Starfaring was, arguably, the first sci fi role playing game. It was released in 1976. (The first actual sci fi role playing game was TSR's
Metamorphosis: Alpha, however, TSR's game didn't deal with the grander aspect of space travel/exploration).
Starfaring was written by Ken St. Andre and published by his
Flying Buffalo company. It was an extremely low quality work, consisting of a single booklet, spiral bound, and printed on 8 1/2" x 11" paper. The covers were a heavier pink paper and the cover art featured a lurid drawing of a large-breasted, blaster-toting space
vixen. The cover gave an indication of the game's theme.
Before the
Christian right corn-holed role playing, getting TSR to remove devils and demons from the
Monster Manual,
Starfaring was more typical of role playing in the anything goes era of the '70s. It was a sci fi game about sex and drugs and rock'n' starships. Seriously.
Starfaring took a rather unique approach to role playing. Instead of generating and playing a single character, in St. Andre's game one generated and played an entire starship and crew. The object of the game was to take your starship on a series of adventures and pay back your government
loan. You need to discover new planets and a fuel source called "star crystals".
Your starship sometimes had encounters with an alien race of
Bug Eyed Monsters called the Slish. When you met the Slish, combat happened. Your crew's ability scores contributed to how well your starship fights. Various medical and
recreational drugs your crew members have stashed aboard could aid your crew in combat. Combat was reminiscent of Flying Buffalo's other RPG mainstay,
Tunnels & Trolls.
Starfaring, although first out of the gate, was highly damaged. The game went for too much humor and
camp. The mechanics didn't allow for adventures outside of your starship. And even more crippling the game didn't allow for multiple starships. This ended up meaning it was a two person role playing game. There was a game master player and a ship player.