Space Base Startopia Review
need to know
What is it? The spiritual successor to the classic space station management simulation game Startopia.
Expect to pay 45 USD/41.39 GBP
release March 26, 2021
Developer Realmforge studio
Publisher Calypso Media
Review date GTX 1080 Ti, Intel i7-8086K, 16GB RAM
multiplayer game? Yes
Associate Official website
Spacebase Startopia is a passionate tribute to one of my favorite management games. More than just a tribute, really, because it elevates almost everything from the original Startopia to the name-it’s more like an unofficial remake. Going back to my huge donut-shaped space station, I should finally be satisfied after waiting for twenty years, but I am a bit contradictory.
Sometimes the similarities are very obvious, it feels like Startopia has undergone a visual upgrade, but being so close to the original also emphasizes the way it missed the mark. Just like those terrible, terrible gimmicks.
We went the wrong way, Spacebase Startopia and me, when it introduced me to my ruthless virtual assistant. Clippy knows nothing about VAL. VAL is an AI partner. He will track your goals, occasionally give up suggestions and keep you disappointed. An AI that is also an idiot is a very popular field, but VAL lacks a key element: it’s just not funny. The writing lacks the wisdom of Glados or even the original Startopia’s AI (also known as VAL), but delivery is the real problem. All three voice options sound like they are run through a text-to-speech program, making them completely incapable of teasing laughter with tone or time.
(Image source: Kalypso Media)
Fortunately, Spacebase Startopia is actually very attractive when you are not bothered by assistants or reading pop-up windows. You will continue to deal with construction projects, visitors in need, mountains of garbage and occasional deaths-I will not pay for speed settings or just a pause button-but you should still spend some time to shelve your responsibilities look around. This is a messy hive full of activities, and there is always something to watch, whether it’s tourists wearing the beautiful new hats they just won from the trophy draw-a reference that has begun to feel outdated-or a large group tore it up Dance on the disco floor and perform different movements according to their species.
Sometimes I follow my diligent little robots as they transport crates and clean up dirty organic matter in the station. They are cute. Even trash bins have some personality, because they are actually robots, and once the robots fill them up, they will send the total cargo to the recycling station. They have very serious faces and I love them.
Dirty
However, before you get too excited about recycling, I should add that when you see some garbage in the real world, Spacebase Startopia will make you start twitching. Disposing of all the rubbish generated by the residents of the station is a difficult task, and unless you give up, you will never be able to truly complete it. In order to master it, you need to help your robot, pick it up manually and place it yourself, as well as squash all the small animals attracted by the dirt. Picking up trash in the original Startopia was not fun, and it was even worse among its spiritual successors. Compared to any other single thing in Spacebase Startopia, I might spend more time on this frustrating task, which is very frustrating. It does make me thankful that I didn’t spend more time on the dirt, at least.
(Image source: Kalypso Media)
At first glance, Spacebase Startopia looks completely chaotic, with hordes of aliens and robots rushing between the rooms, and there is an endless stream of tourists. But this is organized chaos; everyone is working or meeting their many needs and vices, and each is an important link in the ever-spreading chain, making the music in the disco constantly surging, and the factory constantly developing new ideas. Blueprint. Hope they can also bring you some energy, your main currency. Although the ten tasks of the event have different goals, in the end you usually just want to attract more tourists and their wallets, earn energy and prestige-the second currency related to tourist satisfaction-and then you can Turn into more rooms and facilities, attracting more tourists. In sandbox mode, you can do this as much as you want, but the event makes you professional and teaches you how to run a trade center, medical station, and a great resort.
No matter what your focus is, you may still use everything you can use, but the event allows you to easily enter by slowly unlocking a complete list of building projects, allowing you to wait until the end to have absolutely everything. This makes some early tasks very boring, but later you will be thankful that you have not been thrown into the abyss. Spacebase Startopia is not a particularly challenging management game, but it can be demanding, dragging you to the entire space station to reach trade agreements, supervise research projects and ensure that all your facilities are fully equipped.
Once you have a few toys to play with, the three-level system has also proven to be a boon. Each station is divided into several sections, separated by bulkheads that can be opened for a fee and three dedicated decks. At the bottom, you have the main deck, where you will spend most of your time. It has berths, medical centers, all your industrial and safety buildings, research-basically a hodgepodge of essential things. The second deck is where visitors relax their tentacles and enjoy entertainment. There are arcades, cat cafes, and even rides that take people into the black hole-fun and scary for the whole family. Finally, there is the biological deck, where important resources grow, and you can turn it into anything from robots to room blueprints. Tourists looking for peace and tranquility also like to hang out here, you can modify it to adapt to different needs or generate specific resources.
(Image source: Kalypso Media)
The deck system is one of Startopia’s defining features, and it can also work here. It divides huge sites into digestible chunks, which means you will never just stare at the same things for hours. It’s not just your visitors who benefit from some relaxing time on the bio deck. Although pirate raiders murdering people on one deck will not take a break because you are busy preventing everyone from suffocating on another deck, this distance makes it easier to prioritize and focus.
War is hell
Speaking of pirate attackers, the battle is really bad. Whether it’s a pirate or a monster emerging from an alien cocoon, fighting is the least interesting aspect of the job. Manage your security robots and machinery-your guests or employees will not fight-mainly by clicking on what you want to kill… that’s it. Each type of mecha also has a unique ability, but for this kind of superficial encounter, it feels a bit too much. I also had to rearrange a lot of rooms to give my first machine enough space to move around, so I was disgusted. It’s kind of absurd to have to design the entire space station around something you will almost never use. I want to like them, they look great-like big toys-but I am not a fan.
Entering the battle also means switching to a different mode, where the battle interface unnecessarily occupies one-third of the screen. In this mode, you can only control your combat units. When the battle breaks out, you have to switch modes and tell your units to go to the dangerous area, switch back to the regular mode to continue to manage the station, and at the same time they move towards the destination, wait for the notification that the attack is in progress, then switch back to the battle mode and take over. For such a basic RTS layer, there is absolutely no need to do all this nonsense. At least, invasions are not common, but this makes it clearer that they should be cut off. There is really not much that can be saved.
(Image source: Kalypso Media)
With the invasion, other random events emerged, providing more compelling management of wrinkles. Sometimes your task is to make time-sensitive choices, for example, which will have a series of positive and negative consequences. Some of them only give you bad choices, so you have to choose the one you think is the most tolerable, but these events also give you the opportunity to get some very convenient gains. You will also receive an offer, such as someone asking to unload a pile of garbage to get a good return, or offering a fee to clean up some of your own garbage. There are many ways to enter and exit the jam.
One of the incidents also taught me a valuable lesson: If you are also engaged in the work of healing people, it may be possible to let the plague take root in your position. There are not many opportunities to be very ruthless, but this is a great opportunity. I feel a little sorry for my behavior and apologize to some aliens.
I wish there were more of these things: hard choices and corruption. Spacebase Startopia’s cartoon capitalism feels like fertile ground for these pranks, but they are so rare. Although it tends to be at its best when it is as close to its predecessor as possible, it is still regrettable that it relies so much on a single game. Maybe I should be thankful that there are no more mistakes like the new RTS layer, but the management game has evolved a lot in the past two decades, providing a lot of ways to build on Startopia instead of copying it. I think living in the past is not a good thing after all. But it will be fun to visit for a few days.
Today’s best deal
Discover more articles in our categories Gaming & News et encore Anime.
Thanks for visiting we hope our article Space Base Startopia Review
, help us and share the article on Facebook, twitter and e-mail with the hashtag ☑️ #Space #Base #Startopia #Review ☑️!
