The game is set on the planet Xsarra, on which two powerful forces are at war: the Arcanes (Xsarra's original inhabitants) and the Teknos (cybernetic conquerors who want the planet's resources for themselves). The Teknos crash-landed on Xsarra because they were fleeing from the "hunters", a powerful alien race unusually bent on the Teknos' destruction. The Teknos were hoping that the unusual radiation in Xsarra's atmosphere would mask their ship from the hunter's radar scanners. Finding out that there was Aur on Xsarra, they decided that if they stayed here and mined all the Aur on Xsarra, they need not have to worry about the Hunters ever again. But the Natives of Xsarra didn't like this idea, so they formed an allied group, the Arcane forces. They waged war for 20 years, until an uneasy peace was formed that lasted a few years. There was only one common rule: no two people (one from each nation) can have a baby. A few years later a rogue quicksilver (a human-like creature that can transform into a silver being) and a rebel dark angel/stygian (an experiment gone wrong that created humans with wings) escaped into the wastelands to hide. Eventually they were captured, but they didn't get to have a child. This is what started another war, but if they did have a child, the war would have "destroyed all of Xsarra" (the Observer states this). This is where you start off: commanding one of the sides in the last war between the two nations.