Star Atlas ships SAGE Phase III with POLIS Democracy module and single-player campaign

In Brief:

• Star Atlas (official site) launched Phase III of the SAGE C4 public test realm, adding a single-player campaign prologue and the POLIS-powered Democracy module.
• Every test account was wiped and reissued a smaller starter bundle, part of a rebalance that also cuts warp and subwarp speeds by 67% and restricts mining to purpose-built fleets.
• zXP earnings on z.ink remain enabled for a limited time, keeping z.ink profile progression tied to hours spent in a test build that gates the road to mainnet.

Star Atlas launched Phase III of the SAGE C4 public test realm, bringing the POLIS Democracy module into player hands for the first time and shipping the opening chapter of a single-player campaign.

The release lands after weeks of slippage. ATMTA had targeted a launch window in early September, and CEO Michael Wagner told a weekly town hall the Phase III checklist was roughly 80% complete, with the team aiming for that Thursday or Friday at the latest. That window passed without a build.

Democracy module finally opens

The Democracy module was the gate. It was announced for Phase II in July as C4’s first regional governance system, but testing never opened on it, and the studio said Phase III would not go live until the module was finished.

The design puts governance at the starbase level rather than creating a general-purpose DAO. Players dedicate POLIS Voting Power to a specific starbase and vote on that starbase’s economic parameters, including crafting fees. Votes aggregate over an epoch and apply afterward instead of flipping fees instantly, and a low turnout leaves the existing configuration in place rather than pushing through a weakly supported change.

Access is gated on territory. Factions have to upgrade a region’s King system starbase to Tier 5 to unlock a class of building projects that includes a Diplomatic Wing. Once it’s built, players can delegate PVP down from the top-level DAO, but only if they also commit crew members to serve as diplomats at roughly one crew member per 1,000 PVP. Fee increases flow back to players in proportion to their diplomatic presence.

Campaign narrowed to a prologue

The single-player campaign started as an off-chain build of C4 under Chief Product Officer Danny Floyd and grew into a full offline mode that teaches the game without putting assets at risk. Wagner has floated selling it for $4.99, and the studio has said it may replace Holosim as the main free onboarding path.

For Phase III the scope is the prologue, which doubles as the tutorial and first-time user experience. The complete campaign is that prologue plus five acts. ATMTA hasn’t decided how many acts will be ready when C4 reaches mainnet.

Wipe, and a harder map

Phase III wiped every account. The replacement starter bundle is deliberately thinner than the Phase II package, handing out resources, R4, Claim Stakes and a wider spread of ships instead of finished components, which forces players back through Council Rank progression before they can use the advanced gear.

Product Manager John described the phase as the point where the team tests balance and launch feasibility with realistic numbers for income, recipes, XP, ATLAS emissions, NPCs, travel, map size and resource placement.

Subwarp and warp speeds drop 67%, targeting roughly 24 hours to cross between the two farthest points on the map by subwarp. Mining now wants dedicated mining ships or fleets fitted with mining rigs, and non-mining ships retain 5% of the normal rate. Destroyed fleets pay respawn fees. Resources are spread across more sectors and regions, with rare materials pushed deeper into the MRZ and richness varying by location, so a faction that loses key territory can lose practical access to a resource.

Each Council Rank research point is currently planned at 350 ATLAS on mainnet, and probably during Phase III, across 216 total points. That works out to 75,600 ATLAS.

What’s behind and ahead

The public test realm opened in late May on the z.ink testnet, a week after the identity-linked SVM layer 1 went live. C4 represents about 18 months of work and turns SAGE into a 4X game with a diplomatic layer on top of PvE and PvP.

Phase II delivered Combat V2, on-chain NPCs through the Nemesis Engine starting with Jorvik, Cultivation Claims for stimulant production, zXP support and a Goal system. Phase III is scheduled to run 30 days on values close to the release candidate, with progression kept accelerated so testers can still reach the top Council Ranks inside the month.

Phase IV is the release candidate and a launch rehearsal. Progress there won’t carry to mainnet, though SAGE: Starbased license XP will provide a starting boost through a migration formula. ATMTA intends to lock a mainnet date once Phase III is judged ready, followed by a 30 to 45 day campaign covering C4, the z.ink genesis event, token listings and DeFi integrations. When C4 goes live, the Starbased front end and its economic incentives are meant to close, with assets still withdrawable and bridgeable to z.ink.

zXP earnings are still on. “Hop in. You have a galaxy to conquer,” Star Atlas said in the post announcing the release.