[My untitled scifi universe. TLDR pitch: A space adventure setting with a retro visual flair and sensibility. It is set in the far future, with most of the world building taking place just before, during, or in the years after a major war left the galaxy in a state of disorder]

When humanity gained access to faster than light technology, the central earth government was initially eager to explore, but as attitudes and politics changed, it became more concerned with raising living standards and infrastructure on core human worlds than continued exploration.

Not all humans shared that opinion and there were waves of breakaways where various groups established colonies outside both the control and protection of the central earth government.

These colonies were a patchwork collection with no shared leadership, but when the war between the cybornetic Groupthink and the alien Arweli race spilled into human territory, they were all affected. Both sides in the war began using human territory as a battlefield.

The human colonies had to rapidly militarize in attempts to survive the war, but many of them were simply unready. Militias were called up from every day civilians, and often outfitted with and obsolete hodgepodges of weapons. Arweli stealth commandos were extremely devastating to many militia forces.

Many of the colonies ended up in ruin, either destroyed in crossfire or occupied by one of the warring sides. The populations fled to areas controlled by rapidly growing corporations, which became the only organizations in independent human space strong enough to ward the war.