Take
• Thargoid War is genuinely good and makes the galaxy feel alive for once.
• Odyssey on-foot gameplay is “functional” — not the revolution they promised, but not broken anymore.
• The grind is still real. Bring patience or a second monitor for Netflix.
• Worth coming back if you’ve been gone 2+ years. If you quit last month, nothing’s changed.
— Rand, Senior Editor at SpaceGA. 1,200 hours in Elite, 4,000 hours in space games total. Fleet Carrier: HML-Normandy.