As we noted yesterday, when Stars Reach crossed the $500,000 crowdfunding threshhold on Kickstarter, players effectively unlocked the pre-launch (rather than post-launch) addition of a second new species. But we didn’t know much about it, only that it was called the Hyugon species.
Well, now we know much more, thanks to a newsletter and dev blog that dropped last night. Yes: It’s bug people. But it’s extremely cute bug people, just like the fish people we talked about earlier this week.
“The Hyugon species has been one of the trickiest for us. We knew we wanted to have one ‘alien’ species derived from classic Greens and Grays in some way, echoing the spirit of older sci-fi, but Greens and Grays don’t do much for character customization,” Playable Worlds says. “If we weren’t careful, we’d end up crashing into Andorians from Star Trek or Mantis from the MCU!”
Ultimately, the species invokes retro sci-fi but mixes in chibi stylization and features like antenna-esque head attachments and plant themes, though the devs are clear that the design isn’t finished.
“Candidly, we don’t think we are done with the Hyugons!” PW concludes. “It feels like there is still more to explore visually, and we want your feedback. I’ll tell you though, the exploration yielded one of my favorite bits of concept work we’ve ever done. We did it fairly early on, when we had not yet really explored all the variations, and the Hyugons still looked more human than anything else. Even so, it landed so much of the vibe that I still love it.”
The Stars Reach Kickstarter currently sits at $515K as I type this with 22 days to go.
