Stars Reach Species: Every Playable Race

The six documented species at a glance

Terran — the deliberate blank slate

Terrans are, in the studio's own words, just humans. No horns, no wings, no whiskers, no gills — the full messy range of human body types, skin tones, hair textures, scars and tattoos.

They come from Terra, a planet the guide describes as one of huge contrasts: deserts on every continent, rainforests on most, and canyons that look like geology showing off. Terran history is summarised as incredible creativity plus constant arguing plus long-term consequences, having cycled through many political systems with autocracy and democracy as the recurring poles.

If you want a Terran to read as Terran among aliens, the guide suggests leaning on style rather than anatomy — utilitarian workwear, athleisure, streetwear, military surplus. Terrans also use their faces and hands heavily compared with species that default to controlled formality.

As a play choice, Terran is the option with the least visual commitment. That is a real consideration in a game where your species is the one thing about your character you cannot change through the skill system.

Click to play · loads YouTube — Stars Reach Character Creation: Everything You Need to Know, by Controlled Chaos Gaming

Skwatchi — the one built like weather does not apply

The guide's phrase is hard to improve on: Skwatchi are the 'big friend shaped like a bear-shaped boulder' species. Big, hairy, and built like they could carry a crate of ore up a mountain without breaking stride. They are generally the tallest and bulkiest of the Garden species, reading slow-and-strong rather than quick-and-slick.

They come from Chedderath, a mountainous glaciated world with brutal weather and long distances between settlements. The studio is explicit that the environment shaped the culture: small settlements survive only if everyone stays connected, so Skwatchi culture prizes 'beneficial interactions' — checking on neighbours, doing favours, making sure nobody gets iced out socially or literally.

There is a named tradition attached to this. 'Orchee martchar' translates roughly as 'making the rounds', and it comes from the genuine habit of walking miles after storms to see who needs food, help or repairs.

It is worth noticing how neatly that maps onto the game's own progression philosophy, where experience is granted for being useful to other people. Of the six species, Skwatchi culture is the one the mechanics were apparently written to agree with.

Gertan — the species everyone misreads

Gertans are described as the species everyone mistakes for 'the spawns of hell' at first glance: red skin, curving horns, and a sharp rugged silhouette that reads dangerous even when they are being perfectly polite. They run bigger and sturdier than most species, with only the Skwatchi reliably out-bulking them.

Their world is Kuru — active volcanoes, lava flows, caves and constant earthquakes. The guide's framing is that Kuru is a planet that insists you learn resilience or die, and Gertan culture is built around perseverance and make-do problem solving: you do not whine, you shore it up; you do not panic, you brace it.

Historically they carried a strong central authority legacy called the Over Sight, and the guide notes that even rebellious Gertans often retain a deep instinct that rules and process matter.

The intended contrast is the interesting part — an intimidating silhouette wrapped around a culture defined by patience and competence rather than aggression.

Elioni — scouts by temperament

Elioni are the cat-people of the Garden in the most readable, cosplay-friendly way: cat ears, whiskers, a furred face and a visible tail on an otherwise humanoid body. They are built for alertness and agility rather than bulk, which is why the guide notes they are often described as good scouts, explorers and hunters.

They come from Rowwsia, where the largest landmass is overwhelmingly desert and most people historically lived along the coasts. The studio draws a direct line from that geography to the mindset: you do not get much for free, you learn to make your own luck, and you do not wait for permission to be yourself.

Their cultural centre of gravity is independent thought and expression plus a strong meritocratic streak — people want accomplishment to matter, though the guide is candid that this can drift into prestige-chasing and gatekeeping.

For roleplay the guide suggests quick head turns, tail tells, and treating personal space and personal dignity as things your character actively notices.

Stokadi and the Fae — the two later additions

Stokadi are vampire-and-goth coded, with a deliberately moody silhouette. The signature look is dramatic outerwear — cloaks, high collars, veils and hoods, often covering at least one eye — so even a friendly Stokadi reads intimidating at first glance. The suggested emote language is stillness, slow head turns and long pauses.

They come from Revenia, a world that is cold, wet and foggy most of the year with little sun. A civilisation that grew up under a permanent grey ceiling produced a culture whose core obsession is fairness, with a history of rural clan communities and plateau settlements.

The Fae are the odd ones out in a way the studio leans into. Small, wiry humanoids with delicate translucent wings that flutter far more for expression than for flight — most of the Garden treats the wings as decorative or vestigial. Size varies more than for other species; the constant is the wings and a posture the guide calls 'too alert for comfort'.

Most notably, the Fae have no confirmed home world. Their folklore insists on a lost place called Tír na nÓg where magic worked and their wings were more than vestiges, but in ordinary Garden life that is treated as legend — including by many Fae.

Both species arrived through the Kickstarter. The Fae unlocked at the $600,000 stretch goal and Stokadi at a higher tier, alongside the Hansian and Hyugon.

Does your species change how you play?

No published information establishes mechanical differences between species — no stat modifiers, no racial abilities, no restricted professions.

That absence is consistent with how the rest of the game is built. Stars Reach is classless. Your capabilities come from which skills you currently hold in practice and which of five tools you carry, both of which change freely. A system that deliberately refuses to lock you into a role at character creation would be an odd place to hide permanent racial modifiers.

So our reading is that species is cosmetic and cultural. We flag it as a reading rather than a confirmed fact, because the studio has not said so in as many words — and if that turns out to be wrong, this page changes.

What species does affect, concretely, is how founder-pack cosmetics look on you. If you are considering the Voyager or Cosmonaut tier for the outfits, it is worth seeing your species wearing them first.

How to choose

• Pick on looks and temperament. In the absence of published mechanical differences, aesthetics is a rational basis rather than a fallback.
• Read the culture note, not just the silhouette. The studio wrote a distinct temperament for each — Gertan resilience, Stokadi fairness, Elioni independence — and those are what give a character something to play.
• Remember a wipe lands before 1.0. Whatever you pick now is temporary, so this is the cheap time to try the one you would not normally choose.
• If you want to blend in among aliens, Terran is the deliberate blank slate. If you want to be visible across a settlement, Skwatchi or Gertan will do it by size alone.
• Do not optimise. There is nothing published to optimise against.

Reading the species as worldbuilding rather than options

One pattern only becomes visible once you read all six guides together, and it is the most interesting thing about this roster.

Every species' culture is written as a direct consequence of its home world's climate. Chedderath is glaciated with long distances between settlements, so Skwatchi culture is organised around checking on neighbours. Kuru is volcanic and seismically violent, so Gertan culture is organised around bracing and enduring. Revenia sits under permanent grey cloud, so Stokadi culture fixates on fairness. Rowwsia is mostly desert with coastal populations, so Elioni culture prizes making your own luck.

That is a consistent authorial method rather than a set of aesthetic choices, and it is the same instinct visible elsewhere in the game — mechanics that follow from a premise rather than being assembled from genre convention.

The Fae are the deliberate exception that confirms it. They have no home world, so they have no climate to have been shaped by, and their guide leans into exactly that dislocation: a folklore about a lost place called Tír na nÓg that most of the Garden, including many Fae, treats as legend. A species defined by the absence of the thing that defines every other species is a choice, not an oversight.

None of this affects how you play. It does mean that if you pick a species for roleplay reasons, there is more written material behind it than most games in this genre provide.