Colony Ship is a standout journey. With Colony Ship I've done what I do with many games I deeply appreciate and never end up reviewing it because it deserves such a great write up. So instead, here's a good-enough review.
I won't dive into the plot; the demo shows off the tone better than I could explain it. I will say that Colony Ship takes the nihilistic trope for the scenario of the middle generations of a centuries long trip that neither know people that were alive when the ship left nor people that would be alive when it arrives, and fleshes it out in meaningful ways that form the structure of the game. The politics that unwound and factions that formed and fought before the PC arrived are deep and well thought out. The history of the ship previous to the story were obviously thoroughly explored and documented by the devs in detail. The reality of the game world, its variety of locations and characters and the player's journey through it are all both logically believable and richly human. If the demo seems flat and cliche, that feeling falls away pretty quickly as you progress.
Every act of the game (three I believe, it's been a bit since I played) has major and minor choices that completely alter the game. I haven't replayed making different choices because unlike most games, I didn't want to run it as a villain. Not because it wouldn't be interesting. There's a helluva lot of rabid villainy you can get up to. There's just something about the setting and people that draw me towards helping the good and cool and massacring the bad and evil. The choices have to come back together to make the final collection of choices by the very end, but everything between a choice being made and the very end is up for grabs. And they are MAJOR changes. No soft illusion of choice here. There are also plenty of minor choices along the way that may or may not make a big impact. For most of you, that means there is a [b]ton[/b] of replayability.
There's a significant amount of combat (and non-combat) specialization on tap. Goes for the MC as well as companions. It's a deep, old school style char customizer with lots of skills and derived ability scores (my jam).
Your character can start with any background and specialties, and can continue along the original path you set or adapt in other directions. Same thing with companions -- they start out specialized but there is enough leveling on tap to take them either into dual-specialty or an all-rounder. There's not quite Final Fantasy-job levels of specialization, but it's more towards that end than your average CRPG. For example, an SMG-chip-damage + blunt weapon melee build is totally legit. So is a stealth sniper-and-stabber, alongside more traditional builds like a squad buffing assault rifler. Great balancing on that front. There's not a massive amount of individual weapons or classes of weapons; I assume that was a choice made so that most approaches are actually viable. The cyber-implants are pretty sick. They provide major passives but most also open up new tactical avenues and some provide non-combat bonuses as well. Different armor can also enable various actives.
The art direction stands out. Backgrounds are vivid not in color (although often that) but in detail and tone. Character art is strong too and the characters fit well visually in the scenes. It's mostly enjoyable to walk around and get to know the maps and characters in them. CRPGs aren't known for animation and this is no exception but it is above average for the genre. I'm an animation snob and I didn't feel like I had to look the other way while things move. Combat can happen in lots of different places and maps that are both fun to walk around and fight in are a strength. There are set pieces designed for combat first and they make battles pretty hard but not to the point they feel cheaty. This IS a hard game that tends toward realism in combat. No bullet sponges. Low chance-to-hit until characters get high level. If that's your preference, you'll find Colony Ship combat quite rewarding.
Weaknesses are few. The first act can drag until you figure out how to progress more intentionally. It's a long game with lots of locations which is mostly rewarding but a couple areas are very grindy. Companions aren't the deepest ever, but they do consistently add to the experience. It can be a pita to stay properly geared-and-ammo'd. Vendor inventories are limited. More bullets than Resident Evil but you won't walk out of a hard battle with much left.
The biggest disappointment is the ending itself which is just a series of slides. After such a long, hard-fought and crazy ride, it feels like a big letdown. Like at least give me a short in-game movie, or maybe even let me walk around for a few mins. But, here is the biggest thing about the dev Iron Tower that self-published this. Pretty sure they barely got the game out the door while keeping the lights on. Don't know this for sure but my guess is they were flat broke by the end of production. So I can forgive the ending if the alternative was that this great game never came out at all.
Colony Ship is about as solid an indie CRPG as it gets. The devs are super talented and served up a crazy amount of content on a very limited budget. There are extremely few bugs. No soft locks nor a single crash for me. The only way they can continue on is if people keep buying Colony Ship. Give it a shot if you're into deep lore, a dark story that benefits from the darkness instead of just being a stylistic cliche, and great tactical combat that gets deeper as you progress. You'll be glad you played it and happy Iron Tower is one sale closer to finishing that next game.
