I am running Xubuntu at the moment, with latest stable release.

When I try to start a game and I get to choose a ship, I get nothing at all to choose from. Which is a bit less than the 10 ships that was promised. In fact, I can't even choose any other menu option than "play". And then use Escape key to return from that menu to the main title screen.

Any ideas what I might have missed? Or has the developer decided to strip the main game from all content and moved it into "DLC package"? I am a bit baffled as I am fairly new to Linux Gaming, but I want to give it a go.

You unlock more starter ships after meetings with other races.
Some special ships need chain of event to appear (like nontreated disease can result in "mutated race")

I don't remember starter menu, but try to click on racial emblems.

Seems the default resolution for my netbook running Linux crops most of the lower screen off, making most menu options unselectable.

Windows PC with a normal 16:9 screen shows everything fine and I can start a game.

So, the issue seemed to be resolution related after all. However I can't change resolution due to options menu being outside screen area.

Try to check game directory for cfg or ini file with options.

One of my favourite games wouldn't launch on laptops without 1024*800 at all :(

Well... I have 1024x600 screen on my netbook, seems even manually editing the config didn't do the trick. A pity really, this was a game that would be likely to run really well on this thing.

Hm, minimal resolution is 800x600, then 1024x768, it probably does not support 1024x600, 800x600 should work though, if you cant make it to keep aspect then just do windowed mode.