KickStarter Free Stars: Children of Infinity - upcoming Star Control 2 sequel from original creator Fred Ford

[MRY]

Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pistolshrimp/free-stars-children-of-infinity​

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/pistolshrimp​

https://freestarsgame.com

Spoiler

https://dogarandkazon.squarespace.com/

LAUNCH FIGHTERS!
It was almost exactly 25 years ago that we released Star Control II® -- The Ur-Quan Masters for DOS PCs. We poured our hearts into the game, blending our love for classic science fiction, Spacewar!-style action gameplay and our own quirky sense of humor. We had tons of help from many talented friends and collaborators, but even so getting the game across the finish line was a herculean effort -- both the exciting, hydra-fighting kind, as well as the exhausting stable-cleaning kind. Pretty much ever since then, fans have been politely asking us to create a sequel, sometimes begging for a sequel, even threatening us if we don’t make a sequel. Our answer was always, “We really want to do this, we just need to wait until the time is right” -- kind of like Cthulhu awakening, but less end-of-the-worldy. Well, the stars have finally aligned -- we are now working on a direct sequel to Star Control II® -- The Ur-Quan Masters, called Ghosts of the Precursors™.

This is a passion project for us and we have committed to dedicating some of our own time to creating a true sequel. We are early, early in development, but rest assured, the game will include genuine Ur-Quan,Precursors, Super-Melee, Umgah, VUX, Supox, THE ULTRON!, Druuge, Arilou Lalee'lay, Orz, Androsynth, Rainbow Worlds, Ilwrath, Syreen, Mmrnmhrm, Yehat, Shofixti, Spathi (including the ever-terrified Fwiffo),Umgah, Melmorme, Chmmr, Earthlings, Mycon, THE MARK II!, Slylandro, Utwig, Thraddash, Zoq-Fot-Pik,VUX Beast, Pkunk, the Keel-Verezy, and of course all new alien races to discover, befriend ...and/or be annigilate... I mean annihigate.. Damn! Well, you get the idea.

O.O

Like a valiant but bumbling soldier whose corpse becomes the stepladder for a hero, The Long Journey Home has done the work the gods set for it.

 

[LESS T_T]

From Stardock's Brad Wardell: https://forums.stardock.net/485378/

Ghosts of the Precursors

Four years ago Stardock acquired Atari's rights to Star Control. I soon got to meet my hero, Paul Reiche. He was, more than anyone else, the person who inspired me to become a game developer over 20 years ago.

Over the past 4 years, we have communicated regarding the progress of Star Control: Origins. He asked us not to try to make a sequel to Star Control 2 and said that he hoped one day to be able to return to the universe he and Fred Ford created.

Recently, Paul told me the good news: Activision was going to let him do a true sequel to Star Control II: The Ur-Quan Masters (i.e. Star Control III is not canon for that universe).

Today, they posted the news publicly: https://dogarandkazon.squarespace.com/

It's still very early but they will have all the characters from Star Control 2 plus new ones. It's going to be called Ghosts of the Precursors.

For 4 years, people asked me why we weren't going to touch the Star Control 2 story. Now you know.

As soon as they have an official site for it, we'll let you know.

Yea, we're pretty excited.

It doesn't affect Origins either way. What it does do, however, is help people better understand why we had agreed not to use the aliens. While Stardock does have a license to the setting, characters, etc. Paul had asked us not to use them to leave the door open for them to one day return. That was 4 years ago.

Now, those efforts have paid off.

 

[I'm Big Into Anal]

stardock huh

probably going to be burned at the stake here but i absolutely love sins of a solar empire so cautiously optimistic

 

[MRY]

No, Stardock has their own game (old news) that's nearly done. This is separate.

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Unkillable Cat]

...



...



...



LET THE FRUNGY CHAMPIONSHIPS BEGIN!!!

 

[Pope Amole II]

That's pretty cool. Weird business decision, though - why then develop origins at all? Oldschool fans wouldn't give a damn about it after these news and casual audience... Well, they can and will play to grab it, but I'm not sure if owning the IP will actually help that. Besides, I'm not even sure how big that casual space audience is - that Jorney Homo thing wasn't exactly a success.

 

[Darth Roxor]

i should repair my horde lp in tribute to this

 

[Roscoe Scaggs]

Finally gonna get that Mark II!

 

[Falksi]

Just spunked.

 

[MRY]

My understanding from the UQM remake was that Paul and Fred retained the content of the IP, while Activision simply had the trademark and (perhaps) a license to use the content. Note that the sequel described here is "Ghosts of the Precursors" and not, for example, "Star Control: Ghosts of the Precursors." Wardell seems like a true fan, but my guess is that he was also looking to get away from the core races because replicating their unique "voices" (writing, not VO) isn't easy. It may also be that he couldn't buy the rights to the races (i.e., if Activision's license was non-transferable) and his conversation with Paul Reiche was more on the order of, "So, I bought the trademark, and I'd love to develop a true sequel. Can I license the races from you guys?" "Actually, we're thinking of doing a true sequel ourselves, but how about instead you..."

That said, I am 100% sure that he and the PF & FR must've coordinated the timing of this announcement. The Stardock game's release is imminent, and my guess is that they're hoping to do something like, "While you wait for the distant true sequel, try out this awesome fan fiction!"

 

[Zarniwoop]

My understanding from the UQM remake was that Paul and Fred retained the content of the IP, while Activision simply had the trademark and (perhaps) a license to use the content. Note that the sequel described here is "Ghosts of the Precursors" and not, for example, "Star Control: Ghosts of the Precursors." Wardell seems like a true fan, but my guess is that he was also looking to get away from the core races because replicating their unique "voices" (writing, not VO) isn't easy. It may also be that he couldn't buy the rights to the races (i.e., if Activision's license was non-transferable) and his conversation with Paul Reiche was more on the order of, "So, I bought the trademark, and I'd love to develop a true sequel. Can I license the races from you guys?" "Actually, we're thinking of doing a true sequel ourselves, but how about instead you..."

That said, I am 100% sure that he and the PF & FR must've coordinated the timing of this announcement. The Stardock game's release is imminent, and my guess is that they're hoping to do something like, "While you wait for the distant true sequel, try out this awesome fan fiction!"

The last (and, let's be honest here, only) "awesome" thing Stardock ever made was that utility that put back the Start Menu into Windows 8. When 8.1 came out they were back to a mediocre website for Windows skins.

 

[ED-209]

Wait... new Star Control?

Not today, old friend. Not today!​

 

[karoliner]

 

[Dakka]

It's about damn time. Do you think there will be a Slylandro probe 2.0 or more sex scenes with the blue-skinned space babes though?

 

[Anthony Davis]

What happened to these guys anyway? Where have they been all this time

Skylanders

 

[Infinitron]

What happened to these guys anyway? Where have they been all this time

Skylanders

Literally making Toys For Bob.

 

[HansDampf]

It's about damn time. Do you think there will be a Slylandro probe 2.0 or more sex scenes with the blue-skinned space babes though?

Space babes are problematic.

 

[Zarniwoop]

What happened to these guys anyway? Where have they been all this time

Playing Frungy of course.

 

[Dakka]

It's about damn time. Do you think there will be a Slylandro probe 2.0 or more sex scenes with the blue-skinned space babes though?

Space babes are problematic.

Hopefully, the game won't be influenced too much by the current political climate then.

 

[Zarniwoop]

It's about damn time. Do you think there will be a Slylandro probe 2.0 or more sex scenes with the blue-skinned space babes though?

Space babes are problematic.

Hopefully, the game won't be influenced too much by the current political climate then.

Oh heeeeeeeel no.

No fucking mixed race transwombyn captain traipsing through the galaxy seeking social justice from the white devil please. I will cut you, devs.

 

[Black]

I'm afraid.

 

[MRY]

Why would you expect that Paul and Fred's views would have moved in a different direction from the rest of the industry? The Codex spends a lot of energy going into crisis mode so often on this topic. You should probably steel yourselves.

From a 2006 post quoting an email from Paul Reiche from "a few years ago":

Hi Maria,

Good question! My initial intention was that, yes, they were gay, or more properly, strictly monosexual. About the time Fred and I were working on Star Control II, I had my first friendships with openly gay folks. It always has felt good to me to discard a prejudice and I hoped to share that opportunity in teeny-weeny little way with the people who played my games. BUT, when I shared this notion with our publisher, some folks took this to mean that they should use stereotypes for humor, as for instance the "fashion designers of space" crap that ended-up in the manual. I feel like I should have been more courageous getting that comment edited out and if it offended anyone, I feel really bad about that.

Hopefully as the future unfolds, we will find our species more accepting of others and more appreciative of individual expression... either that or we should all get jetpacks. I'm cool either way.

Sincerely,

- Paul Reiche

Ps. By the way, now I am not so sure that all the Androsynth are male. I imagine they might descend from a few clonal lines, so I expect there would be both male and female and perhaps some neutrals.

Also in 2006, he gave an interview with the Escapist on the topic, but it's recounted in a pretty cursory way:

The always jovial head of TFB, Paul Reiche III, kindly took time out from his Christmas holidays to talk. "We intended for the alien races to exemplify human personal and cultural foibles in a focused and exaggerated manner," humbly understating that he did what we think all good science fiction should do. He also revealed a human side to the ominous Ur-Quan: "My own take on [them] came from my relationships with people who had experienced significant childhood abuse and how those traumas produced distinctly odd behaviors in adults. [Their] doctrines were the overtly crazy but internally reasonable responses to their treatment by the Dynarri, and the pain they had to endure to win their freedom from slavery." Further running themes examined cultural intolerances (racial, religious, gay etc.), as seen in the Androsynth's oppression by "normal" humans.

I wonder if he was ever asked about Tanaka and Katana?

 

[Zarniwoop]

Why would you expect that Paul and Fred's views would have moved in a different direction from the rest of the industry? The Codex spends a lot of energy going into crisis mode so often on this topic. You should probably steel yourselves.

Their views are not the point.

I give exactly zero fucks what a developer's views are, unless they shoehorn them into game/movie franchises that should have absolutely nothing to do with politics in the first place.

 

[MRY]

I give exactly zero fucks what a developer's views are, unless they shoehorn them into game/movie franchises that should have absolutely nothing to do with politics in the first place.

Just to be clear, your view is that (1) space opera (i.e., the genre of Starship Troopers, Star Trek, Foundation, Dune, Firefly, Ender's Game, Babylon 5, etc.*) "should have nothing to do with politics" and (2) Star Control II did not have politics in it (in direct contradiction to Reiche's own description)? It seems like both halves of this are blatantly wrong.

It is likely the case that (a) space opera creators' politics have generally drifted leftward; (b) some consumers' have drifted rightward; (c) having been told that they should stop consuming and start dying by various Twitter radicals, consumers on the right are highly sensitized to, and inclined to fight more over, politics in mass media. But given that another Star Control game from these two heroes is an unexpected grace, it seems like the proper approach is to try to control any allergic political reaction and enjoy the game, in the same way that it makes sense not to get up in arms over the global warming themes of the Julian Gollop's new game even if you'd rather not listen to environmentalism.

(* Note that I'm not even bothering to list the dozens of overtly political major space opera writers like Pohl, Delaney, Ringo, Reynolds, Brin, Pournelle, etc., or the even more political space opera writers of the past twenty years.)