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2007 · Hermitworks Entertainment · First-person shooter · Shooter

Space Trader

In the far future, humanity is ruled by The Ministry of Accounts, an oppressive bureaucracy that tracks, records and taxes every transaction of daily life. A new breed of marketeer arises to challenge the authority and make a profit: the Space Trader is born! As a Trader, you will attempt to amass a fortune, buying and selling commodities and taking up arms against the oppressors or even accepting bounty missions.

Released: 25 July 2007
Platforms: Linux Windows macOS
Genres: First-person shooter Shooter Simulation Space trading and combat Strategy
Developers: Hermitworks Entertainment
Publishers: Meridian4
Modes: Co-op Multiplayer Single-player
Perspective: First person
Themes: Action Science fiction
Engine: id Tech 3
Time to beat: 7hmain story15hcompletionist

About

Space Trader is a video game by the Canadian developer HermitWorks Entertainment, for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X released on July 25, 2007. After the game was open-sourced in 2008, an iOS version followed in 2009.

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Gameplay

Space Trader is a combination first person action and trading game with co-operative multiplayer, tied together with online scoreboards. Players assume the role of Traders in a fictitious future universe. Their goal: to make as much money possible within a time limit. They accomplish this by leasing cargo ships, traveling to planets and trading with Merchants.

Each Merchant trades different commodities, and each at different prices. Finding successful trade routes between these merchants is one of the strategic elements of the game. Players can also be stopped along the way by an omnipresent government organization known as the Ministry of Accounts, and forced to pay taxes. Shady informants reveal the location of black market merchants and the location of criminal bosses, which the players can attempt to bring down for the bounty placed on their head by the Ministry of Accounts.

Development

Space Trader was developed on base of the open-source id Tech 3 engine, as the first commercial title to use that engine since it was open sourced in August 2005.

The game's development started in 2005, headed by Cameron Tofer and Marcia Tofer, both previously of BioWare, along with a group of other developers that have joined along the way.