Earth may not be our home for very long, and the fate of our world may fall into the hands of an A.I. Space is an unforgiving place, even for a benevolent A.I, and much can go wrong. Chucklefish is putting players into the place of an artificial overseer with its newest game, Starmancer where players have the power to affect humanity’s future through a large list of choices and consequences.
The news comes from Chucklefish and Ominux Games through Press Engine as part of E3 2021 and is accompanied by a press release and trailer. The 20-minute long trailer showcases the distinct detail and mechanics of the Starmancer, complete with ship construction, colonial management, and maintaining the various systems. of the station. The premise of Starmancer is to help regrow humanity. In a twist straight out of Altered Carbon and the Netflix movie, I Am Mother, players will regrow bodies and insert implants that contain the minds of humanity’s finest. This allows for a sheer number of choices and consequences to occur. During the trailer, the developers also demonstrate the sheer free will that players have as a benevolent AI, driving the colonists insane and encouraging everything from zombification to blowing colonists into the depths of space.
The trailer shown is only the tip of the potential for Starmancer with an entire kitchen sink of features and support pledged. In addition to the base game, the team at Chucklefish and Ominux games are pledging fully customizable features, such as modding support. Additionally, Ominux games have pledged an expansive solar system, filled with alien inhabitants, and hundreds of design options for their station. With these mechanics woven together, Starmancer is ambitious, pledging a mammoth universe where every cause has an effect and every choice has a consequence.
Starmancer is unique as it is a management game, but it goes all-in on its sci-fi direction. Personally, I’ve always been fascinated by the aspects of transhumanism, AI, cyborgs, cybernetic, and ascension to synthetic beings. In our lifetime, we may have that breakthrough of having synthetic bodies similar to Major Kusanagi from Ghost In the Shell. Where Starmancer is wildly ambitious and I look forward to seeing more.
Starmancer launches on Steam Early Access on August 5th, 2021.
