Between The Stars From Isolated Games – Prologue and Info #BetweenTheStars

The Game

Between the Stars is a space action video game with traces of RPG, management and roguelike elements. In it, we’ll live our adventure advancing in the universe and upgrading our ship, Captain and crew in order to be able to withstand the space war that is currently being fought.

• Random Adventures: Between the Stars seeks to be a different experience each time you play. For that, we’ve worked on a procedurally generated system which allows randomness in sectors, crew, events, rewards and many other things.
• Management and customisation: We want the game to adapt to your style of play. We’ve made sure that you have all the options you can to customise your ship and crew to circumvent all the dangers that you will find along your adventures.
• Take decisions: Between the Stars is an open story and as any good story, it has a great protagonist. That’s you! There’s nothing better than to see your decision affect the events and that everything is built around your successes and experience that you’ve lived on each playthrough!
• Real time 3d combat: The universe is full of dangers and captains that want your head. Face them head on in frantic real time combat using your best weapons and skills.

Gameplay

The game transpires throughout different sectors which we can advance through. Each one will pose its own challenges, events, enemies NPCs and space stations where we’ll be able to undertake all the tasks that we deem necessary. The star map system will allow us to jump quickly through sectors that we unlock as the game progresses. It will allow us to go to new sectors as well as go back to already explored ones. All the sectors function with a procedurally generated system, which will generate a new map based on existing probabilities.

Ship and Crew Management

One of the fundamental parts of the game is your ship’s customisation. During your adventure you’ll unlock numerous models with different skins that are customizable for each. Of course, the aesthetic is only a small part of the possibilities. You’ll be able to change the ship’s weapons and tailor them to any situation, allowing you to escape the most dangerous encounters unscathed.

Space Stations

Space stations are a meeting point for captains from all sides of the universe. In them you will be able to sell unused gear, buy weapons and blueprints, collect missions, hire crew and even stash your loot for future runs. These are all generated in a modular manner categorised by different factions so you can’t run into any two alike.

Photo Mode

One of the most satisfying things about flying through space is stopping to enjoy the scenery. With that in mind we have implemented an advance photography system which enables you to capture, adjust, modify and store your favourite moments of your games, both as a memento for yourself or as something to share with other ships’ captains.

Captains

Your avatar and direct representation of yourself in the game. Captains are selected from among a list of three randomly generated captains each match. A captain’s traits are special characteristics that will get better when they level up, while attributes are special characteristics that captains receive depending on how you handle different events. Your Captain will evolve as you play and adapt to your style of conflict resolution.

Crew Members

The ship’s crew are an important aspect of the game. At any moment you can hire new crew or fire previous members. Crew members are divided into three roles that are once again separated into three traits that offer benefits to your ship and higher chances of success in events related to those abilities.

Events

Between the Stars has numerous missions you can undertake, some offered by NPCs, others completely random and others caused by your own actions. Besides combat related missions, investigation or any other task your crew can undertake there are a series of events that charge you with different choices to make, many of them with a chance of failure or success depending on your captain’s capabilities and your crew members’ stats.

Crew Member Tasks

There are numerous tasks your crew members can undertake:

• Creation: Allows an engineer to create weapons and other weapons based on blueprints for their creation if you have enough of the needed materials and your engineers have enough skill.
• Disassembly: Engineers can destroy weapons in order to obtain materials and it also adds a probability that the object will give blueprints for future creations or upgrades.
• Medicine: Allows your scientists to heal your crew members when they are hurt or sick.
• Investigation: Allows your scientists to investigate unknown objects in order to obtain blueprints, information and other rewards.

Permadeath

Between the Stars is a ruthless world, and the event and crew system of your ship reflects that as much as possible. The fights and decisions you make reflect on your team, which could have serious negative side effects, or even the death of a crew member. The permadeath system supposes a basic premise. One life, one adventure. As such it’s the player’s decision if their Captain will be the one to finally end the war or be one of many casualties.

Combat

One of the clearest points of our development was to have a fast and frenetic combat system without leaving behind the management aspect of the ship:

• Shields: Every ship possesses shields in four sides; left, right, front and back. These shields will absorb received damage until they hit 0, at which point the damage goes directly to the hull, which will lower your general health. Avoid prolonged damage on the same side of your ship whilst focusing fire on your enemy’s weak points to better finish them off.
• Weapons and Skills: Weapons will provide special skills for the entire ship when equipped. These are upgradable, scrapable and crafteable. Manage your inventory well and use the correct weapon for every moment and you will be successful in your battles.
• Weak Points: The scan system on your ship allows you to estimate an enemy’s power, and to help you discover the more fragile areas which you should focus on.

Salvaged Rewards

Once you’ve destroyed an enemy ship you can salvage it in order to receive a random salvage pod. Make sure to recover them and open them to unlock valuable materials and powerful weapons that will help you make peace in the universe.

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