StarForge Arena
Frequently asked questions
Everything people ask about StarForge Arena. If your question isn’t here, support will reach us.
The basics
What is StarForge Arena?
StarForge Arena is a free top-down multiplayer space shooter for iPhone and iPad. Matches run two to five minutes across six game modes, played solo against AI bots or online with friends.
How much does StarForge Arena cost?
StarForge Arena is free to play during Early Access, with no advertising. Every ship and every mode is open from your first match. Paid content may come later as the game grows, and nothing you can buy will ever make a ship stronger.
Is there a grind or a battle pass?
No. There are no upgrades to unlock, no stat boosts to buy, and no battle pass. Cosmetics are the only progression, and they never affect a match.
Why are there no ads or in-app purchases?
Because both would work against the design. A shop that sells power turns ship balance into a pricing question, and an ad break makes a two-minute match shorter than the thing interrupting it. The game is built so that the only variable between two pilots is the two pilots.
Does StarForge Arena work on iPad?
Yes. StarForge Arena runs on iPhone and iPad running iOS 16.0 or later.
Playing a match
How long is a match in StarForge Arena?
Usually two to five minutes. The host sets the rules when creating a room: a kill limit from 5 to 20 (or none), and a clock of two, five or ten minutes (or none at all). Battle Royale always keeps a clock, because a shrinking map needs time to finish shrinking.
Can I play StarForge Arena offline?
Yes. Offline practice against AI bots needs no account and no network connection at all. Tap PLAY AS GUEST, then PLAY VS BOTS.
Do I need an account to play?
No. The whole game is playable as a guest offline. An account is only required for online play (quick match, the server browser, and private rooms) because results are attributed to a profile.
How many players can play StarForge Arena?
Between 2 and 12 depending on the mode. Deathmatch runs 2 to 8, the team modes run 4 to 8, and Battle Royale runs 4 to 12 on a map nearly twice the size.
How do I play with friends?
Create a private room and share the invite code, or use the server browser to join an open room. Friends-only rooms are unlisted and reachable only by their code.
Is there crossplay in StarForge Arena?
Yes. StarForge Arena runs on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Windows, and everyone shares the same rooms, the same matchmaking and the same invite codes. An invite code from a phone works on a desktop and the other way around.
How do I get better at StarForge Arena?
Read the minimap more than the screen. The arena fits on it at true scale, flags and hill zones are drawn where they really are, and most avoidable deaths in this game are a rotation somebody could have seen coming. After that: stop chasing kills away from the objective, and learn which abilities are destructible. Every deployable in the game is meant to be shot, including yours.
Does StarForge Arena support controllers?
Yes. Connect an MFi or Bluetooth controller and the on-screen touch controls fade out automatically; touch the screen and they come straight back.
Does StarForge Arena play in landscape?
Yes. Turn the phone sideways during a match and the HUD re-anchors for landscape, a wider view of the arena with the controls at the edges. Menus stay portrait; only the arena rotates.
Can I change the music in StarForge Arena?
Yes. There are four battle tracks (PULSAR DRIFT, NEON SURGE, ION STORM and STARFORGE RUSH), and the settings card cycles and auditions them, remembering your pick. Music and effects have separate volume sliders and separate mute switches. Every sound in the game is synthesised at runtime rather than played back from a file.
Ships, modes and the arena
What are the six ships?
Interceptor (sustained afterburner), Gunship (deployable turret), Phantom (short cloak), Bomber (proximity mines), Carrier (warp beacon), and Specter (charged railgun). Every hull is viable. The difference is what they do, not how strong they are.
What game modes does StarForge Arena have?
Six: Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, King of the Hill, Battle Royale, and StarBall, a zero-gravity ball mode where bolts can knock the ball into the goal.
What is StarBall?
StarBall is space soccer. Ram the ball or shoot it (bolts kick it too) and put it in the enemy goal. The ball carries real momentum, so passes you set up seconds earlier often decide it.
How does Battle Royale work in StarForge Arena?
Death is permanent for the round and a storm closes the map. The safe zone shrinks onto a different off-centre point each phase, so there is no safe middle to camp, and it plays on an arena nearly twice the size of the other modes.
How big is the StarForge Arena map?
Small enough that the whole arena fits on a minimap you can read at a glance, and large enough that crossing it costs you something. Battle Royale plays the same arena scaled to 1.8 times that, which is where the extra pilots and the room to retreat come from.
Does cover actually block shots?
Yes. Bolts sweep their entire path every tick and stop at the nearest thing they cross, rather than checking whether they happen to overlap an obstacle on any given frame. That distinction is what makes an asteroid a wall instead of a suggestion. Without it, close-range shots would pass straight through cover.
Accessibility and privacy
Is StarForge Arena colorblind accessible?
Yes. There are colorblind-safe palettes for deuteranopia, protanopia and tritanopia, and friend-or-foe colour is recoloured at the source rather than filtered over the frame.
Does StarForge Arena track me or show ads?
No. There is no advertising, no IDFA, no third-party analytics, and no App Tracking Transparency prompt. The game collects an email address and user ID for accounts, plus crash data.
Account and support
How do I delete my account?
In game: pause menu, then SETTINGS, then DELETE ACCOUNT. This removes your profile and its associated data.
More on the play space in the arena, and on match formats in how it plays.