Introduction

Between a mix of procrastination and being out of the country, we bring you our last bit of E3 coverage. These last chunks of information cover Eidos, Sierra, and Bethesda. Sadly, this year's trip to the Eidos booth was far less candy filled. Arriving at the booth with the impression that twenty Lara Croft models was actually a prerequisite, I felt something was amiss. To my surprise, all they had were games to look at. For shame! Enough with the lack of underage people strutting about in vinyl; we know that people only come to E3 for the games.

When we ambled over to the Sierra booth, we were treated to games based on Half-Life. An odd trend this seems to be, even odder is the success of it. Hopefully this all ends with the conversion of Quake I into the Half Life engine. Oh the madness.

Startopia

I remember seeing Startopia at E3 last year. Sort of forgotten and on the side, my first impression was simply to turn around and walk away. Then I got a closer look at the game, my initial prejudices went the way of the dodo. I think quirky things really appeal to me, and Startopia fits the bill. This year, my first stop at the Eidos booth was none other than Startopia. I found it much in the same way this year, sort of tacked on and loony as ever.

My peon

Part of the menu screen

Imagine space; then imagine a donut in space. Much like donuts on earth, they end up having little crawly things all over them if left to their own business. In Startopia, these donut-like space stations are the playing field for corporations. The donut, or torus as the mathematically inclined like to call it, is cut up into tons of tiny pieces. If you cut the donut, like a pie, you start out with one slice; within that one slice are three different levels. The goal is basically to take control of all these pieces.

Decks

Each of these three levels has a particular purpose. The top most deck is like the nature preserve. The inhabitants go there for their fill of religion and all things tree-like. The second deck is akin to a pleasure deck. Everybody goes there for hotels, bars, discos, and other assorted hedonistic activities. Then there is the working deck, or the industrial deck. In which you get to build factories and produce swizzle sticks of some sort.

Empty nature deck

The donut

Numerous types of buildings can be created on each deck, different types of factories, hotels and religious centers. Depending on what you build, different types of inhabitants will come and stay. There are nine different races you can attract to your base. Each one is unique in how they act and what they do. Some are good as fighters, other are good at innovating.

Charge!

Since the point is to take over this great donut, there are different ways to conquer greater pieces of the pie. The most straightforward method would be to simply invade. Combat isn't a big part of Startopia. You have enough things to think about without having to make sure one of your peons isn't blowing up your own building. The computer AI handles most of the action. You just have to tell it that you are attacking and create a few waypoints for your units to stage at.

More donuts

Light is good

Or if you are more the pacifist, you can simply out do your competitors. Create your own versions of the Hedonism resorts to attract the feeble minded enemies. Improve working conditions to keep your workers loyal. Make the enemy want to become part of you. If you can steal their workers, they can't very well continue to be a threat to you. Eventually their pieces of the pie will wither and go derelict when they go out of business.

Arches are good

A little self promotion

Mushy stuff

The people on your space station all have feelings too. They feel neglected if you pass them for promotions or raises. They have interests such as zero G weight lifting to soothe their peon-like souls. Basically, they must be treated as individuals. Some of the ingrates even want promotions to keep them happy. The little guys have tons of stats by which you can monitor their status. In return for good treatment, your employees gain new skills to make better, and hopefully bigger, things.

Peon stats

Empty deck

Missions

The single player missions have various goals, instead of simply forcing you to conquer the donut all the time. Sometimes the goal is to make a hospital and get doctors. Other times you are made to rehabilitate a group of prisoners. The game seems to have a lot of leeway in terms of what you are supposed to do. This should make for some of the most interesting gameplay we have seen in quite some time. Expected release for Startopia is within the next few months. This is truly one game we can't wait to play.