Stars Reach Q&A – Raph Koster Dives Into Every Aspect of Its Sandbox MMO with a Fully Simulated Galaxy

Today, MMO fans finally have the pleasure of learning about Stars Reach, the next game envisioned by genre guru Raph Koster and his team at Playable Worlds, a studio founded in late 2019. Koster was the Lead Designer on the seminal Ultima Online, the Creative Director on Star Wars Galaxies, and the Chief Creative Officer on EverQuest II.

For Stars Reach, Koster has returned to his sandbox roots with the power of today's technology. The developers at Playable Worlds have crafted a first-of-its-kind server architecture running partly on the cloud, which allows players to fully modify the universe. In turn, the worlds (yes, plural) will react. Water flows, creating natural currents. Forests can catch fire. Flora changes as heat and humidity change. Creatures migrate as food sources are depleted. This is a single, global, persistent universe that won't reset during downtime. The actions players take affect the landscape, are visible to all, and are permanent.

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The game aims to allow players to build a home on the planet of their choice, an underground lava mining facility, an underwater dome farm, and an orbital starport, and these are just a few examples. You will be able to rule a planet as you see fit, and there will be even areas of space where PvP is enabled. Stars Reach also adopts a fully classless system, eschewing levels in favor of skill-based progression, which means you'll never be 'outleveled' when playing with a friend.

I was able to speak for nearly an hour with Raph Koster about virtually every aspect of Stars Reach that I could think of. The game's ambition is through the roof, as you'll see in the full transcript below.

Let's start with the basics. What engine are you using?

Unity.

Are you aiming to eventually release this game on other platforms?

We're focusing on the PC, but we have been doing work to prepare for other devices,