Frontier Developments has offered Elite Dangerous players with access to the game’s troubled Odyssey expansion a bit of an early Christmas present, finally introducing a new ground vehicle option – the two-seater Scorpion SRV – for the first time in six years.
Elite Dangerous’ first SRV (that’s Surface Recon Vehicle, in case you were wondering) arrived as part of the game’s Horizons expansion back in 2015. Horizons added the ability to land on planets, and that first SRV, the single-seater Scarab – released long before the Odyssey expansion introduced on-foot traversal – was an integral part of the puzzle, giving players the ability to travel outside their ships.
Six years went by with no new options for buggy fans, but that’s all changed with Elite Dangerous’ latest update. As of today, players that own the space sim’s Odyssey expansion on PC will be able to purchase the new Scorpion SRV – only available from military economies – which provides a two-seater alternative to the original Scarab.
Frontier says the Scorpion is designed specifically for supporting infantry during ground-based combat and is intended to be used co-operatively, with one player in the driver’s seat and another manning its weapons: the rapid-fire Surge Repeater, which increases its accuracy and rate of fire the longer it’s being operated, plus the Aculeus Launcher.