Travis Baldree and Erich Schaefer are no strangers to gaming. Schaefer is the co-founder of Blizzard North, creator of Diablo, and with Baldree the two founded Runic Games together in 2008, creating the Torchlight series. But their newest co-founded studio Double Damage is unique in that it’s a two man operation: Not an easy feat, especially when your goal is produce a game like Rebel Galaxy, their sandbox space sim with a bit of an outlaws-of-the-frontier vibe. We had the opportunity to try out the preview version which showcases a piece of a what should be a very large project. I had an up-and-down experience with it, but in the end I found myself liking it quite a bit, and I’m excited to see how this title develops.
The mechanics of Rebel Galaxy are going to be familiar to anyone who’s played their share of space simulators: Travel the galaxy, trade commodities, fight space pirates or privateer on your own, but the scope of Rebel Galaxy is going to be different than your average space flight sim. Instead of piloting a starfighter you’re going to be put in charge of commanding a capital ship of considerable size and might. Instead of acrobatic dogfights you’re going to be in charge the big guns, firing massive broadside cannons at other giant star cruisers. Think of it as WWII navy battles with plasma cannons, but don’t mistake that to mean the action is going to be slow-paced. While your ship doesn’t move with the lithe ease of a fighter craft, even the heavier crafts are nimble enough that you won’t despair at controlling some lumbering behemoth. Your ship will only move on a horizontal plane (back and forth, left and right, like ship combat in Assassin’s Creed) while fighters, which you will not control, also move vertically. At first not being able to move in all directions feels like a disappointing exclusion, but once you get started you won’t feel yourself missing the option.
In combat you will duel with other capital ships, maneuvering to launch broadsides against each other. Your foes are usually accompanied by an entourage of fighters who use their speed to flank and harass. In addition to your cannons your ship has auto-aiming turrets which will defend against fighters, or you can switch control to individual guns and man them yourself. With enough credits you can also hire your own mercenary accompaniment to protect you. I think the game intends to have you leading big battles with large numbers of dueling ships, which sounds very exciting, but in the preview I found combat usually came it two forms: Me obliterating an underpowered enemy who had no chance, or being obliterated without a chance. As I got further into the game I did enjoy a few tense, challenging encounters, and I’m sure they aren’t trying to play all their cards in the first demo , but I hope the complete game will provide more engaging battles as it progresses.
In the preview I had the opportunity to try a few different ships and I’m not sure they felt that much different from one another. However, upgrading those ships with new equipment is going to make all the difference in the world. Rebel Galaxy has plenty of upgrades available from your standard firepower improvements and shield and armor buffs, to some more unique items like software which increases the accuracy of your secondary weapons’ auto aim or improves the precision of a mining laser used to split open asteroids and claim the minerals inside. The difference between a well-outfitted ship and the starter package is night and day, and while at first I was frustrated how unprepared I felt at the beginning, once I realized the value of a few smartly chosen upgrades I felt like the balance is pretty smartly done.
For a game being made by just two people, even industry veterans, Rebel Galaxy is a nice-looking game, both in the quality of the graphics but also the smart design and art direction and once the ship-to-ship battles start going the effects look pretty great. Perhaps more enchanting is just how lovely space is with it’s grand color palette full of celestial wonders, ominous debris fields and other lonesome space stations. A little less perfect is the game’s soundtrack, which is mostly southern rock. While it’s not really to my liking, it does match the spirit of the game pretty well and I think the tracks selected are pretty good, there just wasn’t enough variety before the same handful of songs started getting on my nerves. This is one of those things that I imagine won’t be an issue in the full game.
Candidly, it took me some time to warm up to Rebel Galaxy. Other than the nice graphics the game starts out feeling a little overwhelming; most of the story missions went along the lines of “Go here and come back” and until you figure out the technique to outfitting your ship it can be prohibitively deadly to try out side missions. With a little time invested the game does pick up and some of the side missions and random encounters can actually be a lot of fun. The commodity trading does not feel well fleshed out, with little more than listening to rumors at the bar and buying things on the cheap to sell at higher prices somewhere else. This is an established hallmark of these types of games and I hope to see it expanded upon in the full release. My understanding is that the devs at least envision a game where you can play a more involved role in the ebb and flow of commerce, so hopefully that comes into fruition in the full game.
This is an issue that is probably restricted to the demo but there is only one save file, meaning that you can only play from that save or you start a new game. This wouldn’t be an issue on a demo except that the game will autosave at some inopportune moments, like at the beginning of a fight that you have no hope of winning. My first game was rendered unplayable when the game saved in the middle of an ambush by a pirate fleet that I couldn’t escape and nearly did the same a few other times on my next game. This can obviously be fixed by offering multiple saves, or even by saving the game before it’s too late to escape, but I came very close to giving up on this game early because of that issue and I hope it gets addressed.
While I do have some criticisms about the preview, I did find myself having more fun than I expected with Rebel Galaxy. Even though there were a few spots where I set down the controller and said “No more”, I kept finding myself coming back for a little more and I’m glad I did. Rebel Galaxy has some issues, but nothing so big that it is keeping the game from it becoming something pretty great. I look forward to seeing more of what Double Damage has to offer, we’ll be keeping an eye on this title.
