Did you know about Groombridge?
Left to right: Paul Reiche and Fred Ford
"Here's a low-res and cryptic image of the two of us which we intended to put in Star Control II. We had this idea about presenting ourselves as egotistical space gods who would grant boons only to those who complimented us incessantly. That didn't work out for Star Control II, so instead we decided to apply the same notion to our employees."
- Paul Reiche III, Interview with GameSpot.com
Groombridge is one of the ten rainbow worlds in Star Control II. Each of these plants have plenty of valuable minerals and telling Melnorme Trademaster Greenish the location of these worlds earn credits that can be used to upgrade the Vindicator and the planet landers. If a line was drawn between each rainbow world, it would form an arrow, with Groombridge at the point. The arrow points to the direction the ancient Precursors migrated to.
Unfortunately, during the development of Star Control II, Accolade was desperate to get the game rushed out. Paul and Fred ran out of time to place their godly roles into the game. Luckily Paul still had some images of Groombridge laying around somewhere, released an animated imaged online and even mentioned it in an interview with GameSpot.
The idea was that when the player reaches this star system, they would be able to have interesting conversations with these gods, and by giving compliments, the player would receive hints and other sorts of information. It was a really cool easter egg and it’s a shame that it never made it in the final version. I only wish I could find out what kinds of things they would say.
And now you know! :D
More info: UQM Wiki
