Is Evil Hat Republishing TSR's Star Frontiers?

Last year, Sasquatch Game Studio announced that it had acquired the trademark for TSR's old Alternity science-fiction game. At the time, it was mentioned that they did not have the Star*Drive, Dark*Matter, Gamma World, StarCraft Adventures, or Star Frontiers, properties owned by WotC. This may be changing, though - because Evil Hat Productions has applied for the trademark to Star Frontiers.

Last year, Sasquatch Game Studio announced that it had acquired the trademark for TSR's old Alternity science-fiction game. At the time, it was mentioned that they did not have the Star*Drive, Dark*Matter, Gamma World, StarCraft Adventures, or Star Frontiers, properties owned by WotC. This may be changing, though - because Evil Hat Productions has applied for the trademark to Star Frontiers.


StarFrontiers-AlphaDawnBlueBox1.jpg


Some caveats are worth noting - the trademark application was made in July 2017, and it's likely that nothing will happen on it for months. At this stage, it's just an application, so there's no guarantee that it will even be approved. Speculation is what speculation is, but this is very much a "wait-and-see" situation.

So, what's Star Frontiers? It's a space opera RPG produced by TSR back in the early 80s. Many elements of the game were later re-used in various forms in Spelljammer, d20 Future, and other TSR/WotC games and settings. It was a percentile system game, set in an area of space dominated by the United Planetary Federation composed of four races - Humans, the amoeboid Dralasite, the insectoid Vrusk, and the ape-like Yazirian.

Evil Hat, of course, is the publisher of the popular ENnie-winning Fate line of RPGs, which is a flexible system designed to accommodate a vast array of settings. Whether they plan to make a Fate version of Star Frontiers is far, far too early to start speculating on. I guess we may find out more next year, if the trademark application is approved.
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Morrus

Well, that was fun
Staff member
Exactly! If the news of them acquiring the trademark had resulted in a resounding 'Meh' I'm sure they'd be rethinking their plans...

There’s nothing worse than a deafening silence, as most small publishers are acutely aware! Buzz means people care, even if they guess wrong. :)
 


Jay Verkuilen

Grand Master of Artificial Flowers
Took one look at that cover and all my attempts to forget the 80's just went right down the tubes.
Love the hairdo! :cool:

Anyway, reprints, rehashes, remakes. It's all the rage these days. I'm not particularly enthused with Starfinder, but at least it's not a reprint. Creativity seems to be at an all-time low across markets, with us looking at what, the 3rd Spiderman reboot? The 4th Abramsverse Star Trek and the, lets say it together folks: SIXTH Transformers movie, not to be outdone of course by a Power Rangers movie!

Nostalgia cash in is highly risk-averse. I understand it, but I share your boredom and frustration.


Yes I have a low tolerance for rehashing old content. Sometimes it works. Most of the time it's a flash in the pan. I don't have any real objection to Star Frontiers in particular, and in fact I hope they do use their new system. I hope they do something radical and interesting like they did with the new Battlestar Galactica.

Don't reprint Star Frontiers. Make Star Frontiers 2: Destroyer of 80's Tropes.

So not Star Frontiers 2: Electric Boogaloo?
 

Jay Verkuilen

Grand Master of Artificial Flowers
It can only be a good thing if they completely ignore the old game mechanics - they're hopelessly out-dated.
I'm sure they are, though I can't remember them aside from them being percentile-based.

However, aside from nostalgia, what's interesting about Star Frontiers?
For a modern 'update' there's already Starfinder. Adding the Star Frontiers races (which are easily the most memorable bit) to Starfinder would be almost trivial.
Starfinder seems to be more of a space fantasy than Star Frontiers, which was more space opera without the fantasy aspect as I recall.
 
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aramis erak

Legend
I'm sure they are, though I can't remember them aside from them being percentile-based.
In a nutshell - under 2 dozen skills, each ranked 0 (unskilled) to 6, each with 1 to 10 subskills, each subskill having a separate formula or table for the percentile. Roll percentile or less to succeed. Cost per skill rank determined by PSA (Primary Skill area) and which Skill area the skill falls into.

Zebulon's Guide changes to a color-table like MSH and one edition of Gamma World used... and went to 0 to 8 for most skills, and split out the subskills into separate skills... but lacked conversions for the SFKH added skills.
 


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