INHERIT THE STARS

While deciding which of the five game titles we were looking at to produce next after Battle for Gallion's Reach, seems that one new idea has come out a winner...possibly. I say possibly because things change and this concept may turn out to be less of a "winner" once we really start to examine it as a game...not just a "good idea".

After looking at the board game market these days, there are lots of world war two games on the shelves which can mean two things: 1) It's a popular subject and therefore a good candidate for a title or 2) the market is glutted  OR 3) While there may be many titles, perhaps a unique "take: on the subject could help another one stand out from the pack. This is the realm of the market researcher. Not particularly the most exciting of activities but it has the virtue of being critically important to help ensure your product has a decent chance of succeeding.
We are fortunate that we are actually IN the target market for these games we produce so we know exactly what is liked, but I have always had a hunch that people should try and make things they would like to have themselves.
And I have learned to agree with my hunches!

So, after looking at the current market, there is still a wide open and burgeoning market for science fiction oriented titles.




After studying the most popular titles out there and looking at the various ideas that I have come up with I believe I have a "winner"....or at least a runner up for the prize.

The concept is called "Inherit the Stars". It's a BIG game but can be played in smaller bytes based on the scenarios played and the number of players one can corral up on any given "game night".

We've even dome some preliminary artwork, (posted soon!)

 From 2-10 players. 
On a map board of the entire galaxy which is broken into separate regions, players start with an early starflight-capable civilization with specific traits and colonize the stars. Along the way, they meet other civilizations that are similar or very different from them. Rather than concentrating on space combat (like Battle for Gallion's Reach) Inherit the Stars will feature other ways to win such as a having a dominant culture, creating a Galactic Council and voting which player is to be the Galactic President (6-10 player games only), defeating the Machines (a malevolent autonomous race of intelligent nano-machines), having peaceful relations the longest, and of course, controlling the most regions.

The idea is that, unlike Gallion's Reach, players are actually going to be running their own unique civilizations and trying to deal with the challenges of colonizing, exploring and forming relationships with alien species who are also doing the same things. Gallions' Reach concentrated on combat and conflict and very specific technologies and ship to ship combat, while Inherit the Stars generalizes technological and starship combat at a macro-level. the idea being that players are not destined to fight one another and in fact, peaceful cooperation can benefit some. While this might sound boring, there are enough challenges, such as natural disasters, plagues, revolts, hostile autonomous alien races and surprises due to exploration to keep everyone riveted and busy. Achieving a high victory point total wins the game and each species will gain points differently than others. For example, Humans will gain more points for creating Trade Hubs and Alliances. Some races will gain more points for conquering other races by war. Some will do better by concentrating on colonizing as many regions as they can - which means a utilizing a combination of diplomacy and war. Each race will have it's own unique and specific ways of achieving victory.

Each race will have a Xenophobic rating which determines how friendly it is with aliens, a Species Rating that will determine which alien species it can co-exist and cooperate with the best, character strengths such as propensity for research, war, peace or trade and which sorts of planets they prefer to colonize. In fact, this last propensity can allow different species to co-exist in the same region of space without conflict.

There are going to be scenarios taken from a game that I developed many years ago (but never published) in which 2-6 players can play over the course of a couple of hours or less. these scenarios cover the history of the galaxy as the various races spread out and came into contact with one another. Some can be played in a hour and others might take a couple of evenings of play.

But I want to keep the essential game rules simple and direct and not cluttered with too much to do.

I think this game idea has serious potential among the sci-fi gaming crowd after researching the titles now available.

We'll see.