Between The Stars is fun if you enjoy games like Wing Commander and Star Trek Bridge Commander
Between The Stars is fun if you enjoy games like Wing Commander and Star Trek Bridge Commander
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Would fans of descent freespace or freelancer enjoy this?
Recently discovered Between the Stars and it’s very much like Wing Commander and Star Trek Bridge Commander. You create a character (just for looks) and then you are the captain of a ship with your own crew. There’s a main story you can follow but you can also take a lot of side missions from friendly allied posts or planets. You can upgrade your weapons as well as yourself and your crew to strengthen certain specialties they have. For example, engineers can be made to make the ship handle better, the medical people can heal your crew faster or lessen their chances of being injured, some can also make your weapons stronger.
The main meat of the game is in the space battles. You can divert your ship’s energy to weapons, shields, and engine. If you do that, you will make them perform better. This is most observable with the engine as it will allow your ship to move around to have a better chance of avoiding blasts and lasers from enemies.
Each location has a planet, an allied station that you can dock at and buy stuff, repair your ship, buy new things that don’t come from enemies, and hire new crew members. Sometimes, there are also side missions that you can accept from those places and these missions have their own little stories. The stories are actually quite interesting, but they’re delivered via text so you’re going to have to read a lot if you want to learn what’s going on.
There are also events and battles that happen randomly that don’t involve your ship. For example, sometimes, you might encounter hostile survivors in a ship you’re investigating. The battle happens via dice rolls. You roll a dice, you deal damage to the enemies. Other times, you need to use dice rolls when dealing with situations that rely on chance. For example, if you find a locked door, you can ask your engineers to open it for you, but it’ll depend on whether your dice roll meets the minimum number result requirement that it wants.
The game’s very fun and interesting even if it’s a low budget game. There’s no on foot 3D exploration, which is a little disappointing, because the side missions really feel like they would’ve made for som every interesting 3D adventure themselves. It reminds me of the original Mass Effect game where there’s a sense of wonder and entertainment value even in the most random side missions.
One weakness of the game I’ve noticed so far is that sometimes, random events would repeat. For example, those encounters with broken ships that either have friendly or hostile survivors. I’ve seen those three times already in the 12 hours I’ve been playing the game.
Beyond the Stars is a fun game if you enjoy Wing Commander and other spaceship simulator games. It’s beautiful enough to look at within its limitations as a low budget game, while it is unfortunately limited by its presentation when it comes to the story. If this only had 3D on foot exploration for the side missions, it would’ve been a lot better. It’s still a decent and enjoyable space game for sure.
Oh, bridge commander. Would love to see a new one
Mind if I recommend the Spacebourne 2? It’s a one-man made indie game and I’ve seen it jokingly called the completed Star Citizen.
What kinda heavy ships you got in there
Somehow, I own it already.
I’m guessing it was in EA and part of a bundle at some point?
EDIT: Looked up when I got it, and seems it was part of the Jan 2022 Humble Choice.
YAY, finally a decent space game?
I’m still mad and salty about Starfield. I mean, I had zero expectations but at least I thought it’d be good space adventure. Boy I was so wrong…