Dark Shadow Software Ltd. has announced the release of Star Conquest. It’s a new turn-based strategy game exclusively for the Mac.
In Star Conquest, you guide your own species through its expansion into interstellar space. You start with a couple of populated planets and a small fleet of ships, and it’s up to you to explore and colonize other star systems, eventually confronting your opponents and trying to conquer them, too. You must allocate funding and resources to develop new technologies, you handle trading and banking, and you can choose from five different unique species to play.
Star Conquest supports single player, multi-player and network gameplay — up to ten users can go head-to-head, with another ten players controlled by the computer (for up to 20 players in all). Play By E-Mail (PBEM) is supported; The game supports Internet play through Scott Kevill’s popular Mac-only online gaming service GameRanger, as well.
Star Conquest supports maps of up to 1,000 star systems, each with up to 10 planets. There are 11 different starship types to build; 25 different kinds of planets to colonize and exploit; star bases, battle platforms and many other features.
System requirements call for a PowerPC-based Mac with QuickTime and DrawSprocket (part of Apple’s Game Sprockets) installed; Open Transport and Speech Manager are optional (for networking and speech options); 25MB of free RAM and 300MB available hard disk space. If you want to kick the tires before you buy it, a downloadable demo is available from MacGameFiles.com.
Dark Shadow Software said that the first batch of Star Conquest CD’s is expected to ship at the end of April. The company encourages users to pre-order the game now; they’re also sponsoring a contest to give away five copies of the game. More info on the giveaway, the game, and how to order is available from Dark Shadow Software Ltd.’s Web site.