Starsector - It's Worth the Wait

[aReclusiveMind]

I consider Starsector to be either the best indie space game people don't know about or the best indie space game people here aren't talking about. Since there's no thread about it, and since the next release (0.9a) is poised to add more 4X-like elements to the game, it seemed like a great time to bring people up to speed.

Summary:

- "Open-world single-player space-combat, roleplaying, exploration, and economic game"
- Has 4X elements (which continue to grow), but is more of a 4X-like / RPG hybrid
- Excellent 2D real-time tactical combat that does not require competitive RTS or arcade game skillsets
- Balanced deployment system and combat mechanics requires tactical use of various ship sizes and styles rather than just using the heaviest battleships available to you
- Modding community is robust and dedicated - entire new ship sets and even additional 4X conquest features have already been included in mods
- In development since at least 2010
- Updates occur infrequently (6 months - 2 years) and are large and feature packed
- (Currently) Only available direct from the publisher


What is the basic premise?
The official line is: "You take the role of a space captain seeking fortune and glory however you choose."
You always control and move a fleet of ships (Mount & Blade style) on the starmap. Soon, you will also be able to manage a faction and colonies.


What types of things can you currently do in the game (as of 0.8a)?

- Strike out on your own or fulfill commissions proposed by other factions
- Build up an impressive fleet from a wide variety of ships each with their own unique special ability and attributes
- Hire, level up, and assign skills to officers and then put them to work flying alongside you
- Survey distance worlds, investigate distress beacons, salvage derelicts, hunt down pirates and other criminals, uncover mysterious <redacted>, and engage in the trade of legal and illegal goods


What things are coming in the not too distant future?

- Establish colonies and setup your own faction. Manage the industries/structures, hire administrators, set up colony defense forces, install hull and weapon blueprints for manufacturing, and use AI cores to boost your colony
- Manipulate supply/demand and the overall market availability of commodities. Make your faction the primary supplier for other factions by establishing waystations or engaging in piracy
- Thematically appropriate factions with better fleet compositions and with officer qualities, behavior, and aggression appropriate for the faction.


Why is this ship combat system better than anything available in the space strategy genre?

- There are many ship hulls in the game and each one has its own unique attributes, weapon hard points, and special systems. There are also variants of these hulls that swap hard points around or swap out the special systems.
- Small ships never become unusable. They can outmaneouver bigger ships and cause significant damage. They also cost less money and command points to deploy.
- Flux is generated when firing weapons and by absorbing weapon fire with your shields. When you over-flux, your ship temporarily shuts down and becomes a sitting duck. You must manage shield and weapon usage and know when to back off and when to go for the throat.
- Ship effectiveness degrades over time during combat. Combat readiness decreases per ship the longer a battle lasts, and this can cause issues like random engine shutdowns and weapon failures. This helps balance ships out as certain higher tech ships are deadly but degrade quickly in prolonged engagements compared to more mid and low tech ships.
- Ship combat AI is ruthless and will eliminate a straggler, including you. On that same note, your friendly ships will help cover you if ordered and can allow you a timely retreat to recoup and vent your flux.
- Officer AI determines how effectively they will pilot certain ships. Don't put an aggressive officer in your lightly armored support ship.


I'll update this when 0.9a is available. Right now you can follow along with the in-dev patch notes: http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=13445.0
Also check out the blogs: http://fractalsoftworks.com/blog/
Mods here: http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?board=8.0

[ESonix]

Vuyek님이 먼저 게시:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acqpulP1hLo

I’m just amazed this guy can get 2+ million views on an indie space strategy game review, especially when many other well known strategy game youtuber’s typically only get view counts in the thousands.

[Vuyek]

das tactic gets roughly 200 views on his videos now

sseth and mandaloregaming (no relation, anybody who says they are the same person are conspiracy theorists and deserve..... punishment) are youtube game review superstars.

from experience, I can tell you youtube hates small channels (anything less than 10K views per video). never promoted, channel will never grow.

[Gregorovitch]

ESonix님이 먼저 게시:

Vuyek님이 먼저 게시:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acqpulP1hLo

I’m just amazed this guy can get 2+ million views on an indie space strategy game review, especially when many other well known strategy game youtuber’s typically only get view counts in the thousands.

Having watched Rhadamant play this game for a few hours I can say that not a single word of that review is a lie, or even an exaggeration. Specially the bit about putting AAA studios to shame,

Nearly fell off my chair when the dude posted his CD key for the game at the end of the video. WTF? Still, he says they want a measly fifteen bucks for this game. I'm more than happy to oblige for this.

[ESonix]

Gregorovitch님이 먼저 게시:

Still, he says they want a measly fifteen bucks for this game. I'm more than happy to oblige for this.

Yeah, I know. So, $15, like wtf just give it a try! (I'm getting damn close!)

[Vuyek]

"Nearly fell off my chair when the dude posted his CD key for the game at the end of the video."

Greatest marketing. EVER.

Sales of this game rose astronomically after people "stole it", and tried it.

[Bou]

So this is basically Mount and Blade in space? I've only played the tutorial so far months ago but never continued playing.

[Gregorovitch]

Bou님이 먼저 게시:

So this is basically Mount and Blade in space? I've only played the tutorial so far months ago but never continued playing.

I's say M&B is not a bad analogy. Except the depth of the combat model and the number of different ships and weapon systems available together with the ( I think unique) combination of flux (nasty byproduct of using high tech equipment), shields and phase shifting (invis/teleport). Some ships defend with shields and some with phase shift. Both generate flux. When you reach your max flux buffer you are in trouble. You can "vent" to restore it over a few seconds but that's no help if you're getting your arse shot off. Push your luck with flux and you overload (think paralysed) which leaves you a sitting duck, defenceless, for several seconds. It's complicated.

The game appears to have a demon combat AI. To give an example a lot of pirates are short on high tech guns and favour overwhelming numbers of ramshackle ships equipped with basic stuff plus big old torpedoes. Torpedoes are pretty much useless against shields, but you can easily get 1-shotted by one if your shields are down. So they gank you using their peashooters with the intention of driving up your flux so you have to vent of face overload. The second your shields are down they ram their torpedoes down your throat, not before.

Nasty, malevolent AI.

[Vuyek]

flux is like heat in mechwarrior boardgame

[Gregorovitch]

Been playing this for a couple of days. Highly recommended to those that like the idea of it plus what they see in the vids. If both those are true it's unlikely to disappoint.

In a strange way the combat feels like XCOM where the biggest problem, for me anyway, is resisting the temptation to move a soldier forward to finish off a visible enemy and so trigger a second nasty pod in the process.

In this game the ship AI is canny and you fly just one ship, so most of your fleet is on AI, affected somewhat by your orders and the character and level of any officers you've assigned, as well as the enemy. They do not go in all guns blazing, they play cat and mouse waiting for an opponent to make a mistake and expose themselves to killing crossfire.

You, on the other hand, may find the temptation to chase down your half dead opponent to finish it off overwhelming. And walk into a world of pain as a result. Unfortunately your own ships will not follow you to help if they think you are being a reckless madman so you end up surrounded and isolated, quickly dispatched. Ganked is I believe the expression. I find it difficult to avoid doing this anyway. You've got to play chess. Also the way you load out your ships substantially affects the way you should play the chess.

Exploration is good - the galaxy feels big and dangerous. Because it is.

A key difference between this and many other such games is that buying ships is relatively cheap and "acquiring" them is relatively easy. Supporting/maintaining them however is not. It is measured in arms and legs. Additionally you have one save only and should you run out of fuel there is no limping home - you are good and stuck. If you saved somewhere out in the wilds you might be well and truly fucked as well. You can put out a distress call but far enough out good luck with that.

An effect of this is that everything you do in the game feels like a separate expedition, quest or mission you got to prepare for, finance etc, don't matter if its a survey/exploration trip, scavenging trip, trade run or bounty hunt. All these things are technically just repetitive game loop stuff but somehow it doesn't feel like that. Each trip feels like a new mission in XCOM in a way, like XCOM missions are also technically just repetitive game loop stuff but it also doesn't feel like it.

[Terminus]

How does this game compare to the X-series (X3, X4) of space games? Seems similar.

[Vuyek]

2d top down vs full 3d.....

completely different games

[Terminus]

Well they are both pilot based space/economic simulations, right? Dystopian?

[Vuyek]

blade runner and pink panther - same thing

[Mezmorki]

I've seen people make the comparison to the x-series games. Especially later in the x-games you basically aren't needing to pilot your own ship anymore unless it's just for kicks, as most of your time is spent managing your own base-fleet-station operations.

[Gregorovitch]

Terminus님이 먼저 게시:

How does this game compare to the X-series (X3, X4) of space games? Seems similar.

Only having played this a few days now this is preliminary summary:

Big difference obviously is X3/4 have 3D cockpit view flight sim mechanics, Starsector doesn't. Other than that there are similarities and differences:

Main Differences:

* The X game economy is much more sophisticated where trading etc is part of a real time economic simulation down to individual ware units. Starsector seems like a traditional game implementation just "inventing" trade opportunities on the fly for the player.

* Starsector's colony management, the equivalent of X3/4's station building is a simple screen based affair similar to most space 4Xs and nothing like X3/4's station building mechanics.

* Starsectors combat model is more sophisticated with more meaningful variety of ships and weapons, deeper tactical model with four damage types and four hard counters to them, more like a war game and less like an arcade shooter.

* Starsector's combat AI is stellar, in a different league to X games. Not only does this mean dealing with opposition of roughly equal strength is no laughing matter is also means your own ships behave remarkably well in battle. So although you can control your own ship in battle, and that feels a bit "arcady" in a way, it doesn't take away from the cerebral nature of the tactical combat since you can't win on your own. It's perhaps less exiting but more exacting and cerebral than X3/4.

* Pirates are a much bigger deal in Starsector than they are in X3/4. There are more of them and they are much more aggressive but also a more meaningful source of player income and XP.

* Interesting and more valuable loot is more of a thing in Starsector.

* Character development (RPG-ish style) is much more of a thing in Starsector.

Main Similarities:

* Both universes are of comparable size (subjectively)
* Both have similar number of factions that behave similarly towards the player and each other
* Exploration is a huge part of both games in a similar way
* Fleet building is a huge part of both games in a similar way
* Both games are essentially sandboxes governed by strong lore and a somewhat variable main story arc above it all.
* Both games are essentially about you growing in power to the point where you have significant/decisive impact on the universe and decide what you want to do with that power.

I own both games and if you tried to take one of them away from me you'd probably leave empty handed minus a few fingers. If you wanted to try just one of them for now I'd say the decision would turn on whether the 1st person 3D cockpit flight view, lovely station building mechanics and unique economy sim against a stunning spacescape backdrop in X4 appeals more to you or less to you than the more detailed, tactical and difficult combat model found in Starsector.

To that end there are plenty of vids about X4 to judge from, and here is an hour long combat tutorial about Starsector which gives IMO an excellent overview of Starsector's combat model that should make it easy to evaluate if it's for you.

https://youtu.be/LzQOwp13MHw