THE MAIN SCREEN

The main game screen includes a large window displaying a portion of the galaxy, a right side panel with planetary information and/or control displays, and a row of buttons at the bottom of the screen to access other control and information screens.

In the galaxy window, you can select stars or fleets of ships. If you select a star that you have colonized, the right panel can be used to allocate its resources, build ships in its docks, relocate completed ships to other colonies, or transfer population to other star systems. If you click again on an already selected star system, the display will change to show you more information about that star.

If you select a star that you have not colonized, the right panel displays what information you have about that star system.

If you select a fleet orbiting a planet, the right panel lets you order ships from that fleet to other star systems. If you select a fleet already in space, the panel displays its composition, destination, and ETA.

RATIO BARS

You control the allocation of your planetary spending, and the distribution of your research efforts, using ratio bars. A group of ratio bars shows how a resource is being divided among several different areas. The total value of all the bars must always equal 100% of the resource being allocated. Therefore, if you reduce one bar, another will lengthen; lengthen a bar, and another must get shorter.

To change the setting of a ratio bar, you simply click in the bar area at the position you want the setting to be. Other bars will change their settings to compensate, so that the total values of all the bars still adds up to 100%. You may have finer control over bar settings by pressing the arrows on the left and right of the bars, or by using and keys when the ratio bar is selected.

If you wish to lock down a bar’s setting, so that changing other ratio bars does NOT affect its setting, click on the bar’s title, at the left of the bar you wish to lock. The title will change color, and changing ratios in other bars cannot affect the locked bar‘s resources. You can unlock the ratio bar setting by clicking on the title again.