So what other space games are worth a play?

[Dirtbag_Leader]

If I haven't mentioned before, there are full free remakes of TIE Fighter and Xwing Alliance on the net somewhere, I did try them and they are fun if you haven't played them 20 times over by now but have quirk like having to limit frame rates and such.

I'll note too that XWA MULTIPLAYER on Gameranger works surprisingly well, especially with graphical upgrades, and there's also a LOT of custom missions floating around out there too. That was pretty much my go-to space sim to play with my brother for YEARS before SC came along. I used to regularly create new missions for an online SW gaming club back in the day, so if you're genuinely interested in this let me know and I'll dust things off and walk you through the process!

 

[Lorddarthvik]

One more thing that is kinda sci-fi, although not a space game, more of an fps.
Cyberpunk 2077.
I know, I know, aweful launch, they lied about everything, you all hate Keanu, yada yada... don't matter. It's a freakin amazing game if you put the time into it. If you are gonna play Witcher, give this a try after. It's got some good stories and the action is way better once you get into it.
Running around your enemies at near light speed, with a pack of sticky grenades in hand, and then the time goes back to normal speed and they all explode without ever firing a shot directly at you... it's a fun time! Or you know, you can just attach mechanical gorilla hands and play as OnePunchMan...
I've hit 250 hours today, playing on my second main character going for a full clear of the map again, and still new stuff happens. I just got a chat message from my gf's mother (I'm playing a woman), asking what are my intentions with her daughter. The depths CDPR goes is still there, just like it was in the Witcher.

 

[Brictoria]

One more thing that is kinda sci-fi, although not a space game, more of an fps.
Cyberpunk 2077.
I know, I know, aweful launch, they lied about everything, you all hate Keanu, yada yada... don't matter. It's a freakin amazing game if you put the time into it. If you are gonna play Witcher, give this a try after. It's got some good stories and the action is way better once you get into it.
Running around your enemies at near light speed, with a pack of sticky grenades in hand, and then the time goes back to normal speed and they all explode without ever firing a shot directly at you... it's a fun time! Or you know, you can just attach mechanical gorilla hands and play as OnePunchMan...
I've hit 250 hours today, playing on my second main character going for a full clear of the map again, and still new stuff happens. I just got a chat message from my gf's mother (I'm playing a woman), asking what are my intentions with her daughter. The depths CDPR goes is still there, just like it was in the Witcher.

I prefer a netrunner stealth\contagion based build over the sandevistan ones... Much more relaxing.

It'll be interesting to see how the upcoming tech-tree changes affact builds.

 

[Lorddarthvik]

I prefer a netrunner stealth\contagion based build over the sandevistan ones... Much more relaxing.

It'll be interesting to see how the upcoming tech-tree changes affact builds.

I hope they change around a lot of things. My gripe with my current tech+body+reflex build is that I tried to spec into assault rifles alongside nades, it still takes a whole mag dump or even three to kill somebody, while the comrades hammer is still a one shot one kill pistol against anybody,even while doing the secret ending which has the highest level enemies. So I just keep falling back on that pistol as no other gun even comes close to it. This is on hard BTW, I'm guessing the problem is even worse on higher difficulty.

 

[Mudhawk]

A thing of beauty, will never fade away...
Nothing like racing through Night City towards your next mission with the Radio blaring Samurai songs.
Can't wait for Phantom Liberty. New skills, new engine and new stories.
And as a sideshow the forums will glow red and crumble in the crossfire of heated disputes.
That's entertainement!

 

[Brictoria]

A thing of beauty, will never fade away...
Nothing like racing through Night City towards your next mission with the Radio blaring Samurai songs.
Can't wait for Phantom Liberty. New skills, new engine and new stories.
And as a sideshow the forums will glow red and crumble in the crossfire of heated disputes.
That's entertainement!

For some reason, I like radio Vexelstrom in the game (I haven't tried the other stations, as this one seems to fit the game for me)... It's good that they released all\most of the songs so they can be listed to away from the game, too.

Phantom Liberty certainly looks like it will be an interesting DLC - I've been giving the game a bit of a break in anticipation of this releasing, to prevent possible issues\pain adjusting a pre-patch build (tech tree, clothing, weapons,cyberware, etc.) to the changed systems the DLC will be bringing with it.

 

[BUTUZ]

In dunnno I was put off Cyberpunk in the buggy/lacklustre initial playthrough. I wish it was multiplayer too I find myself yearning for co-op gameplay

 

[Mudhawk]

In dunnno I was put off Cyberpunk in the buggy/lacklustre initial playthrough.

Can't say I don't understand where you're coming from. Truth be told, the game still got some buggy parts even after all those patches they've done.
But still, with all its shortcomings that game had me by the balls from the moment I started it up.
I'm a sucker for gritty Sci-Fi. And sometimes I do drive my car with arms akimbo in real life too. So a lot of bugs didn't register with me I guess.
By now I got 250+ hours of playtime and every possible ending unlocked.
In short Night City is by far the most beautiful burning trashheap i ever dove into head first.
Totally worth it.

 

[Aazatgrabya]

I would definitely give the Mass Effect RPG's a go.

I gave X4 a go but it did feel very old, and after logging out of Star Cit and into X4 you really feel like going backwards - despite X4 having a huge array of mechanisms all in play already. Anyway, the flight model itself put me off, but I persisted and still couldn't stick with it.

No Man's Sky is a different beast. The art direction is very much 1950s-70's sci-fi novel covers, which isn't to everyone's taste. Sure enough, the launch was ballsed up and there was very little to do, but now there is plenty to enjoy - just look at it as an arcade universe exploration game.

You might want to give Squadrons a go if you're looking for dog fighting. Again it's pretty arcadey, but the Star Wars theme is fun and really takes me back to the X-Wing v Tie Fighter days.

Keeping with Star Wars, SW The Old Republic is very much an old-school MMO, so expect lots of kill x number of beasts and return. But there are great story-led missions with an overall narrative arch covering a dozen or so game archetypes (classes) covering both the dark and light side.

Everspace, I would avoid this, a kids arcade game that I really couldn't continue playing, the sequel was worse - in my mind at least.

But I have to say I would save those pennies for Starfield (though it is on Xbox Game pass on PC). I suspect this will be a good, long-term experience. I hope I'm not wrong.

Here's an out of the box idea... there is a board game The Outer Rim, 1-4 players, that is Star Wars themed again. But it is one of my most played (I confess to having a reasonably large collection mostly gained over Covid...). It is essentially a bounty hunter/smuggler RPG action board game that is easy to play, with light to moderately crunchy rules and super replayable.

 

[Lorddarthvik]

For some reason I forgot to add the game I'm actually playing every night for the last couple of weeks lol

Hardspace: Shipbreaker
It's definitely not for everyone. If you enjoy timewaster games (like power wash sim) that let you watch something on the second screen in peace or just think about stuff while doing something with your hands, this is a perfect game. As the title says, you break up ships in a salvage yard in orbit.
There are upgrades to get, goals to reach, and in the late game you do have to use your brain a tiny little bit sometimes to avoid a reactor meltdown or fuel tanks blowing up. You can adjust the "difficulty" by turning off oxygen consumption and shift time limits, or go full hardcore with a single life even.
The gameplay is mostly solid, you do have to pay attention though to your laser clipping into stuff and accidentally blowing stuff up, and also the physics can be unintuitive, sometimes outright the opposite of what you would expect. Thankfully it's weirdness is consistent so once you figure it out, it's gonna be part of the fun.
The biggest annoyance with this game is the "story". It supposedly has one, although it's so lame and meaningless that having to wait through the unskippable voice messages will provide you with nothing but frustration. Thankfully they are short enough and rare enough after a while. You can find other items that add to the world building but I just couldn't care. I was there to cut shit up, swing stuff with my gravity gun into the huge chambers of flames, and just generally turn my brain off while listening to videos.
One thing that I found impressive back in early access was how you can cut up panels into smaller ones. Something I fell would be a fun addition to SC's salvage mechanic sometime in the far future.
If any of you plan on playing this for the first time, I'd recommend skipping the tutorial, just taking a glance at the key bindings, and going in blind. Figuring it all out during your first couple of stints will be much more engaging.

 

[Brictoria]

I'd love to know what's happening with the devlopment of this one...

 

[Mudhawk]

Nice trailer that one. Is there even a publishing estimate out yet?
By the way, watching that I suddenly was reminded of the Borderland games. That counts as Sci-Fi too, right? I had some serious fun with those. Just saying... :-)

 

[Scape]

Kickstarter i backed a few years ago was good. Based on FTL.....

View: https://youtu.be/NTrP3rL3--s

 

[Lorddarthvik]

Kickstarter i backed a few years ago was good. Based on FTL.....

View: https://youtu.be/NTrP3rL3--s

Played the first like 3 hours, basically the tutorial and some more. It's got some promise but the controls and camera is not great and some of the mission mechanics are outright horrible, with invincible plot armored enemies that need to be killed regardless, and other forced events that are not communicated to the player at all. Getting around the station and ship upgrade ui is confusing at best.
It's very much missing a year's worth of polish by actually talented devs. It's an indie game, dime a dozen "we tried" level of game.
Still it can be fun if you can get over the fact you will be thinking "this was done better in insertname" every 5 seconds...

 

[Scape]

Played the first like 3 hours, basically the tutorial and some more. It's got some promise but the controls and camera is not great and some of the mission mechanics are outright horrible, with invincible plot armored enemies that need to be killed regardless, and other forced events that are not communicated to the player at all. Getting around the station and ship upgrade ui is confusing at best.
It's very much missing a year's worth of polish by actually talented devs. It's an indie game, dime a dozen "we tried" level of game.
Still it can be fun if you can get over the fact you will be thinking "this was done better in insertname" every 5 seconds...

Honestly i didnt mind it too much, i got through it mainly to see my name in the credits though.