Stars Reach

Refunding, its kinda garbage. BUT I look forward to trying it out again when/if it launches and goes free to play. There is going to be a launch reset, and there is no real point spending money on it, the bonuses are cosmetic, unless you buy the insanely priced one, then you get like a tool and that's it. "So why did you reccomend it?" I want other people to get scammed so they can make the game better, I do think there is potential.. But I mean this is like 2-3 years away from being decent, and Light No Fire will be out by then so yeahh

They devs have forgotten to include ground textures and also some heads for a few people.. You can see some screenshots on my profile.. not the only person with this issue.. Maybe ill come back and check it out again when they get around to adding the textures :)

The game design is next level. It's nostalgia crammed into the modern day of gaming. It has the makings of something that is reminiscent of Ultima Online and SWG combined with a little No Man's Sky sprinkled on top. Is it a complete game? No, not at all. But it's obviously the beginning of something with great potential. I see this being the next long term game I play. Really looking forward to release.

Game should be renamed to Scammers Reach.

needs more time too much rubberbanding

Not nearly as bad as some people are making it sound. The lag in first days was pretty bad, but they did a lot of work on that. The tech in world simulation is very detailed. If you like exploring & crafting then this game is worth it. There is a ways to go before all systems are in, but plenty to do.

I am going to be honest about this game. First, the background, it is a relatively small team, not a AAA studio. The team has been working on this game for roughly 8 years and spent 40 million dollars or so. Raph Koster is the Lead Dev and Studio Head I think and has an illustrious background with gaming going back to Star Wars Galaxies, and exceptional game for the type of game design it was. This is an attempt to take that concept further, more ambitious and without an IP to adhere to. According to the studio, their funding has run out which is why this was moved to Early Access at this time. The game is stated to be Free to Play on launch. This review is of the current game, not the potential of the game. If you squint and tilt your head just right, you can find potential in any game. The track record of games being forced to Early Access early for need of money is extremely grim. Most don't ever become a game. Not saying that will be the case here, but it is a distinct possibility. Keep that in mind. The game costs $30 US to buy for the Early Access testing. Many will say this gives you great ability to shape the game and have the ear of the developer. That really isn't the case when now theoretically thousands of players are in the testing. Your voice becomes diluted and lost in the noise most of the time. It isn't like a closed Alpha where you may even speak with devs in Discord on a regular basis. As I review the game, please keep in mind this is already 8 years of work. The launch did not go well. Server performance was, and still is, far from smooth. This is supposed to be the spiritual successor to SWG but, to me, and I played SWG a lot, it bears no resemblance to SWG at all, except maybe the graphics. The character creation is not nearly the same. The interface and backstory going through the tutorial not similar at all. Resource distribution and acquisition, tracking, locating and extracting bear no resemblance. No mining machines and such. The resource is just the resource, not the deep, diverse styles of aluminum and iron with differing qualities used to create tools and weapons of varying quality and driving an economy with player run and very custom decorated shops that folks would travel planets to visit if you were the skilled weaponsmith or armorsmith. None of that is in this game. No vehicles. Your community hubs are a floating building with static NPCs and you deal really interact with kiosk posts to do everything from banking to training your skills to the auction house and mission terminal. Then you have to slowly drift through space to a portal that isn't labeled on the map and is labeled so it blends into the glowing gateway and is unreadable until you are right on top of it, then you can see if that is the gate you wanted or not. Again, the travel system is instant porting and doesn't bear any likeness to the starship ports and such of SWG. There are dancers, which instead of being a buff deal, are used for healing. The class structure is not here. The crafting system is detailed but not put together all that well and the housing concept for the game is not similar to SWG either and, in my opinion, not nearly as good. The movement is, as many have said, janky. The graphics very old school and not in the good way. The terrain looks very odd and unbalanced. Even on day 2, the areas are starting to look much like swiss cheese. Large portions of the playable area has little to nothing in it, the plants/trees are very dense usually where they are and the mobs are lackluster, move poorly and kind of rubber band around a bit. You aim at them, putting your cursor on their head, and you will likely hid the ground between the two of you often and even when you do hit them, it isn't registering always as the server latency seems to allow for a lot of desync and you are shooting at an image the server things is at a slightly different location. The only source of coin I have found so far are the mission quests which offer roughly 80 to 400 coin based on difficulty of the quest. There are a limited number per 'world' which is a mighty big name for a pretty small area. When you need 20k coin to buy your homestead to place your plot of land and training your skills costs as much in coin as in experience and you have to pay for buying/selling on the AH, which makes sense, just means getting to that 20k is a long, hard road to travel. Essentially, does the game have the promise of potential? That depends on your view. I would like to think so but a studio putting out what isn't even a successful vertical slice, isn't showing what little they do have in game working well, doing so after 8 years and being out of money, just doesn't install a sense of security in me. I love the concept and have no problem giving the $30 to give it a shot, I've spent far more on less likely to launch titles, looking at you AoC. I didn't even cover the graphical issues with characters spawning in 'inside out' and looking like a bundle of sticks. If you love SWG, which you should if you played it, and you want to give the team the opportunity to try to achieve their dream, then it is worth it for you. If you are wanting to play a cool game and enjoy yourself with your friends, this isn't it. There is no grouping or real group play at this time. A road map is nice, but not a guarantee. I'm going to play because I have no other game to dive into and I love spreadsheeting new games economies and such, but, this really isn't in a playable state and I do think being forced to put this into Early Access in this manner is going to hurt the future of the game. If you decide to play, perhaps I'll see you in game. If you choose to wait, that is more than understandably. It is going to be Free to Play after all when/if it launches. And for those of you that are going to say it is Early Access there are bound to be problems, I agree, but, a review of a game is a review of a game, not a dream or a maybe or a wish. I will GLADLY update this review as things change and I surely hope they do for the better. I hope this helps a few of you determine if this is the right fit for you.