"A trade-ship was detected near your station."

Whilst it's true that the opening movie parodies 2001: A Space Odyssey and therefore only actually works as humour if you've seen the film (which, at the time, I had not... meaning the jokes sailed over my head), Startopia is a game that rewards the open mind. The loading screen cheerfully depicts a green alien riding inside some kind of pod-like spacecraft, laden with suitcases and a cute 'GB' sticker, the kind used in Europe on the back of cars designating their country of origin.

A sad truth is that games such as Startopia,  released in 2001 by Mucky Foot and published by Eidos, are so often brushed aside and forgotten within the gaming industry; a title that refuses to take itself seriously is always a rare and precious gem in a medium saturated with grimness and a constant desire to declare itself edgy and grown-up.

Startopia has no such ambitions to pedantically prove itself; perhaps because it knows, deep down, you're going to love it anyway.

The loading screen fades, and a single robotic spacecraft functioning as the game's main menu springs to life; the music, a kind of trippy electronica, beats into being as the arm extends to ask you to create a profile. Above the music, the voice rings out, "We are controlling transmission."

Twin-headed Turraken scientists research the latest spaceport doodads.

Startopia tasks you with the care, maintenance and operation of a fully functional space station. A great torus of metal slowly turning in space, each station is functionally identical, yet; should you play through the game's campaign rather than dive into a sandbox or multiplayer game; the tasks required of you are very different.

Though far from some sprawling epic, the campaign is nevertheless well fleshed out; each mission is awarded to you by a different species within the Startopia universe, who naturally have their own characteristics; militant races, beings committed to pleasure, traders, and even farmers courtesy of the space station's third tier, the Bio-Deck, complete with terraforming tools and artificial soil in which to grow crops.

Mucky Foot, the game's developers, seemed adamant to squeeze as much variety into their mission set as possible, whilst at the same time introducing you to the various concepts within the game in such a way as you never feel overwhelmed.

By the time you've finished the campaign, you'll feel every bit the professional spaceport Administrator, ready to take on sandbox mode or indulge in some multiplayer fun.

After a hard day mutilating cattle, Queeg'mar was off gambling.

Startopia will please anyone who enjoys the writings of Douglas Adams (and naturally, the game is filled with references to Hitchhiker's Guide for those who know where to look). The game possesses a charming, wry and often dark sense of humour; the first campaign mission has your sarcastic AI advisor VAL (Virtual Artificial Lifeform) quite candidly explain what happened to the last spaceport administrator who failed in his duties; some terrible punishment given by the race who had commissioned the waystation involving some kind of parasitic worm that eventually crawled out of him.

And then, of course, there are the space-cats that appear if your space station is overrun with litter; they eat refuse, which seems useful, and passing aliens will give them a friendly stroke, not knowing that the cuddly felines will soon grow, find a host to hide within, then some time later cause them to explode in a smattering of alien body parts to reveal their hideous new forms; immense black beasts known as Skrashers who will slaughter innocent space-tourists simply for being alive.

Hope you invested wisely in Security Scuzzer droids and Kasvagorian security staff...

Death is common in Startopia, but at least you can beam a cadaver into the Analyser to quench your morbid curiosity for alien autopsies.

So Startopia may have character in spades; each alien species animates differently, walks, talks, even swims differently, and each individual has a randomly generated biography and career sheet you can read through simply by clicking on them. And sure, it's true that every single object in the game has a description, often with jokes, hidden in its Help menu to flesh out the character of the galaxy.

Yet none of this matters if the game doesn't play well, but Startopia's strength comes from marrying this depth of character and dry comedy with a robust and addictive business management sim.

"I am Arona Daal, most respected of the free traders. Delighted to meet you."

So it seems today there's this huge, ugly division people are insisting exists between 'casual' and 'core' gamers. Accusations fly about 'dumbing down' certain titles (with some companies more accused than others, but let's not get into all that) and franchises.

Harking from a time when these divisive statements were not so common to gaming, Startopia has accessibility in spades, yet a satisfying depth if you know where to look. Every structure and device used for managing your spaceport, from looming defensive turrets to space motels to humble yet essential Scuzzer maintenance droids, comes boxed and ready in a crate; right click the crate, choose where to place the item, done. In fact, the robots even unpack themselves, just to be helpful.

Immense bulkhead doors compartmentalise the space station into sections; it will take time before you can run the entire place, as disused sectors of the structure are in disrepair and require your financial outlay to reinvigorate.

And then, that's assuming you're the only person running the station...

You want all this, you'll have to pay out for repairs or kick out your competitors.

Later missions; and, indeed, some sandbox games and obviously all multiplayer games; involve a spaceport being occupied by more than one Supervisor (the title, sometimes used interchangeably with Administrator, for someone running a space station business).

This brings a whole new dimension to the game. The AI itself can be challenging, but the cunning of other players also allows for some potential for co-operation or competition. With, say, four Supervisors aboard one station, each occupying a quarter of the immense donut-like structure, things can get crowded fast.

And sure... you could have a shared sandbox game and all just make your own way, having a kind of open-border treaty allowing others access to your section of the spaceport and vice versa. Indeed, the game's a lot easier that way. But don't you just want to wipe that smug rival Laboratory off the face of the Engineering Deck and stop your fellow Supervisors finding all the good tech-tree discoveries first?

"One of your Siren residents has quit and is leaving the station."

Warfare can be a smidgen on the clumsy side in Startopia, but the system it runs by is, as is par for the course, accessible yet effective, and never confusing even in the midst of laser-fire being bandied about everywhere.

Indeed, accessibility is a strong point to this game. You can win a mission or the entire campaign without ever nosing deeply into the menus, since right-clicking on everything gives you all the functionality you need. Yet if you dig into these menus, a world of statistics on every single alien in your spaceport unfolds, and a simple few clicks will take you directly to whichever alien you're snooping through the profile of wherever they are on the station.

Ingeniously, Startopia combines both finances and resources into Energy, which is used to power your station's commodities, trade with passing ships, and pay your staff.