SpaceCom: a trippy, Asteroids-like real-time strategy 4X
SpaceCom from Flow Combine, published by 11 Bit Launchpad in Poland for PC, provides a simple, surreal gaming experience. The graphics are reminiscent of a high-resolution Asteroids remake: thin lines and type on a black background. The color palette is minimal and soothing — the game uses mostly primary colors.
Above: Two fleets/pie pieces tackle two objectives simultaneously in SpaceCom.
The soundtrack is space-y synth (reminiscent of the more mellow work of Blade Runner composer Vangelis, to continue the 1980s references), and the game takes it seriously. “For meditative strategy experience, headphones recommended,” the launch screen declares.
“In SpaceCom, coincidence, luck, and fast clicking won’t get you far,” 11 Bit senior producer Marek Ziemak says in the video above. “The game is all about planning, all about strategic thinking, and executing your plan until you crash your last enemy.”
That philosophy translates into in-game action almost as sedate as the soundtrack. Moving a ship from one system to another takes in excess of 20 seconds, so while it’s real-time strategy, it’s delayed enough that opponents have plenty of opportunity to respond if they have a unit in the vicinity.
Above: The tutorial is as sleek as the rest of the UI — a few small movable windows that tell you what’s going on and what to do next.
You command three types of fleets. Battle fleets can engage other ships. Siege fleets attack ground forces, but are vulnerable themselves. And invasion fleets capture systems, but need battle escorts to protect them.
The interface to control your ships is actually lovely. The little pie-shaped outlines that represent ships contain three bands: the tip, the middle, and the crust, to extend that analogy. If the fleet contains battle units, the tip band will be solidly colored; if it has siege units, the center stripe is colored in; and if there are invasion units, the crust piece is solid. If a fleet has a combination of units, the stripes representing those units will all be colored. So a single fleet collection with battle and siege units would have both the tip and the center stripe solidly colored, for example.
By looking at which bands have color, you can see at a glance which types of ships are in a particular fleet, and a tiny number next to it tells you how large the overall group is.
Above: Here, a battle fleet and a siege fleet converge on a system to capture it. The numbers next to the pie pieces are how many ships are in each; the numbers below are how many seconds are left before they arrive.
System hubs come in four flavors. Basic hubs expand your population limit, shipyards build you more fleets, repair yards fix your ships, and resource hubs provide supplies to fuel the rest. They come with sci-fi names such as Sigma Centauri and Nanga Oburu … and names that might sound exotic only in the developers’ home country, such as Denver and Yuma.
The strategy comes from your efforts to overwhelm your opponents or the AI; you have to set up tactical plans in advance. If your fleet is in painfully slow movement toward a faraway goal, it doesn’t matter if it takes the enemy 20 seconds to reach your planet — they’re still going to get there before you can turn around. And if someone destroys your resource hub or interrupts the flow of supplies, your shipyards can’t build reinforcements.
Above: The SpaceCom single-player mission control screen.
The single-player missions are satisfying, with obtainable goals and optional tasks that are mostly simple. One might ask you to capture an enemy base, while another tasks you with keeping all of your fleets alive. Unfortunately, no multiplayer games (or opponents) were available when I did my trial during the beta test this week. The game supports six-person multiplayer.
You can get a free key to the closed beta by visiting the SpaceCom Facebook page.
Starion Tactics: a traditional turn-based game for the more casual players
Strategy games in the 4X genre are traditionally turn-based, and Starion Tactics sticks to that tradition. Graphically, the game is a huge step up from SpaceCom, but the gameplay, while serviceable, doesn’t feel as elegant. Starion’s developer is Corncrow Games in Sweden, and it launches today on Steam for PC.
Until September 12, it’s $15; after that, it goes up to $20.
In Starion you capture neutral planets to harvest resources to build fleets to capture the enemy’s planets. These unclaimed worlds may or may not have defenses, depending on the game options you choose. Your ships take varying amounts of turns or resources to build, depending on their attack and defense characteristics.
You can move one system in any direction in the grid with your ships during each turn. As with most turn-based games, you queue up all the actions you’d like to take, then set them in motion.
Above: This is the piece of the grid you’ll see at the start; your randomly generated starting planet and those next door, which are neutral.
You move ships from place to place, start construction on new crafts, or use Cards or “Artefacts” that grant resources, extra abilities, or even game-changing events. For example, a Card might grant you a single resource unit or kill every active ship on the board, sparing only ships being built.
“This one is aiming a bit more toward people who are novices in 4X,” said lead developer William Gillström in an interview from Sweden. “It’s not as complicated when it comes to micromanagement. It’s for people like me. I’m a novice when it comes to strategy games.”
Above: The Starion Tactics manual.
The casual-gamer connection is clear: The manual is just a few heavily illustrated pages. Zoom out on the Starion Tactics system field with the fog of war (that obscures the enemy) turned off, and the display will resolve into fat, colored dots connected with lines, like a digital version of Connect Four.
The game strives for real 4X-style gameplay without the “crazy-long” game sessions, Gillström said. In that way, it’s much like SpaceCom. The game supports multiplayer with up to 4v4 in team play, but that feature was not available at the time of my test.
If you choose to host a multiplayer game — and you’re really hosting it; Starion’s servers are just for matchmaking — you set the time allowed per turn, from 5 seconds to an infinite duration.
Above: These slightly cheesy — but amusing — animated graphics for battles between ships are available as an option.
I found the gameplay unusually easy (I won the King achievement for capturing every planet in my first game), but I expect that will change fast once multiplayer arrives.
Galactic Civilizations III is the only real competition for Civilization: Beyond Earth in this bunch. But they’re all fun strategy diversions while you’re waiting for Sid Meier to launch into space.
GamesBeat received download codes for these games for purposes of writing this roundup.