Stars Reach Promises Things MMORPGs Have Never Done, But How? New Video Pulls Back The Curtain

When Playable Worlds revealed their MMORPG project Stars Reach last week, the announcement had more than its fair share of gaming buzzwords in it. Far be it for me to question Raph Koster, mind you. Founding Playable Worlds after pioneering titles like Ultima and Star Wars Galaxies, the man has certainly more than earned his stripes in the industry.

Hell, a recent post on X from the team touts Stars Reach as accomplishing "things no other MMO has even considered." Bold words.

On my side, though, I've just seen WAY too many "promises" from MMO developers, well-known and not so well-known, that fall utterly flat upon launch. I literally looked at some of Playable Worlds' claims of individual planet environments, weather patterning, wildfires spreading, and a totally responsive universe and thought, "Ok, so you're using the cloud to offload some of this work, but HOW will it all work?"

Today, Koster and team released a new video aimed directly at answering the not-voiced question in my brain, "How?"

In the video, Koster pulls apart some of the tech behind Stars Reach and offers insight into how these systems totally change the way you play an MMO. The universe is not made up of voxels. Using "Cellular Automata", Stars Reach sets the stage with worlds that actually evolve without the aid of players. These aren't the typical set piece-type zones in other MMOs. Each planet has its own days, weeks, months, and years, and they aren't the same on every planet.

The worlds react to things going on in them, including things players do. Meteors hit the planet? That'll cause some holes. Players start terraforming a bit? That'll lead to water behaving like water and going everywhere. Once a world is generated and launched, the game basically starts running a simulation. Everything in Stars Reach is a solid, a liquid, or a gas. While things can't change states (yet), there are tricks to make it appear that they are doing so. Treating fire as a liquid, for instance, allows it to spread to surrounding wildlife. Players can melt sand with heat and turn it into glass.

Plants and the local wildlife have their own "goals." Trees grow on the planets, they aren't simply art placed in a spot by a developer. They throw seedlings to spread a forest. Monsters, if left alone, may expand their territory or even take back their entire planet.

As Koster says, this isn't "just about having cooler digging or chopping down trees," it "adds a fresh layer of interactivity to everything in the game."

This much freedom could certainly lead to some serious player grief-fests and the team at Playable Worlds knows that. Expect their next video to talk about planet governance and rule setting on this exact topic.

Get a look at the video below and let me know what you think. Will Stars Reach be able to achieve their aim on this one? If you're eager to see the title in action, you can wishlist it now on Steam.

UPDATE: Koster also decided to post a blog talking a bit more about the topics he reviewed in the video below.