Starbound (interplanetary terraria)

**miokomioko** · 2012-02-18 23:59

Starbound

Starbound is a brand new game undergoing active development by Chucklefish, an indie game company made up of a lovely group of dudes and dudettes. It’s expected to be released towards the end of Summer 2012, but we’re willing to take the extra time to get things JUST right.

If you like what you see, please feel free to leave a comment or tell your friends. We hope this blog can be an insight into the trials and tribulations of the development process, the people behind the game, and what we hope to achieve.

A story within a sandbox

Starbound begins with you fleeing your homeworld in a space shuttle, just as it’s destroyed by an unknown enemy. With nothing to guide it, the escape pod shoots into space without direction, becoming hopelessly lost in a sea of stars. As luck would have it, the space shuttle makes contact with an abandoned space station and an adventure begins that will take you hurtling across the universe. Starbound contains both quests and story driven missions, buried inside its vast sandbox universe.

The Space Station

The space station in Starbound is sprawling and full of potential. Throughout your travels you’ll find ways to upgrade and repair it, restoring it to its former glory. You’ll need to find a crew, conduct research, catch rare creatures, and unlock its multitude of facilities. From a factory capable of producing mechs to labs where captured enemies can be studied and trained, the space station contains everything you need to explore the universe.

Endless Planets to visit

Planets in Starbound are entirely procedurally generated and filled to the brim with unique content. We went into the planet generation with one simple goal: no two planets should be the same. By procedurally generating even the smallest details, we’re doing just that. Not only is the terrain of the planet procedurally generated, but the weather, the gravity, the difficulty level, the plant life, the behaviour and appearance of alien creatures, and much more all contain random or procedurally generated elements.

We want you to feel like an explorer!

Because we’re working so hard to make each planet unique, we want to give you the tools to catalogue the things you find and make sure absolutely everything you find has depth in the world. Much like old school point and click adventures, absolutely every object in the world, right down to the trees and flowers, can be examined for a description.

See a weird alien tree? Examine it! Maybe you’ll discover something about its use! For any explorer, sharing discoveries is important. So whilst the game is fully coop (Bring your friends along! Form an expedition!) you can also record your findings in an electronic logbook. Not only that, but each and every planet has unique coordinates in the Universe that you can share online, so other players can check out exactly what you found!

Finding a new home

Exploring is wonderful, but everyone needs a place to call their own. That’s why we’re letting you claim an entire planet!

When you claim a planet as your new homeworld, a whole new aspect of gameplay opens up. Everything that makes a planet unique is at your command. Feel like changing the weather? Build a weather centre! Don’t like the terrain? Terraform it! Every aspect of the planet is under your control. Once you’re happy with it, start populating it with characters you’ve met in your travels and take care of them! They’ll have needs and desires and won’t hesitate to ask for your help if they require assistance.

This is only just scratching the surface of what we have in store for you in Starbound.

Screenshots:

Spoiler: show

Random images:

Spoiler: show

Originally Posted by FAQ

What platforms will I be able to play Starbound on?
At launch Starbound will support Windows, Mac, and Linux.

Will there be a console version?
After the PC release we’ll see how viable a console release is, we’d love for as many people to get their hands on the game as possible.

Will it be multiplayer?
Starbound will be fully cooperatively and competitively multiplayer, the number of players is entirely up to the server and we’re working hard to ensure the server is built with server communities in mind.

What will it cost?
The price is still TBD, but we want it to be accessible for everyone!

Will there be a beta?
Yes, but we’re not sure when and how it will be rolled out. We’ll let you know when a schedule is devised.

What are the system requirements?
The game is still in development at the moment, so the specs are subject to change. But we’ve had good success running it on very old hardware so far!

What language is Starbound coded in?
C++

Is there anything else I should know about Starbound?
There are a plethora of unannounced features yet to mention! Stay tuned to the Dev blog and follow us on twitter and facebook to find out more.

It's looking like a world-hopping sci-fi/action/platformer/sandbox... So pretty much Terraria with the ability to travel to different randomly-generated worlds and exploit them to upgrade your space station base, then pick a world to claim, terraform, and build on. I am a big fan of logbook/bestiary completion and this sounds like oodles of that kind of shit. Also, finally some story for those who want something more than an unexplained sandbox.

The artist you'll recognize from Terraria, the other members of the company I'm not familiar with. This is looking to have a lot more potential than Terraria in the long run. I hope it gets the support it needs.

Also:

The killer feature of this little game is that nearly everything is procedurally generated – quests, weapons, enemies, armour, and even the planets which you’ll spend most of your playtime on (different mobs/terrain/plants/materials/weather/scenery/treasures). Finn “Tiyuri” Bryce, revealed that just the rocket launchers have 21,000 visual combinations, and an order of magnitude more combinations of attributes – so it’s entirely possible that one might find a kitten launcher, for example.

The quests have also been revealed to be similarly multitudinous – there’ll be procedurally generated fetch and rescue quests, as well as a main, optional storyline. All of these quests will be playable in cooperative multiplayer, and competetive multiplayer has been confirmed as well.

**Kaisha** · 2012-02-19 00:09

Mega Man jump, check.
Aurora Borealis, check.
Terraria-sized tiles, check.
Tentacles, check.

Alright, I might be able to get behind this even though it looks like a modded Terraria. I like that you have a general goal at the start rather than just being thrown into a generated world for the sake of exploration.

**Trichocyst** · 2012-02-19 14:49

Looks awesome, I can't wait to check this out.

**miokomioko** · 2012-02-24 23:29

Procedurally generated mobs.

In Starbound there will be many NPCs. Something unique about some of these NPCs is that they have many different dynamic appearances so they will rarely look the same twice. Lets take a look at my penguin as an example.

http://playstarbound.com/wp-content/...2/penguin1.png

Penguins can be found throughout the galaxy. They can be of different species, have different modifications and be different colors. Some might be rarer than others. Others might give you special rewards. The combinations are quite numerous.

http://playstarbound.com/wp-content/...02/lizards.png

These are just a few of the possible combinations. Enjoy!

http://playstarbound.com/wp-content/...12/02/deer.png

**miokomioko** · 2012-03-10 02:40

Combat: Shields

One of the things we wanted to do with Starbound was give the combat a lot of depth and flow. We’re aiming to rival the depth of combat you’re used to seeing in huge modern RPGs like Skyrim or Amalur.

Weapons in Starbound can be placed in either the left or right hand (which correspond with the left and right mouse button). Some weapons are two handed, others (like shields) are one handed. Picking two weapons or tools that compliment each other is a big part of being combat effective. Will you choose two daggers? A sword and a shield? An axe and a gun? It’s up to you.

http://playstarbound.com/wp-content/...3/quickbar.png

The combat system in Starbound spans many different tools and weapons, far too many to mention in a single post. So I thought I’d start with one we haven’t really discussed yet. And that’s shields.

Touching (most) enemies in Starbound won’t damage the player directly, instead enemies must go through an attack animation to damage the player. This opens up the gameplay massively to blocking and counter attacks. And that’s where shields come in.

http://playstarbound.com/wp-content/...03/attack1.gif

Once equipped to the left or right hand, shields are brought out by holding the corresponding mouse button. If the player is attacked during this period they take a small percentage (depending on the level of the shield) of regular damage that’s applied to the players health bar as white “recoverable” health.

http://playstarbound.com/wp-content/...hitehealth.png

Once combat is over this health will regenerate, however if the player is hit they’ll lose all of their white health. If the player strikes an enemy shortly after blocking an attack the player gets a “counter attack” which is a guaranteed critical hit. We’re experimenting with increasing the counter attack damage further based on the amount of white health the player currently has. Block many attacks and your next counter attack will be devastating.. but slip up and lose it all. Major risk/reward gameplay.

http://playstarbound.com/wp-content/...3/shield-4.gif

On top of all of this, it won’t just be you making use of shields. Humanoid enemies will use them too and some creatures may have natural shields.

More on combat later!

**miokomioko** · 2012-03-12 20:41

Lighting Demo

Already looks like a polished Terraria. Notice the ability to walk up single-block inclines. <3

**Qalbert** · 2012-05-15 07:19

**avelle** · 2013-04-12 20:17

Looks like pre-orders are up!

http://playstarbound.com/store/

No date on beta though.

**miokomioko** · 2013-04-12 23:09

Bahhh, finally they got my moneys.

Also, a little gameplay:

**djzombie** · 2013-04-13 06:29

do want. take my money.

**Qalbert** · 2013-04-14 14:51

http://www.joystiq.com/2013/04/14/sp...in-pre-orders/

Starbound, a "story within a sandbox" game that has players traversing the universe to explore and complete quests, recently began taking pre-orders. As of this writing, developer Chucklefish hauled in $409,907 in its crowdfunding initiative. While the developer opted to use its official site instead of services such as Kickstarter or Indiegogo to host its tiered funding campaign, it still set stretch goals for the project. A new "novakid" race will be included in the game should pre-orders reach $500,000.

The game promises an endless number of procedurally-generated planets that encourage exploration from players. Starbound's site notes that much like a point-and-click adventure game, players can examine and catalog every item on the varying planets. Additionally, Starbound will feature cooperative and competitive multiplayer options.

Chucklefish was one of ten developers that earned a free Ouya dev kit in December 2012, though the game's site notes that Starbound only supports Windows, Mac and Linux at this time. Backers will receive a Steam key for the game when it launches sometime in 2013.

Vobent · 2013-04-14 15:30

Cannot wait for this game, I sunk so many hours into terraria, anything closely resembling it is more than welcome. Besides, this looks even better than terraria.

**Qalbert** · 2013-04-15 12:49

They hit first goal, so Novakids are in, new stretch goal: http://playstarbound.com/stretch-goal-2-fossils/

Fossils are the remains of long dead creatures scattered throughout Starbounds universe. They’re extremely valuable, very rare and very difficult to dig up. You’ll need special tools to clear the dirt and unearth a fossil. Removing the wrong piece of dirt could cause the fossil to crumble into dust. Successfully removed fossils can be placed as trophies, some have very special properties and perhaps some of these long dead creatures can even be revived.

If we manage to hit $750,000 in pre-orders, this feature will be added to the final game and will be playable by release.

**Qalbert** · 2013-04-19 09:11

They have passed the fossil stretch goal, no new goal announced, as of yet.

**Bartylby** · 2013-04-19 09:22

god damn they raised 750k in 6 days.

I've been watching this game for a long time now and as soon as i seen i could pre-order i jumped all over it. I have high hopes for this game and i hope it delivers where terraria failed to (and it didn't fail much at all lol)

**Corrderio** · 2013-04-19 13:56

1 million dollars will give us starter pets: http://playstarbound.com/stretch-goal-3-starter-pets/

**Waraji** · 2013-04-19 15:41

I'd preorder if I used paypal, but I don't so meh. Had they done it through steam, I would have been all over that.

**miokomioko** · 2013-04-19 16:19

And here I thought this game was beginning to fall off the map. This is promising.

**avelle** · 2013-04-19 23:35

Originally Posted by Waraji

I'd preorder if I used paypal, but I don't so meh. Had they done it through steam, I would have been all over that.

They had an option for Amazon Payments if you are into that sort of thing. That's the route I took personally.

**Qalbert** · 2013-04-29 14:14

just hit third stretch goal/broke 1mil

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