071 - Star Control [Prep Kit]
[GoatedQuest 071 Prep Kit]
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- Star Control -
Released in July of 1990 for DOS
Ported to Amiga, Sega Genesis, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, and Amstrad CPC
"The Ur-Quan Hierarchy - seven alien races welded to form the "evil empire" of the 27th century. Ruthlessly invading interstellar neighbors and slave-bonding the inhabitants. Now humanity is on their shopping list of species. You must join forces with the Alliance of Free Stars to defend the galaxy against the conquesting armies of the Ur-Quan. The captains of seven fantastic star-fleets await your orders for battle. Who (or what) controls man's destiny? The answer is in the stars..."
- Description from the back of the box
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US Box Contents
on one 3.5" or two 5.25" floppy disks, both in box
Interactive reconstruction of Star Control's copy protection code wheel
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Select Pre-Release Coverage
- Roll Call of New Computer Games (Computer Gaming World #74 pg. 76, Sept. 1990)
- Star Control is a one or two player game which features a combination of strategy/action. Unlike the two games discussed earlier, the strategic moves in Star Control are not real-time, but the arcade action in which players fight the battles is. The game involves resource management, strategy and arcade action with space ships which handle similar to Asteroids.
- Boot to the Future: Science-Fiction Software for Home Computers (Video Games & Computer Entertainment #20 pg. 136, Sept. 1990)
- A hypothetical tug-of-war between the Alliance of Free Stars and an alien civilization called the Ur-Quan Hierarchy is the core of Star Control (Accolade for IBM PC). A unique feature of the one- or two- player game, designed by Paul Reiche and Fred Ford, has both strategy and arcade action. The player can concentrate on either phase—with the computer handling the other—or perform both types of activity.
- Game Tips: Star Control Tactics (Computer Gaming World #76 pg. 27, Nov. 1990)
Game Tips: Star Control Tactics, Part II (Computer Gaming World #77 pg. 32, Dec. 1990) - Although it is unusual for CGW to print strategy articles before actually reviewing a computer game, we believe that Star Control is exciting and challenging enough that our readers will not want to wait for these insightful observations from the designer of the game.
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Developer Interviews
NOTE: Most dev interviews for Star Control cover both Star Control 1&2
Ars Technica is proud to present our extended interview with Star Control creators Paul Reiche and Fred Ford. Watch as they discuss the genesis of their groundbreaking fusion of strategy and one-on-one ship combat, taking a deep dive into many of the people and factors involved in creating the Star Control series.
Honoring the Code - Chapter 15
Paul Reiche and Fred Ford, the Toymakers of Gaming
At GDC 2015, Fred Ford and Paul Reiche III, the game design duo who cofounded the venerable Toys For Bob 25 years ago, talked to Rob Dubbin in a Classic Game Postmortem about the influential 1990 space adventure series Star Control and its much-loved sequels.
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Concept Art & Renders
Paul Reiche’s development sketchbook, this is a gold mine!
Here are a few choice pages, but check out the whole thing-
[NOTE: shares pages with Star Control II early concepts]
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Official Advertising
Computer Gaming World #80 pg. 14, March 1991
Star Control Magazine Ad, early 1991
(it seems like Accolade held off on major promotion until more ports were available in 1991)
(it seems like Accolade held off on major promotion until more ports were available in 1991)
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Merchandise
'unauthorized' 18-month Star Control calendar mail-in promotion
If anyone owns this, please let me know! I can't find the actual calendar anywhere
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Miscellaneous
- Famous fantasy artist Boris Vallejo did the Star Control Box Art for Genesis
- “This was the box‐cover for the Genesis version of Star Control I. As we were porting the PC version to the Genesis, Accolade came to us and said, “We got an artist to do the Genesis cover. What would you like him to do?” Not knowing (unless we were psychic) that it was Boris, we said, “Well, just have him make the claw cooler.” And Accolade said, “Uh, Okay.” It was only much later and to our dismay that we discovered the opportunity that had been lost.”
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You're ready now, enjoy Star Control!
Please let me know in the comments if any of the links are dead, I'll try my best to update
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