Takamo Universe - The Five Galaxies

                So Many Ships!    We have a lot of starships and fighter models that have been built or are in development for Takamo Universe massively multiplayer online (MMO) game. A quick mental count has over 150 produced and another 50+ in various stages of design. The video clips above shows off two of ten different versions of a cargo ship class that was inspired by a pen and ink illustration from the Takamo Rulebook (1982).  First Effort     Our first try at building one was in 2013-14 when a contract artist came up with a model for our Kickstarter. At the time, we thought it was great because it was the first 3D model of a Takamo starship. Fortunately, we became much more sophisticated in our model making. Second Try Our next rendition was the ship below. It was far more to our liking and could be rendered in several color schemes. ...

2623    The year is 2623, and billions of souls call the galaxy known as Estra home. It’s a home of unimaginable distance, from the Borthan Empire in the north to the left “lung” of the Klevessan Republic. The Boe Republic brushes the southern emptiness of the Ens Gulf and yet, even here, there is life: teeming organics jostling, cooperating, invading, thriving. Dying. Love You Forever    As children, Kellan Kline and a young Terran girl named Rayelle survived horrific experiments at the hands of The Authority, a group hellbent on creating the perfect supersoldier. They were liberated from the lab together, but circumstance tore them apart.    Years later Kellan found Rayelle again, married to a Terran politico and pregnant with his son. Happy that Rayelle had found peace, Kellan promised her again that his heart and loyalty belonged only to her.    When Rayelle called, begging for his help, Kellan had no choice but to rush to ...

The PBM     T akamo is a play-by-mail game that was developed in 1982 by four college students at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. While sitting around the student union one day, Bill Hayes, a journalism major, introduced his friends Al Edeker, Bill Bunselmeyer, and Randy Ritnour to play-by-mail games. Ritnour liked the concept and began to develop a science fiction game.    The first version was completely hand-moderated. Ritnour recruited a group of friends to play, and all agreed to meet every Tuesday evening at a local Mexican restaurant to receive turn results and write new orders for their fledgling interstellar empires. Alliances were forged, wars were fought, and the first nicknames created: Biologicals were called “Squishies” by the Cybers. Cybernetics gained the honored title “Buckethead.”    Although loads of fun, it became painfully obvious that a hand-moderated game of the scale envisioned by the participants was ph...

Nezra Terran Republic annex bombing on Avril (April) 24, 2473, the Tatou Ammanian militant group Nezra, with support and direction from the Distan Colonies Liberation Organization (DCLO), carried out a suicide bombing targeting the Terran Republic annex in Baru City, Nebalo-3, in the southern Distan Colonies. They used an orbital shuttle packed with explosives. The attack killed 2,405 people. Bombing In Jenuvar (January) 2471, the Terran Republic had relocated its annex operations from North Baru City to the relative security of Aunir, a Valkyrian alien suburb of West Baru City. When on Avril 24, 2473, the Tatou attacker banked her orbital shuttle laden with 20,000 kilograms of explosives toward the three twenty-story buildings of the annex, essential security measures had not yet been completed at the complex, including a massive cerasteel dome. The orbital shuttle was heading for the central garden of the facility but crashed into the southeast building after the ...

DCLO     The Distan Colonies Liberation Organization was an organization founded in 2471 for the purpose of the liberation of Distan Colonies through armed struggle. Most of its violent activities targeted Terran civilians. Terra considered the DCLO a terrorist organization until the Io Moon Conference in 2517. In 2521, the DCLO recognized Terran loyalist's right to live in peace within the Distan Colonies as Terran citizens and rejected violence. In response, Terra officially recognized the DCLO as the representative of the Distan people. However, the DCLO employed violence after their declaration, particularly during the Second Distan Rebellion ( 2460–2540). Founding    At its first summit at the Carvella-4 city of Ancairo in 2471, the Distan Businessman’s League proposed the creation of an organization representing the Distan people. The Distan Colonial Council convened in Ancairo on 21 May 2471. Shortly after the convention, the DCLO was founded...

    This may be an irreverent way to spend a Sunday, but in the Estra galaxy, it's important to know when you're being insulted or cussed at. To that end, I offer a few common terms that have found their way into the Common Trade Language used along the major shipping lanes and in civilized parts of the galaxy. Buttrock Origin: Klevessan Noun Buttrock (plural Buttrocks)  Pronounced BUT-rawk (vulgar, derogatory) A jerk; an inappropriately or objectionably mean, inconsiderate, contemptible, obnoxious, intrusive, stupid, or rude person. “He talked all night about the Wingar and was such a buttrock that everyone left the party.” (vulgar) An unpleasant or uninviting place. "You should have more sense than to talk to anyone in this buttrock mining colony.” (vulgar) By extension, anything unpleasant or undesirable. Often used appositionally. “When he started complaining about the buttrock shuttle again I wanted to par...

REBELLION    R ecall in the previous blog that while the Onwe government negotiated with the victors and worked to rebuild the shattered Imperial Alliance, The Ffawe rebel leader Ronal Bonate secured the promise of a large loan from the Denics in 2586, giving him the funds to build and supply his armies and fleets, which he did over the next decade. Bonate used a portion of his new resources to consolidate his hold on Ffawe Naplia through the judicious use of bribes, threats, and assassinations.    Hoping to quell the Ffawe rebels in upper Naplia, and avoid a full-blown civil war between Naplia and Ffawe Naplia, the Onwe government spent those years hunting insurgents in Naplia and collaborating with the Grand Alliance powers to interdict rebel supply lines in the Pressak corridor. Naplia's diplomatic mission at the Ffawe capital world begged and cajoled the Ffawe to stop supporting the rebels and rejoin the Imperial Alliance but Bonate, who was now t...