Official News page 3

DID YOU KNOW ABOUT STARBASE1?

by Hazed

On the edge of the Solar System there lies a wild, unregulated area of space called Arena Space. Once upon a time, it was a place where wild, unregulated fights would take place between reckless pilots out to prove who was the most macho. The Imperial Navy stayed out of Arena Space, considering it was better to give the hotheads a place they could blast away at each other without innocent bystanders getting hurt. From time to time, official competitions were held here, too, with the victorious fighters winning accolades, and the defeated being dispatched to the hospital in ignominious failure.

Now, Arena Space is all but ignored. The complete ban on ships fighting ships that was instituted during the Interregnum even affects the once lawless areas. Space truly is tame these days.

That's not to say that Arena Space is totally safe: it's a complex area, and it's easy to get lost in its multi-layered space. But if you do explore it thoroughly, if you persevere until you are just about as far from the main spacelanes as you can go, you will find Starbase1.

Once upon a time, Starbase1 was Ming's personal deathstar-style space station. After his overthrow, it remained a high security area accessible only to the top brass of the GA. Now, it's all but abandoned and anybody can land on it. If you do, you will find that the various rooms are decorated in such a way as to offer an homage to some of Bella's favorite science fiction books. Once you've had a look around the space station, check out what books those are here.

Foot (or equivalent) note - the food on sale in the Rama Bar, Gordon's cheese triangles, is a tribute to a programmer who worked for us some years ago on another game. Like many of those who have passed through the ibgames doors at one time or another, Gordon Fong has since moved onto greater things, and has a prestigious job at Electronic Arts.

The triangles of fried camembert are a popular appetizer in the UK, in particular in a chain of French restaurants called Cafe Rouge to which we used to take Gordon back in the old days. He always ordered them, so they became known as Gordon's cheese triangles!

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