Just found this game here on gog, it sounds extremely interesting! If i understand it correctly, the game is still in alpha stage, but fully playable. What I'd like to know: does the game center around a deep storyline, or is the focus more on the sandbox aspect? If the focus is on the story, is there an up-to-date roadmap where i can find out more about when the campaign will be fully playable from start to finish?

Yes the game is interesting. Still in dev, but the developer has been good in continuing his work and sending out patches / hotfixes promptly. This is a one man show, so I expect life gets in the way sometimes. However, as the game stands I have had an amazing amount of enjoyable hours out of the full price, even better value when on sale.

Read some of the other posts here to see how it has develpoed and the devs interaction with questions.

As for storyline, that is planned and chapter 1 currently being worked on. There is some story to kick the game off, where you start on the ground (not flying a spaceship). This part is mainly on rails but serves as an adequate tutorial to ground based movement and combat. Once you have access to a spaceship there are a few quests to deepen the story, after which it is sandbox for now.

I forsee this as being a game where you can sandbox until you feel like furthering the campaign (when it is released).

The sandbox part sees you trading, space combat, ground combat, salvaging and crafting, mining, and gradually getting bigger and better equipment.

I would highly reccomend you take a look at Gamester's lets play series, where he explains pretty well all there is in good detail.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLz9VeMQzouzQK4O7RRZ-qudbGuhWT5tjo

Fortunately all his videos are titled so you can pick and choose. Bear in mind there have been updates to the game during and after his playlist.

I hope you get it and enjoy it as much as I have so far.

Thanks for your detailed answer! I'll definitely check out the Let's Play you recommended to learn more about the aspects of the game. I think I'll just buy the game and follow how it progresses :)

Main reason I bought this game was because it reminded me of the Fallout 1 & 2 games. Also, the old Buck Rogers games from SSI.

If it weren't for the old games paving the way, I don't think I'd have stuck around PC gaming for this long.

I own the game, but haven’t played it yet. I'm waiting until it's fully developed in the story and I think I will enjoy it when it finally comes time to play, if everything I'm reading is any indication.

It's games like this and the others I mentioned that keeps me coming back for more. :)
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Same here, i love this kind of games. And it's great to see that indies like this game are making such a great job. For example, buying Encased when it was released today or AtomRPG Trudograd soon was/will be a no-brainer.

I'll definitely buy Stellar Tactics, that's no question, everything about it sounds great. But because there seem to be no official news in the last 6 months, i decided I'll buy it when the next update arrives. Would be cool to learn more about the scope of the story then!

If this is the case (no armies of QA testers, graphic artists or music composers slaving away in the background) then what has been released so far is a pretty Herculanean achievement.

In it's current state, Stellar Tactics is more of a sandbox game - the story part just covers the tutorial. But what is there story-wise is interesting enough to suggest an epic game lies in wait. And I would suggest to anyone on the fence that purchasing now is more likely to bring it to completion than waiting.

I agree! But according to the website the last update was half a year ago, so I'd like to see some news first. I'm more than willing to support the projects i like :)