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Starshard is a science fantasy tactical role-playing game with elements of procedural generation and stylised art inspired by JRPGs such as Final Fantasy Tactics and Disgaea. In addition to playing through an expansive storyline, players can battle their way through limitless procedurally generated fields, amassing resources, units, and a variety of hidden characters. On top of this, they can challenge other players to extended one-on-one battles taking advantage of the turn-based nature of the game.

When the people of Ceres took to the skies over a thousand years ago, they did not do it alone. It was the gift of shards, granted by a previously unknown race, that bestowed upon them the freedom to roam the universe.

With limitless galaxies now within reach, their understanding of magic and science grew at an exponential rate. Trade was established with alien races - shards providing a universal currency with which to do business. The might of their warring factions, perpetually locked in a cold war fostered by unending tensions, provided an advantage - they could stand on equal footing with those races that boasted superior technology.

Today, the six major races live in relative peace, marred only by the frequent skirmishes amidst the border planets.

On Echelia individuals of all races can coexist in harmony. But this does not extend beyond its skies. War looms on the horizon as two races clash over conflicting ideals. The Nephilim will not yield while unbelievers denounce their divinity.

Far off in the frontiers, the Trailblazer Alliance of Independent Colonies seeks the remnants of long dead civilisations. Within the sealed halls of the ancients lie the keys to retaining their independence.

It is here that Karin's tale begins...

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Update Compilation

News

This time around we have a pretty packed update with lots of different news. We have worked a bit on everything so this will just be a short compilation of those changes. Hope you like it!

Redesigning Classes

We have some big news about changes in the class system of Starshard. Instead of using generic units to form armies we are changing the entire system to be character based. This means that now most units will be unique. We decided to do this to be able to give them more interesting skill sets and designs. To still classify all characters we will keep the six classes described in the beginning. Instead of unlocking the next rank of a unit type class reputation will be earned by using a character of a certain class. Characters can then be unlocked once you earn enough reputation to fulfil their requirements. Be warned though as not all characters might be as easy to persuade. Here you see a mockup for unlocking a class by increasing your reputation with the enforcer factions. This is just some temporary UI though and will likely change later in development.

ClassUnlockMockup


Eldran History: A brief guide

One of the 6 main races in Starshard are the Eldra. So far you have been introduced to one member of their race in form of the Eldran evoker unit. However the entire race is far more diverse than that. So here is a very brief guide to the Eldran race.

To understand the Eldra you have to know their society is built upon bloodlines. Although there are many minor and less respected bloodlines there are only three major ones. Out of those only the first one is shown in the game so far. All Eldran bloodlines are similar in appearance with exception of the Eldr’ath (the second bloodline), which is the most visually different. To show the differences here are some very rough sketches:

EldraComparison
A female Eldra of the first bloodline on the left; A female Eldra of the Eldr'ath bloodline on the right

These just show off some basic differences though. More details will be shown in a later post. We’ll also get to hear some more about the other bloodlines at a later time. So if you’re an Eldra fan look forward to that.

Market Assets

There are a few new objects and tiles available that go along the theme of civilization to make more towny scenes possible. Among those we have some market stalls, signs and some crates. Here are some pictures:

scrCratescrBarrelscrRoad

In addition we added a first non-violent NPC. He might be encounter-able in peaceful procedural fields. The exact function of NPCs has yet to be determined but we were thinking of adding procedural cities that need protection from bandit attacks or similar things. More on that later when we actually put it in the game. Anyways here is his sprite:

MerchantSprite


Battle Emotes

To make the characters come alive more we added emotes for certain characters. In addition to letting your favourite characters show some emotion in battle you might also see special stuff happen when you activate emotes under just the right conditions. Here are two examples, an annoyed and a excited sprite for the footpad and the evoker:

EmoteSprites


Looking for a party?

By the way, if you’re an artist, animator, or illustrator interested in contributing to Starshard, we would love to have you on our team! Feel free to give us a shout if this seems like fun! Cookies for everyone!

Halloween is upon us!

Halloween is upon us!

News

Happy Halloween! This week we’re here to show you a small fragment of one of our many thematic biomes and environments (I’m sure you’ve long grown...

Primitive Civilization

Primitive Civilization

News

This week we made some progress towards getting all basic map features in the game. There are also a few new objects themed around primitive civilization...

Bestiary Entry 14: Skitter

Bestiary Entry 14: Skitter

News

Over the countless millennia since the dawn of time, many have sought mastery over the living beasts which inhabit all corners of the known universe...

Monster and Environments

Monster and Environments

News

This week I have some more designs as well as a new concept to show. Get ready for concept and pixel art.

Post comment Comments
~Leafshade~
~Leafshade~

Do you have any intentions of having a class tree of a similar size (or greater than) the final fantasy tactics games?

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Joe-Griffith Creator
Joe-Griffith

Our current design features three tiers of classes (two of which are evolved tiers, the third being the seven in our post on classes) and branches out depending on a unit's race and starting class. Right now we have plans for roughly fifty different classes based on this concept, which would put the class tree at a greater size than that of Final Fantasy Tactics but potentially slightly less than Tactics A2.

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Beetle_J
Beetle_J

this seems interesting

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Joe-Griffith Creator
Joe-Griffith

Thanks! We're happy to hear that and hope we can keep you interested!

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