What Drox Operative 2 is
Drox Operative 2 is a top-down, real-time starship action RPG where you play a Drox Operative: the captain of a single starship in a galaxy full of alien races. The Drox once ruled through their Operatives, then tried to assassinate them all, which sparked a civil war that left the Drox extinct. The Operative guild survived, and now ancient, mature, and young races are all scouting, colonizing, and expanding, competing through diplomacy, technology, and war.
Your job is not to run an empire. You pick a side in that galactic competition, earn credits, and build the deadliest ship you can. Your choices and inactions affect the other races, so who you back matters: pacifist or militaristic, xenophile or xenophobe, freedom-loving or slave-labor societies.
Playing it with friends
The game supports online co-op multiplayer, so you and your friends can adventure together in the same sector. Each game generates a unique sector with different monsters, ship components, quests, and races, which gives every run its own shape. Everyone flies their own ship while the alien races play out a 4X game around you, so you are effectively running an action RPG inside a universe of empires competing for control.
What to know before starting
Expect a lot of ship-building depth: thousands of components and crew to outfit your vessel with, plus a skill and command system for building a unique ship. Combat is fast, with hundreds of enemy starships to fight and a wide range of component types including plasma cannons, ramming components, probes, ballistic bursts, chaining beams, and plasma waves.
The galaxy keeps moving whether you act or not. Treaties, wars, and sector-wide Cataclysms can shift the balance of power, and you can place spies on planets, sponsor diplomatic and colony ships, vouch for races, or protect or exploit primitive ones. Exploration rewards curiosity, and there is real character customization: 42 known playable races, rebels, and subraces, plus randomly generated young races you can unlock and play. The game runs on Windows and Linux.