Boldly Going Fourth

Today’s the day we mark the fourth anniversary of Star Pirates. And I think we can all agree it’s been one HECK of a ride.

So for the next 12 hours or so, we’ll have a happy birthday event in-game! +1 Energy and +1 Fuel for all, and some unfindable things will become findable.

As a group, we’ve passed the 60000 player milestone. As developers, we’ve avoided destroying the game and community through silly changes. Gameplay has continued to evolve as we adjusted the way fleets fight and change hands, reduced yard times and modernized salvage forays, changed fuel costs and fiddled with loaned items, and played with items from Plasma Cannons to Laser Beams. We’ve made it easier to search for other pirates, and easier for the especially Notorious to blow them up!

We’ve tweaked the look. Increased High Graphics functionality, added some fun little animations to the combat scenes, tweaked things for Mobile users into the bargain and made the Shoutbox easier to work with.

The community has stepped up again and again, with all kinds of fun contests, helpful feedback and the same great social dynamic we’ve come to love. We’ve given you the chance to tell your fellow players all about yourself in a new way with BIOs, and you have not disappointed. AND we’ve shocked and amazed you with the terrifying new Behemoth, which has clearly not disappointed YOU guys. We’ve seen some great IRL events and meetups from the Great Lakes to the Pacific Northwest to St Louis, and we’ve worked with some great webcomics to spread our brand of casual fun to the world.

We’ve seen the torch of moderation passed from worth to worthy, and we’ve said farewell to dear friends.

Greeters have continued to welcome new players. Having real humans bring new players into the game seems both a luxury and a necessity now. To further help new players, we offered them (and others) a few extra Notorious days for a nice, punchy start, and souped up the opening tour and walkthroughs. AND we teamed up with the delightfully non-spammy Ampario surveys to give you a chance to get even more into the bargain.

We introduced Jobs & Tasks, which we later rebranded as Commissions. You’ve told us how much those interest you, and since we’ve added a content writer who is working on expanding the StarCrash Universe story through these Commissions, you can look forward to more and better offerings in the weeks and months to come as you live your own Star Pirate adventure!

Oh yes, it’s been quite a ride, and it’s only going to get better. So raise a mug of Alpha Centauri’s finest to us, to yourselves, and to the finest MMO this side of Pluto & Charon, and we look forward to seeing you this time next year!

– The Star Pirates Crew