Starting this Autumn, the Thargoids are returning to the galaxy in Elite: Dangerous. Players have speculated about this for months now, and their worst fears were initially confirmed in a June forum announcement by Frontier Developments. WE’ll rehash the initial 2.4 announcement for those that missed it below.
Last night we managed to pull off something special; our fantastic community joined together to take part in a Community Goal that would reveal information to change the galaxy forever. Thanks to you, we were able to transfer enough data to Professor Palin who was able to confirm our suspicions: The Thargoids are back… the same enemy so many of our Commanders feared from the original 1984 Elite.
Today we’re excited to announce that Elite Dangerous 2.4 The Return will launch Quarter 3 of 2017, and you will be in direct conflict with our insectoid friends. These fearsome creatures are unlike anything you’ve come across before in Elite Dangerous, meaning that you’ll have to discover new ways to fight, work together, and defend against their new types of weaponry and armour.
Frontier plan to shift around priorities for the release of 2.4 in a manner of speaking. There won’t be a mess of livestreams that reveal too much detail about the update itself. After all, they don’t want to spoil the story before Commanders have a chance to unravel it.
Thargoids are a powerful and mysterious who have appeared in previous Elite games but have, so far, only been a tourist attraction in Elite Dangerous. That will change with Update 2.4. Expect things to get violent and messy for Commanders and Xenos alike.
The Return will play out differently to previous releases in Elite Dangerous: Horizons, with content and story beats affecting all Commanders releasing in the months following its initial release.
As a story-centric update, showing too much ahead of time would spoil the surprise and make for a lesser experience for the community. We want The Return to surprise and shock you as much as possible, but that said, you can expect for further reveals and information about the future of Elite at various community and gaming events throughout the year, such as the upcoming Lavecon.
David Braben talks about the history of the Thargoids, and about how 2.4 The Return will unfold, in the video we posted to our YouTube account:
But as for new information from this weeks newsletter, the focus is on the first details of the closed beta for the 2.4 Update. The closed beta period for 2.4 will run from 17 August for an undisclosed period of time, then shut down for “a few days”, and return again as an open beta. Those who previously paid for beta access will get into the betas for 2.3.10 and 2.4 when they’re available.
It’s also worth mentioning that the Thargoids won’t actually be fully implemented into the closed beta, so expect more a shakedown run for bug fixes and any locations and quests relating to the Xenos to be the focus there.
