Star Control 3

aka: Star Control III, Star Control: Kessari Quadrant, Star Control: The Kessari Quadrant
Moby ID: 125
DOS Specs
Buy on Windows
$3.99 new on Steam

Description official descriptions

Since the events in Star Control 2 the Ur-Quan have been pacified and the captain who bravely destroyed the Sa-Matra has had a horrible vision of the future. Suddenly without warning, all Hyperspace travel in the universe has stopped. Top scientists have pinpointed the cause of this disturbance somewhere in unexplored space in an area known as the Kessari Quadrant. Hastily assembling a fleet of ships as and an untested Precusor star drive... a loose alliance of alien races known as The League of Sentient Races sends a task force to the Kessari Quadrant. You are its commander.

Star Control 3 features a new 3D star map, new alien races to discover, new worlds to explore and colonize, new artifacts to research and a new isometric Hyper Melee battle system for inter-starship battles.

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Credits (DOS version)

115 People (110 developers, 5 thanks) · View all

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 68% (based on 23 ratings)

Players

Average score: 2.6 out of 5 (based on 55 ratings with 14 reviews)

Way under-rated!

The Good
the story was top notch -- easily as good as sc2. It is a SHAME I blew off this game back when it was released due to the change in developer and the added colony-management feature.

The Bad
the colony management portion of the game was so-so, but in sc2 the mining did get old and the colony management is simple and easy to set/forget.

The Bottom Line
When SC3 first game out, I blew it off just like everyone else did. For the dame reasons -- it wasn't made by the original developers and they added colony management which wasn't true to SC2.

I loved sc2 so much that I replayed it this year, 2010. After I finished it I decided to give SC3 a try and absolutely loved every minute of it. Even more than replaying SC2! It was all new content. The sc3 story fit perfectly into the sc2 world and far expanded it. It wrapped up numerous unfinished story components of sc2 and added many new elements. The new races were done very very well, the old races were also done well. I think anyone who has fond memories of sc2 owes it to themselves to go back and give this a try without the biases that kept you from playing it back then.

DOS · by aaron hollingsworth (1) · 2010

A mediocre sequel to a true legend.

The Good
Most of the voice acting fits the motif if you ask me, and HyperMelee is fun even if many of the SC2 ships are missing..

The Bad
Many aspects.. for example the MIDI musics aren't very good, the GUI looks pretty drab and the story quite doesn't match SC2 in excellence.. not to mention that this game is boring. Seriously.

The Bottom Line
A sequel to SC2, but not made by the same people, and it shows.. very well. SC3 is an ok game, just that, ok, but if you compare it to SC2 it is like a comparation between the sun and a worn candle.

Anyone would be better off playing Star Control 2.

DOS · by RmM (68) · 1999

Horrible. Simply is.

The Good
The graphics are OK, I guess.

The Bad
Everything! It's a poor sequel to what I perceive as the greatest game of all times. Even the graphics (which are somewhat better) aren't half as good as in Star Control II. It lacks the elaborate, amuzing dialogues from II, the fast pace action, the broad plot and interesting twists...

A huge disappointment in every respect.

The Bottom Line
Don't touch that, and hope you don't know where it's been.

DOS · by Tomer Gabel (4539) · 1999

[ View all 14 player reviews ]

Trivia

1001 Video Games

Star Control 3 appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

Novel

A novel titled Star Control: Interbellum was published by Prima and written by author W. T. Quick. The book supposedly contains story and events that takes place between Star Control 2 and Star Control 3... however the popular opinion is that the author has never played or was ever given the plot to either game. Also the player character of both games is given a name for the novel, "Commander Omega".

Screenshot capturing technique

This game will dump a screenshot to a .PCX file if you hit PRTSC during gameplay.

Star Control III

Fred Ford and Paul Reiche III owned the character rights to the various alien races, Accolade owned the Star Control copyright. When the original creators declined to make the new sequel, Accolade gave them an ultimatum; sell the character rights or part three would be made with entirely new characters, no continuity involved whatsoever. The creators decided to make some final money off of their creations. A side note to this is that none of the original artists involved with Star Control II were even approached to work on Star Control III.

Information also contributed by Aaron Grier, Vance, and WildKard

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  • MobyGames ID: 125
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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Trixter.

Windows added by Picard. Macintosh added by Terok Nor.

Additional contributors: RmM, Shoddyan, PoliticallyCorrupt, Plok, FatherJack.

Game added May 21, 1999. Last modified March 18, 2024.