Howto

How to play

This is a basic guide on how to How To Play Helium Rain.

In Helium Rain you play a new company in a small colony living around a giant planet Nema.

Your goal is to extend your company and make it an empire. For this, you will need to use a smart combination of commercial and military options. You can achieve the goal you gave yourself (be the richest, the most powerful... or the only one) just by fighting, or without ever fighting, but in some cases both will be required.

In any case you will need to make money. The simplest method to make money is trading.

Trade

See the full article for Trading.

Ships

• You begin with one ship and you can buy or build other ships during the game.
• You can manage ships with fleets, with as many fleets as you want, and as many ships per fleet (it's possible to mix military and trading ships)
• There is a special fleet, the personal fleet: it contains the ship you control. It's possible to switch the control to other ships in your personal fleet at any time.
• It's possible to give orders to other fleets, to travel or to trade, but they will manage their battles alone.
• Military ships left in a sector will defend that sector against every threat.
• You can automate remote fleets with a powerful trade route system. This trade route system is flexible and can be used to organize patrols.

Stations

The most lucrative and safe way to make money is to build stations. Stations are very expensive but can ensure continued and secure revenues. Be careful, your neighbors can be friendly as long as you are small and peaceful, but being more aggressive or ambitious can lead to your fall.

• Stations and ships are built from resources. Resources are gathered from mines or pumps or produced in other stations from primary resources.
• In the early game, other already existing companies will own stations to allow the economy to work.
• During the game, you will build or capture stations/mines/pumps to produce and sell resources and ships yourself.
• In end game, you can become partially or totally autonomous for resources and ships production.

Piracy

You can also try piracy, but a good ending is not a guarantee.

Diplomacy

If your dare it, war can be a very good way to make good deals. The Helium Rain economy is responsive to your action, so destroying a competitor can make you the sole provider of a resource.

To wage war, you can build various military ships to destroy enemy stations or ships.