Gaming Starbound Early Access Review

We take a look at the beta of this vast, space exploration game.
http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/pc/2014/01/22/starbound-early-access-review/1

 

Gotta love Rick's prose.

I have been described as a gas giant in the past

 

FYI for anyone who going to run off now and buy the game: The Development team is currently in the final stages of a huge patch that will push a full (and final) character/universe wipe. The date for this patch is this weekend, so it's not too long - but still very disheartening if you don't know it's coming and you get really involved in the game this week.

EDIT:

Now that I've read through the entire article, a few points to share:

1.) The matter manipulator is useless and is normally used to collect just enough resources to make a stone pickaxe and axe. After that you use those tools to mine and collect wood. The matter manipulator can then (this might change in future versions) be left in some storage box and forgotten about.

2.) Your spaceship uses varying amounts of fuel, depending on how far you travel. Off the top of my head: 5 fuel between very close planets (planet/moon clusters), 50 fuel to neighboring planet clusters within the same solar system, and 200 fuel for between solar systems.
That, coupled with the fact that 10 unrefined wood (the wood directly from trees) can be changed into 1 coal unit, the "fuel crisis" is not as major as suggested in the article.

3.) All resources are fairly rare on the starting level planets (Alpha sector), but increase nearly exponentially after the first boss.

/2cents

 

As mentioned by Draksis, you can transform 10 "unrefined wood" into 1 coal with your furnace. Then the only thing you need is a tree farm. Like in Terraria, each tree will gives you a tree seed when you cut it down. Since trees grow pretty fast, coal in not a problem anymore.

One important thing, not mentioned in the review, is that you can die from starving or losing to much body heat. So you have to eat (and then farm vegies, fruits, cereals or hunt some meat with a knife or a bow). A fire can reheat you, but you'll need special armors for snowy planets. As well, you'll die quickly on atmospherless planets (moon and asteroid fields) and you'll have to wear a special backpack on those planets.

 

£12 for thirty to fifty hours of gameplay is a bargain, in my opinion, so an open-ended game that goes beyond that is great news.

I'm content to wait for the finished game, but this is definitely going on my play list.

 

... and do not forget that this game is opened to modders. I'm sure that incredible mods will be available quite rapidly

 

Can't wait to try this one also.. looks very interesting to play with.

 

I scoffed when you mentioned tutorial planet and having to gather resources, until I realised that I've been on the tutorial planet for the better part of 8 hours. I have a life on this planet now... I can't get up and leave!

 

I'm exploring Delta sector, but my base is still on the first planet I saw .

 

Buy it on humble (through the official site) for $15 works out at just over £9 : )

I've put about 20 hours into it so far, going to put it on the back-burner until it's a little more refined. Looking good so far though!

 

Anyone ever played The Blockheads on Android and iOS? Yeah. Pretty much. BUT WITH SPACE!

 

I only explored 4 planets during my time with Starbound - but I can safely say it is worth the money. There is indeed a little too much focus on crafting vs exploration; but the latter is rewarding in itself (and often provides many materials and ores).

Breaking through the surface into a labyrinthine cave complex armed with little more than a flashlight and a pickaxe is one of the many "just another 10 minutes more then I'll go topside" moments. One cave system I still remember took over 2 hours to fully explore and mine (whilst trapping killing or avoiding the high level creatures hidden in the darkness).

Soundtrack is great. Art style is great. You can play the game at whatever suits you.

 

The Chucklefish Devs have said that they will be balancing that aspect out when the time comes. Not only with more random chests/stuff in chests but also to include many of the unusual items people need to craft the "Boss callers" (like the superior brain) in containers and chests

 

I have nearly 200 hrs on this game and exploring the X Sector. Looking forward to the next patch and all the new content.......it's been a while since I have given so much time to a game, even though it's still in beta. Love it

 

yeah, ive got well over 100 hours into this game. lost 3 characters on the wipes of the past.

the game is stable enough to invest time in now that the latest patch has allowed them to keep characters in subsuquent patches. hopefully no more universe\character wipes in the future.

the mods are incredible, and the developers are really attached to the comminuty - even adding really good ideas and mods to the game.

check out /r/starbound if you want to get close to the devs or start modding. the public chat on steam is another good way to find people who want to play or have servers running. playing in multiplayer is where the fun starts. specifically if you have a good friend to skype with while you both start the game for the first time.

just be warned. you better have an entire day to waste. you wont know what happened lol!