Stellar Overload

**Stellar Overload** (formerly Planets³, pronounced «planetscube») is a 3D open-world voxel-based RPG in first person, from Cubical Drift studio. It was successfully funded through Kickstarter on April 3rd, 2014, and its campaign ended on April 5th, 2014, successfully raising $310,708.

The game is inspired by other games like Minecraft, Skyrim, Starbound or Zelda; movies like Star Wars; and even construction games like Lego.

## Key features

The key elements of the game are:

* The World & Story
* Player evolution
* Construction
* Multiplayer gameplay

## Milestones

Some important dates of Planets³ development:

* Mar-Apr 2014: Kickstarter campaign
* Mar 09, 2014: Planets³ Steam Greenlight concept
* Mar 27, 2014: Prototype is released to the press
* Apr 21, 2014 - Jun 22, 2014: Online store opens with Kickstarter equivalent rewards (except for add-ons and top tiers).
* Jun 02, 2014: Backers can start registering, validating tier selection and optionally selecting add-ons with the remaining pledge amount.
* Jun 30, 2014: Official forum is opened.
* Aug 06, 2014: Official website is reworked, and now includes a development progress chart.
* Sep 01, 2014: Technical prototype (v0.7.7) is released.
* Oct 29, 2014: Decision to switch game engine from Ogre to Unreal Engine 4.
* Jan 07, 2015: Pre-alpha version is released.
* May 27, 2015: First alpha version is released.
* Jul-Sep 2016: First building contest, used to select the spaceship for Steam game cover.
* Jul 12, 2016: Game wins $15 000 via Unreal Dev Grants.
* Oct 12, 2016: Game is released on Steam early access.

## Roadmap

The intial roadmap from Kickstarter campaign has shifted by a few months, in particular due to unforeseen replacement of Ogre game engine with Unreal Engine

### Race to Space

The first release, named Planets³: Race to Space, is to be finalized, with all features complete, for end of 2015 and will include all the goals up to 500 000$ (with the Planets³ editor).
It will take place in the first solar system, with the storyline suspended beyond that...

The estimated timeline (as of October 2014) is:

* **End 2014**: Race to Space pre-alpha
* **Begining 2015**: Race to Space alpha
* **Middle 2015**: Race to Space beta
* **End 2015'**: Race to Space release

### Space Enemies

The release of the 'full game', named Planets³: Space Enemies, will open onto the universe and lead to a climactic story ending. Some clues will be scattered in the first opus, though mostly in annex quests and dungeons.

The estimated timeline is:

* **2017**: Space Enemies release

## Cubical Drift

Current development team is composed of:

* **NeoM** (Michel Thomazeau) - CEO, Co Funder
* **Cording Marmot** (Fabien Perrot) - Dev Lead, Co Funder
* **Guyk** (Guillaume Grodwohl) - Dev, Co Funder
* **Mick** (Mickaël Parisot) - Dev
* **Altaus** (Olivier Fouques) - Web Lead
* **ReyMantha** (Alexandre Rey) - Lead Artist - [1]
* **Martino** (Martin Brunet) - 3D Generalist
* **Merakline** (Kelly Recco) - 3D Generalist [2]
* **Liwhem** (Wilfried Nass) - Sound Designer [3]
* **Lexi** - Administration

Former team members:

* **C34** (Alex Vial) - 2D Artist

## Trivia

* The ³ can be done on Windows using Alt + 0179 keys.

* Technically, if translated to English correctly, Planets³ should be pronounced «Planets *cubed.*»

* The Mac stretch goal on the Kickstarter campaign was successfully reached on April 5rd, 2014.

## External links

* Official website
* Steam store
* Steam DB
* Stellar Overload on PC gaming wiki
* Kickstarter campaign

## References

1. ↑ https://www.unrealengine.com/news/july-epic-games-awards-75k-in-unreal-dev-grants
2. ↑ https://www.planets-cube.com/news/details/27