StarCitizen:Shard
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A shard is game server instance.
Origins
In 1995, the world wide web was still new. Companies such as StarCitizen:Origin Systems or Electronic Arts had no websites, and even having the concept of having an online account with a company that wasn't just an email and local BBS (Bulletin Board Service) Provider such as AOL was new.<ref name=":0">Galactic Inquiry . Starr Long full-length interview, Galactic Inquiry, YouTube, 23 August 2014</ref>
Back at Origin Systems when Ultima Online was made in 1997, 30 000 players were expected. As the beta was too large to download, it was sent by mail at a cost of $5, yet 15 000 people signed up within a week, making Origin realize they might need more servers. Origin Systems had to use rental space all around the world and travel to set up servers. For the sake of immersion, a fictional construct was created to describe them.<ref name=":0" />
In Ultima One, there was a Gem of immortality created by the wizard Mondain, who had captured a world within. The gem of Immortality is shattered by the player at the end of the game to defeat the wizard, and when it was shattered, it created a multiverse of all the different shards.<ref>Ultima Online Intro, Gabriel Knight, YouTube, 3 February 2007</ref>
Star Citizen
Most StarCitizen:MMO structures have a fragmentation of the player base between shards. A player might not have room to join a friend on his world instance leading to both players having to join another shard else they can't play together.<ref name=":1">Template:Cite RSI</ref>
Star Citizen aims to have a single persistent universe server that everyone exists on. So the player will never be separated from his friends. Nevertheless due to the fidelity of the dogfighting and physics simulation and the rendering of great amounts of spaceships it's not possible to handle thousands of players in the same area of space. Instead, Star Citizen uses Battle Instances.<ref name=":1" />
On April 10th StarCitizen:2024, Cloud Imperium Games (CIG) held its own StarCitizen:First Jump Day celebration on Star Citizen's Tech Preview Channel. For this test of the progress on Server Meshing and StarCitizen:Replication layer technology, CIG opened its first functioning Jump Gates, and allowed players to test travelling between two systems for the first time. Players were able to travel between Stanton and Pyro via wormholes, with each system streaming in and out seamlessly. During the test, Star Citizen also achieved 350 concurrent players in a single shard.<ref>Template:Cite RSI</ref>
In 2026, StarCitizen:Chris Roberts said that Star Citizen shards were running 700 to 800 people and would probably break a thousand that same year, maybe up to 2000, with the long term goal to have 10 000+ players in a shard.<ref>The State of Star Citizen with Chris Roberts, Back Pocket, Youtube, Feb 27, 2026</ref>
External Links
See also
References
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