Drox Operative Manual and System Requirements

Soldak Entertainment has put together an info-packed manual for Drox Operative, which puts the system requirements, multiplayer configuration steps, and core gameplay mechanics at our fingertips while we await the release of the space-based action RPG. A sampling:

Windows Minimum specs:
  Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/Vista
  1.5 GHz Pentium 4 (or other equivalent)
  256MB RAM
  GeForce 2 (or other equivalent)
  200MB of hard drive space
  DSL or better for multiplayer on internet

Windows Recommended specs:
  2.0 GHz Pentium 4 (or other equivalent)
  256MB RAM
  GeForce 3 or better (or other equivalent)

Mac Minimum specs:
  OS X 10.4 or above
  1.5 GHz processor (PowerPC or Intel)
  256MB RAM
  GeForce 2 (or other equivalent)
  200MB of hard drive space
  DSL or better for multiplayer on internet

Mac Recommended specs:
  2.0 GHz processor (PowerPC or Intel)
  256MB RAM
  GeForce 3 or better (or other equivalent)

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You ship doesn't have a faster than light drive, so you need to find alternative means to move between star systems.

The most common method is to use a starlane. The Drox created the starlane system 1000s of years ago. Starlanes usually connect each star system to a couple of its nearest neighboring star systems.

Occasionally there are also stable, natural worm holes that can be used to travel to a typically far off star system.

Another method is to use a Jump Gate. Jump Gates form a network of locations in the sector where a ship can instantly move from one network location to another. There are a few limitations though. First you must find and activate each Jump Gate to be able to use it. Second, since Jump Gates need regular maintenance, a Jump Gate can only be a valid destination if it is located in a system that has at least one inhabited planet. And last but not least, each race that has an inhabited planet in the system will charge you a fee to use their Jump Gate as a destination. This fee is based on how much they like you, so try to use Jump Gates controlled by allies.

The only other option is dying and resurrecting, but I wouldn't recommend it.

...

Each time you increase in level you get more crew points to distribute however you want. To use your crew points, open up your character page (defaults to the C key), and press the + button next to the attribute you want to increase. You get 5 crew points each level. Note: crew points are very important. They are the key to which components you can install on your ship and there very few ways to increase your ship's attributes.

There are many ways to regain energy when your energy reserves gets too low. The easiest way is to just let it naturally regenerate. This is the slowest way however. You can use an Energy Spike to instantly regain some energy. Using an Ancient Recharge Station will work great, if you can find one. Finally if you talk to a planet of a friendly race (greater than 50.0 relation), you will get a regeneration bonus.

Component find, tweaked find, critical hit, and crushing blow bonuses are slightly misleading. They represent the bonus compared to normal. For example, a 100% bonus to critical hits means a 100% better chance than normal, not a 100% chance. So if your normal critical hit chance is 5% and you have a 100% bonus, the final value will be 10%.