Stars Reach News

Your weekly update on Stars Reach

• What are the players doing this week?
  
• Building the largest building in Stars Reach:
  [previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
  

• New folks experiencing Stars Reach:
  [previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
  

• Befriending Jackalopes:
  

• New Q&Raph video talks about changes for 24/7 operation and the in-game economy:
  [previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
  

• Coffee with the Moderators - Did you ever wonder what they look like? We had a livestream chat with coffee, tea, and minor leaks. If you think you might want to join our moderation team, you will want to watch this VOD.
  [previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
  

• Join the Moderation team: we are recruiting more moderators to join us as we ramp up to 24/7 operation. If you are interested, send us an email about yourself and your experience with moderation to [email protected].
  
• Controlled Chaos interviewed Sean Grady:
  [previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
  

• We grew our team by 1 animator and 2 artists! We still have design and engineering positions open: https://www.playableworlds.com/careers/
  
• Playable Worlds’ Eric Goldberg is teaming up with Mitch Lasky to present at GamesBeat Summit 2025 on Tuesday, May 20th: “How to Navigate the Games New Normal” https://gbs.venturebeat.com/schedule

• Backer Invites + Discord Backer Badge. Almost all of the backers have submitted their survey, but if you haven’t then search your email box. If you submitted your Backer Surveys before May 6th:
  
• New testers got an invite from FirstLook with a playtest schedule and instructions. (Check your spam folder if you don’t see it!)
  
• Existing testers will not get a new invite, your Discord role should now show a Backer badge. Not yet? Log into FirstLook.gg and synch.
  
• Can’t find it? Email [email protected]
  
• Kickstarter late pledges are still available but this may wind down soon: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/starsreach/stars-reach
  
• Check out our Web Store! At the Galactic Bodega, you are not just a meatbag. https://starsreach.com/store/
  

We started with just three: Alleine, Signus, and Vestaxe held up the sky for years. They were amazing through the unveiling of Stars Reach, two Discord migrations, and the launch of player testing. When interest in the tests started growing, we worked together to recruit X more moderators.

Fast forward to today, and we have Alleine, Lemonous, Leric Dax, Paxus Paine, Signus, Vecta, Vestaxe, and Will! This is great. The Discords are hopping and we are there. For Twitch streams, we have moderators and even game play feeds on hand. Sometimes the mods even jump in to help on stream in additional ways. We have playtests ~4 times per week, and the mods are a huge resource for these as well.

But the day is coming soon when we aren’t running 4 playtests per week – when the servers are up and running nearly 24/7. And we don’t have enough moderators to even pretend to cover our needs. In fact, we currently have gaps in our late Pacific/early Asian time zone coverage.

So we are opening recruitment for more moderators. If you are interested in joining the team, please send an email to [email protected] and introduce yourself. Tell us about your interest, your relevant experience if any, and anything else you think we’d find interesting.

The Stars Reach Team is preparing for a new working plan where stability, optimization, and new features will all be part of the next updates. But more hasn’t been discussed: the economic system, its effects on the game mechanics, and how everything will evolve around the 24/7 goal.

Join Raph Koster and Thomas Marcon in a new Q&Raph Episode!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

• [h3]What have the players done this week?[/h3]
  
  • “That’s the craziest thing I have ever seen in any video game!” and he captured it on video: [previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
    
  • Players are enjoying the “Physics Midterm” build and showing us how we can expect players to approach the game. This allows us to improve the path they are taking.
    

• [h3]Build update: Hotfixes[/h3]
  
  • Bug fixes: metal alloys and recipes calling for clay have been fixed
    
  • Prospecting became inaccurate and that was fixed
    
  • New recipe added: converting Clay Ore to Ceramics
    

• A Warm and homey blogpost by Matt Daly: New World Notes: Stars Reach: Why Raph Koster's Upcoming Sandbox MMO is Already a Wonder-Full Escape from the Internet's Gen AI Slop (Guest Post)
  
• Playable Worlds’ Eric Goldberg is teaming up with Mitch Lasky to present at GamesBeat Summit 2025 next week: “How to Navigate the Games New Normal” https://gbs.venturebeat.com/schedule/
  
• Developer interview with Sean Grady, Lead Simulation Engineer:
  [previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
  
• Did you miss the Fireside Chat on May 3rd?
  [previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
  

• [h3]Backer Invites + Discord Backer Badge.[/h3] Almost all of the backers have submitted their survey, but if you haven’t then search your email box. If you submitted your Backer Surveys before May 6th:
  
  • New testers got an invite from FirstLook with a playtest schedule and instructions. (Check your spam folder if you don’t see it!)
    
  • Existing testers will not get a new invite, your Discord role should now show a Backer badge. Not yet? Log into FirstLook.gg and synch.
    
  • Can’t find it? Email [email protected]
    

• [h3]Kickstarter late pledges[/h3] are still available but this may wind down soon: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/starsreach/stars-reach
  
• You asked and we listened. The newest addition to the Infinite Worlds, Inifinite Possibilities merch line, a t-shirt! Now you can represent IWIP in the soon to come summertime heat! https://starsreach.com/product/infinite-worlds-t-shirt
  

[h3]TUESDAY May 13th[/h3] PLAYTEST 5:00pm - 8:00pm PST


[h3]THURSDAY May 15th[/h3] STREAM 9:00am - 10:30am PST
PLAYTEST 10:00am - 1:00pm PST
PLAYTEST 5:00pm - 8:00pm PST


[h3]SATURDAY May 17th[/h3] PLAYTEST 10:00am - 3:00pm PST