Introduction

The name's Davenport. I review games.

The other day I'm sittin' at my desk, when in walks a fella with spiked leather clothes, a big pink mohawk... and a metal arm. Doesn't even have the common courtesy to knock.

"Let me guess," I says. "You're a cyberpunk?"

"Guess again, mother[CENSORED]!!"

"Okay. You're an [CENSORED]hole?"

"Wrong again!" he says. "I'm a space-punk, here to tell you about Dark Stars."

"Fine, I'll bite: What's space-punk, and what's Dark Stars?"

"Space-punk is the [CENSORED]ing subgenre of Dark Stars, and Dark Stars is a [CENSORED]ing sci-fi tabletop roleplaying game I've brought you to review like a [CENSORED]. It's got all the cyberpunk goods, but with spaceships and aliens and all that [CENSORED] thrown in."

"That it?"

"[CENSORED] no! The game's got supernatural [CENSORED], too. Or it can. Doesn't have to. You can use it or not. I don't give a [CENSORED]."

"Sounds good. So, what kinda music does a space-punk listen to?"

"Mostly the Sex Laser Pistols and the Dead Kennedy Space Center."

Dark Stars: A Space Punk Role Playing Game: Lean, Morgan, Corrin, Matthew,  Kamycka, Monika: 9780648085300: Amazon.com: Books

Substance

Setting

Dark Stars describes itself as a "space-punk" setting, and that's about as accurate as anything I could come up with myself. The setting takes the trappings of cyberpunk — the megacorps, the grit, the economic woes, the hacking, and, of course, the cybernetics — and skillfully incorporates them into an interstellar setting.

The tech level, therefore, proves to be higher than that of the "standard" cyberpunk setting. Cybernetics, for example, have become so advanced that a person could be made to survive unaided in space for six months. Humans have accomplished faster-than-light travel via wormholes that may or may not be naturally-occurring, and there's speculation that aliens may have FTL tech that doesn't require wormholes at all. Planets such as Mars have been fully terraformed. Laser and plasma sidearms see use alongside old-school ballistic projectile weapons ("slug-throwers"). Powered melee weapons and armor exist as well, as do forcefields.

The two main factions of humanity, the capitalist United Nations of Sol and the cyborg transhuman socialists of the Collective, exist in a state of cold war. The former is where you'll find all the standard cyberpunk misery. The latter is presented as a near-utopia, despite the fact that the citizens creepily merge with the eponymous Collective (a kind of super-hivemind). Yes, the game wears its politics on its sleeve. (Of course, that's nothing new for cyberpunk.) If what I've described bothers you — and you don't want to go about changing it yourself — I'd take a hard pass.

The book does a fantastic job of covering human-occupied space, describing a good number of worlds complete with information on their population, gravity, atmosphere, and current status. Interestingly, Earth is now a fully restored paradise reserved for the wealthy and their lackeys. If it's a Blade Runner-like vibe you're after, it's Mars you want.

Why yes, I did mention aliens back there. The book describes eleven alien species — five that humanity has already encountered as of the game setting's year, four that they have not. I should stipulate that when I say "describes," I mean "talks about," not "stats out". That being the case, you're out of luck if you want to actually use them unless (1) you are willing to stat them out yourself and (2) you are okay with having your stats contradicted when and if the author does the job himself. I get the distinct impression that the author intends for play to be restricted to humans and human-occupied space for now, and that the aliens were described only to help give the scope of the setting as a whole. Still, if what you're after is cyberpunk in space, you'll have plenty of room to play.

Now, here's where things start getting weird.

The game describes the history of the setting all the way back to the creation of the universe, where god-like beings were the first to arrive on the scene. From there we get a tale that echoes Christianity's War in Heaven and the fall of Lucifer. All that ties in very closely with the origin of humanity.

If that sounds rather supernatural for a "space-punk" setting, that's because it is. The universe doesn't just have a metaphysical history — it has a metaphysical present, complete with magic (yes, it's called that) pseudo-explained in terms of quantum mechanics and string theory and so forth. In fact, the game offers four different varieties of magic: Luck abilities (which could pass as "dumb luck"), Mentalism abilities (psionics), Miraculous abilities (flashy Ten Commandments-type stuff that is sure to attract supernatural attention), and Vhrill abilities (creepy powers like creating zombies and turning into a demon, possessed by the alien species of the same name). All of this, I should mention, is stated as being optional, so metaphysics are easy to ignore — so easy, in fact, that I'm not clear on how common they're meant to be and what impact they have if they are used. Nevertheless, they are an option, and more options are a good thing in my book.

The book includes only a small handful of sample vehicles, including just one spacecraft. (The text promises more vehicles in future books.) That suggests to me that not only does the core rulebook largely restrict play to human-occupied space, but it also largely restricts play to the surface of planets in human-occupied space.

The game lacks a bestiary. As much as I love a good bestiary, I'm not sure how that could have been avoided given the scope of the setting. How would you choose what location to provide sample creatures for?

In short, using only the core rulebook, a game is likely to look like a basic humans-only cyberpunk setting with more advanced technology and optional supernatural aspects. If that's what you want, you'll be quite happy. If it's not, you'll want to pick up supplements to the game in order to broaden your options.

System

Dark Stars utilizes the same attribute + skill percentile system used in the Faeries Wear Boots game line, currently simply known as the Dark Stars system. As I have already detailed that system in my Beyond the Black Sea review, I'll refer you there for the general description.

Obviously, the rules have to cover a lot of ground not touched on in Beyond the Black Sea, and the game does well in this regard. The cyberspace hacking rules in particular are fascinating, if a bit detailed. The book also features detailed rules for vehicle combat despite its miniscule vehicle list.

Metaphysics cost Ego Points (Essence in Beyond the Black Sea) and require a roll using the Metaphysics Practitioner skill — the higher the level of the spell (rated 1-5), the more difficult the roll.

Style

The art in this full-color 282-page rulebook proves to be exactly as gritty and detailed as the setting demands, with individual examples ranging from good to gorgeous. The clean and attractive layout divides chapters by border color for ease of searching. Really, the worst thing I can say about the layout is the fact that several tables stretch across two pages, and that's pretty much as minor as complaints come.

I found the writing to be clear and engaging with no noteworthy typos.

The book includes a starting scenario that is pretty much just one battle that could lead to future adventures.

Like all good TTRPG rulebooks, Dark Stars features a comprehensive index.

Conclusion

From the setting's introduction:

From a romantic space opera or a gun battle in a dirty Martian street, to the savage brutality of aliens who desire nothing more than the total destruction of all humankind, the possibilities for adventure are endless.

Well, that's not exactly true. The game setting has the potential for all that. This rulebook only really provides enough information for the gun battle.

That said, it's an awesome, detailed setting that deserves to be fleshed out, presented skillfully and combined with a highly-serviceable workhorse of a system.

So! If you are only planning on using the core rulebook and want to cover the whole setting as described, I give the game six out of ten fedoras.

If, on the other hand, you are happy with the playable aspects of the setting or are willing to purchase the supplements needed to fill in the gaps, I give the game eight out of ten fedoras. It really is a great game and a great setting.

I didn't originally set out to do a review of this game.  After your little plug for it, I acquired a copy.  I'm always looking for new mechanics, interesting gear, great NPCs, or exotic set pieces to make my game better for my players.

I was disappointed.

This review is a bit of a heavy handed critique.  I will do my level best not to misrepresent anything in the book but I'm not pulling my punches.

Mechanics

A role playing game lives and dies on how fun it is to play.  Functional mechanics are important to this goal.  Make it too simple and there's not enough depth and character development to be had.  Make it too complicated and it's a slog that eventually bores everyone out of playing it.  Dark Stars is complicated and messy.

I'm not looking for a rules lite system.  Far from it.  A rules system needs to flow, it needs to build on itself in a way that feels natural.   Dark Stars doesn't.

At it's core, it's a d100 game.  Most skill checks are a d100 roll under, just like BRP by Chaosium.  (I suspect that BRP was where they started.)  PC progression is mostly just adding points to your skills and buying features with XP.  From there, too many things are added to it. 

Rolling up a PC is a Rube Goldberg experience.  There's 10 stats you roll for and 10 derived stats you determine by math formulas.  A total of 20 stats?  Seriously?  There's a different formula for each derived stat. (My friend bowed out of play testing this with me at this point.) After you determine your HP, you then divide your HP over different parts of your body.  It just goes on and on like this.  In the end, it ends up with a character sheet that's just too busy and too many characteristics to really manage well.  Comparing the character sheet to the Cyberpunk 2020 character sheet, Cyberpunk 2020 looks like a rules lite system.

On pages 20-21, there's a series of tables for rolling up a past romance.  This includes a table for how your family feels about your past lover.  Not a table to give a little background, it is a series of interlinked tables to generate a romance story.  This is part of rolling up a PC.

There's a lot of mechanics centered around the PC's emotional state and mental health.  You can become a compulsive rapist if you fail a sanity check.  On top of adding a layer of unneeded complexity (and a lot of very questionable table experience), it takes away a lot of player agency in how the PC experiences the world of the game. 

Melee combat resolution is just as convoluted.  Every type of attack has it's own unique modifier.  Throw a punch and have one modifier, do a throw, that's a different one.  There's "advanced" attacks you can buy with XP that have their own formulas.  You'll constantly have to look up the attack you want because you aren't going to memorized all 20+ melee attacks your PC can do.  Then there's all the other modifiers for size, terrain, etc.  There's a lot of edge case modifiers.  It's not the most complex combat system I've used but it's just cumbersome enough to slow combat down a lot without adding a feeling of weight and accomplishment.  In the end, this will result in either players just repeatedly using one or two attack types or spending 20 minutes a round looking up how to do the attack they want.

At this point, I flat out got tired of trying to sort out how it all works.  Thumbing through the rest of the mechanics show there's similar sets of rules for ranged combat, vehicle combat, stealth, hacking, and having a psychotic break.

The Setting

It gives me the impression that the creators started with Cyberpunk Red and then wanted to improve it to their taste.  The setting is a hipster, Rifts like, kitchen sink setting.  It's got cyberpunk, steam punk, angst, coffee shop drama, space... stuff, deciding between the extra large double cream latte and paying rent, Harry Potter magic, communist utopia summer retreats, PTSD, and aliens. 

You're supposed to take all this seriously.

In a nutshell, the bulk of humanity lives under a fascist UN government, there is a democratic socialist enclave that means to lead humanity to enlightenment, there's a collection of small independent groups of people on the fringes of known space, and tying them all together are mega corps selling shitty goods and basically being evil capitalists. The largest group of independent humans are steampunk LARPers; Neo-Victorians of the New British Empire. Oh, and there are aliens.

The setting has a magic system but it's not well implemented and doesn't mesh well lore wise with the rest of the setting.  Honestly, I'm baffled by it's inclusion.

The corp descriptions is most fun I've had with this book.  The cola wars being actual wars was funny.  Then the cease fire resulting in a division of one of the cola corps going rogue and leading a financial guerrilla war and buying up stock in the opposing corp was just the cherry on top.   One of the biggest things Dark Stars flat out misses on is a nuanced take on factions and faction fractals.  They came so close with the cola corps to really having gold. 

One of the strangest parts of this game to me is the way it handles religion.  It mentions religion several times in the books but it feels like when a tour guide rushes you past a certain monument or building because they don't want to answer questions about it.  Rolling for a religion is the only part of the PC generation that's marked "optional."  If you have a religion, there's no mechanical effects on game play.  Given that there's so much in the game about mental and emotional health and how interconnected spiritual beliefs are to them, this is a massive oversight.  If they just left religion out completely, it would be a lot less glaring.  As it is, it's an elephant in the room.

There's a fundamental failure to understand what the "punk" in cyberpunk and steampunk actually is.  It has that millennial/hipster thing going on where they think "punk" is being anti-capitalist and violent.

Did you notice I mentioned the aliens a couple of times but didn't talk about them?  Yeah, just like the book.

The Art

RPG art knits the viewer into the game.  It helps tell the story of how the game plays and sets the mood for the players.

The art in Dark Stars is all over the place in terms of quality and theme.  There's ten different artists with very different takes on the material.  Some of it looks AI generated as well.  All in all, it doesn't tie the setting together.  It's more like flipping through a collection of old Heavy Metal magazines.

A lot of the art just feels like filler, like abstract pieces in a dentist's waiting room.  There are pieces I like very much but there's a few pieces I hate.  One in particular is a woman on a sniper rifle I find repulsive.  It gives the feeling of looking at a corpse.

Odds and Ends

There's a huge list of guns and armor but scant available vehicles.  Given this is a space setting, having only one space ship for PCs to select seems to be an odd choice.  There's two cars, a motorcycle, and a suit of power armor to round out the entire roster of available vehicles PCs can have and use.

There's a massive amount of tables dedicated to lifestyle.  Housing and rent, entertainment, eating out, etc. are covered in detail I have never seen a game played to in 40+ years at the table.  There's more on buying coffee than there is on space travel.  It seems that the whole game is shooting capitalists and then talking about how it makes you feel over a latte.   Wait, is this just AntiFa the RPG with scifi set pieces?

Final thoughts

It's clear Dark Stars wasn't properly play tested.  It's clunky, not intuitive, and slow.  It also has some really bizarre holes where there are things that are part of the setting but no rules to really interact with them.  In the end, the system isn't as complex as Phoenix Command but it isn't as well balanced either.  It's just not workable as a game.  I have never run or played a game that didn't end up getting modified with homebrew and house rules but this one is going to need extensive modifications just to get session one started.  I would be shocked if there were more than one or two tables playing this and even then not for very long.  If I were to run this, I would drop the mechanics in favor of just using BRP.

There's a lot of communist ideology baked into the game, both in the setting and the mechanics.  I really wish these communist asshats would pick up and read The Gulag Archipelago and The Killing Fields before preaching this nonsense.

I wanted to like this book.  I wanted to find out is was a resource for more things to throw into my gritty scifi/cyberpunk/space fairing game.  It just didn't give me anything.  There's no special mechanics that do anything for me.  I find the aliens to be under developed and uninspired in the little bit they are covered.  Cybernetics and genetic manipulation are done all over the place now, nearly every system has a native collection to work with.  "Cyberpunk in space" is already a game I run using Cepheus Engine to the delight of my players.  I'm just not seeing anything this game does that I want at my table.   

I say give this game a pass and save your money.  If the general idea appeals to you, get Hostile by Zozer games or Cyberpunk 2020 with Interlock Unlimited rules and add interstellar travel.