This MMO charges $48,000 for a ship pack - three times the US annual minimum salary

Star Citizen
(Image credit: Cloud Imperium Games)

Star Citizen has a spaceship bundle which - somehow - costs $48,000.

As first noted by TweakTown, Star Citizen just got its annual 'Legatus Ship Pack' for 2023. What's so noteworthy about a bundle for a spacefaring MMO, you ask? Why, only the fact that it costs a gargantuan $48,888, we answer.

Yes, that's right: $48,000 US Dollars. That's over three times the annual salary of a worker on minimum wage in the US. That's the vast majority of the average annual salary for workers throughout the US, which according to Forbes was estimated to be just shy of $60,000 in 2023.

You might be wondering what this small fortune would net you in the massive game of Star Citizen. It includes basically everything ever released in Star Citizen at the time the pack went on sale, which includes 221 ships, as well as paints, concepts, ship hulls, clothes, posters, and models.

This is why the Legatus Ship Pack gets more expensive with each passing year - more stuff is being added into it, so it just gets bigger and bigger. The 2023 version of the ship pack, for example, would have all the ships and hulls released up to and including 2023, whereas the 2022 version of the pack wouldn't have anything released over the past 12 months.

It's worth noting that the price of the Legatus Ship Pack has actually increased a pretty significant amount over the past year. 2021's version of the pack was $40,000, and this rose to $42,000 the following year in 2022. Quite why the pack has jumped up to $48,000 is anyone's guess, but it's probably indicative of the amount of new stuff released in Star Citizen over the last year.

It's utterly bonkers, and we can't quite work out whether there are actually people out there who purchase the Legatus Ship Pack. For it to be make monetary sense (not that it does in the first place), surely you'd have to have never purchased anything in Star Citizen before? We're just left scratching out head at this absurd price tag.

Check out our best MMORPGs guide for a look at some of the other games that can soak up all your free time.

Hirun Cryer

Hirun Cryer is a freelance reporter and writer with Gamesradar+ based out of U.K. After earning a degree in American History specializing in journalism, cinema, literature, and history, he stepped into the games writing world, with a focus on shooters, indie games, and RPGs, and has since been the recipient of the MCV 30 Under 30 award for 2021. In his spare time he freelances with other outlets around the industry, practices Japanese, and enjoys contemporary manga and anime.