On a previous post, we presented the game's design pillars. Those are the immutable goals for the experience we want to offer with Hades Star. To sum up, we want to create a game that has players growing an empire over time; exploring interesting parts of space; making meaningful interactions with other players, and becoming involved in exciting strategic decisions.
The design pillars are quite high level and don't by themselves give much information on how we'll approach specific design questions. This post is an attempt to share additional information. By giving some background on our design approach, including our personal preferences and biases, we hope to add context in how we work and share insight on why the game is the way it is.
This design philosophy may evolve over time, and it will affect not only the initial version of the game, but also the new features we add through ongoing updates. Any new proposed feature, including features suggested by our players, will always be evaluated against the design principle discussed here (in addition to the design pillars). We are hoping that by sharing our design philosophy and pre-existing biases early we can help all players understand why we choose some features over others and drive meaningful discussion.
As always, all feedback on any of this is very welcome.