Miner Wars got $1,484,000 USD in investment funds and is switching to high gear in development in about 2 months. They got a new office and are hiring all the people they'll be needing for the next while.
http://www.minerwars.com/ForumTopic.aspx?id=1762
http://www.minerwars.com/ForumTopic.aspx?id=1788
The game currently has a demo mode that limits you to one pre-generated "sector" (no editor). This should get updated along with the rest of the game if you want to track it without forking money over for the pre-order. Just download the game from their website. (don't forget to press K)
The game is broken up into "sectors" which are cube shaped chunks of space that take about 16 minutes to fly across. When you fly to the edge of the sector you are loaded into the next one. Press tab to see the boundaries .
Reading up on the game, also found that it will be released in two parts, a MMO and a "single player" campaign.
The campaign comes first and is using all the tech the MMO will be using. This means that it
requires an internet connection 100% of the time. Now normally I'd be up in arms over this, but they say the campaign will be co-op AND even if you start by yourself you can invite other players into your campaign to play with you at any time. Being co-op, I bought it to play online with friends. Release date is sometime around November this year, assuming no delays.
The MMO comes some time afterward and in all likely hood will be like the campaign but balanced for the MMO.
Between offering pre-orders that let you play the game as it's being built and making a single player/co-op campaign first, I'm very hopeful it won't follow other MMO's that were forced to release in a alpha state because they ran out of money.
They also have public discussions with players every Sunday, see more info and logs here
http://www.minerwars.com/ForumTopic.aspx?id=1221
NOTE: This is a pre-alpha. There is very little content available to players so far, so don't expect much right now.
And the pre-order is
ONLY FOR THE SINGLE PLAYER/CO-OP CAMPAIGN. It does not cover the MMO. You can play the demo for free to see some of the updates.
-edit- This didn't seem like a wall of text when typing it -_-