Big Blue Ball? Travos? Penus?
I'm looking forward to this as well. I'm hoping I may at least be able to rent this to explore today.
I'm getting it today too....may not play much until thursday night though.
I say you should go for convincing names, grounded in reality. Ouranus. Hisanus. Heranus. Myanus.
The Big Blue Ball would be me. 
SupremeAC said:I say you should go for convincing names, grounded in reality. Ouranus. Hisanus. Heranus. Myanus.
Theranus?
Got it at midnight, only played it enough to get off the first planet and to a space station... Impressions later!
phantom_leo said:Got it at midnight, only played it enough to get off the first planet and to a space station... Impressions later!
Can't wait to hear them.
Well, it's definitely unlike anything I've ever really played before. I am a sucker for anything that has randomly generated elements, so I'm going to be drawn to a game like this naturally. I don't know how it's going to hold up as a "game" for most people though. It's a very solitary experience and forget about running into anyone you know, the chances are next to zero. I like the fact that you can "claim" planets, objects, systems, life-forms, etc, as your own. Seeing my name on a planet and system I discovered first is cool, but, chances are, no one who knows me will encounter my stuff...
It's really a grand, sci-fi survival game. You gather elements and objects to power your ship, suit, multi-tool and various items. There are apparently 3 storylines that run through the game, following along those gives you a sense of purpose beyond just exploring. It seems as if the story will be sometimes advanced by aliens you encounter, but you need to "learn" words in their language to understand what they are saying...
The worlds are huge, but there's a limited number of "things" you can discover on them. You can spend as much or as little time on each as you wish, provided you collect resources to power your gear. There's light combat and you can interact with native life sometimes. You can discover signs of past inhabitants too.
I'm sure the game is going to expand in scope as I play and I am very, very intrigued by it all, but I can see people being totally bored by it too... The devs are planning on supporting it and expanding upon it continuously too...
I don't want to sound negative here, as it REALLY is something different, but having only discovered the tip of the galactic iceberg, I don't have much else to say right now...
Awesome write up. I don't know, I may find myself taking the plunge and buying this anyway. The family can live off of ramen for a week.
It's definitely something worth experiencing. It's just that you need to know what to expect.
I know I might get a little ticked about the lack of main objectives and I sure don't have time to explore but there's something about this. It might be just what I need to break from my uncharted obsession.
Oh. There's absolutely a Main Objective. It's to reach the center of the Universe. The game plots a straight path to it for you, believe it or not. It's just gathering the resources, credits and equipment to make it there and just how distracted you allow yourself to be that makes up the bulk and time of the actual game-play
Nice. Definitely sold.
Captains log star date 8916: I awoke in an alien planet with my ship damaged and no memory of how I got there or who I am. This planet is very rocky with huge rock structures creating arches, plenty of desert like fauna. So I set out to fix my ship by using my mining laser. So i can't scan yet, I have to build it, I need resources to build and charge everything it seems, so let's destroy everything. Hey there is a small robot scanning, leave me alone damn you, I'm mining. Oh hell no it's shooting at me, ANH run, use my jet pack. Fine I'll moderately destroy everything. So I finally get enough stuff to build a scanner, a gun.
Ohh a monolith, let's go toward that, 5 minute trek. I saw some animals that I got to name, I fed one and it started to follow me. It got cold at night so I went underground to stay warm and mine, not much to do there. Oh I found a giant stone stucture that I can mine, I mined the middle of it and the top stayed floating, there seems to be no physics here... I also walked right through some rocks in the cave, not the most stable Galaxy.
I made it to the monolith and I get... A word. I learned a word, great. Oh look a base! I get inside and there is an alien, he starts talking to me but I don't understand him. I get some choices to interact, like offer him money or supplies, he liked my offer and gave me a better multi tool with more space, woohoo. And he taught me a word as well. Oh there is a store here I can sell stuff for higher or lower than the galactic average for money. I have a ton of excess stuff so money it is. Well I can fix my ship so let's do that. Before I leave the planet I find more bases, all have a different alien with the same kind of situation. Got some new blueprints and plenty of money time to head out. I found some artifact next to my ship that tells me to follow atlas on some quest, ok I agreed.
I fly into space and see a bunch of giant space station, ohh let's go there. My ship teaches me to use pulse drive, ok let's press that ohhhhh mmmyyyy goooood slow down! I flew right passed the ship, how do you stop the ship! Ok I stopped, wow the planet is huge, I got a beacon to go to in the next planet in the system. I need to build a hyperdrive so let's do that. This planet is like a forest and its cold. Same kind of mining, same robots, name stuff, go to bases, repeat. If I enjoyed filling metered and randomly collecting shit I would be in heaven. Well I better get that hyperdrive soon, this planet mining is getting boring to me.
Captains log star date 81016
My search for a hyperdrive lead me to a strange anomaly. I don't think this universe is entirely stable, the beacon for the hyperdrive lead me to a base that was stuck under the ground. I was able to glitch my ship into the landing pad but invisible walls prevented me from getting inside and talking to the poor alien that was half inside a rock. I attempted to find ways inside which lead me to fall through the planet into a great nothingness which had the properties of water of which I could not escape. I hit my handy reset life button and magically upon respawning the hyperdrive was in my possession.
Well it's time to get off this crazy planet, who knows what could happen next, I might get stuck inside a bookcase or something. I need a few more components for my hyperdrive to work, my nav computer tells me to go to a space station, so I take off. This time I have a better feel for how to fly boost for local travel and pulse speed for system travel. I see some giant cruisers and speed toward them. They are freighters carrying tons of resources but they also have giant turbo lasers so I won't mess with them.
I point my ship at the space station and hit pulse engines... One minute 30 seconds to reach. Huh, so I just sit here and wait. This ship needs some mini game or something, maybe I should read something... Ok finally, let's get inside, ohh there are other ships here too. I can buy anyone's ship if I have the money, also I can trade with the pilots. Some stuff are worth twice the value of the average so I make some nice profit. Time to go into the space station... And it's a room, the same looking room from all other bases. Who ever built these facilities is making a killing cause they are everywhere.
I meet the alien here, I am sensing a pattern with this species. Every time I talk to them I invent this little story in my head, so like say "the alien looked menacing and pointed at my bag, he seemed to demand something" then I choose what to do. Now I don't think any of my choices will actually get the alien mad, he just does the same repetitive motion over and over. I do this with every alien I meet.
So there is this computer that asks me for a passcode, is this a puzzle?! Guess the next number I the sequence... A second grader can solve this. The secrets of the Galaxy are hidden behind elementary school math problems?! Well it gave me the location of some monoliths, time to learn more words!
Now I need some resource to power the hyperdrive, I guess this planet next to the space station will do. Ok did I eat some bad mushrooms, the plant life is hopping around. A cactus just jumped passed me. It's a very lively planet, I need some carbon and I usually destroy plants for it, just cause they move shouldn't make it any different, OMG it screamed when I killed it, im sorry. Ok another base, hey it's the same room! Oh another computer terminal... And it's the same kind of sequence math problem. Another location marked but where is this damn resource, I can't find it, grrr. I really need a new suit and ship cause I have no space for anything. Damn it I'll take a break here.
robio said:The anticipation of what might come next is just killing me.
F5! F5! F5!
So did you use any of our suggestions for planet names?
This comes out today, woooo. I will be chronicling (is that a word?) my adventures here. I get to name planets so I need suggestions.