Homeworld

Homeworld is a real-time strategy game set in space. Gameplay, as in most real-time strategy games, is focused on gathering resources, building military forces, and using them to destroy enemy forces and accomplish an objective. The game includes both single-player and multiplayer modes; the single-player mode consists of one story-driven campaign, broken up into levels. In each level, the player has an objective to accomplish before they can end the level, though the ultimate objective of the mission can change as the level's story unfolds. Between each of the 16 levels is a hand-drawn, black-and-white cutscene with narrative voiceovers.

The central ship of the player's fleet is the mothership, a large base which can construct other ships; unlike other spacecraft, in the single-player campaign the mothership is unable to move. Present in each level are stationary rocks, gas clouds, or dust clouds, which can be mined by specialized harvesting ships (resource collectors) which then empty their loads at the mothership in the form of "resources", the game's only currency. Resources can be spent by the player on building new ships, which are constructed by the mothership. Buildable ships come in a variety of types, which are discovered over the course of the game.

A century prior to the start of the game, the Kushan, humanoid inhabitants of the desert planet Kharak, discovered a spaceship buried in the sands, which holds a stone map marking Kharak and another planet across the galaxy labelled "Hiigara", meaning "home". The discovery united the clans of Kharak, who had previously determined that they were not indigenous to the planet. Together, they spent the next century developing and building a giant mothership that would carry 600,000 people to Hiigara, with neuroscientist Karan S'jet neurally wired into the ship as Fleet Command to replace an unsustainably large crew. The game opens with the maiden voyage of the mothership, testing the hyperspace drive which brings the fleet to a new destination by faster than light travel.

Instead of the support ship that was expected to be there, the mothership finds a hostile alien carrier. After driving them off, the mothership returns to Kharak, to discover that the planet has been razed by another alien fleet, and that only the 600,000 migrants in suspended animation have survived. A captured enemy captain claims that the Kharak genocide was the consequence of their violation of a 4,000-year-old treaty between the interstellar Taiidan Empire and the Kushan, which forbade the latter from developing hyperspace technology.

Relic Entertainment was founded in Vancouver, Canada, on June 1, 1997, and began work on Homeworld as its first game. Relic co-founders Alex Garden and Luke Moloney served as the director and lead programmer, respectively, while Erin Daly was the designer and Aaron Kambeitz the lead artist. Garden was 22 years old when he founded the company. Writer David J.

Williams is credited with the original story concept, while the script itself was written by Martin Cirulis and the background lore was written by author Arinn Dembo. Cirulis and Dembo, credited jointly as "Marcus Skyler", were selected by the publisher, Sierra Studios, partway through development to expand the story concept of Relic and Williams. Sierra agreed to publish the game early in development based on, according to Garden, "two whiteboard presentations and no demo". Development of the game took over two years; the gameplay systems were largely complete by the final eight months, which Relic spent polishing and improving the game, including adding the whole-map Sensors Manager view.

Homeworld was highly regarded by critics upon release and is listed by review aggregator Metacritic as the highest-rated computer game of 1999 and the third-highest on any platform for the year. The graphics were highly praised; Michael Ryan of GameSpot wrote it had "some of the most impressive graphics ever", while Jason Levine of Computer Games Magazine said that "no game—ever—has made space itself look like this". Eurogamer's review praised the "big, brash and colourful" backgrounds, which was echoed by Levine and John Keefer of GameSpy. Multiple reviewers, such as Vincent Lopez of IGN, also praised the detail and variety of the spaceships, and Jason Samuel of GamePro noted that Relic was able to use their graphics engine to create the intricate cutscenes rather than relying on prerecorded videos.

Greg Fortune of Computer Gaming World added that the rotatable camera was one of the "real joys of the game", allowing the player to view the action from any angle or ship's viewpoint and "creating an impressively sweeping cinematic feel". The sound and music were also lauded; Levine wrote that the sound was "on par with the graphics", praising how it changed when the player zoomed into or away from a battle, while Eurogamer and Lopez applauded the "atmospheric" soundtrack for creating the mood.

Homeworld was released to strong sales and won multiple awards; it sold more than 250,000 copies in its initial weeks, and over 500,000 in its first six months. In the United States alone, sales surpassed 95,000 copies by the end of 1999, while sales in Germany reached 60,000 units by April 2000. It debuted in third place on Germany's computer game sales rankings for October 1999, before dropping to 25th, 31st and 32nd in the following three months, respectively. Homeworld also received a "Silver" sales award from the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA), indicating sales of at least 100,000 copies in the United Kingdom.

Homeworld won Best Strategy Game at the 1999 Game Critics Awards prior to release, and was nominated for "Computer Game of the Year" and "Computer Strategy Game of the Year" at the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences' 3rd Annual Interactive Achievement Awards. It was awarded Game of the Year by IGN and PC Gamer, won Strategy Game of the Year by Computer Gaming World and was nominated for the same by Computer Games Magazine, and won Best Original Storyline and Best Original Score at the 2000 Eurogamer Gaming Globes awards. It also won PC Gamer's "Special Achievement in Music" and "Special Achievement in Art Direction" prizes. Maximum PC wrote in 2003 that Homeworld "did what no game had successfully done before: create a truly three-dimensional space-combat strategy game". HardwareMAG called it "revolutionary" and "ground-breaking" in the real-time strategy genre in 2004, as did Computer Gaming World in 2003.