“Roguelike” is one of those terms that gets thrown around a lot. Here, I’m using it to mean “procedurally generated characters who are given procedurally generated overarching quests but need to perform lots of little procedurally generated little quests to accomplish those overarching quests. Oh, and you’re going to die a lot. Like, a lot a lot.”
Heat Signature is currently on sale for 20% off on Steam for $11.99. Twelve bucks.
Holy cow, is it worth it.
The conceit is simple. You start at a space station with a choice of four space-farers before you. They have, randomly, either a short blade, a long blade, a wrench, or a gun as well as some other item. Pick one of them. Walk over to the mission board and pick a mission… and the mission will be, randomly, a steal an item, kill a guy, capture a guy, rescue a guy. Then you get in your little pod ship and fly through your procedurally generated star system and get to the procedurally generated ship and perform your mission despite whatever number of guards you might happen to have on the ship. (Note: Blades kill, wrenches incapacitate without killing. So if you have to capture a guy, be sure to have a wrench on you. If you only have guns or blades, you’re going to fail the mission.)
If you’re successful with your mission, fly back to your home base (hey, why not hijack the ship you just looted?) and then do it all over again.
At some point you’re going to talk to the guy sitting the corner about your own personal mission (which is get revenge on a guy for hurting/killing a loved one, rescue a kidnapped loved one, steal a particular item to pay off the debt of a loved one…) and learn that it will cost 200 Currency Units to do that particular quest. Holy cow. The missions you’re going to be doing at this point give you, like, 9 Currency Units.
So you play and you play and you die and you start over and you play and you play and you figure out the mechanics and you die and you get better and you successfully do enough missions in a row (including the ones that pay 20, 30, 40 Currency Units) to get assigned that mission… and you die. Because, seriously, it’s a bear.
So you get better. You learn how to use sidewinders, and teleporters, and invisibility shields.
And then you write a review like this one telling other people that they need to get this game because it’s an awesome roguelike that also happens to be on sale.
So… what are you playing?
(Picture is HG Wells playing a war game from Illustrated London News (25 January 1913[/efn_note]
Installing Medieval II: Total War and three other games today. Paid a little under $12. I hate spending this much on luxuries.Report
I picked up Transistor, Stellaris, and War for the Overlord. Oh, and Stardew Valley.Report
Stellaris sounds interesting. That’s the one I’m most likely to kick myself for not buying on sale. I keep hearing it’s like Sid Meier’s Civ set in space, and it’s the first Paradox game that anyone can comprehend. Both comments are intended as compliments, but they seem a little backhanded.Report
Stardew Valley is the ultimate game for those who enjoy sorting m&ms. There is *SO* much to do while, at the same time, it’s very low-key and Zen.Report
@morat20
There’s a lot to like about Stellaris, it has a lot of systems that deliver classic space opera moments. That said, it still feels somewhat incomplete – every war ends in a single decisive battle, trade and diplomacy are very bare bones and the victory conditions barely exist at all.
Also, the next patch is going to be a big one – so it’ll be interesting to see what that does for the game.Report
In general, I find them….very complex, with minimalist tutorials and about two to three times as much complexity as I can handle.
I can grow to handle that level of complexity, but tossing me into it on “Easy” without an expansive tutorial that goes into details about the complex interactions?
Honestly, I figure if I can ever get Crusader Kings or Europa Universalis figured out, it’ll probably translate to all their other games. That first hump is killer, and I spent years playing EVE.Report
I’ve heard similar things. Stellaris is supposed to be their easiest game to get started in, and the way of thinking translates between Paradox games. I just think about the amount of effort it takes to figure some games out, and I’m not positive I want to go down that road.Report