The fear of a crowdfunded project being bought up by a larger company - whose motives may not necessarily be in line with those of backers - has become something of a trending topic ever since Facebook's acquisition of Oculus VR. Chris Roberts, creator of the super-mega-crowdfunded Star Citizen, took to the Internet to alleviate such concerns this week, just as his game crossed the $41 million funding mark.

"We don't need to go to anyone with deep pockets to make our dream a reality," Roberts wrote. "To mass-produce hardware like the Rift, you need an outlay of hundreds of millions of dollars. Luckily our ships are digital so we have hardly any cost of goods, just the cost of developing the universe of Star Citizen and running servers that Star Citizen's universe will be simulated on."

Regarding the Facebook acquisition of Oculus, Roberts doesn't seem concerned. Star Citizen natively supports the Rift, and Roberts himself was a backer of the VR headset on Kickstarter. He hopes that Facebook's funding will help Oculus compete in the market, and eventually release an attractively-priced consumer version of the Rift. Roberts wrote that until he sees something that causes the team behind Oculus to lose the "passion that convinced me to back the project," he will remain a committed partner. [Image: Roberts Space Industries]