Stars in Shadow is a turn-based space strategy game available now for PC/Windows.

Game Features

Media Gallery

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About Us

An Overview of the Game
Screenshots and Concept Art
Discussion Forum
Our Plans for Galactic Domination

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16 October 2019 [Arioch]: Patch 38568 is now live on Steam and GoG. It makes substantial improvements to the game economy and AI.

17 January 2019 [Arioch]: Patch 37958 is now live on Steam and GoG. It adds a variety of diplomacy and AI improvements, as well as a Victory screen with graphs.

21 June 2018 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow is 66% off and the Legacies DLC is 50% off for the Steam Summer Sale, now through July 5!

22 May 2018 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow is 60% off and the Legacies DLC is 50% off on Steam this week!

19 March 2018 [Arioch]: Patch 22090 is now live on Steam and GoG. Among various tweaks, it adds some new strategic map UI improvements, and new functionality for Outpost Transports and the Orthin capacitor hardpoints. Also, Stars in Shadow is 60% off and the Legacies DLC is 40% off on Steam now through March 26! I added four new screenshots to the Media Gallery.

21 February 2018 [Arioch]: Patch 21910 is now live on Steam and GoG. It adds some new Herald reputation mechanics and new Arda Seed technologies that can be purchased or discovered by the player.

15 January 2018 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow is 55% off and the Legacies DLC is 33% off on Steam this week!

15 December 2017 [Arioch]: Patch 21692 is now live on Steam and GoG. It adds some new weapons and ship types for the Arda Seed.

17 November 2017 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow is 50% off at Humble Bundle now through next week.

20 October 2017 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow is 40% off on Steam now through the weekend! Offer ends October 23.

19 October 2017 [Arioch]: Patch 21558 is now live on Steam and GoG. The Legacies DLC is now available for purchase on both platforms. New video and screenshots in the media gallery.

05 October 2017 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow is 50% off on Steam right now for the Iceberg publisher's weekend!

26 September 2017 [Arioch]: Patch 21182 is now live on Steam and GoG.

29 August 2017 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow: Legacies, our first expansion, is coming this Fall. Patch 20909 is now live on Steam and GoG.com. I added 8 new screenshots from the DLC content to the media gallery.

25 July 2017 [Arioch]: Patch 20752 is now live on Steam and GoG.

11 July 2017 [Sven]: Stars in Shadow is now available for purchase on GoG.com!

16 June 2017 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow is 40% off on Steam through July 5!

11 April 2017 [Arioch]: The Tech Tree Update (patch r20298) is now live, which adds a tree view and improved functionality to the Research Screen. I have posted a few new screenshots in the gallery. Also, the game is 33% off on Steam until April 17!

17 March 2017 [Arioch]: Patch 20026 is now live.

03 March 2017 [Arioch]: Patch r19894 is now live. Read the development update here. There is also a development roadmap post which discusses some of our plans for future development; read it on our forums or the Steam forums.

07 February 2017 [Arioch]: Added a few new screenshots from the recent patch which added Super-dreadnought hulls.

19 January 2017 [Arioch]: Stars in Shadow is now officially released! It's the achievement of a goal that we've been working towards for more than six years, so we're pretty excited about it. However, this is not the end of the road; there's still a lot we want to add to the game. In addition to the requisite fixes and balance changes, we'll continue to add features and content with regular updates.

Special thanks to our beta testers, pre-order supporters, and those who tried out Early Access and provided crucial feedback! Your testing, helpful comments and suggestions have helped to make this a better game, and will continue to do so. Keep them coming!

You can visit the SiS Steam store page here, or read the current Patch Notes here.

11 December 2016 [Arioch]: Added 16 screenshots of new features and gameplay to the Media Gallery.

07 December 2016 [Sven]: We're rolling out a big patch this week. The "Stargate Update" is now live, which enables the two previously disabled playable factions (the Phidi and Ashdar Imperials). Read the Patch Notes here.

05 October 2016 [Arioch]: Version 17304 update is now live. Read the Patch Notes here.

29 September 2016 [Arioch]: We've added a zoom feature to the strategic map. Read the development update here.

15 September 2016 [Sven]: Stars in Shadow is now available in Early Access on Steam! The promotional price of USD $19.99 is good until September 22.

28 August 2016 [Arioch]: I have added some screenshots to the Media Gallery of the new diplomacy and population morale systems.

11 August 2016 [Arioch]: Sven will be on the road to Germany demonstrating the game at Gamescom 2016 next week. Stars in Shadow is scheduled to begin Early Access on Steam in September.

23 May 2016 [Arioch]: The Coming Soon page on the Steam Store for Stars in Shadow is now live, along with Steam community hub.

25 April 2016 [Arioch]: Ashdar Games has signed an agreement to publish Stars in Shadow with Iceberg Interactive, well-known publisher of such 4X space titles as Endless Space, StarDrive, and Armada 2526. The official press release is available here.

We�re really looking forward to working with Iceberg. They have an excellent track record in the genre, and Stars in Shadow will certainly benefit from their experience and support. The release is currently targeted for Q3 2016.

I have updated the media gallery with fresh screenshots.

15 April 2016 [Arioch]: Good news! We are in the final stages of signing with a publisher, the details of which will be announced next week on Monday, April 25th. This deal will allow us to complete the game in time for release in the second half of this year. It will also require us to stop selling new pre-orders on this site after that date, though all existing pre-orders will be honored under the new contract and our beta program will continue. We will continue to sell pre-orders through Wednesday April 20 at the current price of $19.99 USD; the price on release is likely to be higher. After that, the pre-order page will be taken down, but testers and pre-purchasers will continue to have access to the beta going forward.

We would like to thank everyone for your continued support, and especially our testers and pre-order customers who have played a critical role in helping us get to this point. We look forward to bringing you a completed version of Stars in Shadow later this year.

13 April 2016 [Arioch]: Work on the beta continues! I added some more planet graphics to the Finished Artwork section of the gallery. Many of the screenshots in the gallery are now a bit out of date, so I will update them with newer ones next week.

19 January 2016 [Sven]: Arioch and I will be joining Space Game Junkie for an SiS-themed podcast tonight. Here's a link to the completed podcast!

04 January 2016 [Sven]: Stars in Shadow has been Greenlit! Thank you all for your enthusiasm and support!

26 Decemember 2015 [Sven]: We've just launched the Stars in Shadow Steam Greenlight submission!

16 Decemember 2015 [Sven]: Devildog of eXplorminate has just posted a Let's Try preview of the latest Stars in Shadow build. The preview includes some discussion of the new resource system -- things are coming together!

28 June 2015 [Arioch]: I added a few new screenshots featuring new UI versions of the Planet Status, Production Menu, and Fleet Movement UI. The new shots feature a few new planet textures. We're hard at work on new features as well as refining the existing ones.

26 May 2015 [Sven]: Edward Varfalvy has just posted a detailed "Early First Impressions and Interview" article on SpaceSector. Also, I've setup a simple facebook page for SiS news and announcements.

29 April 2015 [Sven]: The guys at eXplorminate have just posted a SiS preview article -- including a short beta gameplay video by DevilDogFF!

12 April 2015 [Arioch]: I added a few new screenshots of the revamped solar system and fleet panes, and updated a few of the older shots.

28 March 2015 [Sven]: Updated the FAQ and pre-order pages a bit to better reflect our current plans. I'm now fairly confident that we'll be able to release the game without securing any outside funding, so the FAQ's answer for "will there be a kickstarter" has changed from "maybe" to "probably not". In related news -- I'm very happy with the progress the beta build has made over the last few weeks. We've started inviting in a number of new testers, and rolling invites are likely to continue over the next few weeks. Keep an eye on your inboxes :)

03 March 2015 [Sven]: You can now pre-order the game at the price of US $19.99. We�ve also updated the FAQ with a bit of information on pre-orders and how they may relate to any future crowdfunding campaign. Essentially, preorders made from this site will include any additional features or game content that might be added as stretch goals to possible future crowdfunding campaigns (if any) at the same funding point ($19.99). 

26 February 2015 [Arioch]: eXplorminate.com has posted an hour-long discussion with Sven and myself about the current state of the game and our plans for release.

09 February 2015 [Arioch]: Here's a screenshot of the new Planetary Report pane, which lets you keep an eye on all of your planets' production progress. And yes, the little planet icons rotate.

06 February 2015 [Arioch]: I just wanted to report that the first week of beta testing is going well, with remarkably few showstopping bugs. Sven and I are working to fill out some missing features and close gameplay gaps that will allow us to feel comfortable in inviting a larger group of testers. I will post screenshots of the new UI elements as they make it into the game over the next week.

01 February 2015 [Arioch]: I added a few new screenshots of tactical combat.

01 February 2015 [Sven]: The discussion forums are now officially up! Feel free to head on over and create an account.

31 January 2015 [Arioch]: Beta is here! The first batch of invites should go out this weekend. I have added a set of new screenshots from the beta build to the Media Gallery.

29 December 2014 [Sven]: We�re officially pushing back the estimated beta start date to January 30th; and I�ve made some small updates to the FAQ that reflect this. There�s a few more features that we want to squeeze in -- and a fair amount of general polishing that we�d like to get to before sharing the build with a wider audience. But at the rate we�ve been going, I do think we�ll be able to start sending out invites in about 30 days.

10 December 2014 [Arioch]: We're in the middle of a significant UI pass, so with any luck there will be some nifty new screenshots to show before long. In the meantime, I posted a few new images in the Finished Artwork section of the Media Gallery.

05 December 2014 [Sven]: A couple quick announcements: We're officially pushing the target beta start date back to New Year's (we'd initially hoped to get it out in November). I've also updated some of the FAQ contents to reflect our current best estimates on a release date. Also, I've hacked together a quick "announcement list" signup form for the benefit of those of you would like to get email updates when Stars in Shadow hits major milestones. (If you have signed up for the beta -- I've taken the liberty of adding you to the game announcement list automatically).

24 October 2014 [Sven]: As promised earlier this month, the Races of the Galaxy page is now up. I'm also posting a "developer's dairy" entry I wrote last week.

23 October 2014 [Arioch]: I added some more screenshots and artwork to the Media Gallery.

6 October 2014 [Arioch]: Welcome, all!

6 October 2014 [Sven]: Ok, the site is officially live! There�s still a fair amount of content we�d like to add -- a section with additional background material on the game�s various races should be coming soon. When those and other updates post, they�ll be announced here, and also via the site�s RSS feed.