StarShoal
Fly the fleet, not the ship. Skill, not power.
A 3D space gate-runner where you never fire a shot on purpose. Your shoal shoots on its own; your only job is deciding where to be.
Built and submitted, working through store review. It is finished and submitted. The fastest way to play it today is the playtest programme.
Get the build- Genre
- Roguelite / Arcade shooter
- Built with
- Godot 4.7
- Orientation
- Landscape
- Price
- Free, ad supported
In motion
A real run, frame by frame
A single run, captured frame by frame
What it is
About StarShoal
You fly forward automatically and you shoot automatically. Encounters arrive as a three-by-three grid of drones with the occasional huge glowing gate inside it. Green gates add ships to your shoal. Red gates take them away. Every ship multiplies your damage, so the whole game collapses into one thought, over and over: I want that gate, but there are enemies in the way, and can I get there in time?
Coins are permanent. Dying keeps every coin the run earned, so a failed run is still progress and there is never a reason not to push one gate further than was sensible.
Design notes
Why it works the way it does
Positioning is the whole game
No fire button. Every decision is about where the shoal should be one second from now.
Gates that cost something
The best gate is usually behind the worst drone. Reaching it is the run.
Failure banks
Coins survive death. Every run moves the meta forward, which is why the difficulty is allowed to be honest.
Feels right on a phone
Touch and drag anywhere for a relative virtual stick. Trailing chase camera with banking, FOV punch and a trauma shake you can switch off.
Screens
From the running build
Every shot is captured from the real game. Nothing here is a mock-up.
Questions
Things people ask
When can I play it?
It is built and submitted. Join the playtest and you can have the current build now.
Does it need a controller?
No. Touch and drag on mobile, WASD or a gamepad stick on desktop.
Is it pay to win?
No. Upgrades are bought with coins earned in play, and there is no way to buy power.
Paperwork
StarShoal policies
Every game has its own privacy policy and its own terms, written from what that specific build actually does rather than a single studio-wide document that has to cover everything.
- Data collected: advertising identifiers, anonymous usage events, crash diagnostics — never a name, an email address or a contact list
- Account required: No — there is no login and no profile
- Ads: Yes, from Google AdMob, with a consent prompt where the law requires one
- In-app purchases: None
Elsewhere
