Strange Adventures in Infinite Space was originally released back in 2002. Now, 18 years later, it’s been updated to version 1.6.1 and re-released for free. The free and updated version of Strange Adventures in Infinite Space (SAIS) is available on itchio for Windows, macOS, and Linux, and runs pretty smoothly on those platforms.
According to the SAIS announcement post, developer Digital Eel is responsible for the new version and free release. The original SAIS was created by the Digital Eel team (Bill ‘Digital Eel’ Sears, Rich Carlson, and Iikka Keränen) and published by James Ernest and Cheapass Games in 2002. The announcement post also credits Chris Collins, a professional UNIX systems administrator and systems developer based in Sydney, Australia, with creating the new SAIS builds. Collins detailed his work with the new SAIS build in his A Return to Strange Adventures in Infinite Space blog post.
The announcement post marks SAIS as “the first science fiction/space roguelike (or roguelite) and the second roguelike (at least, on this continent) to be set in a realm other than Tolkienesque fantasy.” It was also inventive in other ways, most notably in the short length of each game session. Roguelikes are commonly many hours long, but SAIS kept its total playtime about equal to a person’s average lunchtime, which lead to the game’s tag line, “Explore the Galaxy…in Twenty Minutes or Less!”
This new SAIS free version is also DRM-free, with features updated from the original, including a playtime of 5 to 20 minutes per session, 7 unique alien races, 18 alien lifeforms, 17 types of planets and stars, 21 ship types, and 69 (nice) weapons, drives, shields, gadgets, and artifacts. Also included with this updated release are “most if not all of the mods created by the SAIS community for the game.”
Links are provided in the announcement post pointing to the original 2002 version of SAIS, along with the original source code, and the handy Galactic Guidebook. There’s also a link to the original SAIS webpage, which has early 2000’s-era links for downloading the game to your “Palm OS® 5.0 (and above) high resolution color devices and Windows Mobile™ for Pocket PC.”
Digital Eel also created two sequels to SAIS - Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space (2005), and Infinite Space III: Sea of Stars (2015). Both games are currently available on Steam and itchio, with links for each provided in the announcement post.
For more Strange Adventures in Infinite Space info, visit Digital Eel’s website, itchio page, and Facebook page.
Source: Strange Adventures in Infinite Space
