Like much of HERO System Sixth Edition, the new Star HERO is a straight conversion of a HERO Fifth Edition sourcebook to 6E rules.  So, if you already got the 5E version of the book, this is basically the same text with the much better layout we've come to expect from the 6E line, with the necessary changes to update to the new edition.  However, this was one of the 5th Edition books I never got around to reviewing on RPG.net.  So for everybody else...

STAR HERO is Hero Games' sourcebook for gaming in the science fiction genre.  Like GURPS Space it goes into fairly extravagant detail on the science part of the science fiction: Astronomy, what it takes to reach escape velocity, the actual physics of using a laser as a weapon, and so on.  As compared to GURPS, Star HERO tries to stake a middle ground between the realism of "hard SF" and the more romantic approach that this book calls "rubber science."  For instance, cloning with severe limitations is feasible in a hard SF story.  Fast-growing a trained clone army within 10 years is much more "rubber science."  And a race of shapeshifters who could change from humanoids to mice to wall paintings are really more magic than science, but are an example of what gets covered in some SF settings.
Again, the new book is in a bright, easily-read layout with blue highlights, and the cover of the new book has the STAR HERO logo trying very, very hard to look like the slanted title logo of the original STAR TREK.

The Introduction says that with gamer interest in Science Fiction, "it's only appropriate that the HERO System, a set of rules unmatched in its flexibility and adaptability to multiple genres, have a book devoted to the infinite opportunities for adventure the Science Fiction genre affords."  Like Fantasy HERO and Champions, it's a genre book; you could use the core books as is to make a science fiction game, (and you actually need THOSE books, not this one, to get the basic rules) but Star HERO is designed to give the specifics on how to make the system simulate the genre effectively.  In this regard, the book elaborates on its middle-ground approach to scientific accuracy: "You need a certain amount of verisimilitude, even if it's just to create realistic-sounding technobabble, to preserve the feel of the genre. If the GM starts talking about purple stars, or gives the wrong size for the Milky Way Galaxy, the obvious scientific errors may taint players' enjoyment of the game."  But at the same time, real scientific accuracy on (say) the physics of acceleration in space would be too much work.  So the book goes for what the authors call the "more realistic, but not totally realistic" system.

Chapter One- Starships, Spacemen and Bug-Eyed Aliens: The Science Fiction Genre starts by defining what Science Fiction IS, given that it encompasses so much that such definition is necessary.  Common elements include The Future (either centuries off or '20 Minutes Into The Future'), Science and High Technology (duh), and Space and Other Worlds (frequently but not always).  Secondary elements include Aliens, Big Dumb Objects (the Ringworld is considered an example of such), Blasters, Computers, Galactic Empires, and more.

There are also particular subgenres of science fiction, such as Cyberpunk ('for a more detailed look at the Cyberpunk genre, please see Cyber Hero'), Earthbound Science Fiction (like Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, or 'alien' scenarios where the aliens invade Earth and the action never leaves the planet), Hard Science Fiction, Low Science Fiction (which may actually not be any more realistic than Hard SF, just deliberately more limited for story purposes – the corporate colonies of Firefly and the Aliens movies are counted as examples), Military Science Fiction (which could be Low SF or Space Opera depending on the setting), Planetary Romance (such as Barsoom; distinguished from Pulp or Space Opera by a certain exoticism and focus on one planet), Post-Apocalyptic (life stinks, and usually so do the characters), Retro-Science Fiction (referring not only to modern Pulp but Steampunk), Space Opera, Time Travel, and Utopia/Dystopia (which for various reasons are not considered good choices for permanent campaign settings).  

Like other Hero genre books, Star HERO also deals with how its genre is used for certain "meta-genres" like Comedy and Romance.  Then you can also mix genres; Champions characters often have a sci-fi origin, and while Fantasy magic might be problematic (since technology might be powerful enough to make magic less distinctive), it's always possible to mix the two completely (like the Dragonstar setting did).  And while Westerns might seem to be the antithesis of Science Fiction, consider how Star Trek was pitched as "Wagon Train to the stars."  Or Firefly.  Or The Wild, Wild West.


Chapter Two – Citizens of the Galaxy: Character Creation gives both species templates (including Android/Robot, which is not a species...) and professional templates (like Doctor, Bounty Hunter, Explorer, etc.).  The former include Culture Templates (Klingons, for instance might take the Warrior Culture template even if they don't also take the Soldier professional template) as well as Environment Templates for certain settings, like Niven's books, where Humans are the main species but have engineered themselves to adapt to different gravities, underwater, etc.

After the templates, Star HERO addresses character creation elements common to the HERO System with regard for how they work in SF games.  Non-standard gravity, for instance, affects both the Strength score and anything involving physical motion (like the Acrobatics Skill).  Different science fiction settings have different Everyman Skills (Computer Programming is an Everyman skill for most subgenres, but not in Post-Apocalyptic).  Campaigns may or may not use the expanded subcategories of skills like Computer Programming and Systems Operation, depending on the setting- this is most likely in realistic or Cyberpunk games, but not in "pulpish" games where characters are assumed to be good all-around with a skill.  
In addition to reviewing existing Perks and Talents, this book comes up with a few like FTL Pilot (this being necessary only if the setting's technology requires a special ability to navigate at faster-than-light, like the prescient abilities of the navigators in Dune).  

Then you have a review of Hero's already extensive Powers list, with an eye towards which Powers simulate which effects (e.g. for things like personal Force Fields and ship shields) and also for plausibility in a given setting.  For instance, physically changing shape is fairly radical in scientific terms, but one could use Shape Shift to simulate disguising a ship's electronic signature.  Hackers can do the same thing to their online ID, which in Cyberspace may mean shapechanging one's avatar.  The list of potential character Complications can either increase or decrease with the setting (Dependence on an addictive substance might be more common in a Cyberpunk world, but being an alien in most Space Opera settings wouldn't qualify as a Distinctive Feature).


Chapter Three – The Universe, Part 1: Galaxies and Stars  This is where Star HERO moves from concepts and game terms to hard science.   As the chapter title indicates, the book details the physical universe, starting from the level of galaxies and then going down to planets (Chapter Four) and Earth's solar system (Chapter Five).  An example of the detail involved is that Chapter Four explains Drake's Equation, a mathematical formula for postulating the odds of extraterrestrial civilizations existing based on various figures including the number of habitable planets in a galaxy.  More speculative bits include sidebars on interstellar travel and "stellar engineering" (an advanced civilization actually using its home star as an energy source).

The chapter gives advice for mapping a  sector ('a convenient-sized region of space')  in both two and three dimensions ('actually, according to current physics it may have ten, but don't worry about that') and the potential for 'wandering' hazards in space travel (like the sensor penalties for traveling through a nebula, comets, or a rubber-science wandering planet).
Going down to the level of stars, the book has a random table for generating a star system (binary, trinary, etc.) although it's emphasized that you can always pick your own results. Statistics are based on astronomical data "based on what Humans know as of 2011."  The random tables also include possibilities like giant stars and "exotic objects" like black holes or wormholes.  The chapter ends with an example of how to use the random tables to generate a sector.  "'System H' is a kind of boring name, so Susan gives it the provisional Galactic Survey number 'GS 5553-781-H,' using the digits of a phone number and the letter H to remind her which one it is on her map. If the system turns out to have a colony or native life, it may get a better name."


Chapter Four – The Universe, Part 2: Planets continues where the last chapter left off.  "It seems likely that most stars have at least a few planets.  Gamemasters can come up with the number of planets in a system by rolling 3d6, or just picking a number out of thin air."  The book actually states that since scientists have not found a consistent pattern to how planetary systems form around a star, that therefore "generating distances randomly is apparently scientifically accurate!"  A certain level of detail is however necessary.  In this case, the book has a table on page 103 with five color-coded zones: Closest to the star is the Red Zone, which is too hot for planets to even form.  Then you have the Yellow Zone where planets can form but is too hot for water-based life (e.g. Mercury).  The Green Zone allows for liquid water and DNA-based life (thus it is also called the Biozone).  Whereas the outer zones (Blue and Black) are too far away and cold to support Earthlike life, but the book speculates on whether they could be the homeworlds of species based on ammonia or liquid hydrogen.  Certain cases are such that they cannot be made with random tables, such as "rosettes" where a circle of three or more worlds share the same orbit, in what will certainly be an artificial arrangement.
 
Having determined the arrangement of the planets in a star system, the next step is the generation of each planet.  There is a random mass table where the middle-ground standard is the mass of Earth (x1 mass on a 2d6 roll of '7' for a Green zone world) and higher or lower numbers on 2d6 mean greater or lesser mass respectively.  Figures follow from this base, and involve some math, but it's fairly well-explained.  Density, for instance, is usually determined by composition (rocky, gas giant, etc.), planet diameter is the cube root of mass over density (a sidebar table is provided if one doesn't have a calculator that does cube roots), and gravity is the relative diameter times the relative density (if a planet has a diameter of .9 Earth's, and a density of .7, it's gravity is about 0.63% that of Earth's).  Other miscellaneous but necessary details are addressed, such as planetary rotation, number of moons, and common atmospheres (Helium is the second most abundant element in the universe after hydrogen, but unbreathable by terrestrial life; 'intrepid space explorers will get to shout for help in funny squeaky voices before they die').

Next, Chapter Four goes further into the subject of planetary life, both the scientifically plausible kind and the exotic possibilities in the genre.  For instance, in planets with a temperature range of -30 to -80 Centigrade, it is postulated that carbon-ammonia life forms can develop using ammonia as the solvent instead of water.  It is also stated that such non-terrestrial life would be possible mainly in the Space Opera/Pulp SF subgenres.  There are random tables for the development of life, including sentient life, adjusted by subgenre (for instance, in Hard SF, the chances that a given planet will have its own sentient species are 1 in 24, or all 6s on a roll of 4d6), which translates to odds of 1 in 1300.  Whereas in a Space Opera the chances of intelligent life on a planet are 1 in 12 -all sixes on just 2d6).  
Further details and tables are given for things like the planet's hydrosphere (quantity of water) and resources (of course, SF stories of various types often involve Earth governments or companies setting up mining operations).   The "cultural" products of native civilizations are also brought up (handcrafts, special tech, the Spice, etc.).  Much of the work up to this point is boxed up in an easy quick-planet-generation system on page 124.  Supplemental parts of the chapter include comets, asteroid belts, and the megastructures common to the Culture novels and Niven's work (there's also a sidebar about buying a planet or similar-size object as a personal base, for those 'with serious claustrophobia').


Chapter Five- The Universe, Part 3: The Solar System looks specifically at Earth's solar system (Sol) as an example, largely because a lot of SF is either "Earthbound" or in a setting where space exploration has not reached the interstellar level.  Interesting bits here include the fact that because of Mercury's proximity to the Sun and its intense glare, it was difficult for astronomers to observe Mercury's pattern of orbit.  "Sadly, in the 1960s, radar observations determined Mercury's true rotation period, and the one-face world was no more."

There are also mentions of other phenomena like the Oort Cloud (starting 30,000 AU out from Sol, it is the source of the 'long-period comets' that enter the inner Solar System), and nearby star systems like Alpha Centauri (4.5 LY away, actually a trinary star system).  Unfortunately, despite the level of useful detail in this chapter, Star HERO does not confirm the correct official pronunciation of  "Uranus."


Chapter Six: Alien and Future Civilizations goes back from the real science to the fiction.  It starts by going back to the Utopia setting and elaborating on exactly WHY it's not usually suited to adventure fiction: For one thing a perfect society means not much to strive against (which is why both the Culture books and the Star Trek Federation stories usually involve conflicts on the fringes).  For another, "a Green Socialist and a Libertarian would probably have vastly different views of what an ideal society would look like" and in-game, the GM's idea of Utopia may not match that of the players.  Then there's similar review of Dystopia, the "Big Tailfins" setting (presented as much like today, only with some progression, somewhat like the films Gattaca or Minority Report) and Post-Apocalyptic ('please see Post-Apocalyptic Hero for a detailed examination of the Post-Apocalyptic subgenre').

At this point the chapter goes into creation of fictional races.  "If there's one Golden Rule of alien creation, it's this: make sure the aliens serve a purpose.  If a Human can play the same role in the story, why go to the trouble of creating an entire alien species and civilization?"  Of course that doesn't prevent popular sci-fi from doing exactly that (there's a sidebar for 'Rubber Suit Aliens') but this section also goes over other archetypes like Talking Beasts (e.g. the Kzin) or Super Intellects, or the Warrior race (not just Klingons, but the Sontarans of Doctor Who).  Even then it's very easy to use such as extreme presentations of different aspects of humanity; for instance, the Super Intellect or Artificial Intelligence being a case of an intellect that tries to or has been made to divorce itself from physical needs, which (depending on the author's message) can have good or bad results.
Part of this process is getting into the game mechanics of building the race- like what Powers and Complications would be used to make an Amphibian race, a flying race, or a race that can only eat plutonium.  Sidebar examples are of course provided.  Other stuff basically reverse-engineers the Racial Template examples given earlier- that is, the book already provided such, but Chapter Six tells the GM how to make his own.
 
Chapter Six next discusses the broader aspects of an alien civilization, such as technology (and the in-play issues of the PCs encountering either much more primitive or much more advanced tech than theirs), a race's preferred habitat (including artificial developments), economics (with a bit of practical detail on being a space trader) and governments ( a section that goes over a great deal, including the role of espionage agencies in adventures).  One of the tables actually gives a chance to establish a certain level of diversity within an alien culture, as compared to the usual media standard where every alien race is a homogenous stereotype.


Chapter Seven- Computers, Blasters and Robots: Technology points out that while the genre is called Science Fiction, it might be better called "tech fiction" because it usually explores the effects of technology upon humanity- and was developed at a time in history when technological progress began to occur on a scale of years or decades rather than centuries.  In terms of comparison, there are a number of scales- "1960s" versus "Industrial Age"- and they don't necessarily overlap.  "If you're an Industrial Age mechanic you can fix anything from an early steamship to a World War II fighter plane."

Thus this chapter asks the GM to first define the setting's tech scale; narrow scales are more appropriate for "bleeding-edge" scenarios like Cyberpunk games where tech characters have to keep abreast of the state of the art, while more Space Opera-like games assume a highly advanced tech level that somehow doesn't need to change much over the centuries.  The example used is the Terran Empire setting (5th Edition vintage) which is defined as "a type" of Space Opera, and which has its own technology classification scale called the Available Technical Resource Index, or ATRI, on a scale where 1 is fire, 10 is Cold Fusion and fast FTL travel, and 12 is Teleportation.  It's pointed out in this regard that the ATRI scale is a development of a future Human empire, and other races might have different scales depending on what directions their technological development took them.  

This chapter also tackles certain "prohibitions" assumed by a setting, the most famous of course being the Star Trek Federation's Prime Directive, but also the Dune novels, which take place after the "Butlerian Jihad" against computers and AI, and thus depict an interstellar society built around that gap.

And after this point Star HERO goes into more detail on "Rubber Science."  As in, all that cool stuff in Science Fiction that really isn't scientifically possible.  Cold fusion, for instance, has been theorized, but is still a Holy Grail in energy development because it violates laws of thermodynamics.  So in such cases where a GM wants such tech, he doesn't have to create a valid scientific basis for it (otherwise it would actually exist), but does have to create a good-sounding basis for it that also takes consequences into account.  (The book later says 'Players, unlike TV Science Fiction writers, aren't likely to ignore nifty new weapons and tools once they've created them.'  Advice which probably goes for the whole chapter.)  Going back to the Terran Empire example, the book says that the empire's ATRI allows for teleportation, but the GM/author doesn't want teleporters to be "Human photocopiers" that could be used to duplicate or preserve people (as transporters have actually done in Star Trek).  Thus he decides that ships' teleport devices work as hyperspace tubes (like the Boom Tube of Jack Kirby's New Gods).  To put limits on the technology, the author decides to make the phenomenon inherently unstable (so that a tube can only be reliably maintained for one second) and easily shielded against (so they can't be used for boarding actions).   This also affects tactics: Ships can still use the technology on missiles to create railguns that operate over millions of miles, and any hit that takes out the target's dampening fields makes boarding (or bombing) the enemy bridge possible.
On such basis, the rest of Chapter Seven goes over how "typical" Science Fiction tech would be built in HERO System terms.  Not just teleport devices, but equipment tables for SF weapons and armor, writeups for realistic or actual energy sources (like fuel cells) and speculation on how other sources like zero-point energy could work.  It even has a writeup for a towel.
Then you get into the subject of acquiring your equipment.  Star HERO is assumed to be a "Heroic-level" game in that PCs have to buy or otherwise obtain gear as opposed to buying it with Character Points like innate superpowers (examples of such in the genre, that DO cost points, would be genetic engineering or cyberware).  Given the variations in fictional societies and economies, the book advises a pricing standard based on the value of one day's worth of unskilled labor.  Other factors may of course apply.  If governments (or the GM) don't want weapons like blasters to be commonly used, they can jack up the price through various means.  On the tables, a "rare item that's of high quality" costs 4x the standard price.  This also ties into things said earlier about the "postcapitalist" economy of Star Trek- something that can't be easily made with a replicator is going to command some sort of price even if common goods are no longer subject to scarcity.  This subject also ties into a very important question for a spacefaring campaign: If characters aren't in some kind of starfleet, how do they buy their spaceship?  In HERO System, it may or may not be bought with points (as a Vehicle Perk) but whether bought with points or currency, it may be prohibitively expensive.  It's suggested that to save costs, a ship can take its own Complication: Watched by the bank.  It's always possible to skip payments, but as Han Solo found out, this causes problems.   And that leads to-


Chapter Eight- To Soar Among The Stars: Starships and Space Stations  which begins with A Brief History Of Human Space Travel.  "The near future of Human space travel depends a great deal on the willingness of Earth's governments to pay for projects. The technology to send Humans to Mars exists as of the early twenty-first century; the political willpower remains absent."

In game terms, the matter of getting a starship is critical for any SF campaign that is not planet-bound.  Star HERO goes over three ways PCs can get a ship: The first is to buy it with money and the second is to buy it with Character Points, both of which may be prohibitively expensive even if the resources are pooled and even given the ratio for buying a Vehicle with points.  Or third, the GM can just give the PCs the ship, either on the simple grounds that they need one to get around, or because circumstances will quickly allow them to acquire their own ship in play.  Of course, that may lead to all kinds of plot hooks, especially if the ship was stolen.
In any case, the ship has to be designed according to the Vehicle rules, and this chapter includes, in addition to an Expanded Vehicle Size Table (where 325 points buys the basic hull for an 'Earth-sized starship'), how to buy Power (END Reserve) and Propulsion systems, other necessary systems like gravity (which is usually handwaved but in Babylon 5 required spin gravity in Human ships), labs for things like Medical/sickbay and so on.
Then the chapter deals with a few vehicles that AREN'T spaceships, namely planetary vehicles and mecha.  Then it goes over space stations, which work similar to vehicles given that in HERO a Base is effectively a Vehicle that doesn't move.  Much of this stuff requires use of the 6E book The Ultimate Base (which is out) or Hero System Vehicles (which is not out yet).

Finally Chapter Eight gives a sampler list composed of a 800-ton merchant ship, a starfighter, a kilometer-long warship, a "X-780 Combat Mech", a space station/trading post, and an orbital military base.


Chapter Nine- Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow: Time Travel is apparently necessary because time travel occurs so often in SF stories but the ramifications of it lead to real problems running it in an RPG.  Indeed, as the book points out, faster-than-light travel and logistics- upon which much popular Sci Fi depend- necessarily involve time travel or causality issues.
Mechanically even though HERO uses an FTL Travel power as its own system, what we conventionally think of as time travel (like visiting a past or future event in the same area as one's 'departure point') is a power called Extra-Dimensional Movement.  Moving to a specific point in time is an Adder to the base Power; 'free-range' time travel is a larger Adder.  Various methods are discussed including an actual Time Machine (e.g. the TARDIS) and the "mind jump" of the TV series Quantum Leap.

Then there is the matter of time paradox.  One dilemma being that time travel would seem to be impossible because it violates causality, but there have been some theories in physics, including the possibility of wormholes in space, that would allow for such.  On the other hand, causality implies that if time travel IS possible and history is altered as a result, the retroactive change means that nobody would realize if history was changed or not.  In game- assuming of course the GM even allows time travel- the problem arises when player free will means that PCs end up changing history even accidentally and you want history to be more or less "fixed."  The danger otherwise is that all aspects of the game setting will change as a result of changes to history, and the book advises that such a campaign "requires a GM who can think on his feet and extrapolate future histories on the fly."  This leads to the discussion of alternate histories and time campaigns, the most likely of which would be a "Time Cop" or Doctor Who-like setup where the PCs are basically checking out history to make sure it goes as it "should."

"For more information about time travel and time travel campaigns, see Time Travel Hero."


Chapter Ten- The Powers Of The Mind: Psionics is on some level the "magic" chapter.  Others would disagree, but Star HERO points out that the various forms of psi in media include not only telepathy, biofeedback and the like but reality manipulation where the individual is changing the universe by the force of his will.  This despite the fact that as is also  pointed out, psi powers are theorized as science despite "a stunning lack of evidence for their existence".

Generally though, psionic characters in SF media operate on what we could call a "player character" level of power, which is convenient for games.  The book addresses the subject of how high-powered psionics can get, which is important for two reasons.  In game, the more powerful psionics are, the more government will wish to regulate them, and the more afraid it will be if people with powers are too powerful to be regulated.  And in PC group terms, the more powerful psis are, the more desirable psi abilities are and the more that non-psionic characters will seem second-rate or pushed to the background.  (What some of my group call 'the Jedi problem.')

In fact the Jedi are a pretty decent example of the sort of abilities considered typical for psionic characters: body control (enhanced healing, extra speed and jumping, etc.), telekinesis, ESP and so on.  The Jedi in the Star Wars prequels are very powerful but not quite on superhero level, although in other sources (like the first set of Clone Wars cartoons) they are at least superhero level.  Luke Skywalker, on the other hand, is an example of an approach recommended by this book for making psionic PCs: Assume either a "Latent Psionic Talent" that gives the person the ability to buy Powers with experience (otherwise PCs can't use them at all) or a bank of points that he doesn't yet have access to.  As he starts to develop his abilities they require time and concentration to work, reflected by Limitations that in Hero System reduce a Power's cost.  As he goes on the path to mastery, he buys those limits off and the abilities become more reliable and usable as well as more powerful.

This chapter goes to some length to examine how a given society would regulate psi powers or control psionic people, more than most superhero games spend going over the social ramifications of superpowers.  But then the Science Fiction genre is largely about a culture's reaction to a technology or scientific discovery as much as the thing itself.  It's mentioned that at the extreme, a civilization could institute genetic screening, lethal injections and other methods to make sure it has no psionics at all.  "Of course when the psionic invaders come, society may wish for a few telepathic defenders, but by then it's too late."

In designing powers for a campaign, the book recommends the aforementioned method of heavily Limited powers over a flat ceiling on a power's Active Cost, since (especially in the case of Mental Powers) some of the effects require a lot of dice.  "Psionics campaigns" centered around mental powers are usually built around Standard Heroic-level characters at a starting total of 150 points, though a GM may add more points to add powers if he feels it necessary.  Characters could be anything from telepathic espionage agents to Psychic Warriors to rebels against a tyranny that either oppresses psis or uses them to enforce the police state.

As an example, the chapter uses Hero Games' Terran Empire setting and a background from author Jim Cambias.  The human empire has a small number of natural psis, literally one in a million people, with half of these having weak powers of 10 Active Points or less, with 1 in 2 million people having powers of 20 Active Points, and so on. Since the Empire is not at all democratic, it has no qualms about registering and monitoring its psionic population, and while the government is practical enough to keep psis in its bureaucracy, it also subtly encourages anti-psi prejudice in the general population (especially since one of the rival powers in the setting is ruled by a psionic dynasty). The result is sort of like the Babylon 5 setting with regard to its Human psionics: Most psis are effective enough to be player characters but not so powerful as to overshadow everybody else, and they operate under a certain social stigma that helps to limit their influence.

Finally there's a list of a few Psi abilities and also a sidebar of psionic inhibitor technology.  Notably a couple of the examples use the new Damage Over Time Advantage to allow an effect to build up over time for a relatively low Active Cost.


Chapter Eleven- A Journey Into The Unknown: Gamemastering Star Hero starts by asking the GM to consider the overarching theme of the game.  The most common themes are "the effects of a technology on society" or "exploring the unknown."  The book counsels not to confuse theme with message; "The effects of biotechnology on society' is a theme; 'cloning is bad' is a message. You can return to a theme, look at it from various angles, and develop it in depth.  But once you've stated a message, the only thing to do is state it again."

In terms of Star HERO's own definitions, Chapter Eleven goes back over the various subgenres of SF so as to show which concepts are more likely to be emphasized in each.  The theme and subgenre also tie in with the campaign subject or "what the characters do".  Both Spy and Criminal games, for instance, both tend to work around teams of specialists like the Tech Guy, Con Man (Hitter, Hacker, Grifter, Thief, Mastermind...) etc. except that in SF you can add the Psionic and the Getaway Pilot.
 
After mentioning the specifics of setting, the chapter also discusses running the game on a session-to-session basis.  The merits of plotted versus unplotted adventures are discussed, with the most practical advice being to use a little bit of both approaches so that if players diverge from the main arc they don't wander off into "blank cubic meters."  Plotting is defined in terms of setting up the adventure "hook," then presenting obstacles (including 'internal obstacles' like the personality factors defined in Hero as Psychological Complications), then building up to the climax and resolution.  
There is of course a Random Plot Generator.  As in most Hero genre sourcebooks, some attention is given to "disconnects" where a genre trope really doesn't work for a role-playing group.  One example being the Firefly or Traveller scenario of itinerant merchant spacers having adventures.  Players expect this activity to make them rich but in the source material the characters barely get by week to week.  Enforcing this idea may discourage players who expect their actions to be rewarded and may feel the GM is "picking on them."  One solution is to simply tell players flat out that the setting comes with a certain assumption of desperation.  Another solution is to actually give the players more control so that they can make a profit, but this requires a higher level of detail.  The book refers to the trading rules in Chapter Six for help there.

On the score of those 'internal obstacles', Chapter Eleven looks over how the game's system of Complications (Disadvantages) works in terms of setting up a Star HERO campaign.  For instance, shared Complications (like Social Limitation, or Hunted) present an obvious reason to get player characters together and give them a common motivation for adventures.
The chapter then goes on to the subject of Environmental issues, which are especially important to a space-faring campaign.  Differences from Earth Gravity (G) get a lot of attention.  Less common but also important considerations dealt with here include atmospheric pressure, corrosive atmosphere, and explosive decompression.

Then the GM's chapter deals with the subject of Villains and important NPCs.  Important points about designing a good villain include "A good villain makes a good story", "A villain who isn't competent isn't very interesting" and that just as good villains often have some sympathetic motivations, they may have flaws like those of interesting heroes, simply with less principle about them.  The popular archetypes of such characters are discussed, along with the issues in presenting them.  For instance the Mad Scientist is a popular antagonist in Pulp and Sci Fi, but one problem with the character is the question "why doesn't he just license all those inventions and get rich?"
Then you get the archetypes of common NPCs, such as the Crusty Old Admiral who frequently gives missions to the ship's Captain, the Good Businessman who promotes capitalism with ethics ('in a Cyberpunk setting he may be enough of a rarity to inspire whole legions of followers'), and the Security Officer (who could be anything from Garibaldi to Bester).  


Chapter Twelve: Argos Exploration is a sample set of characters (potential PCs and their main antagonists/Hunters) for use in the Terran Empire setting.  They're one of those traveling merchant teams with a ship, the main hook being that the Scoundrel With A Heart Of Gold who started the operation had actually come into wealth on a gamble only to be forced to change his identity and career when the crooked merchant he'd won the money from decided to get revenge.  This section also includes a few generic NPC types for the setting like Doctor, Space Marine and Space Pirate.

Then you have a Bibliography of references organized by the book's list of subgenres (Military Science Fiction, etc.) followed by separate lists of Jim Cambias' and Steve Long's top SF books and films.  And then there's the Index.


SUMMARY

"Another classic science-fiction show cancelled before its time."
-Bender, Futurama

If there's any problem with Star HERO, at least compared to other Hero genre books, it's that its scope is such that it doesn't do a great job of conveying the style of the genre or how it would be fit into a game, as opposed to Fantasy HERO, which didn't have an "official" magic system but had a lot of ideas for how you could design your own magic system to fit the premises of your fantasy world.  Or the stellar 5th Edition book Pulp HERO which had so much detail about the early 20th Century time period that it was well worth recommending for a Pulp game even if you didn't use Hero System for it.  Star HERO is less self-contained.  Worse, its invocation of previous genre books or future projects like Time Travel HERO is that much more poignant given that Hero Games recently announced it couldn't publish any new stuff or even maintain a staff, making such projects essentially vaporware.  (Economic recovery, my shiny metal ass.)

But as I said, the main strength of Star HERO is that it goes into great detail on the science part of Science Fiction while still being easy to read for those who do not delve as deeply into the "hard" part of the genre, and is thus probably a better resource for making an SF roleplaying game, no matter what the subgenre.

JAMES GILLEN

Great review!

Indeed.

Thanks.
I think, like Dan, I'm gonna be here from now on.  

JG