I'm glad to see this is drawing interest from the readership. I hope to endeavor to reward this interest with something worth the while as this project moves along...
It looks super interesting!
As the other thread on game settings is locked, I'll ask here if you plan to include some house rules. I was thinking perhaps of having the first NPR encounter be forcibly hostile, or perhaps all of them?
I don't have anything planned in terms of forced hostility, but since the NPRs are at more or less default distances from Sol (they are all customized so a couple may have home worlds not quite inside that band, I didn't check) I expect the first encounters to be with XCOM-flavored spoiler races and thus hostile. I did waffle back and forth about having a +10 hostility modifier, and I may still add that back in before we meet any NPRs.
I locked the settings/TOC thread in case I wanted to add reference material (ship designs, etc.) at a later date, but I wonder if that material would be better in a separate thread instead and I could unlock that one for general comments? I'm undecided on this matter.
Whoa, never even occurred to me to use X-COM as the inspiration for an Aurora game but you seem to have done a great job in setting the stage! Good luck and fingers crossed no Naval Conferences appear to derail this campaign 
I've wanted to do an XCOM setting almost since I picked up Aurora, it was my first real roleplay setup after my initial learning campaigns but alas only on paper then. I felt inspired by the combination of recent improvements to plasma carronades (i.e., size reduction for more effective plasma fighters) and wanting to publish something after my latest attempt at a WH40K setting didn't really excite me.
As far as Naval Conferences, we have cleverly avoided this problem by styling our space forces after the air force rather than the navy, surely this is a flawless plan, for whoever has heard of such silliness as an "Air Force Conference"? Surely an organization popularly denigrated as "Chair Force" cannot be prone to long, dreary meetings about vagaries of procurement policies, right?
Looking forward to the inevitable bickering as nations make various demands on the X-Com organization and express their dissatisfaction in quiet months that no aliens were available to be shot.
On the one hand, I've tried to restrain myself on this account until humanity properly makes it into interstellar space, simply to avoid becoming mired down in the early game due to endless bickering. On the other hand, once we reach this point surely there will be inevitable bickering as planets make various demands on the XCOM organization and express their dissatisfaction in loud months as defensive garrisons are withdrawn to shoot aliens and the colonial governors leverage the apparent disinterest in national defense to spark populist movements and ultimately threaten to declare independence if their demands for power and prestige are not granted posthaste?
Or something.
Most icons are taken from or inspired by those on Niehorster's site
