Star Citizen developer Cloud Imperium Games has announced that the PC space sim's Public Test Universe (PTU) is now available to everyone. Among other things, that means that all players can now try out the in-development version of Star Citizen's first-person shooter module, Arena Commander.

Previously, the PTU was available only to a small number of Star Citizen backers. The PTU is similar to World of Warcraft's Public Test Realm, in that it represents a version of the game that includes features not yet available publicly for the purposes of testing.

Cloud Imperium Games warns that Star Citizen's PTU "is not for the faint of heart," noting that players could encounter non-functional or unstable features. Players who want to help improve the overall Star Citizen experience can provide bug reports here or leave general feedback about the PTU itself here.

Star Citizen's PTU is not a permanent feature, Cloud Imperium Games says. It will be available only on occasions where the studio needs help testing a patch, and will be deactivated after an update is pushed out publicly.

Cloumd Imperium Games has also provided a set of instructions regarding how players can access the Star Citizen PTU. Via Cloud Imperium Games, these instructions are listed below.

Step One: Copy your RSI account to the PTU. Go to your My RSI area, select settings and then access Public Test Universe to begin this process. This will copy all of your account settings, pledges and configuration data to the PTUversion of the RSI environment. You will then receive an email with a new password and additional instructions.

Step Two: Open the Star Citizen launcher, log in with your existing RSI account.

Step Three: Access the Settings area of the Star Citizen launcher (the cog at the top) and locate the Game Channel list.

Step Four: Select 'Public Test Universe' in the Game Channel list and then close the settings page.

Step Five: Log out of the Launcher, then log back in using the new password in the email generated by Step One. Reverse this process to switch back to the standard release channel.

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