Venture: Ultracosmos

A rules-light sci-fi tabletop roleplaying game.

In the year 2301, the first craft containing human life arrived at a planet in another solar system: Proxima Centauri. It would take another fifty years for a base to be set up, and another seventy for terraforming supplies to arrive from Europa and robotic laborers from the mines of Titan.

In the subsequent centuries, humanity spread throughout the Milky Way galaxy, unfurling from the Orion arm. Exposure to stellar radiation caused some of these deep space voyagers to develop strange mutations. They became mystics, able to warp time and space. These mystics propelled humanities expansion and rose to prominence after the third stellar war.

An organization arose to organise the worlds and profit from the immense trade opportunities provided by mystic ships. Thus began the PanGalactic Conglomerate, promoting commerce above conflict for all of its member planets. Inspired by the teachings of a mystic only known as Relan, the Order of The Hand formed, sending recruits on intergalactic pilgrimages.

As humanity expanded and colonised, they found alien species. Spurred on by confidence that the only intelligent life had originated from Earth, humanity refuses to treat other beings as anything other than a resource. Strange and addictive, microbial alien life is a popular but illegal substance. Crime is rife in the PanGalactic Conglomerate, and new habitable worlds are being founded in every system.