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Game
Game2010
Star Ruler
Developer Blind Mind Studios
Star Ruler is a space 4X / RTS hybrid developed and published by American company Blind Mind Studios. Star Ruler was first announced on July 5, 2009 in the Irrlicht Community Forums, the game engine on which Star Ruler was based. It was released on August 21, 2010. The game was launched in retail outlets in the EU on August 16, 2011 via Iceberg Interactive and was planned to launch Mid-October in the US via… From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
190 reactions from 2 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky) · newest Sep 2, 2026 · last updated Oct 8, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
75
LovedLoved
141 positive · 46 negative
95% range 69–81%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 141 | 46 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 0 | 0 | 0 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
3 newer reactions are still waiting for a label.
Steam's own rating
Very Positive
283 of 342 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What people are saying
Summary pending — the reactions are listed below.
Reactions
60 of 190 · most liked firstIf you like Total Annihilation / Supreme Commander types of rolling economies - then this is the 4x for you. Tired of the constant back and forth over a single star system on the edge of your territory? Simply destroy all the planets and the star they orbit and your problem is solved! Don't like how looooong it takes to build those 1,000,000 kilometer long ships? Simply build a Ringworld around a super giant star! You can build fleets in the 1,000's in just seconds! But wait! "Building…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →+/+ Unique take on the 4x genre. +/+ Great technology tree. +/+ Infrastructure and starships receive updates with tech. +/+ Excellent starship construction options. +/+ Lots of options for how you set up the game. +/+ Well supported by developers (over 30 patches). +/- Star Ruler is played in real time with pausing. +/- Micromanagement is handled by the A.I. by default. +/- Swarm style warfare. -/- Weak diplomacy. -/- Mediocre user interface. -/- Little purpose to using fleets. -/- Graphics…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Before buying the game I ran across some reviews indicating that this is a 4X strategy game with a high level of complexity. Thats fine for me, after all that is what is intended to be for serious strategy 4X games. But complexity needs the appropriate tools, interface and AI to work fine. Unfortunately this game lacks all of theme. Yes it is complex, but it turns out to become very chaotic in the end. So you probably get fed up and let everything be managed by the AI. The AI governors will…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I made it. It's probably good, and I like money.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One of my absolute favourite space games of all times. Very open-ended, with a complex technology system that really lets you experiment with countless combinations and strageties. There is a learning curve on how best to design your ships for various purposes, and the AI is extremely difficult I find, but once you have it all down, it is a really rewarding and challenging game. I don't believe the game was fully finished, so there is something a bit unfinished about it, but the shear power…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Great game! BUT - it does seem like this game is getting robbed by a sequel - the game description claims that features are "currently" being expanded... but to all appearances its NOT, its just the old sales pitch, while the expanded feature development is implemented in a new game (sequel). Does "seem" a little dishonest... . If this changes, I'll change my review.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Star Ruler is a very open-ended game. This supports modding very nicely and there are some wonderful mods out there for it, such as Galactic Armory. The blueprint design system lets you stop worrying about exactly how the ship is going to be put together and worry more about exactly what types of systems you want to install, and how much of them. There is almost no limit to how big a ship's scale can be, and everything is done on a beautifully simple relative ratio allowing you to take any ship…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Pros: + the massive scale is amazing. You can make galaxies as big as you computer can run. + the scale is not just limited to the galaxy the palyer can make some massive structures like a gun that can destroy star from other star systems and ships that can be larger than entire planets Cons: - the diplomacy has nothing to it all the options are just to make a threat, demand, allaince, or war. The playere literly just selects on of those optins form a drop down by the race which give no…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →What have you done to this once good game? The UI is now completely and utterly useless. Ships and planets will just NOT follow "automation" orders and will just shamble around aimlessly or do nothing at all. The map scrolling sometimes works well, other times it just stops working altogether. By this I mean "map panning" sometimes it will scroll quick, then all of a sudden it's panning speed will crawl to near zero. It is near impossible to get the camera looking at what you want, when you…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Despite the obvious fact this planet was made on a nearly non-existant budget it's pretty good for how small it is. And the size some of the maps can get to is damn impressive, just be prepared for your borders to become a grind zone for fleets that can range from where in the hundreds to the millions. Add in that literally everything can be destroyed, and you have chaos unending near the end. Don't like chaos? Don't play this. It runs on it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A brilliant game. I play with the [url=http://www.moddb.com/mods/galactic-armory]Galactic Armoury mod and absolutely love the game. There is a steep learning curve and some of the aspects of the game can be a little obscure and difficult to follow but, with potentially infinite maps (depends on how good your computer is) and almost limitless customisation of ships and stations I would rank this as one of my favourite games. Of course the fact that you can make ships that are bigger than the…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Just finished the tutorial and... Wow! this game!.. It has got the best of every 4x game I've played till now. So what should you expect?... ...Expect a Space Empires game (a turn based 4x) minus warp holes for inter-system travel, with RTS elements of Homeworld on a game engine like a AI War: Fleet Command. Oh! Forgot to mention, Star Wolves like pirate raids. :)) Verdict: It is a close to perfect 4x RTS game which doesn't need a hefty system specifications to run on with guaranteed tonnes…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Two thumbs down on this one. The UI is nearly impenetreable and there is no tutorial at all. It just throws you in and assumes you'll be able to figure things out. The diplomacy system makes no sense and 9 times out of 10 you won't even be aware people are trying to give you "diplomatic missions" until you get the alert that your time is up. The system for setting up trade routes and supply runs to even out resources in your empire is so convoluted that even after a *long* time trying to figure…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →How have I spent over 100 hours on this game!? I don't even....I should go design another ship. I personally like this but I caution buyers as this game may not be for everyone. The Masters of Orion/Sins of a Solar Empire junkies will probably be dissapointed. If tempted, definitely pick this game up when it's on sale.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game appears half finished. It has some great mechanics in the damage system and the ship creation system, but the whole thing feels unpolished. At the end of the day, you don't judge a game based on what it could have been, but instead on what it is. I do not recommend this game.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Very dull. No real storyline. Gameplay can be almost completly automated. If you don't automate, everything takes too long. Don't know where this "build ships as big as you want" malarky is coming from. Ships have a "scale" setting, but don't really change size, and still have limited module spaces. An etremely drawn out game with no reward. If you win one game, you've won them all. No variation whatsoever. Not recommended.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Superb 3D space RTS. Like the civilization games if they were massize 3D space RTS with no size limits or unit caps. This game delivers a true 3D universe (with the option to flatten it to a 2D pane if that's the kind of map you want) with real time flight between stars and clusters. Sins of a Solar Empire meets Sid Meier's Civilization with extras that both games lack like 3D spaceflight along individually determined paths, real time civil management and custom unit construction. Really a…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Star Ruler is the perfect example of an indie diamond in the rough. The core realtime 4x gameplay gives you a ton of freedom and ship design is fun and open, while the game progresses to eventually become really hectic. The customization and stuff isn't overdone to the point of being spergy like in some of these types of games. However, the game is pretty graphically poor, there being only two visually distinct sets of ship designs and everything being sort of par for the course budget indie…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Disregard playtime; played it a great deal off steam. It's an amazing game, for its time. A little underdesigned and underpolished, too heavy on micromanagement and not much to look at, but it did so many things that no other game ever tried at the time, and few have attempted since, that it deserves recognition in spite of its shortcomings. It's a thoroughgoing shame that Star Ruler 2 had so little in common with its predecessors ambitions, and that Blind Mind Studios had to close down. The…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →My new favourite space 4x game. I've previously played Master of Orion 3, StarDrive and Space Empires 3 and 4. I have also played Homeworld and the combat and commanding ships in this game is reminiscent of it which is a big plus for me. Star Ruler has a lot of neat features I really like, such as: +Research system based on levels +Economy based on resources which can be transported +Newtonian ship movement +Freeform ship design +Scalable ships I'm very happy with this purchase
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is a 4x RTS that is very old at this point, and in the beginning I had a few technical errors, but once those were resolved it turned out to be an excellent game that allowed fo a lot of creativity with designing ships. It's ship design is the best feature of the game and combined with the ability to have as many star systems as your computer can handle makes it pretty fun. If you haven't tried it yet you won't be disappointed.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I like the idea, but the interface is awful. Controlling and managing ships is completely unbearable.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Wish the developer would have stuck with this. Sequel sucks. I would listen to The Tron: Legacy soundtrack while playing this. It was ♥♥♥♥♥♥ epic. And if your CPU can take it, you'll see some crazy stuff go down, in some HUGE galaxies. 100x better than Galactic Civ or Sins of a Solar Empire. And if you get this, check out a mod called Galactic Armory
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →When a game makes it a struggle enough just to chug to the end of the tutorial, you know there's a problem. I'd sooner have fun completing every tutorial in every paradox game ever made than try to do this tutorial again. It was just too boring. It taught you what felt like everything the game had to offer, and yet I still got into my first match feeling like I've learned nothing at the same time. And here's what I learned in my short time in my first match and in the tutorial of this game.…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This would be an alright real-time space 4X if if weren't for one feature - you have complete control over the size of your ships. Yes, it is theoretically possible to build a ship larger than the galaxy. Do yourself a favor and construct a mega-flagship whose quadrillions of crewmen have never seen the outside world.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Eh.....that learning curve...and the AI is relentless...but worth learning
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →They do not make games like this anymore. Deep as an ocean.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Me learning the game: Oh wow, these game mechanics are so esoteric and the UI is so awkward and messy. This must be a really deep and immersive experience. Me after actually learning the game: Oh, this is actually an extremely bare bones 4x game. I swear to god, there are so many "complex, high-learning curve" games out there that actually have pretty straightforward mechanics, but they're just implemented in convoluted ways, and bundled together under a crappy UI. It doesn't really deserve…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I thought this game was pretty average with a good amount of customisation at first. Diplomacy system is very lacking (you can send the AI a request that only hurts you and they'll refuse). It's still very fun, but not something I'd actively recommend. Then I shot at the galactic central point and made every star near it go supernova, winning a round by nuking the entire galaxy. I'd definitely recommend people try it, there's a lot of fun to be had in just what you can make and how much…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is one of the better Strategy Space games, its just about simple enough to get you started preeeeetty fast, but allows for enough free "building" to design your own fleets/ship/strategy. It sure is a perl in my libary, and i reinstall and play it again and again. do not think the version II will outdo this game, it is a whole different badboy, but its not this badboy! I give this game my best recomendation.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One of my favorite games, hands down. Nearly 400 hours and still rising every so often. If you like having the ability to customize your ships in Galactic Civ II or something along those lines then this is the next step up. There (were) also some excellent mods, at least two total conversion mods that added tons of weapons and the like but unfortunately those have become outdated. I hear, however, that the modding is easy (relatively) so that is another plus if you like messing around with your…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Space is big and so is stuff you can put in space.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I was just sorting through games I haven't played or haven't played in a while. I have close to 30 hours in this game. I don't remember playing any of it, that's how memerable this game is, aparently.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I really tried - repeatedly - to get into this game, and couldn't see the point.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I'm a fan of 4X games, and this game has tons of really promising ideas, but there are a commensurate number of flaws to go with them. I wanted to like this game, especially because of how they tried to be a bit out of the box in many places, but in the end there are better 4X games out there, and I just wasn't having fun playing this one. In summary, there are other 4X games that do most of the stuff Star Ruler does, and do it better. I would recommend playing the Galactic Civilizations…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Nice "pocket" 4x game. Pure resource and reseach management. Perfect for "one evening session". Very good ship design and AI system (really best i seen, but i do not seen many).
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →i played 8 hours of this in the first day and then had fever dreams and the worst night of sleep possible 10/10 would destroy myself again be careful
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's one of the best games I've ever played 4X. Pulls for hours, but please remember that how we perceive the game depends on our tastes. I offer compliments to the creators of the game. English is not my mother tongue, so excuse the mistakes.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →better then the star ruler 2.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →As someone who has been enjoying RTS games since age 7 in 2000, i must say this is one of the most underrated RTS games of all time IMO. Give it a try.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Short review: Largely a strategy-only 4X game, which boils down to zerging the enemy to win. Not much in the way of tactical elements, as the ship design and starship combat doesn't really make much of a difference, relative to grand strategic strength alone. You could argue that in any 4X game, but there really is very little rock-paper-scissors mechanic here at all, with regards to tech and ship combat. The game uses somewhat entertaining newtonian physics, and the ships sling around…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Great game, from 1 planet to destroying the galaxy, every second was fun.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A game that allows you to micromanage, and then promptly makes it as inconvenient as possible. Since micromanagement was never going to be realistic at the scales they were going for, they might as well have abstracted it out of the game. The macromanagement aspect of the game is simply a blown up version of the micromanagement, so it ends up feeling poorly done.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Looks real promising but it doesn't work for me. Windows 7 professional 64bit GeForce 680 graphics card Runs into issues despite trying trouble shooting including restoring and moving system files, which technically breaks my system and makes blue screen of death appear. Resources used.. --> http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-1981921.html Good luck hope it works for you, but for me it doesn't so i cant recommend what i cant play
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game is based around the idea of letting the player design their ships in a nearly open ended way. You can design and build swarms if microscopic ships all the way to solar system sized dreadnoughts. If you enjoy designing your own units to make your forces work in whatever way you choose, then this game is as good as it gets. Once you master designing ships with the vanilla game components it is time to look into mods that add hundreds of additional components. You can build a death star…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Space Ruler is an enjoyable no-frills 4X game in a 3D galaxy. Star systems are highly detailed with planets orbiting their stars, stations orbiting their planets, binary stars orbiting each other, and comets and asteroids floating around. Ships have to accelerate and decelerate. The game is played in real real time but can be enormously slowed down, sped up, and paused at will. Random planets have typically 11-29 slots for buildings, with some special exceptions, and 1 or 2 conditions which…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Very unique game. Totally different experience to its successor title. Both are games you shouldn´t miss if you like ship customization. The second title introduces mechanics that shoud be now widespread in 4x games but unfortunately aren´t because of the lack of fame those games had.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I was drunk when I bought this. After seeing this game sober I just want to get drunk again. Can I have a refund?
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I love to build a ship design with very high nano-bot regeneration capability. This is the only space game I'm aware of that supports that sort of build, and I over-research the technology along those lines. Because Star Ruler 2 doesn't support the same approach, I tend to think this game is the superior of the two. My hours don't reflect actual play time, as I played the demo a ton. If you aren't sure, go find the demo if you can - well worth it. The game is very sandboxy - and does tend…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Woa this one is a bit hard to review. It's an old game from an old distant galaxy in the olden times... Fast review: If it's 10$ or less, you can buy it, over that go buy starforce 2 instead! Much better in everyway!!! Now for the detailed review: - Space strategy 4x game realtime with pause and adjustable speed. Colonize planets, develop them, build ships, conquer - There ain't much graphics in this game. An old windows xp can run this game fine. Ship battle are kinda 2D boring affair. -…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The interface is too poor to tolerate attempting to play the game.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Yikes. This game looks like it could be great. However, I have some GLARING problems that I can't seem to overcome and haven't yet found answers to. These are gameplay basics that just seem to get glossed over as if they are obvious. Well they may be obvious to the developers, but to someone coming in from the dark, it doesn't make any sense at all! Here's my 2 main complaints: 1. The tutorial is terrible. I tried to run the tutorial and it seems to jump through time and says that I've…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Established a small empire, enemy attacked. Decided to whether I could spawn 100 000 000+ ships. My fleet kept expanding until the game crashed. 10/10.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Just couldn't get behind it. I like action and fun. In this game you control this small tiny similar looking ships and build stuff on planets where you spend a bunch of time micromanaging inventory and all these resources and build a bunch of different things. There are like 100 different menus in the game and it is all pretty confusing. The battles are boring, just a bunch of small tiny similar looking ships shooting little ball bullets at each other. There isn't much to do besides let them…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I like the game Star Ruler and the mechanics special for this genre I saw in here for the first time, BUT this game has some great disadvanteages: - The manual. Does barely exists. Many options and mechanics of the game are not explained anywhere. What exactly does the "Upgrade hull" button do? When are upgrades done if I uncheck autoupgrade? What does a upgrade intervall of "Every 0 levels" mean in comparison to "Every 1 levels"? How many metal is used by an electronics fabric to produce one…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →If you like huge Empires, and can stand the resulting complexity, this is the game for you!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This didn't hold my interest single player, and the multiplayer desynced constantly. When it did work, it was entertaining, though.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Unless by some miracle of the internet you happen to buy this and not have the multitude of issues that most of the users of this game have experienced, DON'T purchase this game. The concept, from the near 2 hours of play I got through, is sound and seems awesome, but those two hours involved at least 25 crashes of the game for doing simple things like scrolling down a menu or clicking a menu button. Before I could even run the game I had to activate some file in the program files, just to get…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Pros: Still one of the most ambitious rts games I have ever played, Star ruler makes up for bare-minimum graphics with mind boggling scale and complexity. Will your strategy involve fleets of ai controlled drones? Or a handful of superdestroyers? Perhaps you prefer to send carriers full of small, manned bombers? The ability to customize your strategy to your tastes is easily the best part of the game, followed by a galaxy generation system limited only by your hardware. Its the little details…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Check the demo on his itchio, one of my fave pico8 games to date. Some features of the full game: - I made an isty mod for it. - Medium sized campaign with cool features - An endless mode - Simple tutorial - Ranked mode Only game it really compares to is Star Ruler 2 or Sid's Colonization.
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