Vast, cold, and forbidding, the Stellar Deep extends far into the starry night. A destination for only those with a taste for adventure, this dark expanse of unknown frontier beckons to only the most resourceful explorers, hungriest prospectors, greediest merchants, most ruthless pirates, and bravest combat pilots.

Overview

Stellar Deep is a persistent on-line role-playing adventure game where players can explore, trade, and fight their way to fame and fortune. Players select a starting race, take possession of a modest spacecraft, then proceed on their way to fame and fortune.

As a character in the universe of Stellar Deep you may choose to advance in whatever fashion you desire. Trading, exploration, piracy, escort, smuggling, bounty hunting, and many other activities are equally viable. Best of all, you don't have to choose one path -- your character naturally becomes better at those activities you engage in more frequently.

Using your new found skills and wealth you slowly improve your space ship, increase your prestige, and eventually, even start your own political effort. By creating a network of space stations you acquire a steady income stream, may secure a region of space as your own, and can begin to look towards colonization and empire expansion.

FAQ

NOTE: The following information is subject to change at any time.

Q001: What is Stellar Deep?

Stellar Deep is a multiplayer on-line space exploration and adventure game. The player assume the role of a starship captain in search of adventure, fame, and fortune in a massive and persistent universe. Adventure may come in the form of piracy, privateering, bounty hunting, trading, mining, exploration, surveying, smuggling, colonization, or empire building.

Q002: What is my character like?

Each player controls a single character, the captain of a spaceship. Each character an array of ratings that determine his (or her or its) relative skill in that category: e.g. Piloting, Engineering, Science, Diplomacy, etc. Your character's race will determine you initial and maximum skill ratings, along with some unique racial skills.

In addition, each character possesses a single space ship which is continually enhanced and upgraded as wealth is acquired. The combination of your character's skill ratings and ship capabilities determines your overall level of power.

Q003: What does a character do in the game?

Stellar Deep is an open-ended game that lets a player choose many different paths to adventure. Instead of emphasizing or forcing certain play styles, Stellar Deep embraces multiple parallel play styles that are complementary. You can be a trader, pirate, privateer, smuggler, colonizer, miner, craftsman -- it's up to you. And best of all, you can pursue any of these activities at any time.

Q004: How big is the universe?

The universe is currently about 1000 light years on a side, with over one million star systems and eight million planets for the players to explore.

Q005: That sounds awfully big...how will I meet other players?

One of the goals of Stellar Deep is to allow much or as little social interaction as you desire. The universe is vast enough that players that wish to adventure alone may do so; however players that wish to adventure together may do so very easily.

Q006: Is there player-vs-player combat?

Player-vs-player (PvP) combat only takes between ships that have a Fair Warning Transponder installed. Installation and removal of a Fair Warning Transponder may only occur at certain space stations.

Q007: Is this an action game where I dogfight other players?

Stellar Deep is a role-playing adventure game. The areas emphasized by an action game, such as Internet connection, computer performance and player reflexes, are de-emphasized in favor of your decision making capabilities in conjunction with your character's power.

Q008: How is death handled?

Character do not die in Stellar Deep -- instead their ships are heavily damaged and must be repaired before they can adventure effectively again. When a ship is in "nearly unsalvageable" condition, it is not attacked by any other entities, affording you an opportunity to catch your breath and regroup. Repairs can be handled by the on-board repair unit, or a player can limp over to a nearby star port for faster or more thorough repairs.

Q009: Is there a central bank?

Because death does not destroy a character, it is safe and reasonable to allow all of a character's wealth to accompany that character, thus no central bank is necessary.

Q010: Can I visit a planet's surface?

Future versions of Stellar Deep intend to provide terrestrial exploration in real-time, however this is not a goal for the initial release.

Q011: Are there guilds or clans?

Yes. Players can create and join federations which allow sharing a private communications channel. In addition, players within the same federation will find that the actions of other members affect their own prestige and standing.

Q100: When is Stellar Deep going to ship?

Stellar Deep is going to ship at the end of 2002 in "episodic" form. Instead of trying to ship a massive game all at once, we're going to concentrate on making sure each piece we put out is robust, well balanced, and fun. As time progresses we will continue to release FREE updates to the game.

Q101: How much is Stellar Deep going to cost?

At this time pricing has not been set.  However it is our goal to make the game itself a free download and freely playable, but only a subscriber will be permitted to progress beyond a certain point.

Q102: What are Stellar Deep's system requirements?

Stellar Deep is targeted at average computer owners, not people with the latest and greatest hardware. We believe that fun game play is far more important than the latest graphics technology, especially when that technology locks out 90% of the people that want to play the game!

That said, Stellar Deep's tentative system requirements are:

<< Windows Version >>
OS: Windows 98/Me/NT4 (SP3+)/2000 (SP2)/XP
CPU: Pentium 2/450 or higher
RAM: 128MB
Video Card: DX7 compatible 3D hardware accelerated video card
Sound: DX7 compatible sound card
HDD: 100MB free hard drive space
Networking: 56K modem or better

<< Mac Version >>
OS: OS X.1
CPU: G3/400
RAM: 256MB
Video card: ATI Rage 128, ATI Radeon, NVidia GeForce 2 or NVidia GeForce 3
HDD: 100MB free hard drive space
Networking: 56K modem or better
 

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