History VideoGame / Stars1995

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* ImmortalityProcreationClause: It's possible to invoke a downplayed variant of this during race creation. By dropping the reproduction rate to the bare minimum, you will acquire enough points to have every benefit with no drawbacks as well as allowing the player to check immunity to temperature, gravity, and radiation, allowing colonists to survive on any world.

* RamScoop: The game has two types of engines: conventional and ramscoop. When traveling slowly, scoop-type engines produce surplus fuel, but have lesser optimal (and combat) warp speed than normal engines of the same Tech Levels and when exceeding it eat even more than normal ones. There's also the "No Ram Scoop Engines" trait — unless paired with Improved Fuel Efficiency, this means dependence on big starbases and fragile fuel plants. Radiating Hydro-Ram Scoop, the lowest commonly available on the Tech Tree, gradually kills transported colonists in the same fleet unless the race has a very high radiation optimum value. This means not only are ships with rad-scoop limited to hauling minerals, but armed escorts would have to dance around a transport or colonizer as a separate fleet without merging. Ships with scoops also suffer 1/4 more damage per engine from SpaceMines.

* PortalNetwork: Stargates can function this way if a player builds enough starbases with the capability to transport ships across space in a single turn, bypassing fuel and travel time requirements. They have limitations in regards to the size of the vessel they can transport and the distance that can be travelled, but Interstellar Traveller races can develop stargates with unlimited capabilities. Wormholes occur naturally in space also, allowing instant travel between two points.

* LostTechnology: It is fairly common for settlers on a new world to find an artifact that boosts their research in a given field.

* AllThereInTheManual: A brief synopsis of the state of the universe is given in the manual: Two [[SufficientlyAdvancedAliens highly advanced races]] went to war and destroyed much of the universe in the process. What's left is the galaxy that the player's race inhabits[note]although the occasional merchant from outside would indicate otherwise[/note].

* AllThereInTheManual: A brief synopsis of the state of the universe is given in the manual: Two [[SufficientlyAdvancedAliens highly advanced races]] went to war and destroyed much of the universe in the process. What's left is the galaxy that the player's race inhabits.

* PortalNetwork: Stargates can function this way if a player builds enough starbases with the capability to transport ships across space in a single turn, bypassing fuel and travel time requirements. They have limitations in regards to the size of the vessel they can transport, but Interstellar Traveller races can develop stargates with unlimited capabilities. Wormholes occur naturally in space also, allowing instant travel between two points.

* TheAllegedCar: Buying the racial trait of "Cheap Engines" gets points back, and makes engines cheaper, but every ship has a 10% chance of not launching.

* Terraform: All races have some ability to terraform with research and resources. The Claim Adjusters have additional options and automatically terraform their planets with additional research.

The game is technically abandonware, with the rights held by [=indiePub=] Entertainment, Inc after Empire Interactive folded, but the Jeffs gave tacit permission to the Stars Auto Host forum to generate new software keys for a nominal donation.

''Stars!'' is a turn-based strategy, space FourX game. ''Stars!'' was developed by a pair of programmers, Jeff Johnson and Jeff McBride ("the Jeffs") and was released as shareware in 1995. Empire Interactive later produced and published a retail version. The game shipped with a handful of standard races as well as the ability to create ones own customized races with a variety of traits including preferred environment ranges and rate of population growth.

All players start with a single home planet that has an ideal environment for their race and must explore the universe around them, expand their race, and deal with the other players to achieve eventual victory under a wide variety of possible winning conditions set when building the game. The game sports a full tech tree which varies based on racial traits, customizable ship designs, and a wealth of documentation on the values of individual items and the math of how things are calculated, allowing players to calculate the results of their actions. The game has a simple method for distributing turn files for individual races, allowing a single computer to be used as a server for a Play By [=EMail=] online game. Today, [[https://wiki.starsautohost.org/wiki/Main_Page an autohosting option]] is available to automate the process.

The game is technically abandonware, with the acquired held by [=indiePub=] Entertainment, Inc after Empire Interactive folded, but the Jeffs gave tacit permission to the Stars Auto Host forum to generate new software keys for a nominal donation.