ICARUS Beta Weekend 6: Full Restart, Now With Timed Missions!

Note from the author: Fellow prospectors, we apologize for a major inaccuracy in this news post! Some of the phrasing in the official announcement led us to believe that missions for Beta Weekend 6 would be timed. They were not, and we do not know when and how missions will be timed in the future. Sorry about the misleading title and our speculations below 🙂

This time everything is on a timer, fellow prospectors! The upcoming Beta Weekend is not getting a third day, so time is of the essence: ICARUS Beta Weekend #6 starts on Friday, November 5th, at 5 pm PDT, and ends on Sunday, November 7th, at 10 pm PDT. (What time is that for me?)

So, you might need as much time as you can scrape together and, possibly, a dedicated group of friends to tackle the game this weekend. Remember the mostly useless mission timer on the top of your screen that made it feel like you had a month to complete your beta weekend objectives? Well, this time every mission in the game is properly timed, and you will need to complete some of the missions before you can access the others!

Zero-Level Characters, 6 Missions to Complete

Missed Beta Weekend #1? Not to worry: the first mission, BEACHHEAD, is a basic survival test in the Forest Biome. That’s it. No specific objectives. Survive for “an acceptable length of time,” as RocketWerkz puts it, and you can take on some more challenging missions.

icarus beta weekend 6 timed mission factions — This time you will be able to track explored locations on your map (as in, your map interface will actually work), and be able to tell where the boundary limits are. Helps with avoiding the panic timer.

We don’t know what the other missions are, exactly, but we know that they will be assigned by one or more of the 8 ICARUS factions:

UDA (United Development Agency)
Sinotai (China Space Agency)
ACS (American Coastal States)
União (South American Union)
The Assembly (The African Assembly)
The Lagos Unit (UDA)
Group 15 (UDA)
Mars Administration Authority, AKA “The Administration”

We also don’t know much about these organizations aside from a few bits of lore, but each is, of course, clearly preoccupied with their own goals and many are strict or even corrupt when it comes to getting their slice of pie from Icarus. The ambitious organization interested in terraforming ICARUS is but a facade for other power players and their individual agendas.

Each of the factions will be behind at least one of the 6 Missions we can get this Beta Weekend, which are:

BEACHHEAD
LIVEWIRE
DARK HARVEST
FIELD TEST
KILL LIST
HEADSTONE

We will have to wait until Friday to get more details, but I have to ask: who in the world is on our kill list? (Have we been hired to exact vengeance upon the rabbit population for their contribution to the global raccoon extinction event?) Come to think of it, two more of these have “head” in their names, which is also a little concerning…

icarus beta weekend six 6 missions on the list beachhead

Let’s finish this announcement off with a few other notable highlights for Beta Weekend $6:

The level cap remains 30, without access to the Tech Tier 4 blueprints;
Map regions will vary between the missions. Map interface will show explored areas and boundary limits;
As long as the player starting a prospect qualifies for the mission, it can be started. Other players can join later and will be credited upon completion;
The Lantern‘s light source will now finally be emitted from inside the Lantern. Hopefully, the dramatic redemption saga of this mutilated lighting tool should now be complete!

Please share with us in the comments below: What has your experience with ICARUS been like so far, and what are your expectations for Beta Weekend #6?