Star Control/Trivia

• Acting for Two: Some of the voice actors do multiple voices:
  • Rick Betz plays both the Ariloulaleelay and the Druuge.
  • David Bryce voices the Kohr-Ah, Ilwrath, Shofixti and Spathi.
  • Greg Johnson, in some real Mood Whiplash, voices the Orz, Pkunk and Utwig.
  • Madeleine Wild, besides voicing the Syreen, also does the voices of the Zoq-Fot-Pik and the VUX.
  • Larry Zee does the voices of the Melnorme, Umgah and Ur-Quan.
• Ashcan Copy: The 2007 Flash game was created for Atari in just four days so they could retain the trademark.
• Cross-Dressing Voices: The VUX (including the explicitly male ZEX) are voiced by a female actress Madeleine Wild.
• Executive Meddling:
  • Fortunately averted in the case of Star Control II. The executives wanted to release the game in a buggy and highly incomplete state with placeholder dialogue everywhere. The developers spent 6 months of their own time and money to finish the game, rather than have the unfinished version released.
  • How Star Control 3 came to be in the first place. The publisher wanted to get a third game out, but only held the rights to the name, and not the content. The creators who held the rights to everything else finally gave in, reasoning that it was better than having a new game under the same name with nothing carried over from previous titles.
  • The bit about all Androsynth being "fashion design engineers" was apparently put into the manual without the designers' knowledge (and didn't even make much sense in context, since it was talking about the aesthetics of their ships). Since the Androsynth being homosexuals was a sort of tribute to their gay friends, this stereotype annoyed the designers, who saw it as a subversion of the game's pro-LGBT message.
• Hey, It's That Voice!: The 3DO Japanese dub (Part One,Part Two) has a quite a few familiar seiyuus, like Kaneto Shiozawa voicing the Arilou.
  • The Harika in Star Control 3 is voiced by Jeff Baker, using a voice identical the the one he used for the Dumners, six years later.
• Throw It In: Paul Reiche III said in an IRC chat that the Orz language evolved from some of Erol Otus' randomly scrawled notes (which included the first appearance of *happy campers* and *Jumping Peppers*).
• Trope Namer: The Ur-Quan Hierarchy of Battle Thralls is the source of the name of the trope Battle Thralls.
• Urban Legend of Zelda: The manual clearly showed an Ilwrath Cloaking Device on the inventory screen.
• Vaporware: StarCon, a fully 3D sequel for the PlayStation vaguely similar to Colony Wars. The Harika were one of the confirmed races.
• Word of Gay: The Androsynth, according to Paul Reiche III. It's subtly indicated even in the original material: look closely at their in-game art, and you'll notice that they have little pink triangles on their uniforms. Given the end they meet in the sequel, it could be the greatest case of Bury Your Gays ever.