Star Citizen will not require a subscription not be free-to-play, it will will be available for a one-time purchase. And while players will be able to play in the Star Citizen universe for free, there will also be virtual items available for purchase with in-game credits so players can customize their ships and other items.

Cloud Imperium Games has opened an office in Santa Monica to help create Chris Roberts’ new space sim game, Star Citizen. The game marks Roberts’ return to the gaming industry and has garnered headlines in the last six months by bringing in more money via crowd funding than any other game to date. Cloud Imperium has raised more than $8.6 million since October of 2012 for the development of Star Citizen.

Roberts is best known for creating Wing Commander line of games in the 1990s. Those games sold millions of units worldwide and led to an animated television series, a feature film, a collectible card game and a series of novels and action figures. With Star Citizen Roberts wants to reinvigorate PC gaming and space sims in particular.

The new office in Santa Monica will be part of a distributed development approach for Star Citizen that spans from Montreal to Austin, Texas to the Los Angeles area.

“I’m a big believer in utilizing small, very focused development groups,” says Roberts. “Each studio is working on key features of the game. In Santa Monica we’re working on some of the high-end creative elements, the structuring of our game engine and publishing. Other studios are working on technology, game design and production, customer support and web development. We couldn’t be more pleased with hanging our shingle up in Santa Monica. It’s an incredibly creative community here already with a lot of game development and art resources all around us. We’re reaching out to fill positions for the new office already.”

The office located in the Third Street Promenade area is 2900 square feet of space. Cloud Imperium plans on staffing with up to 20 people.