When designing your character, you will work with the GM step by step. The GM will aid you in your character's history so it fits in smoothly with the RPG, and he'll go over the various stats with you and aid you in designing your character. New characters, currently, are only avaiable for three groups, and those are all in the Main Reality, known as the Prime Reality. The three groups are the EarthGov Military Forces, the Peacekeeping Delegation PAX, and the medieval characters on the new planet Tareh.
The EarthGov Military Forces is made up primarily of races that are part of Earth, which is primarily human. If you read more about EarthGov and it's colonies in Prime's Story Information on the side bar, you'd learn there are other races that are part of it, but these cases are rare. If you make a character for the EarthGov Military Forces that is not human, you will need to work with the GM very carefully to determine why this character is part of their military.
The Peacekeeping Delegation PAX has the most freedom is playing a variety of species, since it is a space hub for all kinds of alien races. This is the most open area for characters that are not human, but again you will need to work with the GM when making your character.
Finally, the medieval group is made up of only three different races: humans, elves, and half-elves. When the medieval group first begins only humans will be really open, as I will be working to introduce the mysteries of the world, but as time goes on, depending on how well players perform, the other two groups will become open to players as well.
You will find your starting level for your character will come with 15 spending points, and then for each level up following that, you will gain a total of 5 points. At least until you reach higher levels, but that's discussed more in character creation on the various group tabs. Leveling up is determined by how you perform as a player. The GM will rate how you RP during the session based on these criterias:
Participation. Ranked from A to F. Merely attending the session is not enough - your participation is judged by how much you do in any given session. If you only RP for 20 mins and idle for the rest of it, you automatically get an F in participation, which comes out to be 0 factor points toward leveling up. As long as you're doing lines, however bad they may be, you will get an A in this category - assuming you participate the entire time. This rank falls down the more you idle.
Performance. Ranked from A to F. Your performance is judged by what you bring to the session. You don't have to solve every problem or beat every bad guy to get an A. Some sessions are just interaction. Your performance, then, is based on how you interact - if you interact. Merely ignoring everyone isn't going to get you an A in an interaction session. In a mission session, your performance is judged by how your character acts/does in said mission with others and toward the mission goal. If you merely have your character follow everyone else and never talk, even if you're steadily doing it with no idle time, your rank will fall down.
Attitude. Ranked from A to F. Your attitude toward other players is also judged. If you pick fights in ooc or argue with the GM, your rank drops. It is one thing to speak your mind to the GM on a situation, it's another to argue when the GM says his decision is final. Also, picking on another player is not acceptable. If you make a joke that another player doesn't appreciate, and continue to provoke, your rank falls down. If you're the player who can't take the joke and you make a big deal out of it instead of merely saying 'please stop', YOUR rank will fall.
It is these three categories you gain "exp" points, and after a certain number, you will level up in the GM's notebook. But there is a catch - this is for each character you play. If you have two or more characters on a team and you do not use the other characters properly, you may get an A Rank in Attitude if your attitude is good, but you will get poor ranks on the other two categories. Keep that in mind when desiring more than one character for any group. However, this is lax in one area: if you make an effort to use all your characters, they will all likely get the same amount of participation points. So if you have four in one group, the GM will take that into account, if all four are used during the RP time.
You can also gain "exp" by doing minis with others and participarting in secondary sessions - sessions that aren't part of the main plot, but for people who want to RP with a certain group even though the main plot isn't focusing on them currently. However, to get the points, you must alert the GM to view these extra RPing scenes.
Each setting has it's own method of attaining currency that you can spend on your characters. To learn more about currency and shops, please visit the Information Hub's Currency and Stores. For an example here, working for the EarthGov military will net your character a certain amount of credits every few sessions, which you can spend on items outside the main RP to help get more experience points for characters you don't use enough - so this will ensure you will have ways to level up your characters outside RPing with them.