Create · planned for players

Write your own starship mission in VR

Every mission in IKAREE is a single data file, not code. You describe what happens at a real star, what can be discovered, the choice the captain faces and how it can end. The AI crew brings it to life. And your story does not end when the mission does: your ship stays in the galaxy and keeps living, and other captains will meet it.

How a mission runs

Routine. The ship is on duty at a real star from the catalogue.
The trigger. A signal, a wreck, a ship on the run. You decide whether it can be refused.
Investigation. Contacts to scan at three levels of detail, hidden facts that come out when the captain asks the right question.
The decision. The captain says what to do in their own words. The crew recognises the intent.
Endings and the log. Several endings, a captain's log entry, and memories your officers keep.

The AI crew only speaks and recognises what the captain means. What actually happens is decided by your mission file, so a story plays the way you wrote it, every time.

{
  "id": "ep11_the_buoy",
  "title": "The Buoy",
  "location": { "star_name": "Tau Ceti" },
  "captain_intents": [
    { "id": "repair_buoy",
      "description_en": "Captain decides to repair the buoy.",
      "examples_en": ["Fix the buoy.", "Repair its prediction module."] },
    { "id": "leave_it",
      "description_en": "Captain decides to leave the buoy alone.",
      "examples_en": ["Leave it.", "Not our business."] }
  ]
}

A small part of a mission file: what the captain might decide, in their own words.

What you write

The place: any real star from the HYG catalogue. The sky around it is already there.
What can be seen: ships, wrecks, buoys and planets, with passive, active and detailed scans and spectra.
Hidden facts: what the crew can find out, and how.
Characters and species: who the captain talks to over the channel, from the species of the Union and beyond.
The officers' views: where Reed, Hart, Cole and the others stand on the dilemma, and their key argument.
Endings: conditions, priorities and the captain's log.

Checked before anyone plays it

A validator checks the file against the vocabulary of everything the game can do, and a simulator plays it through, including sample runs, before a single player sees it. A mission can be tried in the game without a new build.

Your ship lives on

This is where IKAREE is going. Write a story and the ship in it does not vanish when the mission ends. It keeps its own life in the galaxy: it travels, it remembers, and other captains will run into it, hail it, help it or regret it. Over time the Milky Way of IKAREE fills with the stories of its players.

Status

All Season 1 episodes are written in this format today, and about 100 missions are planned. Creator tools for players are in development. If you would like to be one of the first authors, write to us.

Early Access

Take the chair.

Early Access on the Meta Horizon Store. The public store page opens soon.

Meta Quest 3 / 3S, standalone
PC VR on Windows: Air Link, Link or OpenXR
Seated, voice-driven, internet and microphone required

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