Stars Reach is an early access love letter to an earlier era of MMOs
Stars Reach promises the social dynamics of Star Wars Galaxies and other old school MMOs, but its early access state makes it a difficult sell.
It feels great to jump into a game and have things click immediately. Sometimes, you jump in and immediately find the fun. There’s something fascinating when a game refuses such easy categorization, and it takes a bit of a slog before the appeal becomes obvious. I was given a key for Stars Reach by developer Playable Worlds; it’s an old-school sci-fi MMO headed by Raph Koster, a designer on Ultima Online and Star Wars Galaxies. It’s an early access game that’s very, very early access, but it captures an element of MMOs that is sorely missing from many modern games.
MMOs are an inherently difficult genre, especially with the bulk of attention going to big budget mainstays like World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy 14. These games require massive, varied environments, professions and progression tracks, and ways to connect players and force them to work together. When this works right, it creates emergent gameplay unlike anything else in gaming — but that’s much easier said than done. If players are too guided towards specific kinds of content, it feels less like a living world and more like a highly curated theme park.
Stars Reach has likely released too early. The game’s reviews are currently Mixed on Steam, and it makes a poor first impression. The environments are blocky and the colors are saturated and a bit garish. Animations and character models aren’t quite complete. The UI is clunky and barebones. The game raised over $800,000 on Kickstarter, but money goes fast when you’re developing a MMO, and it feels like the game came out not because it was ready, but because Playable Worlds needed more money.
It’s a shame that the first impression is so spoiled, because there’s something really interesting here under the surface.