Hey guys, welcome to my weekly op-ed column that I’m calling “Spacing Out” (the name was a joint effort between my girlfriend and I ;). I realized I’d not been really writing enough op-ed pieces, and came up with the idea of doing them weekly, both as a writing exercise and a way to put thoughts and ideas out there to share and discuss with y’all. :) I’ll be doing these every Wednesday, because if I don’t set a specific day to do ‘em, I never will, you know? ;) Recently, 4X games have been on my mind after the recent release of StarDrive. After I made my decision to put my review of the game on hold, I was taken to task on a forum I frequent for not liking other recent entries in the 4X space race, such as Endless Space and Sword of the Stars II. This got me to thinking, what HAS been going on with spacey 4X games of late?
Continue reading “Spacing Out: The Trouble with 4X Games” »
Spacing Out: The Trouble with 4X Games
SGJ Podcast #12: A Potpourri of Pew Pew
Haaaaaaaaayyyy guuuuuuuuys, how are ya? Sorry for the delay in this week’s podcast episode, but Jim and I were both busier than usual this week with the real life nonsense. That said, we had no guest this past week, so we just caught up on what we’ve been playing, the news and all sorts of other stuff. It was a fun time, so we hope you enjoy it.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
As always, please feel free to comment on the podcast below (I’m not creating specific forum threads anymore, no one uses ‘em ;) and follow us using RSS and/or iTunes. Thanks for listening!
Continue reading “SGJ Podcast #12: A Potpourri of Pew Pew” »
StarDrive Open Beta: Fast-Paced 4X Frivolity (With a Fuss…)
I’m writing this while on a bit of Vicodin (just got a tooth removed), so I’ll blame any inaccuracies or irrelevancies on that. ;) Now, a while back I wrote a preview on a much earlier version of StarDrive that was provided through Desura as a Kickstarter reward I believe. That early version had some issues, but it was still a good time. Now, in a preview, us writin’ folk are supposed to stay positive since the game isn’t finished yet, which is mostly what you’ll see here, but since you can buy the game already, and it’s this close to being released (like, this Friday), I’m also gonna be a bit blunt on some things as well, stuff I’d usually save for a review. That said, the earlier line still holds true, this version still has some issues…
Continue reading “StarDrive Open Beta: Fast-Paced 4X Frivolity (With a Fuss…)” »
Space Game News 1/28/13: Drowning in Videos
Hey y’all, happy Monday! I hopy y’all had a great weekend and, sadly like me, are back to work (kidding, I am SO VERY HAPPY I have such an awesome job). ;) Even though it’s a Monday, we don’t have to a have a case of such, so let’s start the week off right with some spacey game news. :)
- Beyond Beyaan – The big news of the day is that the Kickstarter for Beyond Beyaan began this morning, so that Brent can help spruce the game up some. Head on over and give it a look see! :) I’ll also embed the pitch video below. :) The dev is also giving away some Master of Orion keys over on the GOG forums, so be sure to check that out.
- Rogue System – There’s a new teaser video available that shows some LOVELY shield splash effects that y’all need to see, and I’ll also embed it below. :)
- Enemy Starfighter – Speaking of new videos, there’s a new vid of this game showing off fighter speeds, which I’ll also embed below.
- EVE Online – According to The Mittani, there was a 3,000 ship fight in LowSec this past weekend that you have to freaking see to believe. Apparently fifty dreadnoughts were lost, and nearly forty carriers alone among all sides, which included over 700 corporations and 200 alliances. Holy crap, I tells ya. Eurogamer also has words on this.
- Kerbal Space Program – You can read a new preview over on IGN, and see some new videos over on Twitch.TV that were recorded over the weekend.
- Ring Runner – There’s a new preview up on LevelSave that’s a fun little read.
- Dominion – These guys have a new dev blog for y’all to follow with an RSS feed! YAY RSS feeds! I live off ‘em, for serious.
- StarLife – Thanks to 4xgamer for pointing out some new videos of the game, which I’ll embed below. Note: Their new site needs an RSS feed, for serious. ;) I mean sure, they have a mailing list too, but c’mon. ;)
- X3: Reunion – According to this forum thread, there’s a new build of the Linux version of the game for testing.
- ScrumbleShip – Both the game’s Kickstarter and IndieDB page has more detail about it’s latest 0.20 release, which has a ton of features such as Mac support, new GUI options and much more.
- StarMade – New version 0.089999 (nope, not making that number up) adds a new catalog system which makes for easier searching and faster gameplay, apparently. I need to try it myself to be sure. ;)
- OreSome – Apparently there’s a new first look video from Riddler Gaming er…looking at the game (embedded below), and their IndieDB page has listed several recent changelogs.
- Drifter – The developer posted a new screenshot in which he’s going sightseeing in the game. WANT NOW PLZKTHNXBYE.
- X-Wing – The Game Jar reminisces about the game a little bit.
That’s it for today folks. Have a great one! :)
Spacey Gamey News and Dealsies – 12/21/12
Hey everyone, happy Friday! As this will very likely be the last thing I post before Christmas day, I wanted to wish all those who celebrate the holiday a joyous, fun, and present-filled holiday. :) Now let’s jump into some news and deals!
- First up the Emeny Starfighter site has been updated with two awesome videos showing some fun, short bits of the game. I’ll embed these below, but be sure to check ‘em out, especially the one showing things getting blowed up. ;)
- Okay, get this folks. There’s a new update for one of the Distant Worlds expansions, but not Legends, rather, Return of the Shakturi. That’s kinda crazy awesome. Apparently, “v1.5.0.11 update incorporates all the bug fixes and performance improvements from Distant Worlds: Legends,” which is pretty cool if you’ve not purchased Legends yet.
- Star Trek Online Community Manager Brandon “BranFlakes” Felczer was interviewed on the Deck Eight podcast.
- The Limit Theory Kickstarter has been updated with talk on creating a faction and a new tech demo, which I’ll embed below. Definitely looking awesome!
- Rock, Paper Shotgun has posted an excellent review of Drox Operative that anyone on the fence about getting the game needs to read.
- Iteration 14 of Void Destroyer has been released, which includes a new command mode, turret enhancements and more!
- The Vendetta Online folks have released their holiday newsletter, which offers some free time for previous subscribers and so on.
- The Star Conflict folks are now offering gold standards for victories in battles, which can be used as currency in the game it seems.
- Finally, the Elite: Dangerous Kickstarter has been updated with video of a scavenger hunt (embedded below) as well as some other useful links. Whoopiedeedoo.
Now onto deals, of which there are a bunch today. First off, GamersGate’s holiday sale seems to be in full force, and they have the following funness:
- Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion for $19.99
- Stellar Impact for $2.49 (which is still way too much)
- Galactic Civilizations II: Ultimate Edition for $13.37
- Galactic Civilizations Ultimate Collection for $16.99
- Master of Orion for $1.48
- Master of Orion 3 for $4.98 (again, too much)
- Gratuitous Space Battles for $4.49
- Gratuitous Space Battles: The Nomads for $1.79
- Gratuitous Space Battles: The Parasites for $1.80
- Gratuitous Space Battles: Galactic Conquest for $1.79
- Gratuitous Space Battles: The Order for $1.79
- Gratuitous Space Battles: The Swarm for $1.79
- Gratuitous Space Battles: The Tribe for $1.79
- Gratuitous Space Battles Complete Pack for $6.30
- Space Empires 4 for $1.99
- Space Empires 5 for $3.99 (wow too much)
- Space Empire Bindle (Includes 4 and 5) for $5.99
- Space Empires Star Fury for $1.99
- Galactic Dream – Rage of War for $3.99
- O.R.B. for $3.99
- Dark Matter for $3.74
- Independence War Deluxe for $3.00
- Independence War 2: Edge of Chaos for $3.00
WHEW. Now, we’re not done yet, because DotEmu is also having a sale, which includes the following:
- Space Empires: Starfury for $3.00
- Space Empires 4 for $3.00
- Darkstar One for $3.00
- O.R.B. for $1.50
NOW we’re done, and I need a nap. ;) Again, have a wonderful and festive holiday folks, and thanks as always for visiting. :)
Spacey Gamey NewsiDealsNess – 12/19/12
Hey y’all, happy Wednesday! I’m still on the mend, but feeling better, in case y’all were wondering, which is great because it’s less than a week now before Christmas, yay! I hope y’all thought long and hard about what y’all are gonna get me, I have HUGE expectations! ;) Seriously, folks, every visit and comment is a gift to me, so again, thank you. :) Now, not a lot of news today, unsurprisingly, so let’s get to it! Remember, any video that I can embed will be so after the cut below. :)
- According to a press release I was sent, the third expansion for Endless Space, entitled “Lights of Polaris“, has now been released. This adds a “no pirates” option (WOOHOO!), Steam achievements and so on. You can see some shots of the new expansion on Iceberg Interactive’s Facebook.
- There’s a new update on the Elite: Dangerous Kickstarter that features a call to arms as well as a new teaser video. I’m sure the fourteen folks laid off last week from Frontier Developments are thrilled to watch it. Maybe. (Sorry, something about that bugs me, enough to say so publicly.)
- There’s also a new trailer for Galactose: Pastries in Space which looks like a ton of fun. I seriously need to sit down and play my copy. Speaking of which, they’re still looking for playtesters. ;)
- Finally in news (seriously, that’s it, I’m not even kidding), the folks over at Rock, Paper Shotgun have an interview with Squad, the developers of Kerbal Space Program, which is a fun read.
We’re not done yet though. GOG is having an End of the World sale and it’s a BIGGIE. Seriously, tons of awesome games are even more discounted than they were just a day ago during their regular holiday sale. For spacey gamers, this includes the following:
- FTL is half-off at $4.99
- The Santa in Space Promo, which gives you all of the following games for $15.41 (75% off) or at the following individual prices:
- Moonbase Commander for $2.99
- Fragile Allegiance for $2.99
- Nexus: The Jupiter Incident for $4.99
- Star Control 1+2 for $2.99
- Star Control 3 for $2.99
- Master of Orion 1+2 for $2.99
- Haegemonia Gold Edition for $4.99
- Independence War Deluxe for $2.99
- Independence War 2: The Edge of Chaos for $2.99
The prices also vary depending on which games in the bundle you already own, if any. This bundle is a fantastic deal, so I suggest y’all jump on it if you can.
That’s it for today folks. Have a lovely day ahead, and thanks for visiting!
Space Game News and Deals – 11/28-30/12
Hey y’all, happy Friday! SO, SO sorry about the lack of news for the last couple of days, lots of busy work stuff that had to be finished and I just had neither the time or the energy. Things have slowed a bit now, so now I can get caught up, so let’s dive in, shall we?
- The BIG BIG news is that Drox Operative has been fully released! YAY! If you have a beta version of the game, you can download a patch to bring it up to 1.000. I’ve spoken about the game at length, if you’re curious to read my thoughts, so if you’ve been waiting for the final version before diving in, now’s the time to try it. Don’t forget there’s a demo too that let’s you get up to level six.
- The next piece of big news is that Steam has announced their next spate of Greelinght-approved titles, and both Blackspace (which is continuing despite a sadly-failed Kickstarter campaign) and Kinetic Void made the cut. Congrats to both teams!
- Next up, Miner Wars 2081 was finally released, and you can get it on Steam and GamersGate, as well as view a launch trailer (also embedded after the cut). This is the mostly single-player version of the game, the MMO will be along later, FYI.
- In Limit Theory news, the folks at Rock, Paper Shotgun also interviewed Josh about his game. ;) There’s also a new update on Kickstarter showing off a video of the ship editor, which I’ll also embed below. :)
- The Kickstarter for Predestination announced that they’ve been 50% funded — yay! — along with revealing new concept art and more. Check it out.
- PC Gamer has an interview with Notch where he speaks of 0x10c, kickstarter and a bunch of other fun stuff. Thanks to Blue’s for the tip.
- According to the dev blog for Star Trek Online, the next update for Season 7 will bring promoted user-generated content, the ability to NPCs and more. Thanks to VG247 for the tip.
- Thanks to Rock, Paper Shotgun for letting us know there’s now a demo for the cool looking spacey shooter Retrobooster, which I have to try. ;)
- GOG has made a bunch more of their games Mac compatible, including Master of Orion 1+2, Star Control 1+2 and Star Control 3. Very cool stuff. I also just noticed this, but they must’ve added the soundtrack for Master of Orion 2 as well, since it wasn’t there when I originally downloaded it.
- There’s a buncha Endless Space news! First, their second free content update was released, called “Echoes of the Endless”. This adds exploration awards, random events, new heroes and tons more. To help celebrate, Steam is having both a free weekend to play the game and is selling it for 50% off as well. Gamasutra has an article looking at the background of Amplutude Studio, and finally, 4xgamer has a nonsensical review of the latest release, which is pretty funny. ;)
- There’s also been a ton of EVE Online newsiness as well. First off, Retribution will be deployed on December 4th, and some new dev blogs have been released detailing corp hanger changes, UI improvements, and the new safe logoff system. They’re also going to be included in the first round of games for an exhibit at MOMA in New York City dedicated to video games, which is very cool.
- Both Star Conflict and the X3 Series have seen updates.
- Finally in gamey news, there’s a new dev diary for Elite: Dangerous talking about how the galaxy evolves over time, and it’ll also be embedded in the cut.
Now, in deals, there’s a bunch to discuss.
- There’s a new bundle at Bundle Stars which includes Star Wolves 2. Currently the price is $6.88 for all of the games.
- If you’d like Star Wolves 3: Civil War, the new Indie Gala bundle lets you get it and other games if you pay currently more than $3.94.
- You can pre-order Iron Sky Invasion for 60% off at Green Man Gaming, bringing the price to $15.99.
- Finally, you can get the amazing Hardwar on sale this weekend at DotEmu for $2.40.
These are some fantastic deals, all told (well, I dunno about Iron Sky yet, but the rest are really awesome).
That’s it folks! I hope y’all had a lovely week, and may you have a fantastic weekend ahead!
Continue reading “Space Game News and Deals – 11/28-30/12” »
Spacey Gamey Deals All Over the Interwebs!
Happy Black Friday y’all! I hope y’all had a lovely Thanksgiving here in the US, and I hope y’all are jumping on all the sales today. In trying to help y’all out, I’m putting this post all the non-Steam sales on spacey games I can find. Here we go:
Spacey Game News and Deals – 11/19/12
Hello there y’all, and happy Monday! What a day it’s been already, thanks to the Star Citizen news, but besides that, other stuff happened over the weekend as well, so let’s get it out of the way! :)
- Speaking of Star Citizen, there were a TON of updates leading up to the end of their crowdfunding campaign, so let’s just pound ‘em out right now. First off, we have more general end of campaign,final countdown and 24-hours-to-go updates. Here’s also a photo of the team within the last 24 hours from Twitter. Then, a ton of stuff was unlocked, such as the Krell, Stanton, Kallis and Chronos systems, as well as the new Drake Cutlass, the Caterpilar Armored Transport and the ORIGIN M50 Interceptor. There are also two new vids (which I’ll embed below the cut) of early AI combat as well as an early test of a 3D spaceport. Finally, GOG has an interview with Chris Roberts as well. Whew!
- In Strike Suit Zero news, they have word that the release date for the game is January 24th, 2013! Already?! Nice, can’t wait to play it!
- The ModDB page of Freeworlds: Tides of War — You know, that AMAZING Freelancer mod/total conversion that I can’t wait to play — has an update talking about the final phase of the game and how development is in full swing! YAY!
- Now that the Elite: Dangerous has cleaned up its tiers a bit (they make more sense now, thankfully), they’ve added new pledge add-ons to confuse things further. Or something.
- The StarLife blog has been updated with some brief race descriptions. Brief indeed!
- According to my friend over at Matchsticks for My Eyes, he has word that the mobile port of Master of Orion called Starbase Orion will be ported to the PC via a Kickstarter next year. Oh, the irony of it all. I think.
- Both Sword of the Stars II and Vendetta Online got updates over the weekend.
- The Predestination blog has had its first update in forever with new screenshots that are gorram sexy.
- The Beyond Beyaan blog has been updated with news on dealing with resource shortages. I hate when that happens.
- The Three Moves Ahead podcast recently had a podcast talking to Chris Park of Arcen about AI War and stuff.
- In our final news piece, the SkyJacker folks have relaunched their digital store if you wanna still buy the game. They’ve also announced a new Kickstarter campaign which will build funds for an app to go along with their game.
Now, onto the deals. As its Thanksgiving week here in the U.S., the deals are gonna come hot and heavy, especially from Steam, who will have so many I’ll likely not be able to share ‘em all (I suggest the amazing DDDeals and Cheap Ass Gamer to help keep up). GamersGate, however, has hit the ground running with their Thanksgiving sale, and it includes the following spacey goodness.
- Galactic Civilizations Ultimate Bundle (both games) for $16.99
- Galactic Civilizations II: Ultimate Edition for $13.37
- Galactic Civilizations: Ultimate Edition for $6.67
- Sins of a Solar Empire Trinity for $9.98
- Sins of a Solar Empire Rebellion for $19.98
- X3: Reunion for $4.98
- X3: Terran Conflict for $7.48
- X3: Albion Prelude (which needs the above game to run) for $4.98
- X3: Gold Edition (which includes the above three games) for $12.50 (best deal, IMO)
- Genesis Rising for $2.48
- Darkstar One for $5.00
Aaaand I need a nap now. ;) Have a great day y’all!









